Anyone who has owned a dog knows firsthand the pure and unconditional love these animals demonstrate and the extra efforts they make to please their humans. This devotion, as shown in the fiery crucible of war, is the focus of a new traveling exhibit at The National Museum of the U.S. Army in Fort Belvoir, Va. entitled “Loyal Service: Working Dogs At War.”

Sixteen wooden sculptures created by artist and master wood carver Jim Mellick highlight the extraordinary heroism of working military dogs and their handlers—not only from the U.S. Army, but spanning all branches of the military.

“Pet owners and dog owners know how happy dogs are to see when you come home or interact with you. Dogs do that on the battlefield also – they want to do their job,” said Chief Curator Paul Morando in an interview with HistoryNet.

The life-size sculptures are both realistic and rich in meaning, with some representing specific working dogs and others symbolizing the wartime bonds and experiences shared by dogs and their military handlers. One sculpture pays tribute to both Vietnam War veterans and the 4,000 working dogs left behind in Vietnam at the end of the war.

“The reactions have been very emotional. I think the majority of folks, whether a dog owner or pet owner or not, come away feeling touched after walking through the exhibit,” said Morando. “They are connecting with these sculptures and with these stories.”

One story expressed by the sculptures that has especially resonated with Museum Specialist Sara Bowen, lead curator of the exhibit, is that of the bond between two dogs, Lucca and Cooper. “These sculptures were developed to display together because Cooper and Lucca were actually friends in real life,” Bowen told HistoryNet. “They served together in Iraq.”

On her first tour of Iraq, Lucca bonded with a yellow Labrador named Cooper, who is displayed beside her in the exhibit holding a deflated football. “We have photographs of these two dogs playing with this deflated football in the theater of war,” said Bowen. The bond between the dogs led to a friendship between their handlers, U.S. Marine Gunnery Sgt. Christopher Willingham and U.S. Army Cpl. Kory Wiens of the 94th Mine Dog Detachment, 5th Engineer Batallion, 1st Engineer Brigade. Wiens and Cooper were both tragically killed by an IED on July 6, 2007.

“They were the first dog handler team to be killed in the Global War on Terror,” said Bowen. “As a symbolism of their bond, Cpl. Wiens’ father had both of their ashes buried together.”

Lucca went on to complete 400 missions and survived losing a leg to an IED explosion in March 2012. She became the first U.S. Marine dog to be awarded the PDSA Dickin Medal and was adopted by Willingham, who cared for her at home until her death of natural causes.

Both Lucca and Cooper are commemorated in the display entitled, “Over the Rainbow Bridge,” which celebrates their spirit and their friendship.

“The artist wanted to display them reuniting on the other side of the Rainbow Bridge,” said Bowen, describing how Mellick’s superb attention to detail recreated each dog’s personality, fur colors and even a characteristic flop in one of Lucca’s ears. “You can really see how lifelike they are – how much love and attention to detail the artist Jim Mellick is putting into each individual sculpture. It’s taken months on end to replicate those tiny details.”

“What we want visitors to take away is a deeper appreciation for these working dogs and their service to our country,” Morando said.

The exhibit will be available daily until Jan. 8, 2024. Anyone interested in learning about more unique stories of military service animals can register for online or in-person companion programs offered here.

Many people best remember “The March of the Men of Harlech” for its dramatic appearance in the 1964 film “Zulu” depicting the Battle of Rorke’s Drift, in which Welsh soldiers of the British Army sing it to rally their courage. Yet the song’s appearance in the film is historically inaccurate—the 24th Regiment of Foot was not yet a “Welsh” regiment as of 1879, and although many Welshmen were among its ranks, more than half the men were English. 

The song is rooted in the stones of Harlech castle, a forbidding fortress built above Cardigan Bay by England’s ruthless King Edward I. Edward intended it to serve as an unassailable stamp of his dominance over the Welsh, yet eventually the craggy bastion was seized by the daring Welsh rebel leader Owain Glyndwr, who held it for four years. The castle would later become a linchpin in the conflict between the Lancastrians and the Yorkists during the Wars of the Roses. Supporters of the House of Lancaster held the castle with fierce determination but the Yorkists eventually captured it in 1468. The defenders’ resistance is said to have inspired the folk song; the music was first written down in the 18th century. Welsh regiments in the British Army adopted the “Men of Harlech” tune. While lyrics varied, its defiance remained unchanged, as can be seen in these verses from 1873: 

Men of Harlech, march to glory, victory is hov’ring o’er ye, / Bright-eyed freedom stands before ye, hear ye not her call?

…Your foes on ev’ry side assailing, forward press with heart unfailing, / Till invaders learn with quailing, Cambria ne’er can yield. 

The song was a source of inspiration to Rick Rescorla, a native of Cornwall, England and veteran of both the British Army and U.S. Army. In Vietnam, Rescorla fought at the Battle of Ia Drang under the command of Lt. Col. Hal Moore and was known to sing to keep the troops’ spirits up in battle. On Sept. 11, 2001, Rescorla, working as a director of security in the South Tower of the World Trade Center, defied instructions not to evacuate. He was heard singing a Cornish rendition of “Men of Harlech” through a bullhorn as he evacuated employees. Although Rescorla lost his own life that day, he rescued more than 2,700 people.

this article first appeared in military history quarterly

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Billy Waugh, a fabled Special Forces Green Beret and CIA military operative who served in Korea and Vietnam and helped hunt for Osama Bin Laden and other terrorists, died on April 4 at the age of 93.

Waugh’s 50-plus-year military and intelligence career reads like the script for a Hollywood biopic. After joining the Army in 1948, he trained as a paratrooper and served in Korea as part of the 187th Airborne Regiment. His lengthy special forces career began in 1954 when he became a Green Beret with the 10th Special Forces Group.

Waugh deployed to Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, conducting numerous counterinsurgency operations against the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army. He trained Vietnamese and Cambodian forces and took part in the Vietnam War’s first HALO (High Altitude, Low Opening) combat jump into enemy territory.

In 1965 he was shot several times after a raid in Bong Son before being dragged to safety by his special ops unit commander, Paris Davis—who, on March 3, 2023, was belatedly awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions. Waugh himself was awarded the Silver Star and the Purple Heart for his actions in the Battle of Bong Son.

After Vietnam, Waugh joined the CIA. He helped track Libyan military installations in the 1970s; disrupted Soviet attempts to steal U.S. weapons technology in the Pacific in the 1980s; and worked in counterterrorism against Carlos the Jackel, Osama bin Laden, and other targets in the 1990s and 2000s. Many of Waugh’s missions over the decades are still classified.

In a statement following Waugh’s death in Florida on April 3, 1st Special Forces Command noted that he was a “true warrior” who had “inspired a generation of special operations…. He will be missed.” 

On Sept. 4, 2006, Patrick Murray’s Humvee rolled over a roadside bomb in Fallujah, Iraq, while he was serving with the 1st Battalion, 25th Marines.

That morning began with an explosion and ended with one.

A rumbling sound startled him awake near sunrise. He’d come to learn that was the sound of a Humvee from his platoon striking an improvised explosive device. The blast claimed the lives of two Marines and a Navy Corpsman and wounded another Marine.

The day’s mission concerned finding those who did it and recovering those lost.

“We spent the next few hours chasing down some of the folks that were responsible for it and pulling security so that the Mortuary Affairs unit could come and retrieve the Humvee and as much of their remains as they could to make sure that our friends got back,” he said.

Around dinnertime, he and his unit set off towards the main base to refuel before returning to their morning position, located across the city. They relaxed, removed their gear, and spent an hour there before setting back out.

“My right leg above the knee got blown off,” he said, adding, “September 4 was a very long day.”

All during his recovery, Murray never questioned what he and his fellow Marines were doing in Iraq. They were tasked with a job, and they did it. He got hurt in the process, but it was worth it as long as the mission was accomplished. It wasn’t until 2013 that he realized the war wasn’t what he thought.

“When [the Islamic State] came around and rolled all that area right up, that was disappointing, because it looked like all the hard work that was done was gone in a second,” he said.

The war meant many things for the thousands who served, but for Murrary and fellow Marine Advaith Thampi, the war started out as one thing and has since evolved into something much different in their minds.

Thampi, who immigrated to California with his mother as a child, watched the invasion on television, much the like rest of America.

“I was a kid in high school, I didn’t care,” he said. “It looked like ‘Call of Duty’ kind of. I was a very dumb, idiot kid in high school, and I really didn’t pay attention too much.”

His memory of the invasion was that it seemed surreal — same with the attack on 9/11.

“For the [Iraq] invasion, it felt like [I was seeing] a movie on the news — a war movie in real time,” he said. “I remember being very confused by it, fascinated by it.”

When he graduated in 2005, he knew he’d be going to Iraq or Afghanistan because that was where every Marine was going. He enlisted because his friends did.

“I joined with the intention to just do my part,” he said. “I knew that people were going to go to war, and I wanted to contribute to that endeavor.”

And he has no regrets about that piece of his military service.

“I’m very proud to have answered the call,” he said. “The Marines I served with had my back and mentored me. These are people that I met when I was 18 years old. They taught me how to be a man, how to be a Marine.”

For Murray and Thampi, who remain incredibly proud of their service in Iraq, the nuance of the war that could only be understood by the passage of time, and a dedication to public service has muddled their impressions of the policymakers of the Iraq War but not the U.S. military’s ability to deliver on its promises.

“We were asked to do a mission, and by and large, we did it, we accomplished our missions every single day — whether it was the global mission to invade Iraq and topple a regime, we did that,” Murray said. “We rotated through that country and did missions every single day, did what we were trained to do, and we did it efficiently, effectively … we did it honorably.”

Murray, who now works as the Director of National Legislative Service for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, holds fast to the idea it wasn’t the military that lost in Iraq. The blame, he believes, belongs to the politicians who couldn’t figure out a clear path.

Before the invasion of Iraq, there was support for the Global War on Terror from both sides of the aisle as well as the American public. Then-President George Bush even hit a 90 percent approval rating, the highest Gallup poll number ever of any U.S. president, after a speech about the War on Terror. When it came time to vote, 297 representatives and 77 senators said yes to invading Iraq.

And 4,506 American service members had lost their lives by the time the conflict ended in 2011.

Some major fumbles, including the lack of weapons of mass destruction and the inability to convert Iraq to democracy, have caused politicians, citing hindsight, to call the Iraq War controversial at best, and a mistake at worst. Three of the most prominent politicians who flip-flopped on their initial decision to support the Iraq War include former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, former President Donald Trump, and President Joe Biden.

David L. Phillips, who served as an adviser with the U.S. Department of State during the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations, believes that calling the Iraq War a mistake in hindsight harms government relations with the U.S. military.

“It shows a huge disrespect to them, and it does a disservice to U.S. Armed Forces,” he told Military Times. “Going to war in Iraq to eradicate the risk of Saddam, was not a mistake. The mistake was the way the post-war period was managed, and failures in dealing with the stabilization operation.”

For those that survived the Iraq War, the legacy is one of failure and mistakes made, not by the troops, but by decision makers who didn’t have clear goals or the ability to communicate clearly with the American public.

“It’s not that we never should have gone there, it’s that we never should have stayed there,” Murray said.

Thampi, who now works as legislative counsel and as the senior associate of government affairs at Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, said that since the war has ended, and he’s gotten involved in policymaking, the ignorance and patriotism he once had about the war is long gone.

Though at age 18 he believed he was doing his part to serve a country he loved, he now realizes that the war was always more complicated.

“I don’t get to be naive anymore,” he said. “I think the legacy that a lot of us Iraq War veterans will carry with us for a while is that public policy has significant consequences.”

Both he and Murray hope that the lesson learned in Iraq was that the military is a tool, and an effective one with clear objectives. But it was diplomacy that failed in Iraq, not U.S. troops.

As for the legacy of the Iraq War, now 20 years out from the invasion and U.S. troops pulled out of Afghanistan in 2021, Thampi is learning to make peace with the past and hoping that policymakers will do better to honor the people who fight in their future wars — regardless of the political outcomes — by not labeling failed diplomacy as a mistaken war.

“I think we’ve all accepted that we’re not going to have that New York City ticker tape parade moment — that feeling that we collectively won the war, we beat the bad guys, and the good guys won,” he said, “I don’t think that’s going to happen for these for these wars.”

Originally published by Military Times, our sister publication.

If one is lucky in life, they will know the love of having a “soul” dog — to know undying trust, devotion and of course, love.

For retired Marine Staff Sgt. Brandon Marquez, that “soul” dog is his 12-year-old Belgian Malinois with the unique name of Multi-purpose Canine Shimanski.

“He’s my best friend,” Marquez told Task and Purpose. “Truly, this dog has done everything in life with me. The successes, the hard days, the good ones, the ugly ones; he’s been there with it all. I get to work every day with my best friend and hang out with him. I could never imagine him not being with me for all of it.”

According to the outlet, between 2013 and 2018, Shimanski and his handler Marquez deployed to Afghanistan, Iraq, Jordan and Somalia with U.S. Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command, during which he searched for explosives while under fire.

Deployed four times in five years, Congress awarded MPC Shimanski The Animals in War & Peace Medal of Bravery on March 8, 2023. Created in 2019 the medal awards animals who conspicuously distinguish themselves by displaying gallantry and acts of valor.

Other recipients include Korean War hero Sgt. Reckless, a Mongolian mare who became one of greatest war horses in American history; Nemo, the German Shepherd who alerted his unit of a Viet Cong ambush before fearlessly charging at the enemy. The shepherd was shot in the head — the bullet entering under the right eye and exiting through his mouth — but continued to hurl himself at the Viet Cong attackers, giving his grievously wounded handler Bob Thorneburg time to call in for help. As they awaited rescue, Nemo crawled to Thorneburg and covered the airman with his body to protect him; and Cairo, the Belgian Malinois who took part in “Operation Neptune Spear” the 2011 Navy SEAL raid that killed former al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.

Born in the Netherlands in 2011, the Malinois met Marquez at the age of two in 2013. The pair trained together for six months before their first deployment to Afghanistan.

“Ninety-nine percent of my job was understanding what all of his body language was,” Marquez told Task and Purpose. “If his tail started to spin in a clockwise circle, he was starting to smell explosives.”

In his nomination of Shimanski, Marquez recalled one particular event in February 2014 in Sangin, Afghanistan, where the Malinois’ nose — and tail — saved lives.

With the “Team Chief was fatally wounded [,] Shimanski, his handler, and two other members of the unit rushed to the point of injury,” according to the Animals in War and Peace. “Under extremely heavy enemy direct and indirect fire, regardless of his own safety, MPC Shimanski exited the vehicle with his handler to begin establishing a safe path to their wounded teammate and the surrounding area. The team cleared two hasty helicopter landing zones to evacuate their team member. MPC Shimanski preformed to the highest standard, under gravely dangerous conditions, without error.”

Thankfully, Shimanski was never physically wounded in combat, but the stressors of combat and close calls paid a toll on the animal.

“I certainly went through my struggles, and things like that, but Shimanski also kind of went through his struggles,” Marquez told Task and Purpose. “He’s got a little Post Traumatic Stress and he’s been knocked around with me too.”

After nearly six years together — the dog-handler relationship typical ends at four — Marquez couldn’t part with his partner and best friend and ultimately decided to adopt Shimanski.

Marquez, according to Task and Purpose, owns a small dog training business, and he also runs a non-profit group that trains service dogs for veterans. Shimanski is still working alongside Marquez, albeit the stakes are much lower now.

A well-deserved retirement for a very, very good boy.

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Drowned in a storm: Capt. Arthur Hood (1755–1775) 

Three Hood brothers (Arthur, Alexander, and Samuel) all served in the Royal Navy in the latter half of the 18th century. They were the second generation of the Hood family to go to sea; two of them did not survive to retire from the service. Arthur Hood served aboard the 18 gun sloop of war HMS Pomona  in the West Indies.

When the Pomona was caught in a hurricane in the West Indies, Hood drowned in the storm. He was the first of the Hood family to die at sea.

Killed at the Last Minute: Capt. Alexander Hood (1758–1798) 

Alexander Hood was the younger brother of Capt. Arthur Hood. On April 21, 1798, Hood was captain of HMS Mars, a 74-gun third class ship of the line, when he engaged the French ship Hercule off the Brittany coast. Despite the two ships being nearly evenly matched in firepower, mounting 74 guns each, the French got the worst of the fight, losing more than 300 men to British losses of 31 men killed and 60 wounded.

Capt. Hood did not live to savor his victory—he was mortally wounded in the final moments of the battle and died as he was being presented with the French captain’s surrendered sword.  

Family ravaged by yellow fever: Lt.-Gen. John Bell Hood (1831–1879) 

John B. Hood served as a Confederate general officer during the American Civil War. He was a bold fighter and excelled as a combat leader at the brigade and division levels, but in more senior positions of command his boldness verged on aggressive foolhardiness. His appointment to the command of the Army of Tennessee in the last year of the war was a poor choice by the Confederate government, because in a matter of weeks his repeated assaults on much stronger Union forces all but destroyed the ranks of the army that his predecessor, Gen. Joseph E. Johnston, had managed to keep intact in the face of overwhelming odds. The poet Stephen Vincent Benet was not far off the mark when he described Hood as “all lion, none of the fox.”

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Hood was twice severely wounded: his left arm was crippled by shrapnel at the July 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, and he lost his right leg at Chickamauga two months later. After the war ended he took up work as a cotton trader and insurance broker in New Orleans, but in 1878 his business was ruined during an outbreak of yellow fever.

Within a single week, Hood, his wife, and his eldest child all died of the disease. His other 10 children were left orphaned. 

Lost At Sea: Rear Adm. Sir Horace Lambert Alexander Hood (1870–1916) 

Another scion of the British Hood family of Royal Navy fame, Horace Hood began his naval career in 1882 at the age of twelve. As a commander of riverine gunboats on the Nile he served in the Mahdist War in 1898, and in 1903 he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for action against the Dervishes in Somaliland. By 1908 he was commanding the battleship HMS Commonwealth, and as a flag officer in 1916 he took command of the 3rd Battlecruiser Squadron with the rank of rear admiral.

On May 31 of that year, aboard his flagship HMS Invincible, Hood led his squadron into action against the German fleet at the Battle of Jutland. In the first exchange of fire Invincible succeeded in fatally damaging the German cruiser SMS Wiesbaden, before she herself was targeted by the combined gunnery of battlecruisers SMS Lützow and SMS Derfflinger. A shell from one of Derfflinger’s 12-inch guns penetrated Invincible’s starboard “Q” turret and denotated its store of cordite propellant, causing a massive explosion that literally cut the ship in half.

Invincible went down in minutes. Rear Admiral Hood perished with his ship and all but six of his 1,021 men.

Catastrophic explosion: HMS Hood (named for Adm. Samuel Hood) 

HMS Hood was an Admiral class battlecruiser of the Royal Navy, laid down in September 1916 at the height of the First World War. Originally planned as a class of four ships, Hood was the only ship of the four to actually be constructed. By the outbreak of the Second World War, Hood was overdue for modernization; advances in gunnery and range finding made her particularly vulnerable to plunging fire from heavy guns on account of her thinner deck armor, and problems with her steam condensers meant that she was unable to attain full speed when maneuvering.

In 1941 Hood was dispatched as the flagship of the battle group sent to intercept the German battleship Bismarck. On May 24, the British brought Bismarck and her escort, the heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen, to bay in the Denmark Strait. The two German ships concentrated their combined fire on Hood. Hood sustained repeated hits, and then just before 6:00a.m. she was struck by a salvo that blew up her aft magazine in a catastrophic explosion.

Hood went vertical in the water, going down by the stern, and she sank in less than three minutes with a loss of 1,415 men. Only three members of her crew survived.

More than 40% Casualties: Hood Battalion, Royal Naval Division (1914–1919) 

The Royal Naval Division (RND), one of the most unique combat units ever fielded by the British military, was an idea conceived by Winston Churchill during his tenure as First Lord of the Admiralty (1911–1915). Initially comprised of sailors from the Royal Naval Reserve and Royal Marines, each of the RND’s battalions were named after famous British admirals such as Hawke, Drake, Nelson, Howe, and of course, Hood. The Hood Battalion fought with the RND in some of the most important battles of the First World War including Gallipoli, the Somme, Gavrelle, and Passchendaele.

Twice, the Hood Battalion nearly fought itself out of existence as a combat effective unit, sustaining casualty rates of almost 50 percent until its ranks could be replenished.

Even though the RND represented only 5% of the Royal Navy’s total strength during the First World War, the division’s combat losses accounted for more than 40% of the naval service’s total casualties, and those losses occurred on land, not at sea. When the RND was formally disbanded in June 1919, the Hood Battalion was one of only four of the original eight battalions remaining in the division.

A troubled History: Fort Hood, Texas

A US Army installation named for Confederate Lt.-Gen. John Bell Hood, Fort Hood is located outside Killeen, Texas. Covering an area of 214,000 acres, it is one of the largest military installations in the world. Founded in 1942, the post has long been a training center for armor warfare and since 1971 it has been home to the famous 1st Cavalry Division.

Fort Hood was the scene of social activism and soldier protests during both the Vietnam War and more recently the War on Terror. It also has a troubled history of incidents of scandal and criminal violence, one of the worst occurring on November 5, 2009. A self-described jihadist named Nidal Hasan, who was then a US Army medical corps major, carried out a shooting attack in the post Soldier Readiness Center, killing 13 people and wounding 32. Hasan was sentenced to death by court martial in 2013 and is currently on the military death row at the Fort Leavenworth prison.

In recent years Fort Hood has gained a grim notoriety for sexual assault and sexual harassment problems, so egregious that in 2020 the Secretary of the Army relieved 14 senior leaders on the installation for “leadership failures.” In May 2022 the Army announced that as part of the decision to redesignate any post bearing the name of former Confederate soldiers, Fort Hood will be renamed Fort Cavazos in honor of General Richard E. Cavazos, the first Hispanic soldier to ever hold four star rank.

In the years since the U.S. war in Afghanistan began in October 2001, a number of defining books and movies have helped the American public understand how its troops lived, fought and sometimes died there.

Sebastian Junger’s documentary Restrepo and his accompanying works like “War” and “Korengal” helped audiences understand the brutal reality of fighting in the country’s rugged mountainous northeast, and Wes Morgan’s The Hardest Place placed that struggle into the broader context of the political-military establishment’s strategic failures in the country.

One veteran I know served in the Korengal with Battle Company of the 173rd Airborne Brigade’s 2-503rd Infantry, earning a valor award for his actions there. When we chatted about the way his slice of the Afghanistan War was portrayed in books and on screen, he reminded me that other units across the country had very different fights — they just didn’t have their Junger or Morgan to immortalize it yet.

But author Ben Kesling, a former Marine infantry officer and reporter at the Wall Street Journal, has written what may be the defining book about a very different version of the war in southern Afghanistan: the arid-yet-lush, improvised explosive device-scattered Arghandab Valley in Kandahar Province.

Kesling’s new book, “Bravo Company: An Afghanistan Deployment And Its Aftermath,” follows the paratroopers of Bravo Company of the 82nd Airborne Division’s 2-508th Infantry from their pre-deployment training — when they thought they’d be heading to Iraq — through the twists and turns of a 2008-2009 Afghanistan deployment that saw three Bravo soldiers killed and and nearly half of the company decorated with the Purple Heart for combat wounds. And most of the killed and wounded fell victim to IEDs, with little warning or opportunity to fight the Taliban face-to-face.

Bravo Company: An Afghanistan Deployment And Its Aftermath

by Ben Kesling, Harry N. Abrams, November 1, 2022

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Soldiers waded through filthy canals and streams as much as possible for their daily patrols, since they figured not even the Taliban could plant bombs there. One NCO recalled wading several miles in his dress uniform to the battalion command post to appear before the sergeant major for a promotion board. When the soldier and his comrades showed up, their uniforms ruined, the CSM abruptly cancelled the board interviews to go on a battlefield circulation trip.

The author masterfully captures the dark humor that troops used to cope with their real anxieties through writing that simultaneously captures the infantryman’s spirit (and profanity) in a way any reader can understand. First troops would joke that they didn’t want to be saved if they lost a leg, but as more and more of them lost limbs, the joke evolved to if they lost two legs. But as the number of double amputees mounted, the sacred body parts that young paratroopers (whose units did not yet have women) didn’t want to lose moved a little bit north.

“[A]fter a while two legs gone didn’t seem so bad. So they’d say, ‘Man, if I get blown up and lose my dick, don’t even try and save me,’” explained Kesling. “That one never changed. The dick is a sacred piece of Army gear that no soldier can imagine losing. Even the balls are somewhat expendable.”

Eventually many soldiers refused to patrol as casualties mounted. On the other side of the valley, the battalion’s Charlie Company saw a similar phenomenon unfold, though they at least got to see the Taliban (and shoot them) sometimes.

But Bravo Company goes further than telling the story of the company’s Arghandab war. Kesling also follows the men of Bravo home, where the Department of Veterans Affairs identified its solders as being at “extraordinary risk” of mental health struggles due to the nature of the combat they saw and the high rate of both visible — and invisible — wounds.

The book tells the story of how one soldier who lost his foot — Steve Towery — struggled with whether he was truly a combat veteran or not. He’d lost his foot to an IED on the first day Bravo took casualties, ending his war earlier than that of his colleagues. He would tell his young children that a shark had eaten it, or that he’d lost a knife fight in Mexico.

Another soldier, Staff Sgt. Allen Thomas, had been wounded by a suicide bomber and medically retired. He never fully recovered, eventually killing two neighbors and himself in a 2013 murder-suicide in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Then another Bravo vet, Derek Hill, died by suicide in 2018.

That led the VA to partner with a non-profit and take an innovative approach to community support for Bravo Company vets: a pilot public-private partnership brought 98 of them together in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 2019, connecting them to one another and resources that can change their lives. And since that transformative reunion, no Bravo vets have died by suicide.

Throughout the book, Kesling’s own saltiness and cynicism shines through at times, offering an authentic edge to his work.

That’s what makes his telling of Bravo Company’s redemptive reunion compelling — leaving readers hopeful of the lessons it offers for those who may still be struggling and disconnected during the war that follows redeployment.

“Bravo Company: An Afghanistan Deployment And Its Aftermath” by Ben Kesling released Nov. 1 and is available for purchase at local bookstores and retailers around the country.

Originally published by Military Times, our sister publication.

A fine grit covered everything that hot day in 2010. With each step, another cloud of dust billowed up and coated uniforms, weapons and skin, then settled in mouths with a dry, acrid aftertaste. The Marines in Helmand Province of Afghanistan called it “moon dust.” 

Lt. Tom Schueman watched as his squad of Marines moved slowly across the field, kicking up more powdery material with each measured step. The men of 1st Platoon, Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 5th Division were taking an agonizingly long time to get through the withered corn rows at the farm in the Sangin District. Their objective, a town controlled by the Taliban, was just ahead. First, though, they had to check every inch of the way for IEDs. The Marines moved carefully and deliberately as they swept the farm field. 

Suddenly, a lone figure came running up to the platoon. The leathernecks flinched at first, praying it wasn’t a suicide bomber, then relaxed when they saw he was wearing a Marine uniform. It was Zainullah Zaki, their Afghan interpreter, whom everyone called “Zak.” He had been listening to the local radio chatter and had news for the lieutenant. 

“Sir, the Taliban is setting up an ambush,” he told Schueman.  

More Than an Interpreter 

The Marine commander responded that his team was moving as fast as possible but had to make sure there were no boobytraps. One false step could mean dismemberment — or worse. 

Zaki became agitated as he spoke. He knew the Taliban could start firing at any moment, which would be deadly for a squad caught in the open. Disregarding his own safety, Zaki sprinted through the cornfield to a nearby house. He prayed to Allah that there were no IEDs in his path. 

The Afghan then burst through the door of a mudbrick house and knocked down a small, bearded man. In his hand was a radio, which the Talib was using to set up the ambush. Zaki grabbed the man by the neck and dragged him back to the Marines. 

That was the moment that Schueman realized just how devoted his interpreter was to the Marines. An unbreakable bond and strong friendship of mutual respect had just formed. Blooded by combat, they became brothers in the best tradition of the Marine Corps motto: Semper Fidelis, “Always Faithful.” 

“It was clear to me that Zaki was more than an interpreter,” recalled Schueman, now a major. “He was there to fight and serve right next to us. He just ran ahead into the village and spoiled the ambush. Zaki went across unswept ground where there were a lot of mines. That to me was just incredible bravery.” 

Enduring Bond 

A new book details the remarkable relationship that developed between the two men during deadly combat in that faraway country and endured even after Schueman returned to the United States. Co-authored by both, “Always Faithful: A Story of the War in Afghanistan, the Fall of Kabul, and the Unshakable Bond Between a Marine and an Interpreter” chronicles how they made it through the war together, then how their friendship proved strongest when the country collapsed in terror and a daring rescue effort was needed to save the lives of Zaki and his family. 

“We are brothers,” Zaki said in a Zoom interview. “Maj. Tom is family. We have brotherhood. In Afghanistan, we have same uniform. The Afghans would call me ‘infidel.’ I would say, ‘No, I am Muslim.’ They would ask, ‘Why you wear uniform?’ I tell them, ‘Because they are working with us together to build our country.’” 

No One Wanted Any Tea 

Schueman and Zaki first met in 2010. Both had been deployed to Helmand, which would soon become one of the bloodiest places on Earth. The harsh desert and hard people who inhabited the Sangin District were a different experience for both men. Schueman grew up in Chicago with a mother who was a cop. Zaki was from Asadabad City in Kunar Province, a greener, more pastoral setting than this hot, dusty, deadly setting 

For Schueman, he expected to be part of a nation-building effort in Afghanistan. He had read the book “Three Cups of Tea” to better understand the culture and find ways of to win the hearts and minds of the people there. That ideal was shattered on his first day on patrol, when his platoon was ambushed before it even left its forward operating base. 

“No one wanted any tea, and everyone wanted to shoot me,” Schueman recalled. “We thought if we just showed the people we were here to help, they would turn. No, the Taliban there were not interested in any of that.” 

Hostile Territory for Zak 

Zaki was equally surprised by the conditions in the Helmand Province.  

“The people, the culture, the language — it was all different. I didn’t barely understand what they were saying at first,” he said. “They speak Pashtun like me, but with a different accent. They were different people, hard people. They put IEDs in the mosques.” 

The Marines engaged in fierce fighting, often battling the Taliban from house to house in each village. Zaki, who was not supposed to carry a weapon, would pick up a rifle from a fallen leatherneck to help defend their position when things got bad. 

“Sometimes, when we were off the base, my team would give me a pistol for my protection,” the interpreter said. “It was too dangerous.” 

Following his first tour, Schueman returned home. However, he knew the job wasn’t done and wanted to go back. He did so in 2012 but was not able to connect with Zaki. He said he felt lost without his former interpreter who always seemed to understand him. 

“I needed Zak, who could not only translate for me, but could speak for me,” he wrote in the book. “More than that, though, I needed a friend.” 

Bureaucratic Nightmare 

Schueman went home after his second deployment. He and Zaki lost track of each other until the Afghan reached out to him via social media in 2016, when they rekindled their relationship. 

It was about that same time that Zaki began to have doubts about the future of his country and the safety of his family. The Taliban, a relentless enemy who often threatened the interpreter with torture and death, was not going away. He decided to begin the process of emigrating to America through a program set up by the American government to help those who had assisted the military. 

What should have been a slam dunk turned out to be a bureaucratic nightmare. Over the next five years, roadblock after roadblock stymied the effort to get Zaki and his family out of Afghanistan. Schueman tried to intercede on several occasions only to be told certain paperwork was missing or Zaki was not eligible for the program. 

Matter of Life and Death 

Things came to a head in 2020, when the United States and the Taliban signed an agreement to end the 18-year war and return control of the country to the extremist religious group the following year. Unfortunately, Zak’s case to leave the Afghanistan was denied because of “insufficient documentation.” The clock was now ticking as the enemy retook province after province. 

“I felt helpless,” Zaki recalled. “The Taliban were killing interpreters. I was very worried for my wife and children.” 

Back in the United States, Schueman felt equally helpless. No matter how hard he tried, he could not help his friend. Now, as the Taliban quickly regained control of the country, it appeared he could not save Zaki, a man he considered his “Marine brother.” 

Getting to Kabul Airport 

The fall of Kabul happened faster than anyone anticipated, including military leaders. The Afghan capital was captured by the Taliban on Aug. 15, 2021, even though U.S. troops still held the airport. Schueman and Zaki were in near-constant contact, trying to work out a last-minute solution before the interpreter would be caught up in the inevitable reprisals. The Marine officer acted without hesitation. 

“I had to leverage a personal friendship,” said Schueman, who was at the Naval War College in Rhode Island at the time. “He was a pilot for the PJs [pararescue] in the Air Force. He said to get Zaki and his family to the gate at the airport and he would get them out.” 

Three times they worked out a plan of extraction. Three times those efforts failed, as fear caused tens of thousands of panicked Afghans to surround the perimeter of the airport. Taliban checkpoints were everywhere. 

The Marines have a saying: “Adapt and overcome.” Plans are going to break down, so improvisation is going to become a necessity. At that moment, Schueman began to feel like overcoming might be beyond a reasonable hope. 

Extraction Team 

With time almost out, the Marine major called his PJ friend again and asked him to do something. What happened next sounds like a scene out of a Hollywood action-adventure movie.  

With loaded weapons, a rescue team leaped over the blast wall surrounding the airport and began searching for Zak, who was holding his screaming 3-year-old daughter. Schueman watched breathlessly on a video app. The scared family finally made it to a gate where they were allowed into the airport by a large American with a tattoo on his forearm of angel embracing the world and the words “That Others May Live.” The pathway to freedom was suddenly open. 

“Maj. Tom’s friends came for us,” Zaki said. “They tried to find us at first, but it was too crowded. A SEAL team got me out with my family. They got us into the airport and put us on a plane. That was a sad and happy moment for me — sad because the enemy got control of our country and happy because we were safe.” 

Fellow Americans 

Zaki and his family eventually made it to the United States and slowly became acclimated to their new country. He now manages a carwash in San Antonio, where his family has connected with others in a small refugee community. 

Stationed at Camp Pendleton in California today, Schueman is nearly 1,500 miles away from his friend. That has not stopped them from getting together whenever possible. 

“We’re going to New York,” Schueman said. “We’ll be on ‘Good Morning America’ for the book. But I’m also planning to take leave and visit him in Texas. We make it a family thing. We’re two dads who really care about their families and want to get together when we can.” 

Zaki agreed that the bond between the two men who became friends in a distant, deadly land remains indelible.  

“We were brothers, we are brothers, we will be brothers all the time,” he said. 

For these men, their relationship will remain always faithful. 

“Always Faithful: A Story of the War in Afghanistan, the Fall of Kabul, and the Unshakable Bond Between a Marine and an Interpreter,” by Maj. Tom Schueman and Zainullah Zaki, will be published by William Morrow on Aug. 9. 

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No one can argue that Toyota vehicles are dependable, affordable, and abundant. But ask any veteran of the last 50 years and they’ll tell you these Japanese automobiles are vehicles of war.

In fact, there was even a Toyota War fought in the late ’80s between Libya and Chad, named thus for the Toyota Hilux and the Toyota LandCruiser, which the Chadians selected for their durability and mobility in battle.

But one man, Chris, 26, has made it his life’s work to chronicle the use of Toyotas in combat through his Instagram page @ToyotasofWar.

“While working for a defense company that was building out Toyotas, I become obsessed with learning and gathering as much info on them as possible,” Chris told Military Times. “Part of that process was compiling any photos I came across. Over time, the page morphed into a way for guys and gals to share their own photos and stories of trucks from deployment.”

His fascination with the vehicle’s history is what fuels the feed, which he views as a form of photojournalism. Chris compiles the photographs and archives their unique histories.

“I believe the page has morphed into a unique combination of car content and photo-based wartime journalism,” he said. “In a social media world, we provide a nice change of pace. The ‘mall crawler’ and ‘overlander’ content is played out. Too many vehicles have turned into a rolling gear catalogue. We like to focus on the vehicles and how they are used.”

His favorite part of running the page, Chris said, is when someone converts to being a Toyota-buyer.

“I love sharing stories of Toyota reliability and how much abuse they can take,” he said. “I always get a kick out of the DMs saying, ‘Congrats, I will now be buying a Toyota. —Current Nissan owner.’”

Toyota’s DNA, he said, is based upon military vehicle designs. The staying power of Toyota from the Korean War through contemporary conflicts, however, comes down to its adaptability.

“Reliability and availability,” Chris said. “They work — and when they don’t, parts are widely available. It’s also important to understand the history of Toyota. [The company] received the design for the Model BM truck and the Willys Jeep from the U.S. Army as part of the Korean War effort. Eventually, Toyota’s version of the Jeep morphed into what is known as the modern day ‘LandCruiser.’”

And in fact, his favorite Toyota is the 79 series LandCruiser.

“As an American, it’s the proverbial ‘forbidden fruit,’” he added.

But it’s the white Toyota pickup truck that became somewhat synonymous with the War on Terror. However, according to Chris, it’s more a mix of coincidence and strategy.

“Statistically, white cars are popular worldwide,” he noted. “Last numbers I saw, close to 40 percent of the cars sold in the Middle East were color white. White paint stays cooler in the sun (up to 15 degrees cooler), plus they are are easier to maintain visually (don’t show scratches, and have a higher resale value). Tactically — white provides a decent base color that can be masked/camouflaged with mud mix.”

And it’s not just pickup trucks, he added. Toyotas of all shapes and sizes are seen in combat around the world.

“Vehicles in all forms are used,” he said. “Sedans, vans, scooters, I have even come across a forklift in use.”

This was the case on Aug. 29 when the U.S. Defense Department authorized a drone strike after commanders mistakenly thought they found a white Toyota sedan packed with explosives driven by an Islamic State operative. It turns out that the driver was an aid worker transporting water for his family. The hellfire strike killed seven children and three adults.

On Nov. 3, the Defense Department announced that it found no misconduct in a review of the drone strike.

The review, carried out by Air Force Lt. Gen. Sami Said, found issues of communication and in the process of identifying and confirming the target ofn the strike, Military Times previously reported. Ultimately, however, it was concluded that the mistaken strike happened despite prudent measures to prevent civilian deaths.

The U.S. is moving now to make financial reparations to the family, and possibly help them seek asylum outside Afghanistan.

Chris’ last name was omitted from this story to protect the privacy of the @ToyotasofWar account manager.

Originally published on Military Times, our sister publication.

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Charles Waterhouse devoted his last years to portraying all Marines and Navy corpsmen who earned the Medal of Honor

“Once a Marine, always a Marine,” goes a popular saying, and if the U.S. Marine Corps ever had to prove the point, it need only refer to Col. Charles H. Waterhouse.

He was just another kid in the corps when he hit the sulfurous beach with the first wave at Iwo Jima, Japan, on Feb. 19, 1945, only to fall with a wound that inflicted permanent nerve damage to his left hand. Regardless, after World War II he studied art at the Newark School of Fine and Industrial Arts in New Jersey. On graduation in 1950 he embarked on a successful career that drew him back to illustrating moments in Marine history.

That led to his being commissioned a major and named the first—and thus far only—Marine Corps artist in residence. He ultimately painted more than 500 portraits or scenarios depicting an array of events, from the formation of the corps, on Nov. 10, 1775, to the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At age 82 Waterhouse set his sights on rendering portraits of every Marine and Navy corpsman awarded the Medal of Honor and portraying the acts for which each received the award. At the time of his death at age 89 on Nov. 16, 2013, he had produced 332 such paintings—the most comprehensive output of Medal of Honor moments by a single artist.

His daughter Jane Waterhouse, a successful author of novels and mysteries, showed equal devotion in publishing all those paintings and a personal tribute to the man who created them in a stirring volume entitled Valor in Action. Here is a showcase of images from the book. MH

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This article appeared in the March 2022 issue of Military History magazine. For more stories, subscribe and visit us on Facebook.

Christopher Martin was barely making it through a listless early attempt at college when he made an abrupt turn and enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. The move wasn’t entirely out of nowhere; he had been borderline obsessed with reading accounts of warfare, especially ancient warriors such as Alexander the Great.

Growing up a “husky kid with thick glasses,” Martin said that in his small-town life in the shadow of Penn State University — the son of a teacher and grandson of a professor — adventure certainly didn’t seem like it was on the horizon.

But like many young people who join the military, excitement and adventure was exactly what he craved — and to be part of something historic.

Where does one find adventure in the Marines, or at least the promise of such adventure, as two wars rage? That’s right, the infantry.

He told his worried parents, however, that he would be in intelligence, probably doing some administrative desk work, a lie he kept up throughout his enlistment.

Since leaving the Corps, Martin has written a book about his experiences: “Chasing Alexander: A Marine’s Journey Across Iraq and Afghanistan.” He spoke with Marine Corps Times about his life as a Marine, why he decided to create a book and how he sees that life now that he writes computer software for a company that makes drone detection sensors.

Editor’s Note: The below section has been edited for content, clarity and length.

Q: In your book you intersperse short snapshots into the life of Alexander the Great in chapters before talking about your own experience. Why did you decide to write the book in this way?

A: On my Iraq deployment I remember sitting in the Humvee next to the Euphrates River and thinking, “there’s so much history right here.” I was really enraptured with how historical this area was. I had the same thoughts in Afghanistan. The seed germinated while I was deployed. When I sat down to write the book I was just in awe of these places where Marines were fighting. The Euphrates and Helmand river valleys.

Q: Had you read many war memoirs before you wrote your book? If so, what are some of your favorites?

A: I had read a lot of biographies before I went into the Marines, but when I got out I went to school at Denison University, a small liberal arts school near Columbus, Ohio. I had a professor, Brenda Boyle, who had us read war memoirs, war narratives. We read Thucydides, President George Bush’s memoir and saw all of these different ways to tell stories about war.

My favorite was a pair, “One Bullet Away” by Nathaniel Fick, a former Marine reconnaissance officer, and “Generation Kill” by Rolling Stone reporter Evan Wright. Wright’s book chronicles Marines of 1st Recon Battalion in the 2003 Iraq invasion. Fick was an officer in the unit and the second half of his book tells that story as well. Fick’s is this kind of “important sense of an honorable officer’s perspective.” While Wright’s is about smoking cigarettes with a lance corporal in a gun turret. It’s kind of like Tim O’Brien’s short story, “How to Tell a True War Story.” You can have a million different perspectives.

Q: Not to spoil the book but you had a fairly uneventful tour in Iraq, just post-surge, but a much more intense deployment to Afghanistan, which included heavy fighting around the Battle of Marjah. How might your experience have been different if you’d had only one of those deployments during your single enlistment?

A: It definitely would have been an extremely different experience had I just done one of the deployments. Had I only done the Iraq deployment, I certainly would not have written a book about it. There were a group of guys around when I did my two tours who did one or two pumps on float but never got a Combat Action Ribbon. There’s a little bit of “I wanted to do this and be in the fire, and I missed my chance.” I was scheduled to do a Marine Expeditionary Unit tour, but that got canceled and, instead, I went on both deployments. Had I done the MEU then Afghanistan I think it would have been a similar experience.

Q: Did you plan to write a book all along or did you do anything such as keep a journal while you were in or while deployed?

A: I didn’t journal but I did keep all of my patrol orders, all of my “Rite-In-The-Rain” field books. That’s how I built everything together. Other guys in my squad I asked, after I’d written sections, if they could fact check some of it for me: “Is this how you remember this?” One guy, Blackwood, kept a pretty detailed journal. He’d look at what I wrote and say things like, these things happened in a similar order, but this one happened before, for example. There was also an assistant patrol leader who helped me remember some of the internal squad dynamics, conversations.

I began writing down kind of short stories about my experiences a few years later. I don’t have any regrets from my time in the Marines except I wish I would have kept a journal. Even little things, like how I was feeling about getting promoted, would have helped.

Q: You made some other style choices in the book. For example, there are not a lot of acronyms.

A: It was an intentional choice to use words so that someone who’s not familiar with military jargon could read it and have a pretty good idea of what’s going on. Even things like ranks, most civilians don’t understand things like rank structure. There is an understanding of what’s behind those terms if you’re in the military or served in the military. It is easier for civilians to understand but it also cuts out some of the nuance and depth. The scene where I was screaming at the regimental sergeant major, and he didn’t do anything wrong, a civilian might not get that, where a veteran or military member would be “Oh my god, this corporal just smashed a handset and screamed at a regimental sergeant major?”

Q: You didn’t provide a lot of analysis or big-picture context of world events surrounding your experience. What could you share regarding your views on events such as the Iraq War’s end, ISIS and the recent Afghanistan exit?

A: I know when ISIS took over Ramadi, it felt very disappointing. When I was in Iraq it was post-Anbar Awakening. We were one of the last active duty infantry units in the country. We hadn’t really won, but things were on the right track. The police and Army had things mostly under control and the insurgency was pretty much wiped out. It felt like things were moving in the right direction. I felt much less disappointed or surprised when the Taliban took over Afghanistan this past year. It never seemed like the Afghanistan National Army was going to be able to hold on to the country. The locals in Helmand province were so disaffected with NATO forces and the Army. They just wanted to be left alone but were put in a really tough spot between NATO forces and the Taliban. They would just tell us, you guys are going to leave but the Taliban are never going to leave.

[hr]

Originally published by Military Times, our sister publication. 

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President Joe Biden will soon present Medals of Honor to three soldiers for actions in Iraq and Afghanistan in the coming weeks, according to a source and a Washington Post report.

The three recipients will be:

• Sgt. 1st Class Alwyn Cashe, who died of burns sustained in October 2005 after rescuing, one-by-one, six soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter from a burning Bradley Fighting Vehicle that struck an IED near Samarra, Iraq.

• Master Sgt. Earl Plumlee, a Green Beret who played a pivotal role in fighting off a complex suicide attack at FOB Ghazni, Afghanistan, in August 2013.
•  
• Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Celiz, an Army Ranger who died of wounds received in Paktia Province, Afghanistan, during a firefight with Taliban militants in July 2018.

The Washington Post first reported the pending ceremony. A friend of the Cashe family confirmed the award when reached by Army Times. White House officials declined to comment on the awards, but a formal announcement was expected as early as Wednesday evening.

All three soldiers previously received valor awards for their actions — Cashe and Plumlee were awarded the Silver Star, and Celiz received a Bronze Star with V device.

Cashe’s award is long overdue, according to many observers. He will be the first Black service member to receive the Medal of Honor for events during the Global War on Terrorism.

Cashe’s efforts to rescue his soldiers resulted in second and third degree burns over nearly 75 percent of his body, ultimately leading to his death. Witnesses said that even as the heat burned his uniform and body armor off of him, Cashe ignored the pain to continue pulling his men out of the fire.

Originally, his command rapidly moved to award him the Silver Star.

But after learning the full extent of Cashe’s actions, his battalion commander, now-Lt. Gen. Gary Brito, soon launched a campaign to upgrade the award. It took more than a decade for Cashe’s supporters to win over Army officials and lawmakers in order to clear administrative barriers for the award.

In November 2020, Congress removed the final hurdle when it passed legislation authorizing Cashe to receive the nation’s highest award for valor, but the Trump administration did not award the medal.

[hr]

Originally published on Military Times, our sister publication.

“I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

Patrick Henry, a gifted orator and major figure in the American Revolution, in a speech on March 23, 1775, to the Second Virginia Convention at St. John’s Henrico Parish Church in Richmond, Virginia

“Please remain. You give me the pictures and I’ll give you the war.”

Newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst to Frederic Remington, his artist in Cuba, in 1897 after Remington, finding no Spanish atrocities there and no scenes worth illustrating, had cabled: “There is no trouble here. There will be no war. I wish to return.”

“Hello Central! Give Me No Man’s Land…”

A 1918 song, introduced by Al Jolson in the Broadway musical Sinbad, that recounts the story of a young
child attempting to call her father on the Western Front after her mother has gone to bed

“Give me five years and you will not recognize Germany again.”

A line in a speech Adolf Hitler gave during his rise to power in the early 1930s, famously memorialized
in a photograph of a stenciled sign posted outside the bombed-out remains of Aachen, Germany, in 1945

“Give me a gas mask, I can’t stand the smell of Nazis.”

Signs carried by some of the 100,000 demonstrators who gathered outside Madison Square Garden in
New York City on February 20, 1939, to protest a rally organized by the German American Bund, the largest pro-Nazi organization in the United States

“Dammit, Brad, just give me 400,000 gallons of gasoline and I’ll put you inside Germany in two days.”

General George S. Patton Jr., the commander of the Third Army, angrily complaining in August 1944 to Lieutenant General Omar N. Bradley, the commander of the First Army, about being sidelined by severe fuel shortages

“Give me ten thousand Filipinos and I shall conquer the world!”

General Douglas MacArthur during the U.S. liberation of Manila, the capital of the Philippines, in 1945

“Give me the horse.”

British prime minister Winston Churchill, warning of “such awful agencies as the atomic bomb” on July 10, 1951, in a speech to the Royal College of Physicians in London

“The light is at the end of the tunnel, just give me a hundred thousand more.”

General William C. Westmoreland, the commander of U.S. forces in the Vietnam War, as quoted in 1991
by General Norman Schwarzkopf Jr., who served under Westmoreland in Vietnam

“Give me the lesser of evils.”

President Lyndon B. Johnson, instructing Secretary of Defense Clark Clifford in 1968 to reevaluate the nation’s involvement in the Vietnam War following Westmoreland’s request for 206,000 reinforcements

“Give me a few hours.”

Brigadier General Dwight D. Eisenhower on December 15, 1941, when General George Marshall, the U.S. Army’s chief of staff, summoned him to the War Department and asked him to recommend a “general line of action” in response to the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor

“Give me a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers, and I do better with that than I do with torture.”

Retired U.S. Marine Corps general James Mattis, as quoted by President Donald Trump in 2016, when asked whether the administration should bring back the practice of waterboarding in military and CIA interrogations

“Give me $50,000—here’s some names of some people we’ve recruited.”

Former CIA officer turned KGB double agent Aldrich Ames describing what he called “my little scam” with the Soviet Union in a 1999 interview

Shot Heard Round the World
I was surprised to see history being revised in the September 2021 issue [“A Turn for the Worse,” by Douglas L. Gifford] when I saw, not once but twice, that the “shot heard round the world” had been moved from Lexington Green to the North Bridge at Concord, Mass. Hopefully there are enough people in Massachusetts, especially the Lexington area, who fired off memos protesting this infringement on their heritage. The reason the minuteman statue is at Lexington Green is because the first shots were fired there, the first casualties occurred there, and it was clear New Englanders meant to fight.

Mark Prose
Oracle, Ariz.

Editor responds: The minutemen at Lexington Green did fire first on the British on April 19, 1775, eight Americans paying for that resistance with their lives. But the first organized battle followed at Concord’s North Bridge, and the phrase “shot heard round the world” derives from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Concord Hymn.” Here’s the first stanza: “By the rude bridge that arched the flood / Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled / Here once the embattled farmers stood / And fired the shot heard round the world.” Emerson wrote the poem for the dedication of a monument to the Battle of Concord, the location of his “rude bridge.”

‘None of us expected the Afghan National Army or Afghan National Police to put up much of a fight, but the way the citizens were abandoned and the resurgent Taliban handed billions of dollars in first-rate military equipment is truly sad’

Afghanistan
I always read my history magazines in the order I receive them. I opened up the September 2021 issue on Aug. 17, 2021, not more than 48 hours after Kabul fell to the Taliban. The timeliness of this issue was no doubt planned by your editors, but the reality of reading the issue while watching thousands of Afghans try to flee their country really hit home. I have been to Afghanistan on a few occasions throughout Operation Enduring Freedom. I am sickened by the way our troop withdrawal turned out. None of us expected the Afghan National Army or Afghan National Police to put up much of a fight, but the way the citizens were abandoned and the resurgent Taliban handed billions of dollars in first-rate military equipment is truly sad. Too many American, NATO and Afghan military and police lives were given for it to end this way.

Dave Stanley
Bethesda, Md.

Brothers-in-Arms
Paul X. Rutz’s article [“Honor Before Glory,” September 2021] on the tragic death of Pat Tillman in Afghanistan brings up an interesting dilemma—brothers serving together in combat zones. Back in November 1942 the five Sullivan brothers, all serving aboard USS Juneau, died together when the light cruiser was sunk. Since then the military has frowned on brothers serving together.

Amid the Vietnam War I returned to the States from a tour in South Korea. Because Korea is considered a hardship tour, when my artillery unit at Fort Bliss, Texas, was scheduled to deploy to South Vietnam, I didn’t have to go. However, wanting to stay with my unit, I signed waivers at my new station and went with them. My older brother, Joe (19 years my senior), also volunteered to go to Vietnam, and I got to see him there. Joe was a Korean War veteran, wounded in that war while serving as a combat engineer. I had not seen him for a few years, so it was a nice surprise to see him in Vietnam.

In regard to Pat Tillman, unfortunately in wartime friendly fire does occur, more often than we would like. All wartime deaths are tragic, of course, but there is something very unsettling about friendly fire. I am sad to say my artillery unit accidently hit our own troops in a couple of instances. Some faulted unreliable maps or miscommunication from our fire-direction section to our 8-inch guns. As several articles in Military History have pointed out, when these horrible incidents happen, they often involve green troops. When my artillery unit tried to get jungle training, we went out on patrols we were not familiar with, and on one such patrol a young officer was killed by his own men who mistook him for a Viet Cong. After that our patrols ceased. We left it to the infantry units who were more qualified.

Tom R. Kovach
Nevis, Minn.

Send letters via email to militaryhistory@historynet.com or to Editor, Military History, 901 N. Glebe Road, Fifth Floor, Arlington, VA 22203. Please include name, address and phone number. This article was published in the January 2022 issue of Military History.

A Global War on Terror memorial made up of over 7,000 dog tags representing every fallen servicemember during the war will be on display at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. Nov. 11.

The Fallen Heroes Memorial, sponsored by Veterans and Athletes United and the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, will be displayed from 7 a.m. until 6:30 p.m. Nov. 11, during which the names of the 7063 servicemembers who made the ultimate sacrifice during the Global War on Terror will be read.

“We hope to bring awareness of the heavy price paid for this flag and to keep our country free,” James Howard, Founder and President of VAU said in a press release. “We hope our memorial provides an opportunity for visitors to honor, reflect, and heal; To remember all those who gave their lives defending this great country in the War on Terror.”

The memorial is meant to represent the American flag when it’s draped over the casket of a fallen servicemember, standing at exactly 6 feet tall and 28 inches wide. And while traditional American flags have 50 white stars, the stars on the memorial have been colored gold in homage to gold star families nationwide.

Veterans & Athletes United is an all-volunteer non-profit organization that provides support to veterans with disabilities and works to honor fallen heroes specifically from the War on Terror. The Tunnel to Towers Foundation is a non-profit organization honoring the sacrifice of firefighter Stephen Siller who laid down his life to save others on Sept. 11, 2001.

The memorial has been displayed in over 60 locations nationwide since its creation in 2018, with proceeds going toward gold star family organizations and the GWOT Memorial Foundation’s mission to build a national memorial at the Capital.

[hr]

Originally published by Military Times, our sister publication.

Hailed as one of the great battle captains of our time, Gen. David H. Petraeus developed an interest in the Vietnam War as a cadet at the U.S. Military Academy and examined the war’s effect on the Army’s senior leadership in his doctoral dissertation at Princeton. Those lessons stayed with him when he assumed command of U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

After graduating from West Point in 1974, Petraeus spent the better part of the next four decades rising to high positions in the Army. He commanded the 101st Airborne Division during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and was later dispatched to head up Multinational Security Transition Command-Iraq, where he assumed responsibility for organizing, training and equipping Iraqi security forces.

Appointed commander of Multinational Force-Iraq in 2007, Petraeus presided over the “surge” strategy implemented to stabilize the country and avert a sectarian civil war. He also headed U.S. Central Command and the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan before retiring from the Army in 2011 to serve as CIA director.

In an interview with Vietnam contributor Warren Wilkins, Petraeus discussed the Vietnam War, its influence on the postwar military and the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Q: What piqued your interest in the Vietnam War?

Vietnam was the defining conflict of the 1960s and early 1970s. Those were very formative years for me as I was in high school and then at West Point for the final 10 years of the war. It seemed natural, I guess, that I should study the conflict that had so gripped and roiled our country during that time.

Beyond that, it appeared to me that the impact of Vietnam on the senior military’s thinking about the use of force was very substantial. Given that advice on the use of force is arguably the most important task of senior military leaders, I thought I ought to explore what they had taken from their service during the war, how it influenced their thinking and advice on the use of force, whether that influence was fully warranted and what the implications of that influence were for our military forces.

I figured that such an exploration would be instructive and stimulating and that it might also provide intellectual capital on which I could draw if I was ever in a position to give advice on the use of force. Needless to say, that situation did materialize, and the research and thought for my Ph.D. dissertation did, indeed, provide considerable intellectual capital to help me when I ultimately was one of those providing options and recommendations to the president.

Do you feel your appointment to command the surge in Iraq cast you in the same role as Gen. Creighton Abrams in 1968—a “savior general” dispatched to reverse a war many believed the U.S. was losing?

I actually saw my role as more akin to that of Gen. [Matthew] Ridgway taking over the embattled and retreating 8th Army in Korea, halting the enemy’s momentum, restoring morale and confidence in the American forces and then conducting an aggressive campaign of counteroffensive operations that ultimately established the front lines of the war roughly along the 38th parallel, north of Seoul. Ridgway’s leadership turned around a failing effort and achieved an outcome that, while short of the kind of victory once thought possible, was still broadly acceptable to America’s leaders and citizens.

By contrast, and whether completely fair or not, my sense was always that Gen. Abrams’ main task in Vietnam was to figure out how to draw down U.S. forces, hand off the fight to the South Vietnamese and embark on a path to an American withdrawal, without the forces of the South collapsing in the process.

Some scholars have, of course, asserted that Abrams increased emphasis on a true counterinsurgency approach and reduced what was described as the “attrition warfare” approach of Gen. [William] Westmoreland. There is some substance to that, to be sure. However, as your excellent article on Gen. Westmoreland’s command [“When Strategy Isn’t Enough: General Westmoreland and the War in Vietnam,” On Point—Journal of Army History] showed, there actually was a reasonable amount of emphasis on a counterinsurgency approach during Westmoreland’s time, albeit with South Vietnamese forces and U.S. advisers—rather than with U.S. combat forces, which generally conducted search and destroy operations—taking the lead whenever possible in “clear, hold, build and transition” operations that characterize counterinsurgency.

Critically, those operations —“clear, hold, build and transition”— were the most significant element of our approach with U.S. and Iraqi forces during the “surge” in Iraq, together with a tenacious pursuit of “irreconcilables” and the promotion of reconciliation with rank-and-file insurgents and militia members.

Of note concerning Vietnam, of course, the CORDS [Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support] pacification effort began a full year before the transition from Gen. Westmoreland to Gen. Abrams. I should note that then Brig. Gen. Bill Knowlton, whose daughter I would marry in 1974, was the deputy to CORDS chief Bob Komer during Knowlton’s first year in Vietnam.

And Gen. Abrams’ approach with US units, at the least, did not change that dramatically from the Westmoreland era, when he assumed command, though the enemy main-force threat during his time became increasingly North Vietnamese forces rather than the Viet Cong.

In fact, the Battle of Hamburger Hill, one of the most intense and controversial of the search-and-destroy operations during the entire war, took place about 11 months after Abrams assumed command in Vietnam. Tragically, the hill on which so many lives were lost was surrendered within weeks of the battle. To be fair, the commander of the 101st Airborne Division explained that he had fought for the hill because that’s where the enemy was, not because it had any operational significance.  

In any event, with all that in mind, when I was informed in late December 2006 that I would be nominated to command the “surge” in Iraq that was to begin within a month or a month and ahalf, I asked one of the many great military historians at Fort Leavenworth, where I was assigned at the time, to research Gen. Ridgway’s assumption of command in Korea rather than Gen. Abrams’s assumption of command in Vietnam. Coincidentally, perhaps, Gen. Ridgway and I are among the five individuals featured in Victor Davis Hanson’s 2013 book, Savior Generals: How Five Great Commanders Saved Wars That Were Lost—From Ancient Greece to Iraq.

Vietnam, you noted, profoundly affected the military’s postwar mindset. Some senior officers concluded that the military should avoid fighting low intensity “irregular wars” altogether. The Gulf War in 1990-91 seemed to confirm that institutional bias. You concluded, however, that the U.S. was more likely to be engaged in similar conflicts in the future and that the military had better be prepared to fight them. Do you still feel that?

I fully appreciated the understandable reasons why senior military leaders might harbor an aversion to engaging in irregular warfare again after Vietnam and would prefer the tank-on-tank-in-the-desert combat—in largely open terrain devoid of civilians— that characterized most of the battles in Operation Desert Storm.

I feared, however, that we would not have a choice in that policymakers would commit American forces to irregular conflicts despite our misgivings about engaging in them and regardless of our level of preparation for them. That proved to be a valid concern.

In fact, in the 1980s, we were already engaged in such warfare, supporting counterinsurgency campaigns in El Salvador—which I visited twice during a summer temporary duty stint in 1986 as special assistant to Gen. Jack Galvin, the commander of U.S. Southern Command and the most significant mentor I had during my career— and Colombia. Additionally, we were clandestinely supporting insurgents in Nicaragua.

And, in the 1990s and early 2000s, we would go on to conduct irregular operations in Somalia and peace enforcement operations in Haiti, Bosnia and Kosovo. And then, of course, we commenced operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Policymakers didn’t ask when the decisions were made to go to war in those countries whether we were prepared for the operations in which we ultimately became very heavily engaged.

Finally, we are still engaged in irregular warfare today, not just in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also in Syria, various locations in Africa and a handful of other locations, although in numbers that are now quite sustainable and in operations that largely consist of advising, assisting, supporting and enabling indigenous, rather than American, forces to assume responsibility for the fighting on the frontlines.

Beyond that, I am pretty certain that we will continue to have to engage in various tasks associated with irregular warfare, even as the paramount focus of our military understandably shifts to the endeavors necessitated by an era of renewed great power rivalries, in particular in the so-called Indo-Pacific region.

In 2006, you directed the drafting of a new counterinsurgency manual for the Army and Marine Corps. Were operations in Vietnam a starting point for the manual?

We certainly revisited U.S. operations in Vietnam during the drafting of the new field manual; however, the more important experiences from which we sought to distill lessons were our ongoing operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Philippine Islands, as well as experiences of the U.S. in El Salvador, which featured a particularly impressive comprehensive civil-military campaign.

We also considered the post-World War II Philippines, the British, especially T.E. Lawrence, in the post-World War I Arab world and Iraq, Britain’s post-World War II operations in Malaysia, Oman and Northern Ireland, and the French experience in Vietnam and Algeria. And, of course, we studied U.S. efforts to counter communist forces under Mao Zedong in post-World War II China.

Did the 2007 surge of over 25,000 U.S. troops in Iraq have similarities to counterinsurgency operations in Vietnam?

In general, the situation in Iraq was very different from that in Vietnam. That said, there certainly were a few similarities between Vietnam and our operations in Iraq, in that we had air supremacy over the operations on the ground in Iraq and over South Vietnam, though not the North, certainly.

The threats to helicopters in Vietnam were considerably greater than were the threats to our aircraft in Iraq, though some were shot down in Iraq to be sure. Our overall technology, equipment, weapons systems, soldier kit—including night vision goggles, body armor, weaponry and optics—and so forth were generally much better than those of our adversaries.

Nevertheless our enemies in Iraq made very good use of sophisticated improvised explosive devices, suicide bombers, snipers, rockets, and were tenacious fighters—just as the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese made creative use of mortars, RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades], booby traps, mines, and snipers while also fighting with great determination and courage.

How were they different?

The differences were much more numerous and significant. First and foremost was the mindset of President Bush. Unlike what I suspect was increasingly in the minds of Presidents Johnson and Nixon over time—that the war in Vietnam was unwinnable—President Bush rejected the assessment that we could not achieve our objectives, even when the bulk of his advisers believed that to be the case. He decided to surge, and thanks to the great work of our military and their coalition and Iraqi counterparts, his view was validated.

The enemy situation in Iraq was also quite different from that of Vietnam. The situation in Iraq at the start of the surge in early 2007 was no longer just a Sunni Arab terrorist and insurgency campaign against the Shia Arab-led government that the Sunnis believed had disenfranchised them. By then, the situation in Iraq had evolved into the early stages of a Sunni-Shia Civil War in mixed areas where the two groups lived together, such as in Baghdad and its surrounding areas.

The battles in Vietnam in the late 1960s and early 1970s increasingly were with North Vietnamese regular forces, of course, for which there was no comparable element in Iraq. Moreover, the terrain and population density in Iraq also were very different. In contrast to Vietnam, which featured a large rural population, dense jungle and a mountainous border, the bulk of the Iraqi population was concentrated in cities and towns along and between the Tigris, Euphrates, Diyala and other rivers in that country.

this article first appeared in vietnam magazine

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While there were operations in dispersed villages in the desert, most of our operations in Iraq were in fairly populated areas. Our biggest battles were in the biggest cities, similar perhaps to the fighting in Hue and Saigon during the Vietnam War.

Additionally, we fought the war in Iraq with a professional force, not a largely draftee force as in Vietnam. All of our men and women in uniform had volunteered for multiple years of service or more. Many of us, regardless of rank, served multiple tours in Iraq and really came to understand the situation in a granular, nuanced way. We learned, for example, how to develop important relationships with our Iraqi counterparts and partners. This was absolutely invaluable.

Westmoreland preferred to delegate responsibility for securing the civilian population to indigenous forces. In Iraq you argued that U.S. units could not simply “commute to the fight” and decided to base them in populated areas. Why?

The decision to use U.S. and to a degree coalition forces, typically in partnership with Iraq forces—but often in the lead—to secure the people by “living with them” and conducting clear, hold, build and gradually transition operations reflected the unique circumstances and situation in Iraq, which was on the verge of a full-blown sectarian—Sunni-Shia—civil war.

We had to break the cycle of sectarian violence and improve security for the people, as nothing else was possible without that. As always in such a situation, security is the foundation on which all else is built. Military action was not sufficient, in and of itself, but without it nothing else was possible. So we had to dramatically reduce the violence and substantially improve security for the people, and only our forces could do that.

In addition to that reality, I also knew that if we didn’t have demonstrable results to report to Congress six months after I took command, the residual support for the war in Iraq in the U.S. Senate, in particular, could lead to constraints on our campaign and, possibly, even to an effort to defund the war. Given that reality and the fact that many of the Iraqi Army and police units had been so seriously degraded by the violence that they were not fully effective, our forces had to take the lead in operations to improve security. And to do that, we recognized that we had to reverse the previous approach of consolidating U.S. forces on large bases and return to the neighborhoods.

As my guidance explained, the human terrain was the decisive terrain. We had to provide improved security for the people. And we could only do that by living with them. In Baghdad, for example, we established 77 new locations—Joint Security Stations, Combat Outposts, and other bases—to provide better security for the Iraqis and to break the cycle of sectarian violence.

That approach worked. By the end of the surge in the summer of 2008, violence in Iraq was down by some 85 percent. Sensational attacks—car bombs and suicide vest bombs— had also been dramatically reduced, and all other metrics concerning security issues—civilian casualties, Iraqi and coalition casualties, etc.— also were all significantly improved. And that improvement, in turn, enabled the reconstitution and expansion of Iraqi security forces, repair of damaged or destroyed infrastructure, revival of markets, reopening of schools and health facilities, establishment of local governance, business development and even the reopening of the Baghdad amusement and water parks and soccer leagues. It also helped with the passage of some key laws in the Iraqi Council of Representatives, though achievements in that realm were to prove more elusive than were those in the security arena.

Whom do you admire from the Vietnam-era military?

I must say that those I admired from the Vietnam period were, first and foremost, the young men who were drafted to fight a war about which there were increasing questions, but who served faithfully nonetheless and were then treated horribly by their fellow American citizens when they returned home. That was a disgraceful episode in our history, and I have sought to thank Vietnam veterans ever since then in public venues where they have been present.

Interestingly, it was Vietnam veterans who worked harder than any other element of our citizenry to ensure that those who returned home from Iraq and Afghanistan were given the recognition and thanks that those who came home from Vietnam never received.

Beyond my admiration for those who carried a rucksack on the ground, in a tough war, against a determined enemy in very difficult terrain and weather conditions, I focused on those who led platoons, companies and battalions, especially those who did so particularly valiantly. This was, most likely, because I was a cadet or young officer when I studied operations in Vietnam. I was fascinated by books about both the French and American experiences on the ground. I read everything I could find about those operations and developed enormous admiration for those leading tactical operations.

I read and reread, for example, Seven Firefights in Vietnam, one of which was about Lt. Col. Hal Moore’s 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, and its battle in the Ia Drang in late 1965. That battle was later the subject of Moore’s exceptional book, We Were Soldiers Once…and Young: Ia Drang-the Battle that Changed the War in Vietnam. I was so impressed by Seven Firefights in Vietnam [published by the Army’s Office of the Chief of Military History] that decades later, in 2006, I asked the Combat Studies Institute at Fort Leavenworth to produce a similar product on Afghanistan and Iraq when I was the commander of the Combined Arms Center at Fort Leavenworth.

In sum, then, perhaps given that I was a company and field grade officer when I most intently studied Vietnam, I most admired those who commanded tactical units—especially those like captains Paul Bucha, Bill Carpenter and Jack Jacobs, each of whom had earned the Medal of Honor or Distinguished Service Cross and was assigned to West Point when I was a cadet.

Ultimately, I did study the senior military and civilian leaders of that period as well, and ever since I have engaged in an internal—and sometimes external—debate about what we might have done differently and better, in particular whether geographic considerations and various features of the forces and leadership of North and South Vietnam meant that our effort there was, at the end of the day, unwinnable and also unsustainable over time, given the cost in blood and treasure.

What are the enduring lessons of Vietnam?

One lesson has to be to truly understand the strategic significance, context and nature of a possible commitment of military forces. Likewise, we need to appreciate in a very nuanced way the country where the commitment will take place—something we lacked in both Iraq and Afghanistan for a number of years—undertake very thorough preparation of the units and individuals deploying for a particular campaign and pursue personnel policies that enable the development of understanding by those fighting the war.

It has often been noted that we refought Vietnam every year for over a decade as result of our draft and individual personnel replacement system. Beyond that, we must also recognize when the conduct of our partners may jeopardize the achievement of progress and a desired outcome etc.

Of course, we had to relearn many of those lessons in Iraq and Afghanistan, though I’d like to think that we did prove to be a learning organization over the years by dramatically improving how we prepared leaders, units and soldiers for deployment to those wars. Complementing those efforts, we developed considerable understanding of the situation and greatly enhanced our organizational capabilities, especially in the intelligence realm, and structures.

Similarly, we improved our equipment, weapons systems and individual kit, and we changed how we fought the wars over time, particularly with respect to advances in drone technology, precision air munitions, intelligence fusion and so forth.  Together these initiatives now enable us to help our partners on the ground combat their enemies, so that our forces do not have to do the fighting on the front lines. 

Beyond all that, of course, we dramatically changed how we operated when we commenced the surge.  I have often noted that the surge that mattered most in Iraq was not the surge of forces, it was the surge of ideas—namely the 180-degree change from consolidating our forces on big bases and handing off security tasks to our Iraqi counterparts to going back into the neighborhoods and assuming responsibility for securing the people. Providing security also included aggressively promoting reconciliation with rank-and-file members of the Sunni insurgent and Shia militia groups while intensifying the effort to capture or kill their irreconcilable leaders. 

The results that our young men and women and their coalition and Iraqi counterparts achieved were dramatic. Indeed, our efforts resulted in a substantial reduction in violence that only improved in the subsequent three and a half years after the surge, even as our forces were steadily drawn down.

This positive trend continued until, tragically, the prime minister with whom we had worked to bring the fabric of Iraqi society back together began pursuing highly sectarian initiatives right after our final combat forces departed in December 2011. That once again tore the fabric apart and alienated the Sunni Arabs. And as the Iraqi forces focused on confronting huge Sunni demonstrations, they took their eyes off the Islamic State, which was able to reconstitute, move into Syria and exploit the civil war there to build the kind of strength, numbers and capabilities that enabled it to establish a caliphate on the ground in northeastern Syria and northern and western Iraq. It was very sad to see all this from my position as director of the CIA by that time.

I should also share the most important lesson I learned about wars “among the people.” It was captured on a sign that we always had posted on the front wall of the operations center in the 101st Airborne Division in Mosul and in each subsequent ops center. The sign asked, “Will this operation take more bad guys off the street than it creates by its conduct?” If the answer to that question was “No,” then we were supposed to go sit under a tree until the thought of that operation passed. The same question should be asked of policies, of course.

In any event, I think that many episodes—operational ones as well as policy decisions, such as the firing of Iraq’s army without telling them how we would enable them to continue to provide for themselves and their families—validated the importance of that question. There were many additional operations and policies in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan that validated the concept that that question captured, as well.

It is, in fact, very likely the most important question of all that we should ask when contemplating committing America’s sons and daughters to combat, and one we should repeatedly ask again and again once in combat. V

This interview appeared in the October 2021 issue of Vietnam magazine.

Twenty years ago on a sunny September day, civil aviation as we knew it changed forever. So, too, did the lives of all Americans, as the horrifying spectacle of airliners crashing into the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon made it obvious the world would never be the same.

On that day then-25-year-old Heather “Lucky” Penney was a new first lieutenant serving as a training officer with the 121st Fighter Squadron of the District of Columbia Air National Guard, based at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington. The first woman to serve in her ANG unit, she flew F-16Cs on training missions in preparation for combat. When the 121st received word of the second Trade Center strike, and a half-hour later the Pentagon was hit, it became clear the United States was under attack. With news of a fourth airliner possibly headed toward Washington, Penney and her wingman, Colonel Marc “Sass” Sasseville, scramble-started their F-16s and took off to intercept it.

Their mission was simple but sobering: Find the airliner and take it down by any means necessary. Since there had been no time to arm their F-16s, that essentially meant they would be flying a kamikaze mission, ramming their jets into the airliner. “I’m going to go for the cockpit,” Sass told her. “I’ll take the tail,” Lucky replied.

Their flight path from Andrews took them over the Pentagon, and “there was no way to avoid seeing the smoke that was billowing out of the building,” she said. “I didn’t dwell on that because we had more important things to do.” Penney described feeling disconnected from her emotions as she focused on the mission: “It was a completely surreal experience.”

She and Sasseville headed northwest into Pennsylvania, searching for the airliner but careful not to go too far. “We went out as far as Sass thought was reasonable to ensure that we had sanitized the airspace far out enough,” she said, “but then we needed to turn back home so that we could get over D.C. and make sure we weren’t flanked.” It would be some time before she learned that the airliner they were searching for, United Flight 93, had been taken down by a courageous group of passengers. Penney called them the real heroes because they were willing to sacrifice themselves, but then so was she.

Asked about the lasting effects of 9/11, she said, “It fundamentally altered the vector of history, and we are all living with the impact of those events today. And I think that many of the tragedies that we see unfolding today are directly traceable…back to that moment in time.” Penney laments the freedoms that Americans have sacrificed in the name of security, pointing out that “being American is about adhering to certain beliefs and ideals and dreams that bind us all together….But with that comes risk, and if we’re unwilling to accept risk, then we lose something that makes us essentially Americans.”

“I think the challenge we all have is to remain connected to those ideals, to those beliefs, to that kind of courage and live that out in our daily lives of service,” said Penney. “And remember that there are things in this world that are more important than ourselves…that are more important than security.”

this article first appeared in AVIATION HISTORY magazine

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“Are you ready? Okay, let’s roll.”

The final words of Todd Beamer, one of the four men believed to have overpowered hijackers on United Airlines Flight 93, match the sustained tone of National Geographic’s latest six-part memorialization of the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

9/11: One Day in America, an all-new, comprehensive retelling of the infamous day that launched a forever war and shocked the world, can only be described as heartbreakingly thorough. With never-before-seen footage and all-new interviews, the documentary series from the production team of Dan Lindsay and T.J. Martin (“Undefeated” and “LA 92”) is a devastating yet mesmerizing portrait of America on perhaps the nation’s worst day in generations.

While the documentary begins like many accounts that preceded it — imagery of New York City firefighters and businessmen who worked at the World Trade Center — little time elapses before realizing this series is different.

Audio and video footage spans past and present narratives while highlighting vantage points that range from the casual New Yorker standing horrified outside of a taxi to the frantic personnel inside the actual towers.

Calls previously released from American Flight 11 are included, as is an account of one man working in the WTC whose sister and niece were onboard the plane that hit the North Tower. There’s the fire chief who lost his brother after giving him one final order, a mother who hoped her kind-hearted son could be a killer when he needed to be, a security officer who sang people to safety, a man buried alive and left behind, a fighter pilot faced with a decision to kill innocent Americans — and herself with them — before another plane reached its target.

Still, perhaps the most beautiful aspect of this oft-agonizing and meticulous series lies not within the footage of witnesses, but in the moments of hope and resiliency that underscore those fateful events and the days that followed.

Viewers will watch horrified one moment as clouds of ash, smoke and debris swallow screams and people alike, only to be rejuvenated the next by a woman, who should have died, sitting in a hospital bed happily showcasing a gift from her fiancé, or even a former Marine-turned-firefighter recounting the heroism of a colleague who saved his secretary.

Every viewer may know how the story ends, but this immersive retelling leaves no doubt as to why that day 20 years ago should remain prominent in our memories.

“This was my world, never to be the same again,” one interviewee says.

That same sentiment will no doubt resonate with viewers.

National Geographic’s 9/11: One Day in America is currently available to stream on Hulu, and will air in three-episode segments on the National Geographic channel on Sept. 10 and 11.

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Originally published on Military Times, our sister publication.

Spc. Bryan Stern was hungover. It was a sunny near-autumn day, but after a night of partying to bid a friend farewell, he didn’t want to be anywhere but bed.

Stationed in Lower Manhattan with the 227th Military Intelligence Company housed at 7 World Trade Center, he was riding the subway to work from Brooklyn, wishing he had stayed home on September 11, 2001.

“I was having a slow, slow morning,” he told Military Times. “I was just kind of in my own little world.”

Struggling, he continued his daily routine, making a much-needed stop at a street cart where he’d order a bagel and coffee each morning.

“My friend, I’m so happy you’re okay,” the cart owner said. Not feeling particularly fine, Stern asked what he meant.

The cart owner pointed up, at the flaming hole in the side of 1 World Trade Center.

Nearly 3,000 miles away at Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego, California, Lt. Amy McGrath was sound asleep when her sister called to tell her to turn on the news. A plane had hit the World Trade Center.

“I hung up and thought to myself that it was probably just a Cessna,” she said.

Unable to reach anyone using his early-era cell phone, Stern made his way to the building, hoping he might be able to assist with whatever had happened.

“I figured people needed help,” he said. “I have a lot of medical training, so I made my way down and I was just north of the South Tower, right in between them.”

Then a plane smashed into the second tower.

“I felt it on my face,” he said. “The exit hole of the second tower was right above me. I thought, ‘Holy shit, I’m going to get clobbered with all this debris.”

McGrath turned on her television just in time to see footage of the plane making impact. Her command called and asked her to head to the base.

“I got my flight suit on, put my flight boots on and got in my car,” she said. “Because I lived so close to the gate, I was one of the first air crew on the base that morning.”

Staff Sgt. Stefan Still was stationed at Fort Myer with the Army’s Old Guard, just outside Washington, D.C., and three miles from the Pentagon.

“It was just an absolutely beautiful morning,” he said. “It’s kind of the first morning where the temperature had broken and it first started to feel like fall.”

After PT, while waiting for assignments, he and members of his platoon were listening to the radio when they heard about the crash in New York. They switched a television to CNN.

And then they felt their building shake. Flight 77 had crashed into the Pentagon.

“As I’m opening the door, I can already see the smoke coming up,” he said.

Still instructed his unit to call their loved ones and tell them they were okay. He phoned his wife at the time, who was still sleeping. She screamed as she turned on the TV.

“It’s a very surreal feeling to see F-16s churning and burning above the barracks when you’re underneath combat air patrol for the nation’s capital,” Still said. “It’s not something that you should ever really see.”

Col. Randy Rosin was stationed at U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Florida. While he believed the first plane crash into the side of the North Tower was an accident, when the second tower was struck, he quickly began to piece together exactly what was happening.

“We had all this activity that was going on, this chatter — they called it the ‘big wedding,’” he said. “In August, there was an intelligence assessment that came out, that said that something big is going to happen. But they placed it in Africa not New York.”

When the second plane hit the south tower, he began to realize that perhaps the intel about this large-scale al-Qaida event was correct about everything but the location.

Rosin, who had previously worked on plans for a response to the USS Cole bombing — the al-Qaida suicide attack against the guided missile destroyer on Oct. 12, 2000 in Yemen — recognized that the two attacks could be connected.

“I started to think, ‘Holy shit. This is the big wedding.’”

Stern was injured and bleeding from surface cuts. People were screaming, running in every direction. Medics treated him, and he returned to the base of the towers to continue helping. A few workers in the towers even began jumping, hopelessness spread, and panic ensued.

Then the second tower began to fall.

“I ran north,” Stern said. “My big idea was to get onto the West Side Highway kind of and bolt. There are no words to describe it. I remember thinking I’m going to die, I hope that I’m found, and I hope it’s not too painful.”

He found a car to hide under, and as the plume of debris washed over everything in sight, Stern waited to die. Minutes or maybe hours later, he emerged, with a mouth full of soot, and made his way back towards Ground Zero. Along the way, he spotted a friend.

Looking for a bathroom, the pair stumbled across the only building with lights on — 340 West Street, a Bloomberg office with a generator. With permission from a lingering employee, the pair worked to set up a mobile command center to direct survivors stuck in lower Manhattan to safety.

Stern stepped out for a cigarette when he noticed something odd.

“There’s a little city bus stop, and all the glass is gone,” he said. “I looked down and there’s this American flag. It’s all crumpled up and messed up, and had probably been hanging over a building somewhere before.”

He picked it up, hung it over the door of the building, and he and the friend called the Army to connect with survivors in the city.

“Just tell them to look for the flag,” they said.

McGrath, had never flown in combat, but was ordered to board a jet and take it to the edge of the runway, leave the engines running, and await further instruction.

“I played scenarios out in my head,” McGrath said. “[I wondered] ‘Could we escort first?’ We didn’t train for this. We were sort of making it up as we went along in the hopes that we would never have to do the unthinkable.”

The orders she expected were to shoot down any hijacked aircraft on the West Coast headed towards densely populated centers or key buildings — planes that were transporting civilians, American men, women and children.

It never came to that. After several hours, McGrath was relieved, but she knew this assignment was just the beginning of what was to come.

Still’s orders came the next day. His unit was one of several selected for recovery duty at the Pentagon.

“It’s one thing to see that on television,” he said. “But it’s another thing to actually pull up to the site itself. It’s still smoking, it’s still on fire.”

His job was to pull casualties from the wreckage. His unit worked the lower floors. He felt lucky because there the intact bodies were fewer.

“Most of what we were dealing with, we knew was a human at one point,” Still said. “But you could just disassociate yourself from what it was because it was just a foot or a hand you, as opposed to the higher floors. They were dealing with people that died of smoke inhalation.”

For Stern, Sept. 11 was a tipping point in his career and his life. He left the Army and recommissioned with the Navy, working with intelligence and special operations, and dedicated much of the last 20 years to homeland security.

Every day, when he leaves his house, however, he is reminded of that sunny Tuesday. The flag that served as a beacon for survivors at 340 West Street is prominently displayed in his living room. He recently reframed it, and it brought him straight back to lower Manhattan.

“It still smells,” he said. “It smelled like dust and dead people when I took it out of the frame. I had to go take a walk because it still smells like Ground Zero.”

Stern said that for years after 9/11, he was unable to go near construction sites because of the smell of the concrete and the sweat on the workers.

Reminders of the day can be difficult to contextualize for those who served.

“How do you transition back from seeing all of that to going home and seeing your family and seeing your wife and seeing the dog?” Still said. “There was a lot of anger, I think in my heart.”

Still, whose unit didn’t deploy to Afghanistan or Iraq, got out of the Army. He thought about rejoining so that he could be part of a combat unit, but ultimately chose to separate from service after two more years. He keeps in touch with members of the platoon he served with on Sept. 11.

He noted, however, the way that the events that followed the attack altered the fabric of the military changed.

“Everybody that signed up post-9/11, every single one of them knew they were going to war,” Still said. “I don’t know if I would have been the person that would have done that absolutely knowing 100 percent and I’m deploying to Afghanistan or Iraq soon after basic training.”

Reflecting on the last two decades of war, McGrath said the military has made great strides in inclusion and diversity that never would have come if not for 9/11.

“When we deployed to combat, we were the first women to deploy in these roles,” McGrath said. “We were very aware that we were the first, not only from a combat aircrew experience, but also the maintainers and the mechanics that came out. This was really the first time that a combat unit like ours was integrated with women actually doing combat.”

She said the way women stepped up into combat roles during the Global War on Terror is part of the reason why, in 2015, all military occupations across all four branches were opened up to women.

“Our performance in combat was a big part of why no one could make the argument effectively that we should keep these doors closed to women, to all these other jobs,” she said. “I’m not sure that would have happened had it not been for our combat time after 9/11.”

McGrath herself deployed to both Afghanistan and Iraq, retiring in 2017 at the rank of lieutenant colonel. In 2020, she challenged Sen. Mitch McConnell for his Kentucky seat and lost. But now she will teach national security studies at the college level.

After four administrations and nearly 20 years at war, President Joe Biden, committed to pulling U.S. troops out of Afghanistan this summer. The withdrawal and evacuation, which was finalized Aug. 31, leaves veterans of America’s longest war with questions.

“We are asking ourselves, did the sacrifices of our families, and those people who lost their lives and their families, who were our friends, was it all worth it? ” McGrath said.

In the span of a few weeks, the Afghan National Army ceded power to the Taliban and ISIS-K attacked evacuees, leaving 13 U.S. service members and 170 civilians dead.

“The gains of the Taliban have been happening for at least a decade,” McGrath said. “Did anybody think it would happen in in four days — a complete collapse of the Afghan government and the Taliban taking over the entire country? No.”

For Rosin, the events of August 2021 signal the end of an era. His entire immediate family has served in this war in some capacity, including his daughter.

“My wife did three tours with USAID and Afghanistan, I did a tour, our daughter did a tour,” he said. “It really disrupted our lives. And this was the inevitable outcome once we said we were going to leave.”

Now, McGrath advocates that to preserve the legacy of those that fought in the Global War on Terror is to prevent another 9/11.

“I want to remind people that their service mattered because our country hasn’t been attacked, in the same 9/11 style for the last 20 years from Afghanistan‚” she said. “I’m not sure that we could have said that had we not gone there, at least initially.”

While saddened, she doesn’t believe the events of the last month should take away from what the U.S. military set out to do twenty years ago.

“The initial reasons to go in after 9/11, were right and true,” McGrath said. “They had attacked our country, and they needed to be ousted. And I’m proud that we did that. We did it swiftly, we did it with the full backing of the American public, and not only did we do it with the full backing the American public, we did it with the full backing of the world.”

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Article originally published on Military Times, our sister publication.

During the broadcast of Super Bowl LIV in 2020 a three-minute commercial featured a boy with a football dashing past several current and former National Football League stars who encouragingly yell, “Take it to the house, kid!” amid cheerful music. In the middle of the ad the boy pauses, as does the music, and he gazes up at the statue of Arizona Cardinals safety Pat Tillman outside State Farm Stadium in Glendale. After the ad aired, a familiar debate bubbled up in the press and on social media. Was the NFL honoring or exploiting the memory of a generation’s most famous fallen soldier?

After Tillman walked away from football to join the Army in 2002, he refused to speak publicly about it, believing his enlistment spoke for itself. But circumstances took his life, and therefore his legacy, in directions he couldn’t have foreseen, from the invasion of Iraq to his preventable death in Afghanistan in 2004.

The events surrounding his final moments were initially obscured behind a smoke screen of medals, political praise and redacted documents before the truth came out he’d been killed by members of his own platoon. Even today, after a slew of investigations and a congressional hearing, his story evokes bitter disagreement about who was to blame and what his service meant.

In an interview given five years after Pat’s death his mother, Mary “Dannie” Tillman, bemoaned her son’s iconic status. “He was a human being, and by putting this kind of heroic, saintly quality to him, you’re taking away the struggle of being a human being,” she said. “He had to make choices, just like we all do.”

Why had Tillman chosen the Army over the NFL? What had he sought to accomplish as an enlisted soldier? A few clues—including football-related interviews, his family’s remembrances and passages from his personal wartime journal—bring us as close as we may ever get to answering such questions.

Patrick Daniel Tillman Jr. was born on Nov. 6, 1976, and raised with two younger brothers in suburban Fremont, Calif., on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay. An all-around gifted athlete, he became a football star on both offense and defense, making up for his relatively slight stature with dedication in the weight room, a taste for delivering hard hits and the acumen to guess an opponent’s moves and react quickly. By age 16 he stood 5 feet 11 inches and weighed 195 pounds. His aggressive nature got him in trouble during his senior year when he assaulted another teen in a parking lot brawl and landed in juvenile hall for 30 days. Fortunately, the misdemeanor did not prevent him from claiming Arizona State University’s last football scholarship for the 1994 season. He joined the team as a defensive specialist.

Tillman said his short time in lockup prompted a major reassessment of his priorities, and in college his ambition kicked into high gear. He’d built a reputation among friends for climbing tall objects and taking death-defying leaps from canyon ledges into trees. At ASU he applied his energies to voracious reading and debates on politics and international relations. He earned his bachelor’s degree in three and a half years, graduating in December 1997 with a 3.84 grade point average.

The young athlete became a darling of the press for his mix of eccentric and admirable qualities, including a patriotic streak. In one interview Tillman mentioned legendary World War II Gen. George Patton. “He made some comment one time,” Pat said, “something to the effect of, ‘No one ever won a war dying for their country. Let the other son of a bitch die for his.’ It’s things like that, you know, it’s guys like that, guys where their attitude—they’re a little bit crazy—but it’s that craziness that propels them to greatness.”

Still considered undersized and somewhat slow on his feet for pro football, he nevertheless made it onto the NFL’s radar by leading his college team in tackles. Of the 241 players chosen in the 1998 NFL draft, Tillman came up number 226. He signed a one-year contract with the Cardinals for $158,000, the league minimum. As he had done throughout his youth, he outworked and outhit teammates to earn his spot as the team’s go-to strong safety, though he never earned more than the league minimum salary, which for a fourth-year player was $512,000.

Meanwhile, he maintained his reputation for unconventional antics. He initially rode his bicycle to team practice, eventually upgrading to a secondhand Volvo station wagon. During the off-season he finished a marathon, the only NFL player to do so in the year 2000. In 2001 he completed an Ironman half-triathlon, comprising a 1.2-mile swim, a 56-mile bike ride and a 13.11 mile run. He also re-enrolled at ASU to pursue a master’s degree in history.

Tillman twice turned down a major payday—first a $9.6 million offer in 2001 because he didn’t want to leave Arizona to play for the St. Louis Rams, and then a $3.6 million offer from the Cardinals in spring 2002.

The Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on American soil hit Tillman hard. He watched TV footage of the unfolding tragedy all morning from home and then with teammates at the Cardinals’ practice facility. He was especially shocked to see footage of desperate people holding hands and leaping from the blazing World Trade Center towers.

With pro sports on hold, he sat for an on-camera interview the next day. “My great grandfather was at Pearl Harbor, and a lot of my family…has gone and fought in wars, and I really haven’t done a damn thing as far as laying myself on the line like that,” he said. “So I have a great deal of respect for those that have.” The interviewer then asked whether he was itching to return to the field. “We play football, you know?” he replied. “It is so unimportant compared to everything that’s taken place.”

While Tillman’s parents encouraged their boys to question authority, they also taught reverence for fellow Americans who had answered the call to serve. After Pat’s death, Dannie—herself a college history major—reflected on those lessons. “Discussions about the military had been part of the boys’ childhood—why people fight for their country; why they should; when it is right to do so; the effect of war on people; how it crushes them tragically or enables them to do heroic things,” she wrote. Dannie recalled some of her own favorite memories, including visits to Gettysburg National Military Park and watching plebes march at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

In the six months following 9/11 Pat explored his options, and in February 2002 he ventured to Provo, Utah, to climb frozen waterfalls and speak with a former Force Recon Marine. After deciding to join the Army, Tillman told middle brother Kevin, then a minor league baseball player with the Cleveland Indians organization. To no one’s surprise, Kevin, who had considered military service since he was a teen, quit baseball to join up with Pat. The Tillmans met with a recruiter who explained that if they joined the Army Rangers, the brothers would incur a modest three-year commitment, do short (three-month) deployments and could choose to be based at Fort Lewis, Wash., just south of Seattle.

Pat and Kevin—just 14 months apart and lifelong best friends—called Dannie on Mother’s Day 2002 to explain their plan. They had wanted to so do in person, they said, but someone at the recruiting station had recognized Pat, and the brothers thought they might soon be in the news. Although both had college degrees, they chose not to become officers, loathing the idea of having to send others into harm’s way.

On April 8, 2002, Pat penned a reflective document he titled “Decision,” writing in part, “It seems that more often than not we know the right decision long before it’s actually made.” Being an NFL player, he noted, “strokes my vanity enough to fool me into thinking it’s important…[but] especially after recent events I’ve come to appreciate just how shallow and insignificant my role is.” The next month Pat married Marie Ugenti, his one and only girlfriend, and the newlyweds honeymooned in Bora-Bora. In June he and Kevin signed their enlistment papers and took the oath.

From the moment the Tillman brothers joined up, the nation’s military leaders were watching. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld wrote a memo to the Army secretary calling Tillman “world-class” and adding, “We might want to keep an eye on him.”

On June 28 he wrote Pat a personal letter of praise. Rumsfeld’s senior military assistant later said it was the only time he could recall the defense secretary having sent personal congratulations to a soldier on his enlistment. Major General John Vines also sent a letter, inviting the Tillmans to join the 82nd Airborne Division instead of the Rangers.

On July 8 Pat and Kevin traveled to Fort Benning, Ga., for basic and advanced individual training. Aged 25 and 24, respectively, they were dismayed at the immature behavior displayed by many of their younger fellow recruits, many of whom had joined for practical instead of patriotic reasons. Pat journaled his alarm at seeing “all these guns in the hands of children.” He also wrote of longing for the wife and career he’d left, along with the hope his military experience would “free up my conscience to enjoy what I have.”

The Tillman brothers stuck it out through airborne school and the Ranger Indoctrination Program, and just before Christmas 2002 they were sent to Fort Lewis as the newest members of 2nd Platoon, Company A, 2nd Ranger Battalion.

By early March 2003 Pat and Kevin were setting up tents and stringing concertina wire with the rest of Company A near Arar, Saudi Arabia, within 40 miles of the Iraqi border. Wearing uncomfortable protective suits in the desert heat to protect them from Saddam Hussein’s rumored chemical and biological weapons, they followed news of the invasion, Operation Iraqi Freedom, which began on March 20.

On March 27 Rangers finally boarded helicopters to join the fight—but the Tillmans remained in camp. With no seniority or experience, they were seen as more liability than asset. “I’m not out for blood or in any hurry to kill people,” Pat wrote in a fiery journal entry, “however, I did not throw my life to s___ in order to fill sandbags and guard Hummers. This is a f______ insult that boils my blood. All I want to do is rip out the throat of one of these loudmouth f___s who’s going as opposed to me.” Although he expressed great misgivings about the war in Iraq, suggesting it was about oil and little else, Pat clearly wanted to taste combat.

As it happened, while assaulting Qadisiyah Air Base northwest of Ramadi on that first mission, Manuel Avila, the M249 squad automatic weapon (SAW) gunner in Pat’s four-man fire team, was shot twice in the chest. Avila survived, but from that point Pat took his spot on the SAW.

The closest the Tillman brothers came to major action in Iraq was the high-profile rescue of Pfc. Jessica Lynch, a 19-year-old supply clerk in the 507th Maintenance Company who was captured by the enemy on March 23 after the convoy she was traveling in took successive wrong turns into the southern city of Nasiriyah, inadvertently becoming the tip of the invasion spear.

Breathless initial news reports claimed Lynch had fought until her M16 ran out of ammunition, sustained stab and gunshot wounds, and was tortured—none of which turned out to be true. In fact, she hadn’t fired a shot, and the injuries she received occurred when the Humvee she was riding in collided with a tractor trailer during the ambush. Her name was eventually linked to Pat’s in the official record, as each became characters in a mendacious wartime propaganda campaign.

Lynch’s rescue—a massive undertaking involving roughly 1,000 troops—came at midnight on April 1. The special operations team responsible met light resistance and suffered zero casualties as they bore Lynch on a stretcher from Saddam Hussein Hospital. A camera crew from the 4th Psychological Operations Group recorded the action, during which someone placed a conspicuous U.S. flag on Lynch’s chest. The Tillman brothers, part of a standby quick-reaction force, spent a cold night waiting at bombed-out Tallil Air Base.

Beginning on April 9 Pat and Kevin spent five weeks patrolling out of an aircraft hangar at Baghdad International Airport. Pat fired his weapon just once, on April 21, to ward off approaching vehicles with warning shots. In mid-May the Tillmans, having yet to earn the coveted Combat Infantryman Badge, returned stateside to attend Ranger School at Fort Benning. On November 28, after nine arduous weeks, the brothers received their shoulder patches—or tabs—marking them full-fledged Rangers.

As 2003 drew to a close, Pat learned that since he had deployed to a war zone, he could be honorably discharged under special circumstances. His agent told him several NFL teams were hoping to sign him to play in the fall 2004 season, but Pat refused to consider an early discharge. He would stick to his three-year commitment.

Pat, Kevin and the rest of 2nd Platoon (the “Black Sheep”) arrived in Afghanistan for their second deployment on April 8, 2004. Six days later they helicoptered to Forward Operating Base Salerno, along the Pakistani border in the southeastern province of Khost, to search nearby villages for Taliban activity.

On April 22, just two weeks into the deployment, Pat was killed. A day later superiors submitted a Silver Star recommendation that claimed Tillman had “put himself in the line of devastating enemy fire” during an ambush. The recommendation quickly went up the chain of command, along with a posthumous promotion to corporal. News accounts parroted the official line Pat had succumbed to enemy fire while saving fellow Rangers. Within weeks, however, that version of events began unraveling.

In fact, on the afternoon of Pat’s death headquarters had ordered Black Sheep commander 1st Lt. David Uthlaut to split his platoon to meet a predetermined time line. As they threaded through steep-walled valleys in their Humvees and Toyota Hilux pickups, the platoon’s two sections lost radio contact with each other. The trailing section, whose members included Kevin Tillman, soon came under ambush by mortars and small arms from the hills above.

As members of the other section, including Pat, dismounted from their vehicles and rushed to help, trigger-happy Rangers—many in their first firefight—mistook Pat and fellow rescuers for enemy combatants. They killed Sayed Farhad, an Afghan ally. Standing beside Farhad, Pat took an initial 5.56-caliber round to the chest, then three more to the right forehead, likely from a SAW. According to fellow Ranger Pfc. Bryan O’Neal, as he and his teammates came under fire, Pat waved his arms over his head, yelling, “I’m Pat Tillman! I’m Pat f______ Tillman! Why are you shooting at me?!” Wounded in the friendly fire incident were Lieutenant Uthlaut and Spc. Jade Lane.

Kevin arrived on scene 10 minutes after the shooting. He was told his brother was dead but not about the circumstances. Over the following days unit members burned Pat’s body armor, uniform and other potential evidence, while officials doctored written statements for the Silver Star recommendation and lied to the press and the Tillman family. A week after Pat’s death Brig. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the Joint Special Operations commander, sent senior government officials a confidential P4 memo mentioning fratricide—friendly fire—and warning civilian leadership to tread carefully. The story fell apart on May 24 when Rangers finally told Kevin what had happened.

In 2008 the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a report, “Misleading Information From the Battlefield: The Tillman and Lynch Episodes,” detailing the damage done by deliberate deception in both cases. “The bare minimum we owe our soldiers and their families is the truth,” said committee chairman Henry Waxman. “That didn’t happen for two of the most famous soldiers in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. For Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman the government violated its basic responsibility.”

Yet the committee assigned little blame. Officials all the way up to former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld testified they could not recall many details. The highest official punished for the cover-up was retired Lt. Gen. Philip Kensinger, former commander of the Army Special Operations Command. The Army censured Kensinger for misleading investigators and stripped him of his third star, stating he knew about the fratricide even while attending Tillman’s May 3, 2004, memorial service.

Despite the tragic circumstances of Pat Tillman’s death and the subsequent shortfall in officialdom, Pat’s family honored his legacy of service by creating the Pat Tillman Foundation [pattillmanfoundation.org]. Still going strong, it provides scholarships and other support for service members, veterans and military spouses who want to parlay their education to serve their communities. MH

Paul X. Rutz, a former U.S. Navy officer, is a visual artist and freelance writer. For further reading he recommends Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman, by Jon Krakauer, and Boots on the Ground by Dusk: My Tribute to Pat Tillman, by Mary Tillman.

This article appeared in the September 2021 issue of Military History magazine. For more stories, subscribe and visit us on Facebook: