Jul 20 2008

“It’s gonna be a bloodbath,”

(8:30PM EST – promoted by Nightprowlkitty)

Stars and Stripes

Sgt. Jacob Walker and Spc. Tyler Stafford talk about the attack

   

Soldiers recount deadly attack on Afghanistan outpost

Everything was on fire. The trucks. The bazaar. The grass.

It looked surreal. It looked like a movie.

That was July 13. That was when Stafford was blown out of a fighting position by an RPG, survived a grenade blast and had the tail of an RPG strike his helmet.

That was the day nine Chosen Company soldiers died.

It was just days before the unit was scheduled to leave the base.

“It was some of the bravest stuff I’ve ever seen in my life, and I will never see it again because those guys,” Stafford said, then paused. “Normal humans wouldn’t do that. You’re not supposed to do that – getting up and firing back when everything around you is popping and whizzing and trees, branches coming down and sandbags exploding and RPGs coming in over your head … It was a fistfight then, and those guys held ‘ em off.”

Stafford offered a guess as to why his fellow soldiers fought so hard.

“Just hardcoreness I guess,” he said. “Just guys kicking ass, basically. Just making sure that we look scary enough that you don’t want to come in and try to get us.”

CNN

“It’s gonna be a bloodbath,” fallen soldier told father

Cpl. Gunnar Zwilling suspected that his days were numbered last week, while he and his band of brothers in the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team prepared for a mission near Wanat, Afghanistan.

Cpl. Gunnar Zwilling had a bad feeling about his final mission in Afghanistan, said his father, Kurt.

“It’s gonna be a bloodbath,” he told his father, Kurt Zwilling, on the phone in what would be their last conversation.

The Defense Department on Wednesday identified the U.S. soldiers killed Sunday when their outpost was overrun in Afghanistan.

• 1st Lt. Jonathan P. Brostrom, 24, of Aiea, Hawaii.

• Sgt. Israel Garcia, 24, of Long Beach, California.

• Cpl. Jonathan R. Ayers, 24, of Snellville, Georgia.

• Cpl. Jason M. Bogar, 25, of Seattle, Washington.

• Cpl. Jason D. Hovater, 24, of Clinton, Tennessee.

• Cpl. Matthew B. Phillips, 27, of Jasper, Georgia.

• Cpl. Pruitt A. Rainey, 22, of Haw River, North Carolina.

• Cpl. Gunnar W. Zwilling, 20, of Florissant, Missouri.

• Pfc. Sergio S. Abad, 21, of Morganfield, Kentucky.

There’s nothing I really can add to the above, nor do I feel I should.

The interviews at the links and the video, by the soldiers, are the reality.

RIP Young Brothers

7 comments

Skip to comment form

    • Edger on July 20, 2008 at 02:48
    • #

  3. …I’m hearing echoes of everything I ever read about Nam.

  4. Military looking at intelligence before deadly Afghan clash

    A formal investigation into an attack on a U.S. Army unit by about 200 Taliban insurgents will examine whether the Army had intelligence about a possible assault and whether the troops had access to it.

    This one from today:

    Misunderstanding leaves 9 dead in Afghan airstrike

    A misunderstanding between local police and coalition forces led to an airstrike in southwestern Afghanistan Sunday that left nine police officers dead, a defense ministry official said.

    I leave it up to your own thoughts to see the picture of what is and has been going on!

  5. Witnesses to War

    When the separation ends! CNN Video

    CNN’s Rick Sanchez talks with Dr. Paul Ragan about the effects of war on soldiers and the high price they pay for it.

    After the centuries and than finally after ‘Nam and still way too many just don’t get it, as to combat soldiers and those living in combat theaters!

    • banger on July 20, 2008 at 21:04
    • #

    It’s very interesting that the Democratic Party and in particular Mr. Obama are threatening to go heavily into Afghanistan if they get in office. If so, were going to regret it. The MSM line is that Afghanistan is about Taliban vs. the Good Guys (us and our warlord pals). It’s not so simple just as Iraq wasn’t so simple. I won’t go into the complexities here but suffice it to say that a people who cannot understand complexity and need to understand life in terms of “good guys” and “bad guys” does not in any sense deserve to rule an Empire–I always cringe when I hear reporters and military people use those terms–it shows incredible stupidity. I know it is just propaganda but the contractors on the ground, soldiers, mid-managment types actually believe that the world is that simple–Americans that is. In fact the Aghani enterprise like the Iraq War is deeply and hopelessly corrupt. We need to negotiate our way out that place and let the Iranians, Indians and Pakistanis deal with it.

Comments have been disabled.