The story focuses on "Reaper Two," a sniper team from the Charlie Company's 2nd Battalion. The team's mission that morning was to provide a rooftop observation point (OP) to guard against insurgent activity on the roads into the central Samarra, where Charlie Company's 3rd Platoon would be carrying out a search of an IED manufacturing shop.
Reaper Two's position atop the building was compromised, and the sniper team came under withering enemy fire. The team's four paratroopers - Sergeant Josh Morley, Specialist Tracy Willis, Specialist Chris Corriveau, and Specialist Eric Moser - fought courageously to hold their position:
ON THE ROOF OF THE APARTMENT BUILDING, Morley and Moser were taking AK-47 and PKC (a 7.62mm Russian-made machine gun) fire from both stairwells. As they spun around to return fire, they saw several small, dark objects flying onto the roof from the stairwell -- hand grenades. Morley recognized that the situation was rapidly deteriorating and knew that, though his team currently occupied the high ground in the emerging battle, they could not hold out for very long due to their vast disadvantage in numbers. Seeing that Willis, who was next to the team's radio, was busy firing into the stairwell through a window on the enclave's north side, and not knowing that one of the first hand grenades tossed onto the roof had disabled it, Morley made a dash across the roof to call for the QRF.Read the whole thing.
He never made it there.
As Moser fired into the door from his corner in an attempt to suppress the enemy assault, he saw Morley appear to stumble and go down, his weapon skidding across the rooftop toward the stairwell door. His first thought was that the team leader had tripped and fallen; a moment later, his brain registered the truth: Morley had been shot. A burst of gunfire from the southern stairwell across the dividing wall had scored a direct hit, with one round striking Morley directly in the forehead. He was dead before hitting the ground.
Moser didn't have time to dwell on Morley's death. Knowing that what had just become a three-man team could not long withstand the concerted effort by what was clearly a large enemy force to move up the stairs to his location, he took the same chance that Morley had, and crossed the roof to the radio while Willis continued to fire his .240 machine gun into the stairwell, killing at least two enemy fighters with well-placed bursts as grenades continued to be tossed up the stairs and out onto the roof. As he moved to the radio (which he found to have been disabled by a grenade), Moser was able to get a look down into the northern stairwell. Inside, he saw a number of armed men, both black and Arab rushing up the steps toward the roof -- none of whom were the individuals he had seen get out of the car moments before on the street. Apparently there had been fighters stationed in the building before the white car's arrival.
We don't often get such intimate reporting of the modern American military in combat. The article, written by Jeff Emanuel, a special operations veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, keeps a tight focus on tactical developments of the firefight, and doesn't dwell on the carnage and losses. Emanuel's conclusion is uplifting, but not weepy. We see the perseverance and strength of our fighters, and we get a feeling for the importance of unit camaraderie in battle.
Hat tip: Infidel's Are Cool.
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