Wikipedia -- United States Staff Sergeant Keith Matthew "Matt" Maupin was captured by Iraqi insurgents on April 9, 2004, while serving in Iraq after his convoy came under attack by rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire near Baghdad, Iraq. On June 28, 2004, Al Jazeera reported he was executed by his captors who shot him in the head. On June 30, 2004, an Army spokesman said the video showing Maupin's alleged death was "totally inconclusive."

Born on July 13, 1983, Batavia, Ohio, Maupin was a 3.5 grade-point-average student and football player at Glen Este High School in Union Township, Clermont County, Ohio. He graduated in 2001 and enrolled in the University of Cincinnati Aerospace Engineering Program using a scholarship that Matt received from winning a writing competition. In 2002 Matt joined the United States Army Reserve and was stationed with the 705th Transportation Battalion based in Dayton, Ohio.

POW Network -- BATAVIA, Ohio -- The only soldier the U.S. Army lists as captured in Iraq has been promoted to sergeant, his second promotion since he was abducted last year, the Army said Monday.

The promotion of reservist Keith M. "Matt" Maupin was effective last Friday, said Maj. Elizabeth Robbins, an Army spokeswoman at the Pentagon. Maupin was promoted from private first class to specialist after his disappearance.

He has been missing since last April 9 when his fuel truck convoy was ambushed by insurgents west of Baghdad.

A board with the 724th Transportation Company, Maupin's unit based in Bartonville, Ill., promoted him.

Though the Army does not know where Maupin is, he is presumed to be serving honorably, Robbins said. Maupin received a waiver of a requirement that normally would have required him to have served longer before becoming eligible for a promotion.

A message seeking comment was left Monday at the suburban Cincinnati home of Carolyn Maupin, the soldier's mother.

A three-member Army board of inquiry is to meet Wednesday in Alexandria, Va., for a routine annual review of his status, Robbins said. The Army had said last week that the board would meet this coming Saturday -- the anniversary of Maupin's abduction in Iraq -- but the meeting has been moved up, Robbins said.

The board's decision is not expected to be announced until next week, she said.

Maupin, 21, is known to have been captured alive. A week after he disappeared, Arab television network Al-Jazeera released a videotape showing him sitting on the floor surrounded by five masked men holding automatic rifles.

Since then, there's been nothing identifiable. A dark, grainy video Al-Jazeera released in June showed a blindfolded man in fatigues, sitting on the ground. Al-Jazeera said it did not broadcast a scene from the videotape in which the blindfolded man was shot.

U.S. military experts examined the tape but called it inconclusive. Citing security concerns, Army officials won't disclose what they are doing to find him.

Army Times -- August 6, 2006. Keith "Matt" Maupin, the only soldier listed as captured in Iraq, has been promoted to staff sergeant, the Army announced Tuesday.

Maupin, of the Army Reserve's 724th Transportation Company in Bartonville, Ill., went missing April 9, 2004, when insurgents attacked his convoy using rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire. Two soldiers and six American civilian truck drivers were killed in the attack outside Baghdad.

Maupin, who enlisted on Oct. 9, 2002, was a private first class when he was captured. His 23rd birthday was July 13. The Army, in announcing Maupin's promotion, said it is "unwavering" in its commitment to find Maupin.

Until he is found, Maupin remains on active-duty status with all rights and privileges for pay and promotions, the Army said.

OC Register --January 10, 2007. Keith Maupin of Batavia, Ohio, wants to extend a plea to the people of Orange County. It's the same plea he would like to have heard in every city and town in America.

Please remember my son, he says. Please don't forget my son.

Keith is the father of Army Reserve Staff Sgt. Keith Matthew "Matt" Maupin, who was captured by insurgents in Iraq on April 9, 2004, after his truck convoy was attacked near Baghdad. Although a number of U.S. civilians are officially listed as missing in Iraq, and an Iraqi-born American Army translator, Spc. Ahmed Altaie, 41, was apparently kidnapped in October while visiting family members in Baghdad, 23-year-old Matt Maupin is the only American soldier still officially listed as "missing/captured" in combat in Iraq since the war began in 2003.

There is no doubt that he was taken alive. A week after his capture, insurgents released a video showing Matt Maupin surrounded by masked gunmen. Two months later insurgents announced through Arab news media that Maupin had been shot in the head, but a review of a grainy videotape of the alleged execution didn't support the claim that it was Matt, or even that it was a real execution.

So Keith believes there is a better than even chance that Matt is still alive. But it is a belief based on hope, not knowledge – and in some ways, it is harder even than death.

In recent years I've often witnessed first-hand the pain of families whose sons have died in Iraq or Afghanistan– the families of Lance Cpl. Marcus Glimpse of Huntington Beach, or Lance Cpl. Hugo Lopez of La Habra, or so many others. The pain is almost unbearable.

But as almost anyone who has suffered a terrible loss will tell you, eventually there comes a day when the pain compresses itself into a deep, dull ache, when you stop hoping it's just a nightmare from which you'll awaken, when you finally accept the truth.

But for Keith Maupin and his family, for almost three years there has been no truth, no certain knowledge. There is only a constant daily battle between hope and doubt. "There's not a moment that Matt isn't with me," Keith says. "I think about him and pray for him every day, all day."

And if you can, Keith respectfully requests that you think about Staff Sgt. Matt Maupin, too.

Keith contacted me last week, after he'd read a column I had written about Iraq. A reserved, plain-spoken man and a former Marine, he was reaching out to anyone he could for help, even to a stranger 2,000 miles away – and through me to you.

It's not that the Maupin family hasn't gotten a lot of support since Matt was captured. Over the years there have been rallies and prayer meetings and messages of hope from across the country. Just the other day, Keith says, "A soldier just back from Iraq came up to me and said, 'I want you to know we haven't forgotten him, we're still looking for him.' " Keith and his family also get regular updates and briefings on the U.S. military's search for his son. He believes that "they're doing what they can" to find him.

And he's not bitter about the war. As Keith says, "Matt understood the consequences of war. I believe he was where he was supposed to be. I'm not a politician, but I think as an American it's my job to support the troops wherever they are."

And yet, with the passage of time, and all the furious debate over the war, over whether we should stay or go, Keith can't help worrying that memories will fade, that political priorities will change, that somehow in the rush to extricate ourselves from an increasingly unpopular conflict his son and others will be expediently forgotten.

"I keep asking myself, am I doing all I can? Are we (as a country) doing all we can to search for Matt, or are we going to leave Matt in Iraq like we did all those of Vietnam and other wars?

"I know that a lot of people out there may not know about Matt," Keith told me by phone. "But once people know about him, I know they won't forget him."

And wherever Matt Maupin is, whatever has happened to him, that's really all that Keith Maupin is asking for. However you feel about the war, and whatever course it takes, he's simply asking that you, and that we as a nation, remember his son.

And not let him be left behind.

If you'd like to express support for Staff Sgt. Matt Maupin's return, go to The Yellow Ribbon Support Center and click on "Guestbook." The Center is an Ohio-based organization founded by Keith and Carolyn Maupin to support U.S. troops overseas.

Biography of Keith Matthew Maupin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Maupin