BRUSSELS, Wis. (WFRV) — A Door County veteran is turning years of personal experience into a mission focused on helping others long after his military service ended.
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Jared Spude served with the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division from 2008 to 2016, including a 12-month deployment to Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan, along the Pakistan border.
Right out of high school, he trained as a forward observer and later became a joint forward observer, coordinating both artillery and airstrikes during his time overseas.
“I joined the military right out of high school,” Spude said. “I went to basic training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, to be a forward observer for the artillery.”
During deployment, Spude says his role often went beyond combat. He described working with communities to build infrastructure and improve daily life, helping create access to clean water and safer ways for families to stay connected.
“Trying to help them as much as humanly possible, get an active well, have clean drinking water, put up some type of infrastructure so they could cross a wadi to see family,” Spude said. “Those basic human needs, I think it was tough.”
But the biggest challenges came after returning home.
Spude came back to Wisconsin during the Green Bay Packers’ Super Bowl celebration, a moment that highlighted how quickly life shifted from a combat zone to everyday civilian life.
“Going from a war zone three days to being in the streets of Green Bay celebrating a Super Bowl, it’s hard,” he said.
He spent years trying to understand what he was feeling before realizing he was processing survivor’s guilt tied to the loss of friends and fellow service members.
“It wasn’t till maybe three or four years ago that I figured out I was processing survivor’s guilt,” he said.
Watching the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 brought back a flood of emotions, leaving him searching for direction again. That perspective began to shift after participating in an Old Glory Honor Flight trip last fall, where he connected with other veterans and reflected on the broader impact of service.
“I was one of those people that thought it wasn’t for me,” Spude said. “But once I went, it was important for me, and maybe I’m meant to go to help somebody else.”
Now a father of three living in Brussels, Spude says his focus is on helping veterans find connection and purpose through community involvement and nonprofit work across northeast Wisconsin.
“My mission in life now is to try to help other veterans and other people find a purpose,” Spude said. “At the end of the day, that’s what we want, to be a part of a mission bigger than ourselves.”
He encourages veterans who may be struggling to reach out, saying support doesn’t have to be complicated.
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“We all think we’re tough enough,” Spude said. “But we have to get help.”
Spude says northeast Wisconsin’s strong veteran community continues to play a major role in that effort, offering support networks that help veterans adjust, reconnect and move forward.
