Lone Survivor_ The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 ( PDFDrive )

operation — get above the target, stalk him, photograph him, and, if at all
possible, grab him.
We had very decent intel on him, which suggested the CIA and probably the
FBI were also extremely interested in his capture or death. And as the various
briefings went on, Ben Sharmak seemed to get progressively more important.
There were now reports of an eighty-troop minimum and a two-hundred-troop
maximum in his army, and this constituted a very big operation. And Chief
Healy decreed that me and my three buddies in Alfa Platoon were the precise
guys to carry it out.
We were not expected to take on this large bunch of wild-eyed killers.
Indeed, we were expected to stay quieter than we had ever been in our lives.
“Just find this bastard, nail him down, his location and troop strength, then radio
in for a direct action force to come in by air and take him down.” Simple, right?
If we thought he might be preparing an immediate evacuation of the village
in which he resided, then we would take him out forthwith. That would be me or
Axe. The chances were I’d get only one shot at Sharmak, just one time when I
could trap him in the crosshairs and squeeze that trigger, probably from hundreds
of yards away. I knew only one thing: I better not miss, because the apparitions
of Webb and Davis, not to mention every other serving SEAL, would surely rise
up and tear my ass off. This was, after all, precisely what they had trained me
for.
And in case anyone’s wondering, I had absolutely no qualms about putting a
bullet straight through this bastard’s head. He was a fanatical sworn enemy of
the United States of America who had already murdered many of my colleagues
in the U.S. Marines. He was also the kind of terrorist who would like nothing
better than to mastermind a new attack on the U.S. mainland. If I got a shot, he’d
get no mercy from me. I knew what was expected of me. I knew the team boss
wanted this character eliminated, and when I thought about it, I was damned
proud they considered me and my buddies the men for the job. As ever, we
would do everything possible not to let anyone down.
Every day we checked the intel office to see what further data there was on
Sharmak. Chief Healy was right on the case, working with the ops officer and
our skipper, Commander Pero. The problem was always the same: where was
our target? He was worse than Saddam Hussein, disappearing, evading the
prying eye of the satellites, keeping his identity and location secret even from the
many CIA informers who were close to him.
There was of course no point in charging into the mountains armed to the