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Though he left the Army in 2013 after serving as a combat medic, Matt Lloyd hasn't forgotten the promise he made six years earlier when he joined.

"As a soldier, we've sworn to protect against enemies both foreign and domestic," he said, reflecting back on his enlistment as a scrappy 17-year-old fresh out of high school.

Lloyd fulfilled the foreign part of the commitment with deployments abroad to Germany and Iraq. Now, at 27 and as a veteran, he plans to realize the second half: protecting U.S. citizens at home.

Along with 20 other veterans from Utah and some 2,000 nationwide, Lloyd is traveling to North Dakota in a collective effort to protect the Native Americans and other citizens protesting a nearly completed 1,200-mile long oil pipeline.

The veterans are not taking weapons, they have said. Instead, they plan to serve as human shields for the other protesters.

Those camping on the reservation — joining the Standing Rock Sioux in rallying against the development they believe threatens the tribe's river and sacred sites — have been there since August, growing in size into the thousands.

The group's pleas of "Water is Life" have gone largely unheard by the federal government, Lloyd said, despite clashes with local law enforcement allegedly using rubber bullets, water and mace on the demonstrators. Hundreds have been arrested.

Campers supposedly have until Monday to evacuate the site, according to an eviction notice, but it's unclear what will happen to those who defy the order: Will they be forcibly removed? Will they be cited for trespassing? Many have vowed to stay and defend the land despite freezing cold temperatures.

Lloyd, having left St. George on Friday morning for the more than 1,000-mile drive, plans to stay and protect those who choose to remain at the encampment. He feels a sense of duty and will be "acting as a barrier" between the protesters and police.

"I certainly hope to not see the injuries that I did in Iraq," he said.

The rally, though, is intended to be a peaceful demonstration, said Wesley Spridgeon, a 27-year-old Marine Corps veteran living in Centerville who's traveling to North Dakota with the Utah caravan. To him, that makes the use of force by police officers "unthinkable."

"We've invaded other countries, we've started wars in other countries for things like this," he said. "And yet it's happening in our own country and it doesn't even matter."

The apparent human rights violations pulled Spridgeon off his couch and into action — though he left his pocketknife at home as a sign of solidarity with the peace movement. He says the actions taken by the U.S. makes him question: "Is this who we are as a nation?"

With a history of broken treaties against native people, Spridgeon hopes the presence of the veterans will broker some resolve for the long-embattled tribes. He believes law enforcement agencies wouldn't dare to harm the military when the world is watching.

"It's political suicide to do something against the veterans," he said.

Spridgeon had arrived in South Dakota by Saturday evening and was waiting for other Utah veterans before heading north to the reservation.

Leading the charge for the Utah group is John Bagby, whose military parlance is still up to speed as he refers to the veterans' mission as a "deployment" and the police as an "invading force." Bagby, 47, is carpooling with Lloyd and served in the Navy during the Cold War. He will present the regimental colors from the state's crews to the American Indian veterans at Standing Rock.

He said: "We're not going to fight back, but we're not going to step back either."

ctanner@sltrib.com Twitter: @CourtneyLTanner