Hi folks. This was forwarded to me by a friend in the Special Forces community - it's the story of the SEAL who was knocked out of an aircraft in Afghanistan, and some of the men who went in to recover his body. Some of this stuff is pretty raw, so be warned. Also jargon heavy. Some of the ones I caught (if you want to know more I'll try and explain the ones I know): CINCSOC: Commander In Chief Special Operations Command CSAR: Combat Search and Rescue
Anyways, it's pretty astonishing. This SEAL, knocked out of an aircraft and alone in the middle of enemy held territory, decided to go on offense and attack. Now that's heroism. This man really deserves the Medal of Honor. Gautam Hey everyone, Just wanted to let you know Neil Robert's funeral service was today at the Creek. Packed, wall to wall. Everyone did a super job honouring our fallen comrade. Even though I did not know Neil personally, now I feel I know him a little bit better and he will be sorely missed by all. His little boy (18 months) has a head full of curly red hair just like his dad's. CINCSOC showed up, and Admiral Olson gave his wife the posthumous Bronze Star & Purple Heart. There is rumour he will be up for the CMH; the media has not caught on to the real story yet and I wonder if they ever will. CDR Fitz spoke on behalf of damneck and told everyone the updated version of what they have been able to piece together. I guess since he said it there I can repeat it here on this net...yes, Neil was alive when he fell out of the helo after it had been hit by at least 3 RPGs. The helo landed about 8 km away since it was full of holes and basically had no hydraulic fluid left. Apparantly he belly-crawled about 200 yards up a ridgeline to a position very close to a AQ machine gun nest. When another helo came in and the AQ engaged, Neil opened up and took out a bunch of the bad guys before he himself was overcome by enemy fire. No more details, but everyone wanted to make sure (and coming from damneck, who are usually pretty quiet about these things) that without a shadow of a doubt Neil was a hero in every respect...he did what every frogman hopes he will do in that sort of situation..."CHARLIE MIKE..." continue mission. And he did it knowing that his position was unsupported. His teammates requested and were approved to go after him. They fought their way to him, killing a lot of bad guys but getting shot up pretty bad themselves. They eventually retrieved his body and got out the next night. Anyways, if you don't know what he looked like I attached the front of the program. Take it easy, Leif Some more of the story. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Saturday, March 16, 2002 11:30 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Beau Laskey Subject: Turbo visit Hey all, Just wanted to let you know, went and saw Turbo at the hospital. He was at 8 before going over to damneck about 4 years ago; I don't claim to know him well but wanted to show teammate support. He's going to get his foot amputated on Monday; his decision (he will still stay in the teams and follow in the foot steps [no pun intended] of Rat and Van Hoosier). Bullet (AK/7.62) went in his ankle, tumbled about and ended up resting next to his big toe in his foot; really fucked up his ankle and he's already had 6 surgeries and is on an epidural and morphine drip. Got to check out the bullet while I was there; still in perfect shape. Here's the "reader's digest" version of the story as he relayed it; the admiral gave him the go-ahead to document and publish his account to get the word out. He was with the group on Neil's helo that after being shot up and after Neil fell out, basically crash landed and consolidated onto another helo, then went back to base to regroup. They formed an ad-hoc CSAR squad that flew back to the area to find Neil. After circling around and not seeing him, they landed about the same spot (geographically, it was kind of a flat area about 300 meters around, with ridgelines on two sides and cliffs going down on the other two, and about 2-3 feet of snow on the ground...about 12,000 ft altitude) and offloaded, and the helo took off and they immediately came under fire from all directions. The CCT guy with them was killed immediately, and basically they tried to break contact and move out of the area. The only way out was down a cliff. As they were moving, engaging the enemy at distances as close as 15 ft, the AQ was blasting at them with small arms, heavy machine gun, RPG and mortars. The one advantage our guys had was they were using NVGs and IR so they were getting good accurate shots on the bad guys and putting them down. Turbo said he knows he killed at least three, and got hits on as many as 20. He got the guy who shot him, triple-tap head shot that sent the bad guy's turban flying. He got hit as they were getting ready to scale down this rock/snow face; basically crawled/was drug along with his foot flapping around and connected only by skin as they continued to break contact. He said he fell 100-200 feet down the cliff before being stopped by a tree...somehow they all got down to the secondary extract and waited several hours to get picked up. By the way, Chad, RL was point for them so he did good...wonder what he will say about the whole thing. Anyways, Turbo finally had a chance to wrap his wound although he was bleeding out and going hypothermic...his teammates kept him awake and he thought he was done for. The Rangers later cleared the whole area and found Neil and the CCT guy's bodies together where the AQ had dragged them in a bunker. Turbo said the "be careful what you wish for" rule definitely applied; nothing he would ever want to go through again. The other team guy who was hit had one go through his thigh and frag from a grenade peppered his legs; luckily no vitals hit and he was released from the hospital yesterday. Our guys were extremely brave and held it together while risking their lives trying to find a teammate. Leif +---------------------------------------------------------+ This message may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the addressee or authorized to receive this for the addressee, you must not use, copy, disclose or take any action based on this message or any information herein. If you have received this message in error, please advise the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this message. Thank you for your cooperation. +---------------------------------------------------------+
