Colonel Frank J. Caponio served as the general staff personnel officer (G1) with the 1st Cavalry Division. Operations centered on Task Force Baghdad, although units participated in operations as far away as Fallujah and An Najaf. The division grew to about 38,000 soldiers during their tour, peaking during the first election cycle in January 2005. The G1 has responsibility for casualty reporting, administrative support, as well as morale, welfare and recreation. Caponio had a hand in shaping the division's image in the historical memory through support of an artist's rendering as well as the support a 1st Cavalry Division memorial depicting a unit medic rendering aid to a wounded Iraqi child, injured in a mortar attack thought to have been targeted on Americans. As Caponio explained, the division focused on strategic and operational implementation of rebuilding the city and country. Metrics presented in the daily battle update brief presented efforts on behalf on development/redevelopment. Such work was critical in establishing the path to democratic rule, despite the mission shift from regime change and finding weapons of mass destruction. Securing the city to safeguard Iraqi voting was perhaps the strategic highpoint of the colonel's tour. Under the division's security umbrella, Iraqis voted in defiance of insurgent threats and intimidation.

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