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

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in the grim island fortress of Chateau d’If.And I never thought those unforgettable words he carved with flintstones,into the granite walls of the cruelest of jails, would also provide me with hope; aforlorn hope, but hope nonetheless. During the peril of my own darkest hours, Ithought of those words over and over, more times than I care to admit: God willgive me justice.
3A School for WarriorsIt was pitch dark, and he was wearing sunglasses, wraparound,shiny black...“Most of you aren’t going to be here in a couple ofmonths,” said Instructor Reno...“If you guys don’t start pullingtogether as a team, none of you will be here.”The six SEALs from Bahrain landed in Bagram, in northeast Afghanistan,shortly after first light. I realize I have just spent two entire chapters essentiallypointing out what a momentous event that was, our arrival to work with the elitemountain troops of the U.S. Army. It has occurred to me that you might bewondering why we thought we were so goddamned superior to everyone else,why we felt entitled to our own private brand of arrogance.Not wishing to be haunted by anyone’s doubts about me and my teammates,I propose to explain right now, before we get moving, precisely why we felt thisway about the world. It’s not some form of premature triumph, and it would beabsurd to call it mere confidence. That would be like calling the Pacific wet.It’s a higher form of consciousness, and I do not mean that to be pretentious.It’s been said that only the very rich understand the difference betweenthemselves and the poor, and only the truly brilliant understand the differencebetween themselves and the relatively dumb.Well, only men who have gone through what we went through canunderstand the difference between us and the rest. In the military, even the restunderstand what it takes to scale the heights of combat excellence. And in mycase, it started inauspiciously. Way down on the ranch, with Mom in tears,refusing to leave the house to see me go. March 7, 1999. I was twenty-three.To say that I was not making amazing headway in my hometown would bean understatement. The reputation Morgan and I had was not assisting either of
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Copyright © 2007 by Marcus Luttrel
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This book is dedicated to the memor
Page 8 and 9: “Help me, Marcus! Please help me!
Page 10 and 11: fighting force where valor is a com
Page 12 and 13: King Fahd Causeway.The six of us, d
Page 14 and 15: obliged to get out there and find.
Page 16 and 17: Cordell and Donna, and to his broth
Page 18 and 19: revs on the TAC. Don’t mess with
Page 20 and 21: petty officer second class. Like Sh
Page 22 and 23: photographing hot spots and danger
Page 24 and 25: But usually he came up with somethi
Page 26 and 27: cannot see. Someone described us as
Page 28 and 29: and plug into some quality happines
Page 30 and 31: the front line. Each of the six of
Page 32 and 33: blood.At which point, urged on by a
Page 34 and 35: They never tell us, or anyone else,
Page 36 and 37: My mom’s a seventh-generation Tex
Page 38 and 39: a way, I’m glad I lived through i
Page 40 and 41: and hard work. And he didn’t let
Page 42 and 43: their families. But they don’t se
Page 44 and 45: I’m not getting one dime from any
Page 46 and 47: Kush mountains. The most southerly
Page 48 and 49: opposition to their hard-line polic
Page 50 and 51: Jalalabad, Kandahar, and Herat. The
Page 52 and 53: Somehow these hickory-tough tribesm
Page 54 and 55: air brake on violence. According to
Page 58 and 59: us. There were always guys showing
Page 60 and 61: learned how to extinguish fires, es
Page 62 and 63: seem too much to ask in return, sin
Page 64 and 65: understand and will comply. We say
Page 66 and 67: 3. A minimum of 50 sit-ups in 2 min
Page 68 and 69: while I was prostrate on the floor
Page 70 and 71: everything. Why not just tell it li
Page 72 and 73: rowing, lifting, swimming, fighting
Page 74 and 75: our tests was called slide for life
Page 76 and 77: room inspection. The guy couldn’t
Page 78 and 79: The water was only a fraction above
Page 80 and 81: 4Welcome to Hell, GentlemenBattlefi
Page 82 and 83: times, because if we did not put ou
Page 84 and 85: ordered from one exercise to anothe
Page 86 and 87: There were about eighteen guys outs
Page 88 and 89: signifying resignation, and we hadn
Page 90 and 91: listened carefully while Chief Niel
Page 92 and 93: boats out through the waves, dumpin
Page 94 and 95: determined young men who would rath
Page 96 and 97: opened fire, spraying the room with
Page 98 and 99: whistles kept blowing, one blast, t
Page 100 and 101: inserted that poison into my mind.
Page 102 and 103: below the thirty-two-minute standar
Page 104 and 105: supple for the day ahead.The new sh
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someone else.Joe Burns nodded curtl
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Somehow you find yourself able to b
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1. Consider all weapons to be loade
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Florida. I was there on 9/11, and l
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might expect you to be. My only sol
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6’Bye, Dudes, Give ’Em HellThe
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mind. If a troop of wild tribesmen
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intel on him, from both satellites
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BRUTAL US TROOPS GUN DOWNPEACE-LOVI
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sensationally good news for our ene
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Sometimes we’d run across a group
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takes, was their obvious belief. In
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operation — get above the target,
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but underneath he could be very fun
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watch. You simply cannot do effecti
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have a good feeling about this. And
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It was really slow going, clamberin
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7An Avalanche of GunfireDown the mo
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position where we could rest on thi
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That type of thing. Nothing else. N
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Omar Bradley? MacArthur? Would they
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about that...Marcus, I’ll go with
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we would be too well hidden for the
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hidden. I kept perfectly still, tha
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water, comms, phone. I’d even los
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uncompromising, steady, hard-eyed,
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was still fierce on all sides, but
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bullets; the swirling dust cloud en
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8The Final Battle forMurphy’s Rid
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When that grenade blew me over the
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But then Axe reached for his rifle
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enemies. If knocked down, I will ge
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they shot him, I thought mortally,
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not together, not on this earth. Ax
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I had only one Teammate. And He mov
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to the quick reaction force (QRF) i
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found gun barrels snapped in half a
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I decided this was not a risk I was
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But my back hurt like hell. I never
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I’d travel a whole lot farther on
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They are born trackers, able to pic
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cross with honor.”I sang those wo
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dwell in the house of the Lord for
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announcement from the SEAL HQ in Ha
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positions. I could see one guy, the
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fighting as one in a team of four o
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You’re probably not going to beli
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was trying to communicate.“Americ
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Jesus Christ! I mean, Muhammad! Or
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As they approached me, I took out m
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else to do me harm. Nor would they
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them it was against my religion! I
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surrounded by more Taliban, all of
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somehow come back for me.Bang! Sudd
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killing mode, going for the leaders
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Eternal Father, strong to save,Whos
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was me. Like a lot of other folk ha
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three hours while we discussed, as
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prove too strong even for the Talib
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their language. Those kids were gre
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11Reports of My DeathGreatly Exagge
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were adults and kids, all mixed up,
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I sent them right out there again,
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It seemed apparent that my presence
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illuminated the sky beyond our imme
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Jeff Bender, Admiral Maguire’s pu
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here they had the last one.The more
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cornered.But an impending attack re
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alienating the people and, in parti
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For a few moments, I considered wri
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12“Two-two-eight!It’s Two-two-e
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ready for anything, bursting with f
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found, that I was stable and unlike
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The shattering din high in the Hind
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the SEAL skipper, Commander Kent Pe
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Right around this time, I was assig
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senior commanders came over and tol
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his face as he lay dying, just as t
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I didn’t know at the time that th
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Even though it may seem like a stra
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toward us is perpetuated by the lib
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Right here I’d run, jumped, heave
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recognized our C in C as “a real
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by Patrick RobinsonIn the fall of 2
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to change that.— Marcus Luttrell
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The guy in front is Billy Shelton,
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Taking the strain: This is a BUD/S
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Petty Officer Matthew Axelson in co
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Lieutenant Michael Murphy. If they
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Petty Officer Danny Dietz provided
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Up in the mountains or down at sea
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Lieutenant Commander Erik Kristense
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Shane Patton was replaced at the la
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U.S. Special Forces move in single
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Thankfully, not all Afghan villager
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Night and day for one week these lo
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I’ve taken it to the limit for my
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About the AuthorsPetty Officer Marc
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Lone Survivor_ The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10 ( PDFDrive )

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