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COMBAT SITREP FROM SHEWAN, AFGHANISTAN
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George Bitsoli
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Jul 21, 2009 15:53 PDT
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----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2009 10:33 AM
Subject: COMBAT SITREP FROM SHEWAN, AFGHANISTAN
Another opportunity to excel
COMBAT SITREP FROM SHEWAN, AFGHANISTAN
Outnumbered 8 - 1: 'A good day for the Corps'
By Peter Bronson
"Our vehicles came under a barrage of enemy RPGs (rocket propelled grenades)
and machine gun fire.
One of our humvees was disabled from RPG fire, and the Marines inside
dismounted and laid down
suppression fire so they could evacuate a Marine who was knocked unconscious
from the blast."
That's not from an episode of The Unit or 24. It's not from an anti-war
movie.
It's not from any newspaper or TV news reports I could find.
The quote comes from a "designated marksman who requested to remain
unidentified."
He was reporting what happened recently in the city of Shewan, Afghanistan.
The story was told in a Marine Corps News report by Cpl. James M. Mercure.
It will give you goose bumps and make you want to stand up and salute the
nearest flag.
Here's more, because it's a lotbetter than anything I could write today:
"The day started out with a 10-kilometer patrol with elements mounted and
dismounted, so by the time we
got to Shewan, we were pretty beat,"the marksman said. Mercure reported,
"Shewan had been a thorn in
the side of Task Force 2d Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, Special Purpose
Marine Air Ground Task Force
Afghanistan throughout the Marines' deployment here in support of Operation
Enduring Freedom, because
it controls an important supply route into the Bala Baluk district. Opening
the route was key to continuing
combat operations in the area."
"The vicious attack that left the humvee destroyed and several of the
Marines pinned down in the kill zone
sparked an intense eight-hour battle as the platoon desperately fought to
recover their comrades.
After recovering the Marines trapped in the kill zone, another platoon
sergeant personally led numerous
attacks on enemy fortified positions while the platoon fought house to house
and trench to trench in order
to clear through the enemy ambush site.
"The biggest thing to take from that day is what Marines can accomplish when
they're given the opportunity
to fight," the sniper said. "A small group of Marines met a numerically
superior force and embarrassed them
in their own backyard. The insurgents told the townspeople that they were
stronger than the Americans, and
that day we showed them they were wrong."
"During the battle, the designated marksman single handedly thwarted a
company-sized enemy RPG and
machinegun ambush by reportedly killing 20 enemy fighters with his
devastatingly accurate precision fire.
He selflessly exposed himself time and again to intense enemy fire during a
critical point in the eight-hour
battle for Shewan in order to kill any enemy combatants who attempted to
engage or maneuver on the
Marines in the kill zone. What made his actions even more impressive was
the fact that he didn't miss any
shots, despite the enemies' rounds impacting within a foot of his fighting
position.
"I was in my own little world," the young corporal said. "I wasn't even
aware of a lot of the rounds impacting
near my position, because I was concentrating so hard on making sure my
rounds were on target."
After calling for close-air support, the small group of Marines pushed
forward and broke the enemies' spirit as
many of them dropped their weapons and fled the battlefield. At the end of
the battle, the Marines had reduced
an enemy stronghold, killed more than 50 insurgents and wounded several
more.
"I didn't realize how many bad guys there were until we had broken through
the enemies' lines and forced them
to retreat. It was roughly 250 insurgents against 30 of us," the corporal
said. "It was a good day for the Marine
Corps. We killed a lot of bad guys, and none of our guys were seriously
injured."
Such an amazing story of heroism and victory would have been on Page One in
every paper in the country during
World War II. Just 30 Marines giving eight hours of hell to 250 insurgents
is the kind of story that would make a
good movie -- if that kind of movie still could be made.
But these days, it did not even make Page 10. I couldn't find a story about
it anywhere. The only mentions were
on conservative blogs and military Web sites. The soldiers who are fighting
for their lives and our country might
as well be in another dimension. News from the battlefronts in Iraq and
Afghanistan is apparently not important.
It reminds the jaded anti-war crowd that they were wrong. We're winning.
It reminds a self-centered nation that
some Americans are making sacrifices much bigger than a loss in their
401(k)s.
So we don't hear about it.
But we need to hear news like that, because a good day for the Marine Corps
is a good day for freedom.
And that's a good day for America.
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