Return to Blackhawk Down

This has been making the rounds for about a week now, so you may have already seen it. In case you don't know, Jeff Struecker became a Chaplain sometime after the battle, and was my friend M4 Guru's Chaplain in the 82nd. Keni Thomas went into music after leaving the service. If you like country, check out his stuff. He's pretty dang good.

This is a piece of the story of Keni and Jeff heading back to Mogadishu 20 years after The Battle of the Black Sea (Battle of Mogadishu). Its pretty awesome.

Religion of peace? Ft. Hood is making me rethink my opinion

The events at Fort Hood this week have been very much in the fore of my mind. There was at least one LF forum member that was reported to be in that area, so the situation hit closer to home. Thankfully, he's been heard from since and was not involved. However, the reaction from the leaders of Islam are making me rethink what I thought about Muslims.

I used to believe, or at least want to believe, that there was a difference between Islam and Militant Islam. I don't know a lot of Muslims; being a Christian I don't have a lot of contact with them in my daily life, and certainly not in my spiritual life. So, what I know of Islam has been gleaned through my own limited research and what I have observed of it through the news.

Islam is called the Religion of Peace. That sounds great on the surface, but if the definition of peace I have been told is accurate, that becomes very troubling. According to what I've found, "peace", in terms of the Muslim definition of the word, means "the world under Islamic rule". Till then, there is no peace. We're certainly in the midst of that right now.

Because Islam doesn't come out against, and denounce as being against the teachings of Islam, fanatics like the murderer in Texas-I refuse to publish that waste of skin's name-makes me think they're in favor of it. Because they decry only Islam being painted in a bad light and not acts of murder and terrorism, I'm coming to the conclusion that there's no difference between Militant Islam and the rest of Islam. It appears they may be one and the same. I need to do more research, but as the Magic 8 Ball would say, "signs point to yes".

Commemorating

A friend of mine had these made up for members of the LF community that have been killed in action. They include Travis Patriquin (look for a book soon on the man), Danish serviceman Christian Raaschou, and the teammate of my friend M4Guru, SSG Justin Whiting. I can't call Justin a friend, but I had met him and talked with him on several occasions. Like all of these gentlemen, he was taken too early in his life, but gave his life for a cause he believed in.

All of these, and more in the service, are better men than we deserve. I fear that we will, once again, leave the job unfinished and do the famous cut and run in the Middle East. I can't believe we're looking at doing that AGAIN. What a waste.

Obama's War

I didn't intend to blog on politics today, and as both of the readers of my blog have probably noticed, I have avoided commenting on the new administration because I know I don't have anything good to say. However, watching the news this morning, the war in Afghanistan has become a hot topic, and it concerns me deeply.

The administration is planning a surge in troops there. They've been talking about that for months, at least. That's not news. What is news if you look deeper is that they're trying to do it all the wrong way. They're talking about increasing the number of troops there dramatically. Heard that before? They're talking about mechanizing it, bringing in tanks and other armor. Sound familiar? They're planning to bring in infantry is large numbers. Does that ring a bell?

What's the problem here? More troops means more fighting ability in the battle space, doesn't it? The Soviets used somewhere between 80,000 and a little over 100,000 troops there, most of which were conventional infantry (the 40th Army, IIRC). They brought tanks and armored personnel carriers, artillery and lots of trucks. They ended up leaving quite a lot of it there, too.

This isn't a conventional war. The conflict in Afghanistan is Unconventional Warfare. As such, and as was already proven by the take down of the country in a matter of weeks, it is a mission that is the very definition of a Special Forces mission. Not the CIF, not any other direct action unit, but a straight up, textbook Special Forces mission.

If you're not familiar with what SF does, their job is Unconventional Warfare, including FID (Foreign Internal Defense) and creating insurgencies. Their tasking is to either stabilize or destabilize a country and either foment or put down rebellion, depending on the situation. These are the guys that, along with the Northern Alliance, took down the Taliban in a matter of weeks. According to most accounts from people who were there, the reason that OBL and the Taliban weren't crushed completely is that conventional forces got involved and didn't let SF do what they do. See the books Ghost Wars, Masters of Chaos, and The Mission, The Men and Me.

Nations continue to get in the way of what they do well. This is no exception. We have the perfect force to fight this war, and aren't allowing them to run with it. Now, to be fair (I know, its hard to believe I'm saying that), this situation didn't unfold entirely on the watch of the Obamanation. They are, however, going to be the ones that perpetuate it. Why is that? Well, because he has no experience and has surrounded himself with cronies and Clinton administration retreads.

Increasing the number of troops isn't the answer. Decreasing them might be, if the Powers What Be would allow the organization most able to do this job to do it completely. Unfortunately, there are bureaucrats that won't allow that to happen, because it doesn't make them look good. And then it's political business as usual, rather than selling out to win the fight. In the end, I'll blame the Obamanation. Again.

Courage, strength, and perseverence. I gotta warn you, this will be humbling.

Mark Campbell is an officer in the Canadian Army. Recently, he was WIA in Afghanistan, The following is copied from his post at Lightfighter.net explaining what happened and what is happening now. I have to say, this post humbled me, and at the same time, confirmed that I have a lot of work to do on myself. His attitude in amazing and inspiring. This is the quality of service personnel we have in this fight. We owe them all a debt I fear we will never fully understand, much less ever be able to repay.

Howdy Fellow LFers,

First and foremost, I'm still alive and kicking so no "memorial" stuff is required at this point. Second, many thanks for all of your well-wishes and associated kind words. All is as well with me as can be expected under the circumstances. I had a "bad day" in Siah Choy (Zhari District) back on 01 Jun, but it certainly wasn't the end of the world. Indeed, I am quite thankful that aside from the loss of both legs above the knees, I am 100% good to go. In other words, the same old me - for better or for worse!

To satisfy any natural curiosity, I was hit by a comd-detonated AP mine that initiated a complex ambush against the ANA coy that I was accompanying on a village clearance op. The blast threw me straight up and slightly backwards such that I landed just behind the blast seat on my back. I did a crunch and saw that both legs were gone below the knees. I yelled for assistance and managed to get a CAT around my left stump before attending troops took over my care under fire. Both legs were tourniquetted and I was extracted under fire to a secure location while the coy engaged the enemy under the very capable guidance of one of my coy mentoring teams. I remained conscious throughout, which turned out to be a PITA due to the incredible degree of pain I was in.

Three other members of my HQ were evacced with me, including my Med Sgt, who provided life-saving treatment to me while simultaneously treating himself for blast-related concussion. There was a running gun battle back to the designated HLS that lasted about an hour, followed by a 25-minute helo ride to KAF and 30 minutes of in-processing at the Role 3 Forward Surgical Hospital. By that point I was literally begging to be rendered unconscious via anesthetic, as the pain was totally out of control. That was by far the worst part of the entire episode - feeling every single second of the 2 hours it took to finally get some pain relief.

I underwent intial surgery at the Role 3 in KAF, and was then air-evacced to Landstuhl Germany. Once I was anethesized at the Role 3, I was kept unconscious for the better part of a week aside from a couple of occasions where they woke me up for various assessments and phone calls. I was intubated and kept in intensive care due to blast damage to my lung tissue which compromised oxygen processing. Once I regained consciousness, I remained in the Landstuhl ICU for a further 5 days before being placed in the general ward. My repat to Canada was delayed as a result of the lung damage, which impacted my ability to fly at altitude under normal pressurization. Eventually all was well, and I flew from Germany to Edmonton via Airbus and Challenger.

I have been in the Isolation Ward of the U of Alberta Hospital for just over two weeks now, where my wounds have undergone follow-on treatment. Initially the treatment consisted of debriding and irrigating the wounds every 2 days IOT ensure the presence of healthy tissue suitable for skin grafting. I still had a lot of dead tissue in and around my wounds as a result of the blast and the Afghan "super-bug" that I contracted. After a week of dressing changes and cleanings the surgeons were able to conduct the initial skin-grafts required to create suitable stumps for prosthetic legs. The donor tissue came from my upper thighs, which added a whole new level of discomfort. Morphine, Dilaudid, OxyContin, etc, have become my new bestest friends! Anyhow, as of today the docs assess that the graft on my right leg is 100% successful. The graft on my left leg is only 85% healthy, due to the fact that my left thigh took the worst of the blast damage and therefore requires the most reconstruction. If all goes according to plan, one more surgery this coming weekend will sort out the graft on my left stump and put both at 100% so that I can get on with healing and rehab.

I will remain at the U of A Hospital for a few more weeks to let my stumps heal, then transition to the Glenrose Hospital (still in Edmonton) for 3 to 6 months of in-patient amputee rehab. The length of my stay in rehab will depend entirely upon my personal rate of progress through the recovery programme. The good news is that the Glenrose provides cutting-edge/state of the art amputee treatment. There will be plenty of hard work, but | can expect to see maximum return on my rehab efforts.

The support and assistance that I have received throughout every stage of my injury, evacuation and treatment to date has been superb. As you can appreciate, there are still many unanswered questions that need to be addressed, but for the most part my immediate requirements have all been met. My family, friends, co-workers and the various institutional representatives have all been incredibly supportive thus far. My Wife of 18 years has been a rock-solid port in some pretty stormy seas of late. My friends, spanning 27 years of military service, have rallied around my family and shown their true colours. One could not hope for better friends, and I consider myself a very rich man for their company. Likewise, the various military institutions that affect me have been tremendous in their support, starting with a personal visit by the Canadian Forces Chief of Defence Staff (Gen Rick Hillier) and working down the chain through the Army, my Regiment (the PPCLI), and my unit (3rd Bn, PPCLI). I honestly couldn't ask for more in terms of assistance and support in dealing with my current challenges.

Anyhow, I just wanted to let you know that I am doing fine despite my recent set-back. Yeah, the Taliban bastards managed to wing me. They didn't kill me though - just slowed me down a bit. I'm a partial mobility kill, nothing worse. My injuries will heal and my mobility will eventually improve. I am pleased to say that this is much more than a large number of former Taliban can boast. We did some very good killing on the ops immediately preceeding and during my injury with an extremely high "exchange rate". No doubt the lop-sided killing has continued in my absence....

Life has thrown some new challenges in my path, but at the same time there are new opportunities to be exploited. I just need to figure out what those opportunities are and how they apply to me in order to chart a suitable way ahead for myself and my family. First things first though - for now I need to focus on mending and regaining my mobility. I'll worry about the long-term stuff later.

That is about all I have to report for now. Many thanks again for your concern and your individual well-wishes! That means a lot to me coming from such a distinguished group of BTDT fellow warriors.

Soldier on, no regrets!

Mark Campbell (aka "Stumpy") :Smile:

PS. Here's a link to a recent article with embedded video featuring my mentoring team on ops. The op occurred way back in April before the campaign season really ramped up. As a result, there isn't any kinetic contact. Still, the reporter manages to pretty accurately capture the typical mix of friction-induced stupidity and tactical success. A good intro for those not familiar with ongoing NATO efforts to professionalize the ANA. Enjoy!

http://www.legionmagazine.com/en/index.php/2008/07/assi...teesh-bazi/#more-994

Ask Me if I Care About 'Mishandling' of Koran Op Ed by Doug Patton

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