( bell rings ) Decision-making
in these environments is all--
it's all instinct. We decided to assault
enemy positions. <i>And when we got
to the top,</i> I could see
what the enemy
had up there. It was a hard bunker. We didn't know
how many enemy
were in there. So we couldn't continue
to assault it. Man:<i> They were prepared
and waiting for us,</i> so most of our advantage
was gone. Man #2:<i> We were just
kind of pinned down</i> This is what you raise
your right hand for. You want to be a ranger?
It's time. My name is Nathan Self. I'm from-- originally from,
Waco, Texas. A little town
outside of Waco,
called China Spring. <i>A real simple life.
Hunt birds and fish,</i> <i>and do pretty much anything
that we wanted to do,</i> <i>as kids growing up.</i> <i>Played a lot of sports,
and, uh, went to church a lot.</i> Just small town
Texas stuff. I went to the Academy
at West Point, <i>It's a four-year college.</i> <i>It's all military.</i> <i>I chose to join
the Infantry coming
out of there,</i> <i>and so I was
commissioned as Lieutenant.</i> But when I read the book
"Black Hawk Down" I really was drawn
to wanting to serve
in that unit. The Army Rangers. <i>My first impressions
of the rangers were that
they were all really fit.</i> <i>There were several guys
in the platoon</i> that ran their two miles in under
nine and a half minutes. I thought I was
a decent runner, at around 11 minutes, and I was in my old unit, when I got there
it wasn't even close. So, I was a bit intimidated
by the physical abilities
of some of these guys. And then, from
a tactical perspective, they had been doing things
that I'd never done before. That was tough for me,
kind of on the inside, to know how to get by,
in that environment and... and gain respect. <i>( sirens wailing )</i> Self:<i> I remember
on September 11th,</i> <i>I was listening
to the radio,</i> <i>and there was
this news bulletin</i> <i>that an aircraft had flown
into the World Trade Center.</i> When I got to the platoon, they were watching
stuff on TV, and then we watched together,
uh, the second aircraft fly into
the second tower. <i>I was actually on CQ,</i> basically a guy sitting
at a desk, outside the barracks. And it was just like,
"Wow, what is going on here?" And I remember everybody
else went to the range, and I said there
and watched everything, and when
everybody came back, I remember giving
them updates. <i>( sirens wailing
in the distance )</i> <i>I remember
one guy called,</i> <i>and said, "Hey guys,
I know what you're getting
ready to go do.</i> <i>He says,
"I just want to say,</i> 'Hey, get some.
I'm with ya.'" Female reporter:<i>
As America's offensive
in Afghanistan pounds</i> <i>Taliban targets
from the air,</i> <i>some U.S. troops
have already been sent
in on the ground,</i> And not just any troops. The U.S. Army Rangers. Female Reporter #2:<i>
Rangers conduct raids...</i> ( explosion ) <i>search
and rescue missions,</i> <i>they are fast
and elusive.</i> <i>They are often
the first ones
in and out.</i> We can go anywhere
in the world, at any given time,
any given day, and accomplish any mission
given to us. Man:<i> Our Special
Operations Community</i> are a very tight-knit group, that when you ask us
to do a mission, you know,
we're gonna do it. We're gonna
take it out, you're gonna carry on
to the best of our ability. <i>( helicopter blades whirring )</i> Self:
From the moment
we stepped foot on the ground there,
in Afghanistan, I just remember seeing...
all the mountains around, <i>all the wreckage
of the tanks,</i> <i>and the MiG fighters,</i> and it was just, uh,
kinda eerie. You know, the terrain mixed with
these skeletons of... you know,
the previous war. Vela:<i>
We get off the bird,</i> Third Range Battalion
gets on the bird, takes off, and they're--
greeted us very kindly saying, "Make sure you don't get
off the tiles and stuff," because there were still
a lot of, uh, mines
that were in the area, trying to mess
with us and say like, "You get off,
you're gonna get blown up by all the Russian mines that we had left--
that they had left behind back when the, uh,
the Russians had invaded Afghanistan,
so... that's how we were greeted,
so... ( laughs ) Miceli:<i>
We built
a little makeshift gym</i> <i>in the basement
of, uh, a building.</i> Path going out to there, path going to a little place
to lay out and get some sun, <i>and you know, make things
as normal as possible.</i> Self:<i>
The mission
that were were given,</i> that was
a nonstop mission, was to be
a quick Reaction Force for our task force. That's kind of like
the First Responders
here on call all the time. Miceli:<i>
We were assigned</i> <i>to the Special Op teams
over there,</i> <i>and if something happened,
or went down,</i> <i>something went bad,
we would be recalled quickly</i> to go in and pull guys out you know,
add security on the ground. Whatever it may be, just to have
a jack-of-all-trades. I was working on
route planning, or planning zones,
or something like that, <i>and I heard
over the radio</i> <i>some traffic about
one of our aircrafts.</i> <i>I heard them say
that they were going down,</i> <i>or that
they had just gone down</i> <i>and crashed.</i> Hearing that an aircraft
that had flown out
of our compound was down, there was no denying,
there was no escape, there was no one else
that would-- would respond to that call. <i>Someone had the predator feed
on the big screen</i> <i>of the downed aircraft.</i> <i>There were men walking
around the aircraft,</i> <i>the aircraft
was in the snow.</i> So, you could see, like,
where you were going, and it was
a weird feeling. <i>And then, there was
this other mission</i> <i>that came in
at the same time,</i> which was we have
a missing American somewhere. It was really confusing
at that point, we have our mission,
that's our aircraft
on the ground, but there's a missing person
somewhere. Don't know
if it's related to this, if it's
completely unrelated, <i>but it's really important</i> <i>if we have somebody
that's missing in action.</i> I really didn't like the idea
of having two missions that were
potentially divergent, but I was told,
specifically that, "You've got to plan
for both of these missions." <i>So, I just left
the Joint Operations Center,</i> <i>and ran down
to where our tents are,</i> <i>and I told them,</i> <i>"Hey get up,
we have a mission."</i> I mean,
this is what we did,
we trained all the time, beat ourselves up
constantly for it, and we get to do
what we do. It's only
a matter of time. Vela:<i>
I was pulling guard
with my gunner,</i> <i>that's when we noticed
all the vehicles moving,</i> and then another Ranger
coming to get us. <i>The only thing we knew
is that we had men down,</i> And we have to get up there
to help them. Self:<i>
Right before
we were gonna load</i> to fly away,
someone walked up and said, "I need one
of these two Chinooks, because we gotta get
fuel down to the battlefield." I didn't like that. <i>I was planning on 25 Rangers,
or something,</i> <i>to secure this aircraft,
that we would get cut down
to 10 or 12.</i> Talk to Arin Canon,
who was my second-in-command
at the time, and said, "Try to see
if you need another Chinook, and get down there
with us." And he said he would. Before we flew away, I heard Arin Canon
call me on the radio and said, "Hey,
we found another Chinook,
we're on board. We're coming with you." So, I felt great. <i>( helicopters whirring )</i> Self:<i>
As we're going down
from Bagram</i> <i>to this battlefield,</i> <i>I'm talking on the radio</i> <i>from the aircraft,
back to our job,</i> <i>trying to figure out
what the real mission is.</i> <i>He said,
"We don't know yet,</i> <i>we're still trying
to sort it out.</i> Just fly down
to the area." Miceli:<i>
There would have been
more information</i> <i>had we had more information
at certain times.</i> You get what you need
to do your job. I mean, the big picture,
that's up to Nate. He-- he takes care
of the big picture, and that's just the way
it's set up. Self:<i>
We lost radio contact
with our trail aircraft,</i> <i>which had Arin Canon,</i> <i>and the other half
the Rangers.</i> We couldn't talk to them,
they didn't respond, couldn't see them
behind us anymore, which is very dangerous
if you're flying that low in between the mountains. Thirty seconds! Miceli:<i>
More information's
already coming in</i> that maybe the mission
was gonna change. Self:<i>
The pilots started
to circle this mountain.</i> <i>Kinda leveled off,
and nose up flared,</i> <i>it went right into
this mountain peak.</i> Probably 20 feet
off the ground. You could feel the rotorwash
coming up into the aircraft, <i>and the kind of the grainy,
snowy air</i> <i>come flushing
through the aircraft.</i> And then,
immediately I hear, the right door gunner
start shooting. ( all shouting ) There was so much commotion. You could feel the--
the bullets going by. Self:<i>
You could feel the helicopter</i> <i>kind of jolt to the left,
and then just, um...</i> ( loud crash ) ( gunshots ) Self:<i>
I was on my back
and I could see</i> tracer rounds coming through
both sides of the aircraft. I didn't know what was
going on at the time because I didn't see out
before that. But I did roll
to my stomach, and I looked out
from the front of the aircraft
all the way down the Chinook
and out the ramp, and I just saw
most of our Rangers were just in a pile. <i>Marc Anderson on my right
was already dead.</i> <i>The door gunner
across from me</i> <i>on the left
was already dead.</i> <i>The door gunner touching me
on my left side,</i> <i>had his leg broken
with a machine gun round.</i> And I wasn't hit in the middle
of these three guys. Two of them were killed. And, so... It's hard to make sense
of that kind of stuff. You know,
even years beyond, um... <i>There were two Rangers dead
on the ramp.</i> <i>Brad Gross
and Matt Collins.</i> Brad was faced down
in the snow, his arms were to his side. <i>His feet were still
in the ramp.</i> <i>And then Matt was lying
across the ramp face up.</i> I didn't know it
at the time, but there was someone on the left side
of the aircraft that was shooting
right across the ramp, and so they had
a-- a perfect position to hit every person
as they came out of there, and I just happened
to fall under the burst. ( loud explosion ) As I stepped off, it was probably
knee-deep snow. My first step,
I hit the ground. I just tumbled
face-forward. <i>Went to fire my weapon,
and it didn't work.</i> <i>I noticed part of my laser
was hanging off.</i> <i>And then it was like,
"Oh, my SAW got shot."</i> RPG came by. <i>Took my rifle
before I could touch it.</i> Ditched the SAW,
couldn't use it. And went back up, <i>and got one
of the causalities weapons.</i> Self:<i>
I remember just thinking,</i> "The sun
hasn't even come up, and we are gonna
be here all day." <i>And I think the reason why
I thought that was</i> <i>because I didn't feel like
there was any reason</i> why anyone would bring
an aircraft in there to support us
during the daytime. It's just too dangerous. At that point, we were just
kind of pinned down. You can't get up and run because they're still
shooting at you, and there's nowhere
to run to anyway. Self:<i>
And then one of the pilots</i> <i>kind of dropped out
of the cockpit,</i> said he couldn't feel
his leg, thought his leg
was blown off. <i>We told him
put your leg in the snow,</i> and he had a rifle, he'd just protect
that part of the aircraft. Miceli:<i>
Some time had gone by.</i> <i>Not sure exactly
how much.</i> There was no cover
around the bird, everything was, uh,
was pushed off to the sides
on the ridgelines that were surrounding us, and at that point,
you couldn't have assault
those ridgelines because you didn't know what
was on the other side of them. <i>But to see
the bullets tumbling</i> after they would hit
the rocks around me, and I'm like,
"This isn't gonna work, "I'm dropping down
into this depression." And... stayed there. I was a lot more protected
at that point. Self:<i>
Miceli at this point,</i> <i>essentially covered
the whole rear side</i> <i>of the aircraft</i> <i>and the left side
of the aircraft</i> <i>from his one position.</i> <i>I didn't worry about it.</i> I just felt confidence
in knowing that if there's one guy
that's gonna take care
of all that for us, then that's fine. That's him. <i>Tony's a guy that,
when I came to know him,
seemed to get hurt a lot.</i> <i>And so you take him
coming off the aircraft,</i> <i>and his weapon,</i> <i>getting shot up
all in his hands,</i> <i>and he doesn't get wounded,</i> and the motto was,
"No one can kill Miceli but Miceli." Vela:<i>
Well, the guy
belly flopped off of...</i> <i>a fast-moving boat
at one point,</i> and belly flopped into the--
to the river, and he had to get
a spleen operation-- 'cause he ruptured it. He was just
an accident-prone guy, 'cause he's such a nut. Miceli:<i>
I had a reputation
of getting into everything.</i> <i>If something
was gonna happen,</i> <i>it was gonna happen to me.</i> My old man
laughs about it now. He's like,
"I just didn't think you were gonna
make it out, man." ( laughs ) <i>I grew up
in St. Louis, Missouri.</i> <i>Three older sisters,
tortured.</i> I wore dresses,
I wore makeup, it was, uh,
it was awful. <i>I wrestled for awhile
until I found booze.</i> <i>And then it was
pretty much partying,
and the rest of that.</i> I wasn't bad,
I just did stupid things, and I think that kind of fits
the reputation that everybody else
knows of me. I just run through life,
face-first. <i>I joined the army
while I was in high school.</i> <i>And my recruiter in the Army
actually was a Ranger</i> <i>who was in Desert Storm,</i> <i>and we got to talking
about that,</i> and as soon as we started
getting into the details I was like, "Oh, yeah,
that's what I want to do." That's what I want--
that just fits me perfect. <i>I remember showing up.
You're a brand new private.</i> <i>And you get crushed.</i> The whole Ranger experience
just... basically getting...
the crap knocked out of you. It makes you harder
in a better way, you know? There's-- there's
a reason for it, <i>that you don't understand
until later.</i> Self:<i>
I really felt like
the mission</i> <i>of the downed aircraft,</i> <i>the mission
of the missing American,</i> <i>those missions
were irrelevant.</i> I just kind of felt like
were were alone, and we were getting shot at. <i>Meanwhile, a couple guys</i> <i>were talking
to aircraft overhead,</i> <i>and within a few minutes,
he told me</i> that he had a pair of F15's that had bombs,
and they were ready
to drop bombs. Well, the enemy
was really close to us, I mean, we were...
50-75 meters from each other. You don't drop 500-pound bombs
that close to yourself, so I said,
"None of that right now.
We don't want that." And he said,
"Well, what about guns?" And I said,
"That sounds good." <i>I'd been to a few air shows
growing up,</i> <i>you know, as a child,</i> and sometimes the Blue Angels
will do these low flyovers. That's kind of what
it felt like. Meanwhile, I'm thinking,
"Where's-- where's
that other aircraft with 10 more Rangers on it? <i>Where's Arin Canon
and that other squad?"</i> <i>We haven't heard from them.</i> Vela:<i>
Our main goal</i> <i>was to get to the top
of the mountain.</i> So, whatever they're throwing
at us right now, it's basically,
"Hey, get up. Get down. Continue to move. Move. Move. Continue.
We have to get up there." <i>There is no easy way
to do it.</i> <i>Because under that snow
is jagged rock.</i> Self:<i>
When they landed,
Arin Canon called me,</i> <i>and he got up on the radio,</i> <i>and said,
"Hey, we're on the ground.</i> <i>Where are you?
We're gonna come to you."</i> Right around that time,
we also started hearing
water rounds being fired off, in the distance. And they started coming in
on our position, which meant
that there was a coordinated kind of enemy,
uh, effort, and they were trying to bring
an indirect fire on us, and put pressure on us. ( explosion ) The first set of rounds
didn't land on us, it landed, um,
I think behind us, the next set went over us, and so,
from an artillery perspective, that's how you do it. I mean, you bracket
to your enemy. It's like
shooting free throws. If you're long, the next one
needs to be short, and then the next one
might be in the middle, and then you keep
shooting there. <i>We decided to move
all the causalities
into the aircraft,</i> <i>so that the shrapnel blast
wouldn't hit them.</i> We decided we would
just hold what we had until the other group
of Rangers got to us. Vela:<i>
I was the assistant gunner.</i> <i>And Ammo Bear.</i> So, I had
not only my weapon, but over 500-600 rounds
of the ammunition to supply for the gun. Plus the body armor,
I was probably carrying anywhere from 80-110 pounds
of gear. It definitely
was slow-moving because of the terrain
and because of the snow. <i>Me, Miceli, and Marc Anderson
did a crazy leg workout</i> <i>the night before.</i> We were doing all these types
of different-- you know,
lots of reps on squats and we'd get down
on the floor and do different
elevated leg raises,
flutter kicks. So, we were just doing
a circuit. <i>I remember Marc
specifically saying,</i> <i>"Vela, are you trying
to kill my legs?</i> <i>Or what the hell, man?
I'm just-- this is
my first workout</i> <i>I've done with these,
come on."</i> <i>You know.</i> So... what I thought
climbing up, is, one, ( scoffs ).
"My legs are crazy smoked
because of that workout. Two,
how are Marc's legs feeling right now? Because if mine
are feeling sore, man, I wonder how the heck
he does, cause he hadn't been
working out with us during that time." Miceli:<i> Omar and I
are pretty good buddies.</i> He's one of those guys, that no matter what
he's doing, he's gonna
make you laugh. Just listening to him
talk about anything, the way he talks about it,
makes you laugh. <i>He played football
in high school.</i> Yeah, I was always
looking at him. Yeah, how do I get big?
I wanna get big. He'd give me tips
and we'd work out together. And that was kind of
our routine there. Vela:<i>
I went to Baylor University,</i> <i>and I graduated there
with a B.A. in Biology,</i> <i>I was pre-medicine.</i> But a year
before graduation, uh, I started wanting
to push myself and challenge myself,
physically and mentally. Then I started looking
at the different branches
of the military, from the Navy, to the Army,
to Special Operations. What were the differences
between them? <i>I decided on the Army,</i> <i>I went right
to the recruiter,</i> <i>and I said, "Hey,
I wanna Ranger contract."</i> You know, they really
came at you hard, as far as trying
to test your mental. You know, test you-- "Do you realize that going
into the Ranger Battalions <i>is a way of life?</i> <i>Halfway through,
Nate Self radioed back
to our chop leader.</i> You know,
the sense of urgency
was really kicking in a little bit more. Especially when, you know, we weren't making
the time hacks. Self:<i>
I called Arin and said,
"Where are you?"</i> And he said,
"We're in really deep snow,
we're moving slowly." <i>Forty-five minutes passed,</i> <i>and the more the fire
started to increase.</i> You know they're coming, you can hear them
come out to you. <i>( loud pop )</i> ( gunfire ) I remember just trying
to make myself as small as possible. Squeeze myself
into the ground. If I could have crawled
under a penny, I could have crawled
under a penny. Self:<i>
I kind of feel like,
this is a position</i> <i>where if-- if the motor fire
comes in on top of us
with a lot of volume,</i> <i>we're gonna be in
bad trouble.</i> <i>And so,
when that happened,</i> I told three or four
of the Rangers that were there with me to get ready to move
and attack. ( gunfire continues ) Miceli:<i>
The things that were going
through my mind were just</i> not worry, not fear,
just kind of like, all right,
here we are. Let's get this
over with. Self:<i>
There was one big tree</i> <i>that we were calling
the Bonsai tree at the time.</i> There was a guy
that came out from around it, and fired at us
and went back and I noticed that
he was down into a pit at the base of this tree and that there were logs that had been latched together
with rope, and that there was
fresh foliage that was put over the top
of it, so... It was a hard position. My instincts just told me this is not--
this isn't right. <i>So, I said, "Get back."</i> <i>The reaction of the Rangers
that were with me</i> was kind of like,
"Are you kidding?" It felt a bit cowardly
when it happened. Decision-making
in these environments
is all... it's all instinct. It's... it's not easy. <i>I remember at West Point,
when we started there,</i> <i>they had this honor code
where it was really
black and white.</i> <i>You don't lie,
cheat, or steal.</i> <i>Those kinds of things.</i> <i>And it's really clear</i> <i>when someone's done
something wrong,</i> <i>and so the cases
they presented us with</i> <i>were pretty easy.</i> And that's not the kind
of decision that... that I'm talking about
on the battlefield, <i>and I can say that</i> <i>the experience
that you have</i> builds an intuition
inside of you that you have to rely on
in those situations because you-- you have to make
decisions where you won't know for years
if it was the right
or wrong decision. You might not know
for your whole life if it was the right
or wrong decision, but something has to push you
one way or the other. They were prepared
and waiting for us, and they ambushed us
and had us in a really bad position. <i>We are the elite,</i> and we're essentially
up against the ropes. Self:<i>
It definitely felt wrong</i> <i>that we were
so highly trained,</i> so well-equipped,
and so cohesive as a unit
to be in such a bad position. This shouldn't be happening. <i>At that point
I knew the different solution</i> <i>that I can't really
assault again</i> <i>unless I get more firepower
on the bunker.</i> So, I called the--
back to Arin and said,
"How much longer?" "Probably another 45 minutes."
Right? So, I'm getting
pretty frustrated that.. so, the only way
I can get more firepower
on the bunker is to drop bombs
on the bunker? Which was
the original offering from the aircraft,
that we had 500 pounders
that we can drop, but there wasn't
100 meters of you. We typically in training would want that to be
750-1,000 meters out, so your likelihood
of your own causalities
is pretty high, even if they hit the target. <i>I heard the combat controller
talking on the radio
to the Predator,</i> and I asked him
to see if it's armed, and he called back
and told me it's armed
and has two hellfires, and I said,
"Shoot them into the bunker." <i>Fired the first hellfire.</i> <i>It was a little off target.</i> Something in me said,
"Hey, I want to look at this, I want to watch
this explosion." And I-- I caught
the brunt of it. <i>I just remember hot rocks
just blasting all of my face.</i> It felt like
they were sticking to me,
so I had to brush them off, but it was-- it was
something that I needed
to see, I don't know. And then fired
the second hellfire, and it went right
into the bunker that we were assaulting,
and basically blew it up. Then the guy that was up
on the radio talking overhead, he called over to me
and said, "Hey, I'm talking
to a SEAL team there that's down the mountain
from us. They said,
'Don't shoot that way 'cause they're down there.'" At that point I realized, that was probably
the SEAL team that was asking for us
to come in. But I said,
"Okay, got it. We're down here,
you're up there. Let's make sure
we don't shoot each other." And that was it. <i>At the same time,</i> <i>the mortar rounds
that were landing around us,</i> <i>were shifting down toward
the other Rangers,</i> <i>and so the pressure on us
was a bit alleviated.</i> If they could get to us,
then we could complete
our assault. Vela:<i>
I remember there was a point</i> <i>when the mortar rounds
were coming,</i> and I remember
getting down at one point and looking and seeing
a mortar round land... it had to have been,
about, you know, maybe 50 meters away,
if that. And it just went
( thump ) into the snow. And it didn't do anything,
and I was just like "Huh." And I just got back up
and started moving. Miceli:<i>
The linkup was uh,
it was difficult.</i> <i>You know, A, they were coming
from a different direction</i> <i>than we thought
they were coming from.</i> B, just the terrain,
trying to-- you know, they're down here,
there's rocks,
we're in depression... It came down to throwing
a bunch of snow in the air, "Can you see us throwing snow
in the air?" And then, finally,
yeah, everybody just,
you know, filed up, past our position first,
and they just looked crushed. <i>It was a high mountain</i> <i>just walking
from point to point</i> <i>up on top of it
burned your lungs.</i> <i>The altitude
was killing us.</i> I almost felt bad
because I'm sitting there, you know... almost laying down
in the borne leaning up against the rock
relaxed almost. And these guys just--
just killed it coming up. Vela:<i>
Once we linkup,
there was no rest.</i> It's time to go. <i>We just started
laying down fire</i> <i>onto the bunker,</i> while two squads came around to flank onto the bunker
himself, and to try
and sweep him through. Miceli:<i>
It felt like
a shooting gallery.</i> <i>They'd go from the bunker
to a tree.</i> And would just take them down
as they'd go or they'd get to the tree, and we'd wait
till they pop out. You fire, I fire,
You fire, I fire,
You fire, I fire... <i>and that's when
our guy swept through</i> <i>and eliminated the rest
of the insurgents up there.</i> <i>Regardless of how many hours
we had been walking,</i> <i>it didn't matter,
they were no match for us.</i> We overwhelmed them. Self:<i>
I got a call
from Arin Canon,</i> <i>who had moved up
with that squad,</i> <i>right at the edge
of the bunker.</i> And he said, "Hey, sir,
you need to get up here, we have a...
we have a blue causality." <i>I'm thinking someone
got hurt, somehow.</i> <i>When I started walking
up there</i> <i>to the top of the mountain</i> I saw a pair of boots. A guy was laying out
in the snow right at the edge
of that bunker that we had fought against
the whole morning. And when I got to him,
I recognized he wasn't
a part of our team, and he was an American,
and he was dead. And...
when I got to Arin, I said, "Where did
this guy come from?" He goes, "I don't know." <i>We weren't sure what
was going on at that point.</i> And we found another American
in the bunkers. <i>And he was in the bunker
that we had hit
with the hellfire</i> <i>so he was down under</i> <i>a bunch of brush
and everything.</i> A lot of thoughts
running through my head. Like, I'm thinking,
"These guys were captured, and brought here,
and no one knew that. Why are there two guys here that we didn't know
were here? They were here before us. Did we kill them... when we were dropping bombs
and shooting up in here?" <i>Something sour went on here.</i> <i>I don't know how
this happened.</i> Self:<i>
We start trying to find out</i> <i>who these two
dead Americans are,</i> <i>that are in the midst
of this position.</i> <i>Arin
and a couple other guys</i> <i>were able to pull
personal effects,</i> <i>and find out the names
of the two guys.</i> My combat controller
called a SEAL team that was down
on the low ground again and said, "Yeah,
they came from our team." <i>Everything came
into clarity for me.</i> <i>One of these guys
was Neil Roberts,</i> the man that was
originally missing that was potentially part
of our mission. This is the SEAL team
that was calling us in. Now, it's kinda starting
to make sense for me. But, I mean,
we're four or five hours into the fight,
and I had no idea that those guys
were up there. <i>So, it was very disruptive
for me to know</i> <i>that we were shooting
into that position</i> and firing
and dropping bombs into that position
knowing that they were there. We found out that,
hey, all the enemy had been eliminated
in the bunker, all enemy to the rear
has been eliminated. We're clear,
we're good to go, to move openly,
to move freely. <i>That's when the command
comes out</i> <i>to start to collect
the casualties.</i> Where they had set up
a consolidation was brutal. I mean, you just had
to stop every couple... you know, 10, 15, 20 feet
to catch your breath. <i>There was even a point
when we were consolidating,</i> that the pastor said,
he said, "Man, that look--
that's Anderson." He's like, "I can't believe
that's Anderson." And I'm like, "Man,
we can't think about that
right now." There's time
to think about that later. <i>My sister's joke
about me being coldhearted,</i> <i>but I don't think
it has anything</i> <i>to do with that.</i> You got to be able
to turn your emotions off to do your job,
because it's what we do. I mean, it's not a pretty job
sometimes. Vela:<i>
They had tried to do
a trauma attention to him.</i> <i>But it was a direct shot
to the side.</i> <i>It went through
his body armor</i> <i>and immediately
hit his heart.</i> I remember
looking at Marc, you know, called his name,
you know, once but that was
about it. Then as were moving
casualties up, I remember
all this gunfire came up from behind
the aircraft. ( explosion roars ) <i>Everyone just
kind of hit the deck.</i> Well, another group
had snuck up below us and had set in an ambush. It was bad. We called
the Air Force again, and got bigger bombs
and dropped them all around where the enemy was. <i>We tried to contract
our position</i> <i>as tight as we could
and dropped more ordnance</i> around us
to try to keep anyone from trying to get up
that mountain. That went on
for a long time trying to move people
to get them to safety. That was a tough part
of the fight. <i>I didn't know it at the time,
but a pararescue jumper</i> that was on my aircraft,
Jason Cunningham, Corey Lambrow
the flight medic were both shot
in the abdomen as they were working
on casualties. <i>So, we had two</i> <i>of our medical personnel
down.</i> <i>We started asking somehwere
around noon or 1:00</i> <i>for a medevac aircraft
to get them out.</i> Vela:<i> They were like,
they're not gonna try
and risk</i> <i>getting any more guys
killed in action today.</i> They did not want to do
a daytime exfil. They couldn't--
they didn't want to-- they didn't authorize it,
so. Self:<i>
You've got guys
that you think</i> <i>are gonna die
if they don't get</i> <i>high level
medical attention</i> <i>in the next
two or three hours.</i> It's a really tough thing
to... come to grips with when they're right there
next to you and they're still alive. I was irritated,
because, you know, it was cold and we were tired
and lost guys and we had casualties
and we had to get
these guys out. But you also understood,
you can't get more casualties. I mean, to lose more guys
would just make the situation
so much more worse. Self:<i>
After a period
of several hours,</i> Jason Cunningham
started to take a turn
for the worse. <i>He started to slip away</i> <i>and then he died
in our midst.</i> <i>Then I called in
and reported</i> that we had lost one,
and that was it. Self:<i>
I wonder
if I did a good enough job</i> <i>of painting the picture
as to what the situation
on the ground was,</i> <i>because it was
completely different</i> <i>once we took the mountain
with them before.</i> And I feel at times
a lot of guilt around whether
I communicated well enough to get those guys out. <i>I've thought about whether</i> <i>I should have lied
to manipulate the situation.</i> I'm still not sure
if I had tried to manipulate that decision, if I could have manipulated
that decision. And I've been told
that I couldn't have. <i>We paired up everyone,</i> <i>I didn't really
want guys alone.</i> <i>I didn't want their minds
to do things to them.</i> You know, I wanted them
to have someone to be with, the kind of
Ranger buddy mentality. Vela:<i>
Then came
the waiting game to leave,</i> but that's when you started
to really, you know, feel it, as far as, man, we're getting
pretty, pretty tired up here. Miceli:<i>
There's MREs
and we'd split them up.</i> Dropped some M&Ms
in the dirt. I'm like,
"Oh, man, listen.
I don't care." So,
I'm digging through the dirt just to get these things. And... somebody said, "You have no idea
what's on this ground here." And I'm like,
"I don't really care, either. This M&Ms'
going in my mouth." It's one of those things. And the cold
was just horrible. We were spooning
just to keep warm, and then wrapping up
with, you know, a map to try
to keep ourselves warm. <i>( helicopter whirring )</i> <i>The snow had started
to freeze on top.</i> <i>You would step on it,</i> <i>and feel secure,
and you'd break through.</i> <i>Whoever I was carrying,</i> <i>I dropped him
like, three times.</i> And I remember the guy's like,
"Hey, ( bleep ) man." I'm like, "I'm sorry, man.
I'm so sorry." He's like,
"No, it's okay, I get it." I just remember
dropping that guy and just feeling terrible,
'cause, you know, he was wounded
and to make matters worse, I'm throwing him
on the ground. Self:<i>
The first Chinook
that went out</i> <i>had the guys
that were wounded.</i> And the second Chinook
that went out had the guys
that were still able to walk around
and were okay plus
the killed in action. <i>So, when I got
on that aircraft,</i> <i>I moved all the way up
to the front,</i> <i>sat down
next to Arin Canon.</i> We were just trying
to make space, and I think
I just sat down <i>in between his legs</i> <i>and leaned back
on him the same way.</i> <i>And just went into
a little daze as we flew off.</i> <i>And I heard
my platoon sergeant</i> <i>get on the radio
and-- and he asked Arin</i> where's the platoon leader. And I keyed my mic
and I said, "I'm in between
his legs." And I didn't mean for that
to be funny, but as soon as that
came out of my mouth, I knew that probably
was not sounding too good. <i>You know, I think
that mission itself</i> <i>is emblematic of a creed.</i> <i>If someone is in need</i> <i>that you're gonna go
help him.</i> Neil Roberts was a SEAL that was missing
and essentially the man
that we went to get that we wouldn't
leave behind. And a lot of people
kind of scratch their heads
as to say "We had one missing
and we lost six more?" But you have
no way of knowing that you're going to lose six
or 60 going to get one. VELA:<i>
That day shaped me.</i> <i>The going up the mountain,</i> <i>the stress
that it put on your body.</i> There's nothing
that will ever-- and after that, come on,
you know, what else you got? The whole
"I wanna get out and kill, I wanna get out
and get these guys," at least for me,
that was gone. I slayed my dragons. <i>I always thought that,
you know, guys that went out</i> <i>and did stuff
and nothing bad happened</i> <i>always came away
with a different attitude</i> of "Yeah, that's awesome." Compared to, you know,
hey, it's not always awesome. You know, there's bad stuff
that can happen. <i>The next day,
I was cleaning my gun</i> <i>outside in the back,
that's when it started
to hit me.</i> These guys are gone. Self:<i>
I remember
just sitting on the bunk,</i> <i>and probably
some blood on my pants,</i> <i>the chaplain
came in and told me</i> <i>to get out of those pants.</i> <i>Put some clean clothes on</i> <i>and, you know,
kind of get out</i> <i>of that state.</i> We went to Afganistan
to kill or capture people. I can say
for the most part, my role in that
wasn't significant. <i>But when given a mission
to bring back one of our own,</i> there's nothing
more important than that. <i>There's several men
that died there</i> <i>that have families.</i> <i>You had young kids
at the time</i> that don't have
their fathers and I think it's important
that we tell these stories and that we remember
that these men gave their lives
for another man. You know, I think
that is a very special thing about... about who we are that I don't want
people to forget.
