SEALs have been going through Ranger School for quite a while.  We had one in our platoon (class 05/01) and he was a complete soup sandwich in the woods, weak on rucking, etc... maybe he was GOD tier in the water but he never got to Florida to show us.  

Chow came up missing out of rucks two times when he was assigned to stay back at the patrol base while we hit our target in Mountains.  After that, one night he "fell" off the side of a cliff  and got some injuries to his eye, body, etc. He got sent to the gulag and figured it would be a good idea to buy some Jack Daniel's and order a pizza from the joint on Camp Merrill.  He was PNG'ed shortly after.

Another Seal we talked to said mostly the guys sent there were there as a punishment/last chance with their Teams.  If they couldn't get squared away they got dropped when they got home.  A smaller subgroup was there to enhance their small unit tactics and test themselves in a new way. Didn't hear a single bad word about that 2nd SEAL from them.  

Small sample group but that's all I got.

I wanted to post something in this thread but I didn’t want to be disrespectful to the people who have way more insight into this than me or sound callous about the subject or the person involved. I’ve never been there or done that but I have a couple of questions.

Why was it important that the survivor was found having loaded mags in his carrier’s? Did he claim to be out of ammunition at some point and that it affected his actions or decisions?

It’s said now that he was running away at some point. Was this during a fight or after or what?

I’ve never read the book or seen the movie I’m just going on different things I’ve seen and read over the years.

Thanks for any answers I get.

RIP to those men. I think they deserved better than they got from the people who were supposed to be supporting them.

The insurgents had a cameramen along with our drone footage. One of two videos recorded by the insurgents have been released but not the second.

There were 3 four man teams with a belt fed and rpg designated insurgent in each.  They held the high ground and ambushed them in a gulch.

IIRC, Ranger School used to be punishment for seals.  That and since it has always been billed as a leadership school, not sure I would call it the be all end all for learning field craft.

I hate to point this out but Big Army and JSOC can't keep the 3rd World in check like the USMC does for 1/10th the price.

It's a pity the gigantic Lone Survivor threads got archived.  A lot of BTDT types gave some very interesting color on what happened to this civilian reading them.  

The accusations in this podcast, as related by those of you who listened to it, frankly don't make sense.  The opposition had enough control of the area to loot Dietz's body, and the controversial laptop but couldn't find Axelson?  Who had no other set of comms, or ways to signal the orbiting drone that allegedly saw Luttrell running?

(I think Luttrell just fell down the 2°-shy of vertical mountainside, rolling pretty much to Gulab's door, and out of the kill zone..  As one of you in those threads noted, if he falls into the other valley, he's found and he dies.)

The ST-6 members didn't share the, "Oh by the way, we know there are Manpads where you're going.  Good luck!", with the remainder of the QRF?  Moreover, we knew they were Grails and not Stingers?  We didn't have any kind of IR ECM that could be employed, either on rotary or fixed wing?  The TOC is completely empty and something like a radio watch isn't constantly, redundantly running when there are clandestine OPs in Indian Country?  (Who knows, maybe that one does happen?  Seems slipshod.)

Is it inappropriate to say he looks like the kind of guy that would run. Reminds me of Private Pyle from Full Metal Jacket.

I went through Ranger School (10-89) with a SEAL. He didn't make a good impression.

It seems odd. But one did get away, so maybe another did too, for awhile.

Has the drone video been released?

I especially liked the part where he went rolling down the mountain and almost landed in a diamondback rattlesnake-in the middle east.

They couldn't find something that lives in that area?

No poison Oak also...

I miss Colonel Paul Darling.

a lot of us do. when Arfcom had it together (P.S. been around long before the date under my name).

After listening to that.

I never knew Axe was found near the rally point leaning against a tree and was supposedly alive for 6-7 days.

Thought Riberts Ridge was worse until I learned that. (Assuming it's true)

Do you think the Pred video wil come out ever?

As someone who served in a very uninteresting and unimportant capacity.  It makes sense to me when you consider how situations rarely lead to obviously heroic situations. There's this belief that there's this moment where a man knows he can make a stand on beliefs or principle.

But more often than not it will pass you by without you understanding that was the moment to do something.  So the ones who do were often in the right place at the right time more than "heroes who made a stand"

It was over in like 5 minutes. A couple of 3-4 man teams with PKMs did a near ambush on them, Luttrell was covering their rear and ran off as the others were smoked in short order. There were only about a dozen total Taliban fighters in the whole valley during that time frame.
It’s been covered many times here over the years. The book and movie are complete BS.

When you find out the SFOD-D Ground Commander was written out of BHD and hired by Sig USA after he retired would you still believe what happened to Shugart and Gordon?

How does Scott Miller play into that?

Marine mission for a relatively low priority target.

Marines don't have the proper equipment or training to fly there during that time of the month do to low/no light

Find out 160th will/can do it, but 160th is SOF and mainly worked with SEALs at the time, so SEALS were chosen for the RECCE mission

When they get found by shephards, SOP was to call in and ask,  they can't get in contact. So they cut loose immediately.

Come under fire, cannot get in contact, they've made all their radio checks, so word on the street is the TOC got lax and were outside playing and not constantly watching.

Murphy has to call Virginia with sat phone so they could call the TOC. Finally word gets to their help.

USMC already had QRF planned/ready, but SF wanted to keep internal. Shithooks loaded up and at last second  1st tier SEALS get pulled off the chopper because supposedly command knew of the SA7 threat but didn't tell anyone and pulled their guys so they didn't die.

Chinook is hit right in the engine, typical of a SA7 not an inaccurate RPG.

Other bird sees "swirling object" hit it. AKA a missed under guidance making corrections.

Second bird was ready to offload help but get ordered back.

During recovery of the downed bird get a signal from Marcus, guys stripped down and haul ass down there to find the village. When they get there they bring Marcus out.

Marcus is found to be unhelpful and basically told them all his teammates are dead, and couldn't really tell them where exactly to find them. Marcus walked himself to the helicopter.

Marcus telling him they're all dead put a hault to finding them ASAP so the recovery was slow rolled... they didn't want to risk more lives.

8-10 days later when SEALS from Germany arrive (again USMC still not asked for help) they FINALLY share the Rally Point position with the recovery teams.

Find Axelson leaned up to a tree no too far away and he was supposedly only dead for 2 days when they found him.

I missed the part where he kept repeating Marcus said on live air during a CNN interview in the early days, when Murphy called out for help he dropped his rifle, covered his ears and ran.

Supposedly there is Predator video of him running away



I probably missed some, typed on a phone, so probably lots of errors

I wasn't going to drop names but fans of the film are waiting for his DVD commentary and Shawn Ryan Podcast

I’d never heard this. If true …

Navy SEALs are first and foremost, combat swimmers.

I missed the part where he kept repeating Marcus said on live air during a CNN interview in the early days, when Murphy called out for help he dropped his rifle, covered his ears and ran.

Supposedly there is Predator video of him running away, guy on the podcast claims it was Marcus' first mission and contact.

What I don't understand, probably because I'm a civilian with no military background, is why such a small team to begin with? I get that they're technically just there to recon, but with 4 guys, if just one goes down, you're now at 75% effectiveness. The margin for error seems like 0.

Maybe that's just how it is with such missions? IDK.

I’m slow speed, high drag.

It’s my understanding from reading the books and watching the insurgent video that they were out maneuvered and outgunned.
Basically an L shaped ambush that drove them to and over the cliffs. I can’t imagine losing friends and being alone in those hostile mountains.

Marcus also deployed to Iraq, I believe, a year later before his medical discharge.

I hope he finds peace.

-An old Seabee

@18B30
I was in Ramadi and then Haditha in 2005 so didn’t get a lot of news back then.

I heard part of that story.  It all starts to make sense.  Sad

Interesting to read this all

I thought to get a MOH it had to be witnessed by more than one person?

has to be three signed statements iirc

There are multiple sources that claim the mission was reviewed by other teams and this UDT team were the first ones to say yes to doing it.

The book being absolute BS has been known for a while. Luttrell got (Jessica) Lynch'd to an extent I think.

I'm not familiar with this podcast but seems like quite a few "let's pick on the SEALs" stuff. Good virality bait.

Hadn't heard about Axe being alive that long, crazy if true.

Code over Country is decent, clearly biased, but decent. The author goes on Cleared Hot to take a few lumps, which is honorable. Victory Point is 100% a must read. Lone Survivor is a young adult action book basically.

Brent Tucker is making the rounds. A lot of it is clickbait BS.

srsly.. this is like a movie where 2 guys talk the whole time about mostly irrelevant shit.

No. They were the ones who were cleared to fly in 160th birds, so they took the OP. If 2/3 would have conducted it, no one would ever have even known this happened. No movie. No book. Three more seals alive (in addition to the chinook not going down)  No lost laptop.

That was the definition of a STA platoons job. Who ever thought sending a four man seal/sdv team in, well, was Probobly the same people that turned the afghanistan campaign in to what it became. Wrong tool for the job.

The real heroic story is the rangers who humped in to extract the fallen. Which is ironically what 2/3 would have likely done to conduct their recon. But people above want eyes on now (of a not important at all target) and cool guys get cool assets. Let the grunts do grunt shit.

The thought that luttrell was coerced in to carrying on with this narrative is an interesting and fairly believable one. Albeit a personal made hell.

It's surreal seeing these guy's on podcasts speaking of in house politics and being critical of the organization.

I mentioned earlier in the thread about 2/3's STA platoon. They actually went in to the same area. Conducted a similar operation, just properly, and ended up smoking a shit ton of dudes after the op went kinetic. Because they had belt feds, pre-planned fires, appropriate comms, etc.

Video / Podcast is the least efficient method of trnamsitting info.

This is the first time I've ever heard the claim that Axelson lived "for days".

They were but not the only ones. Like I said there's a lot of reporting out there about this mission being presented to other teams that declined it.

I'm not talking about the 2/3 guys. Thats the whole reason they had to find someone else to take on the initial insert.

The SDV guys were not the ONLY team this OP was presented to.

Honestly this is the part of the movie that made me lose all hope for the film. I even re-wound it to make sure it was a diamondback. It disproportionately pissed me off. It made me question everything else in the film and I’ve only watched it once because of that stupid snake.

I’m not making a statement. Just repeating what the podcast said for those that didn’t want to watch. Once again, I have no dog in this fight and have no comment on this matter/execution/heroics. Nothing I said were my own words, they were paraphrased from the podcast.

The Gordon and Shugart story makes a whole lot more sense when you read the real story and realize they planned on having their chopper cover them with a minigun until about 10 minutes after dropping the snipers off it was hit by an RPG and almost crashed. Four helicopters were hit with RPGs that day but two managed to not crash inside the city. If their bird wasn't shot down it's very likely they could have pulled Durant out and extracted him.

Brent Tucker is a Delta guy. He spends his time talking about NSW's dirty laundry and getting clicks. Maybe he should talk about his own units wrong doings as there is plenty.

An active or very recently retired A Squadron guy didn't have good things to say about Brent. Pretty interesting.

I’d never heard of him prior to December. He’s really making a name for himself by going after people. It’s a little odd.

Alive for a few days with a headshot, fucking A.

After seeing the [Deleted] video of them stripping Murphy's body of his gear, I hope everyone of them met a very painful death. Especially the one that sat on his chest for a little propaganda piece. I hope that guy died in pieces.

Oh, I understand. I'm just saying, we're
coming up on the 19th anniversary of that debacle, and it's the first I'm reading anything like that.