However I hope I get this one. I think I would move this to the top of the stack.

According to a former Navy SEAL who claims to have the inside track, the mangled tales told of that historic night have only now been corrected.

“It became obvious in the weeks evolving after the mission that the story that was getting put out there was not only untrue, but it was a really ugly farce of what did happen,” said Chuck Pfarrer, author of Seal Target Geronimo: The Inside Story of the Mission to Kill Osama Bin Laden.

Read more: dailycaller.com/2011/11/07/correcting-the-fairy-tale-a-seals-account-of-how-osama-bin-laden-really-died/#ixzz1d8DXcmI9

Yep, I am looking forward to this one from Mr. Pfarrer.

Related articles, courtesy of Zemanta:

• Former Navy SEAL: Account of Osama bin Laden’s Death Is ‘Fairy Tale’
• New Navy Seal Book Sheds Light on Osama Bin Laden’s Death

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One of the books I just finished qualifies as “can’t put it down AWESOME”. It is called the Lions of Kandahar and is written by Special Forces Major Rusty Bradley and Kevin Maurer.

I have received a few books that talk about some awesome battle that nobody has heard about or what a tide-turner in the war on terror. Usually when they say that, my eyebrow raises with skepticism. The subtitle on this book does not say that, it just states “The Story of a Fight Against all Odds”. However once you get into the book reading about this one significant battle then it comes clear that the battle of Sperwan Ghar in Kandahar Province Afghanistan was truly a battle that shaped the war there not only that year but for years to come.

I am a big fan of James F. Christ’s books about huge but unknown battles in Afghanistan in his series that he has written about Embedded Training Teams (ETT). I am a fan, not only because I was an ETT, but several of them are written about battles that happened when I was there and many include people I know. Rusty’s book stuck with me for some of the same reasons. Even though he has multiple tours in Afghanistan and Iraq this book is written about one specific battle that happened in 2006, the same time I was there. In fact this battle was part of a larger operation called Operation Medusa. At the same time that Medusa was happening I was involved with Operation Mountain Fury which was a shaping operation for Meduda. So this book did strike a chord with me for that reason also. 

As with James’s books, the Lions of Kandahar is not written about an entire tour or life in general as a Special Forces ODA team leader. It is written about one specific and instrumental battle and the overly-brave men that against all odds, with some luck and probably blessing by God himself were able to defeat an enemy that could have and should have wiped them out.

The book starts out with Rusty and his team returning to the same place in Afghanistan they had been the previous year. This allowed them to gain an instant perspective of how much worse the situation had turned since they left. It also allowed them to hit the ground running as they knew the Afghan forces they would be working with, the influential people in the villages they would deal with and the enemy they would fight.

Right from the start the reader gets a sense that the world Rusty and his team stepped back into has drastically gotten worse and that they are going to be in a hell of a fight for territory they had once owned. Besides a reinvigorated enemy they are now dealing with new dynamics on the friendly side of the fence. ISAF had recently taken over in Southern Afghanistan from the Americans so a whole new mindset, doctrine and capability (or lack thereof) was in place too.

There are many actions in the book that are just awe-inspiring and any one of them would be a major undertaking on their own, but for three ODA teams of Special Forces to have gone through all they did and accomplish their mission with so few wounded is beyond amazing. These three teams, their support personnel, the terps and the Afghan forces they fought with ran the gauntlet. They somehow danced between the raindrops of bullets and RPG rounds to engage and destroy hundreds of enemy soldiers and probably wounded thousands. Throughout the pages you can truly get a sense of the odds they faced, the professionalism then maintained and the fear they had through it all. There is more than one occasion where brave and battle-tested Special Forces warriors truly felt they could not win, that they would be overrun or where they felt they would fight to the death down to the last bullet.

However the reader also gets insight into the humor, some of it dark and twisted, that the guys had and how they used that to deal with pants-wetting situations. They truly took the worst of moments and used humor and good-natured ribbing to keep their sanity. I think some of my favorite parts were reading how Rusty dealt with a hard-headed and not really great interrupter (terp) that he was assigned. Since I dealt with many terps during my time there I could easily relate to the challenges he had with ‘Victor’.

The book is well written with all military acronyms spelled out and not lost on the reader who may not be familiar with them. There are no assumptions that the reader will know what the terminology or tactics mean as it explains them well. It also does not go into every minute detail of the mission, but takes the reader from significant moment to moment that Rusty felt were major contributors to explaining the gravity of the fight and the story.

When I asked Rusty the other night on You Served Radio why he wrote this, he answered the way I thought he would. “To tell the story of bravery his men showed in a battle that almost nobody knows about”. There is no doubt there were actions in this book that are worthy of the Medal of Honor, and in fact he highlights at least one of the men was submitted for that recognition.

If you want to have even an idea of what life was truly like in Afghanistan in 2006 at the pointy-est end of the tip of the spear, then head over to Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble or anywhere else you can find it and get a copy of Lions of Kandahar. You will not be disappointed.

Lastly let me say I was very encouraged to find out that Rusty is good friends with one of my best friends, Scott Kesterson. Scott and Rusty have been side by side a few times in Afghanistan. Since my interview with Rusty I have talked to both men about the connection and of course they have nothing but utmost respect and kind words about each other. Makes me feel good to run in the circles that I do.

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I talked about David’s book, House to House, which has this one incident documented in great detail along with a whole lots more from this tour. You can read that posting at: www.bouhammer.com/2010/09/my-own-return/

Take a minute and listen to David talk about this one particular day as they show the re-enactment and then go check out the book at: www.amazon.com/House-David-Bellavia/dp/1416574719  because you won’t be disappointed in reading it. 

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www.bouhammer.com/2010/02/book-review-the-only-thing-worth-dying-for/

Thanks to Eric’s book and things like this series of videos from the NRA can America even know the story about the brave team of ODA 574 and what they did and sacrificed to help topple the last of the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001. Please take time to watch these videos, but do yourself a favor and also read the book. It has a lot of more detail and will be a hard book to put down as I talked about in my review.
 
THE CALLING
 

 
THE COURAGEOUS
 

 
THE SACRIFICE
 

 
I wrote about these guys again after visiting Gabriel Field myself. That blog posting is at:

www.bouhammer.com/2011/06/walking-hollowed-ground/

 
THE REVERED
 

 
Please bookmark this posting, share with your friends, put on your Facebook wall, tweet it, whatever. Taking the time to watch these four videos is the least you can do as Americans to at least become a little smarter into the sacrifices that just a few of our bravest warriors have went through.

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There have been many people involved with this project and all of them along with the stories listed in both Volume I and Volume II (forthcoming) at heroesfallenstudiosinc.webs.com/whoweare.htm. As you will see, I along with many other vets have stories represented in both volumes via the talents of many great artists.

Clayton is not a veteran himself, he does not have a kid who is serving, or any other connection to the military other than his love of this country and his care for those who defend and guarantee our freedoms. He started this project purely out of his love for this country and his desire to somehow do something to give back to those that defend his love. The proceeds from the sale of this graphic novel are benefitting four great troop supporting organizations. 

They are:

Wounded Warrior Project

Soldiers’ Angels

USO

Fischer House

You can’t go wrong in supporting these organizations and there is no argument that they all directly contribute back to our service-members.

If you are a fan of milblogs then I really think you will really like this book as it tells the same type of stories, but in a graphic “comic-book” style of presentation. Head over to heroesfallenstudiosinc.webs.com/ to learn more and go to heroesfallenstudiosinc.webs.com/hfsiwebstore.htm to place your order today. You can also click on the graphic to the right that looks like the one below. I am giving Clayton some free advertisting space here on Bouhammer.com becuase I beleive in this project and I believe in him. 

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After all those weeks of discussions the number settled on 30,000 and almost up to the point of the speech at West Point it was still bring decided and confirmed. A lot of people gave the Administration criticism for taking so long to come to that decision, to include yours truly on this blog. After reading the book by Woodward my fears were realized as to why it took so long. The President just did not have the experience or the trusted people around him with the experience to make the decision when it needed to be made. He was getting a lot of varying advice and as I read it, just did not know who to trust. 

As part of that deal was the caveat to produce an assessment of the surge in December 2010. Some argued that was way too soon after the surge finally got into theater (which was around the Aug timeframe). Personally I think it is way too early to do this assessment. Of course it was decided to do it in December of this year because the President had stated that a withdrawal of troops would start in June of 2011 (according to Woodward’s book that was originally SecDef Gates’s idea). Since the mid-term elections have ended the date for possible drawdown in Afghanistan has been pushed to 2014. I think that is quite coincidental that the 2014 date was announced after the elections,,,,NOT!

Anyway, back to the point of this post is that this week Afghanistan is about to become the front page news all over again as the assessment is scheduled to be released on Thursday. I think I have a good idea of what will be coming out in it. Based on the comments and interviews over the past week by GEN Petreaus, ADM Mullen and the SecDef it will be a marginally optimistic report that will say something close to the following:

• The surge has stopped or started to turn back the progress of the Taliban in the fight against the Coalition
• Villages and districts that were once taliban controlled or at least un-friendly to coalition forces are now on our side and defending themselves. (The village of Marjah may be highlighted as an example)
• The training of national security forces is progressing, but slower than what would be preferred.
• AWOL among security forces is still a major issue
• Corruption is the longest pole in the tent and possibly the largest Afghanistan inhibitor to progress
• Pakistan has to step up and help us control the borders and police up their own country if our mission in Afghanistan is going to be successful

I am sure there will be much more content in the report but I am predicting based on what I have heard the military leadership say that the meat of the assessment will be close to the above bullet-points. What it probably won’t say is it won’t place any blame on the switchover of command from McChrystal to Petreaus (even though that did have a temporary impact). It will also probably not say anything negative about Karzai as the Wikileaks state department leaks have done more than enough damage already. Lastly it won’t say what really needs to be said and that is that we must have the authority to put ground forces into parts of Pakistan in order to take out the leadership of the anti-coalition forces and to put a stop to many of our threats in country. Pakistan is the key to our success and until they take a strong stance or turn a blind eye to our movement into their country then the supply of people willing to fight our forces will never end. 

I have had many people ask me why we don’t just invade Pakistan and take them out? Why do we continue to give them billions in aid and toy around with them when we know they are the root of the problems. The answer is simple, NUCLEAR. They have the nuclear card and as long as they do we can’t risk it. I am convinced that had they not had nuclear weapons we would have had large-scale ground forces in there years ago. However that country is like an unstable powderkeg, except that there isn’t blackpowder in the keg, it is nuclear warheads. 

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SSG Guinta will be receiving the MoH very soon from the President in Washington DC.

The video below is the best I have seen from him explaining exactly what happened that day. In addition to SSG Guinta talking, MAJ Kearney who was the Company Commander of Battle Company is giving his views about the same day. This is a very emotional video with Sal talking raw and open about those moments and his thoughts on the moment he was told he would be getting the Medal of Honor. His exact words…”Fuck You…”. You need to see why he said it and thoughts behind receiving it.

My friend Tim Hetherington who is the filmmaker of Restrepo and was Sebastian Junger’s partner on Restrepo and Sebastian’s book, WAR is the interviewer of this piece. As always Tim has done a great job in his filming and editing to tell the story.

Tim also has his new book out called, Infidel. You can read reviews and get a copy at www.amazon.com/Tim-Hetherington-Infidel/dp/1905712189

The Sal Giunta Story from Ryan Blaind on Vimeo.

Last but not least, you will hear MAJ Kearney talk about Landigal and that being an objective of Operation Rock Avalanche. If you want to read a phenomenal book that is a great easy read and happened in the same place, Landigal, but two years earlier then check out James F. Christ’s book which goes by that name of that place. You can find it at www.lulu.com/product/paperback/landigal/13236158

I read a draft of Landigal back in May and sent James the following feedback directly to him in an email.

This story needs to be told as quickly as possible. Especially since we have now pulled all US forces out of Korengal. We have given up all that land that these and many other boys bled and died on.

As I said, it is a easy read and not very expensive. Give it a look to understand some of the background of this very volatile part of Afghanistan which we no longer occupy.

For more information about the TV premiere of Restrepo, please visit www.natgeotv.com/restrepo. For additional information about the film, please visit www.restrepothemovie.com, and join us on Facebook and Twitter.

The television premiere of Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington’s acclaimed film, Restrepo, will be on Monday, November 29 at 9pm ET/PT. Tune into your local National Geographic Channel to view it.

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I have been struggling with how to write this review as I want to be able to highlight key parts of this book but don’t want to give it all away. I have edited this many times so I hope this review gives the book justice.

Eric Blehm (who was interviewed on You Served Radio Feb 11th, www.blogtalkradio.com:80/youserved/2010/02/12/episode-75) did a great job writing the story of ODA574 and how this single 11-man Special Forces A-team did the true Special Forces job of partnering with local opposition to overthrow an oppressive regime and help that opposition train to get ready to fight against the regime. In this case the oppressive regime was the Taliban, and the opposition was a little-known influential leader in the area named Hamid Karzai. Even though there were already SF teams and CIA in northern Afghanistan teamed up with the Northern Alliance, the Northern Alliance was a loosely disciplined and defined fighting force. In the south, it was Hamid Karzai with maybe a dozen loyal supporters.

Eric does a fabulous job of not inserting his opinion or viewpoints into any part of this book. Instead he simply tells the story of them men that were part of this critical mission. Actually to call it critical is an understatement. Had this team not partnered with Karzai, or had any number of things happened which could have caused this mission to fail, it is without a doubt that Afghanistan would not be where it is today. Yes, this 11-man team wrote history and has had a direct influence into where we are today in the Global War on Terror.

Kandahar was the last city to fall in Afghanistan, and was considered the headquarters of the Taliban in 2001. When that city surrendered the initial “liberation” stage of the war in Afghanistan was considered complete. The actions of this team, and many others that supported them caused that to happen. In addition to helping bring down Kandahar, they also protected Hamid Karzai at all costs because they recognized his importance to the success of Afghanistan.

Unlike many other books I have read which tend to name and highlight people that do good things but hide the identity of people that screw up, Eric does not do that. Because he is truly just telling the story of these men, he calls out and tells the story of even those that made mistakes…even mistakes that costs American lives. The book is an easy read and does not cause the reader to have a Google page opened up to define military jargon. As my buddy CJ says, it does not go into the technical weeds that will cause the non-Special Forces reader to get lost.

The book starts with a prologue of Eric finally getting a chance to meet with Hamid Karzai in a NYC hotel room. Eric was given 15 minutes between meetings of (then) VP candidate Sarah Palin and (then) Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. That 15 minute meeting dragged on for over an hour as Karzai recited many facts from memory about the men on that team and looked at photos that Eric brought with him. Secretary Rice was made to wait, but I am sure she would understand if she knew why.

As per Eric’s website, I want to highlight the following paragraph

From the author of the award-winning The Last Season comes a one-of-a-kind war story that redefines our understanding of America’s early days in Afghanistan. THE ONLY THING WORTH DYING FORreveals, for the first time, the astonishing true story of the Special Forces A-team that helped conquer the Taliban in southern Afghanistan, and bring Hamid Karzai to power. In powerfully simple prose, Eric Blehm weaves together the unbelievable chain of events that intimately expose the realities of modern unconventional warfare and international politics during the critical months after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. Following Captain Jason Amerine and his ten Green Berets, Blehm puts the reader on the ground alongside Hamid Karzai and his guerrillas as the men of two very different worlds unite to seek a reckoning for the horrors haunting both of their nations…

The video below is Eric himself telling a good overview of the story and them men he wrote about. It is worth the watch.

The story actually starts with ODA574 training in K-stan with local forces there on 9/11/01 and how they agonized with being stuck overseas while their country is under attack. Eventually they get back to the US and thru all the right things happening at the right time, they become the team selected to insert into Pakistan for a mission that would take them and Karzai into Afghanistan to start what was supposed to be several months of local fighter training for an eventual clearing of Taliban forces in Southern Afghanistan. However, as we always say in the military, the best plans in the world get thrown out the window once you hit the ground. That is no different for these true warriors. Murphy’s Law was present, but they adapted and overcame and rather than a couple of months of train-up, they had literally days before they were thrown into the fight.

The courage and bravery of not only the 11-man A-team, but also the courage and guts of Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) rescue pilots is demonstrated in this book. These guys flew the first daytime missions into Afghanistan, over populated areas and some of the crew had only been in the area for a few hours. Sadly the incompetence and fear of the Marine Commander at Camp Rhino is also portrayed and I am sure it will make you as mad as it made me. Especially seeing who that Marine General was and what he eventually became to be. I can also say (as I had blogged on here before) that this book changed my mind about Hamid Karzai. I have said some very non-so-nice things about Karzai on this blog many times, but after reading this book I have to be honest when I say that I have a lot more respect for Karzai now than I ever did before. Not to say Karzai is perfect, but at least I know how he used to be and where his roots are in the Global War on Terror.

The whole story is told in this book, from the impact of 9/11/01 on these guys and our military, to the planning process and decision making, to the decisions entrusted to a Captain (Now-Major Jason Amerine will be interviewed on You Served Radio on Feb 18th, 2010 at www.blogtalkradio.com:80/youserved/2010/02/19/episode-20) and 10 of his men to how things tend to get screwed up when higher command go against their own doctrine and micro-manage competent professionals.

There is no doubt that as the years pass, more and more “history” books will be written about the war in Afghanistan. But you don’t have to wait long to find out how our forces inserted cold into the southern part of the country, with no support network, cut off from the rest of the world while deep behind enemy lines. How they ensured that the person who would eventually be selected to lead Afghanistan (three times) stayed alive and how all of them were either wounded or killed doing it. But for those that died, they knew it was THE ONLY THING WORTH DYING FOR.

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The mission of training and empowering a country’s indigenous Army has always been a mission of the Special Forces and what they have mastered over the last 40 years. However there was not enough of them either, so National Guard was tapped. However if there were a 2nd best option to Special Forces doing the mission, then it was the National Guard. The soldiers in a National Guard unit have just left being a civilian and will soon return to it. They know and understand the basics of COIN, long before it became a buzz-word and well before it became a standard part of our doctrine. The National Guard soldiers bring with them a mixture of civilian skills which are vital to the mission as many of the ETTs are very far downrange and must provide for their own life-support. There is little to no support from higher headquarters at all. So the skills of carpenter, plumber, HVAC, mechanic, school teacher, etc., etc. all are transferable to the mission of being forward deployed on a small FOB or COP with no support and almost no other Americans with you. In 2007, Task Force Phoenix took over the mentoring and advising of the Afghanistan National Police with PMTs (Police Mentoring Teams).

Famed WWII history author, James F. Christ who is known for his novels about the small but important Marine Paratroopers during the battles in the Pacific has now taken up a new focus for his writing. James is in the process of writing a 10-book series on ETTs in Afghanistan and very important, but unknown battles that have happened there since 2003. His first two books are available and can be downloaded for the Kindle or purchased from Amazon.com HERE or HERE. You can also learn more about the books at the publisher’s website at www.mountainlandpublishing.com/catalog.html.

I have read both of these books cover to cover, along with the next one in the series that is not yet published. They are all easy-reads and will suck you right into reading them non-stop until you are finished. There is no building up of characters, there is no plot development, all becuase there is no need. James takes you right into the ETT team, and before long you get to know the individual soldiers, how they act in combat, etc. If they have dialects or accents, James writes in a way so you can hear the accent as you read. I relate these books to the famed book Blackhawk Down (which the movie was based on). I say this becuase just like Blackhawk Down, James’s books start right before the battle, take you through the battle and then wrap up soon after the battle is over. The entire book is about the battle itself.

The battles are huge and the odds are stacked up against the American forces (most of which are National Guard ETTs). As you read either Morghab Canyon or The Boneyard, you will be amazed at how out-numbered and how brave the American soldier are and you will even be more amazed that more US and ANA forces were not slaughtered. The ingineuity, initiative and drive to survive by these soldiers is amazing. 

I have interviewed James twice on You Served Radio (you can hear the latest interview on You Served Radio here, www.blogtalkradio.com/youserved/2009/12/11/episode-67) and after talking to him then and on multiple one-on-one phone conversations, I am convinced he is one of the most knowledgeable civilians about Afghanistan that has never actually been to the country. He has spent so many hours interviewing ETTs for these books that he has truly become immersed into what it is like to be an ETT and in my opinion earned an honorary ETT title if there were such a thing.

I have told James and his publisher that if these books are not finished and published that it would be a dis-service to all ETTs, past and present. I have circulated several of his books to other past ETTs to get their opinions and the response has been 100% that “he gets it” and “this is the best book ever written about ETTs”.

I recently heard back from Vampire 6 from www.afghanistanshrugged.com and his response to James’s writings were

“This book is awesome! It definitely needs to be out there for people to read. I think every ETT has a story like this, …. While reading this I could identify with these guys and felt like they were just like guys on my team.  Truly awesome book!”

So if you have been an ETT/PMT, are an ETT/PMT, will be an ETT/PMT or you are a family member or friend of a past, present, future ETT/PMT then you need to go to Amazon.com and get these books. I cannot stress enough how accurate these books are and how well they will educate you as to what it is like to be on the “Tip of the Spear, but at the end of the line”

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We are also talking with Mark Baker, creator of the popular Army Times cartoon “PVT Murphy’s Law” (www.pvtmurphy.com/). Mark and CJ are old friends so it should be a good time to find out any dirt on CJ from the past. We will be talking about his very famous comic strip, the feedback he gets about it and how Murphy has grown over the years from a Private to a Sergeant.

Last but not least, Wesley Gray, author of “EMBEDDED: A Marine Corps Advisor Inside the Iraqi Army” will join CJ and Troy to talk about his book and the story he is trying to tell the world through this book.

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