[scribbler]

David Lowe



We were about a week from leaving country when we got a call that another unit was in trouble. They were in an ongoing fire fight and they couldn’t seem to get everything under control. There was little pockets of enemy all over the area.

In that situation, you go through every nook and cranny and see what you got. See what you find and see what you need to take care of as it comes along.

It took about four hours to get to where we were going. It was early afternoon by the time that we got out there. We had a team plus some. Maybe 15 or 20 Americans and a platoon or two of Afghan forces.

We split up into pretty much four elements. I was on the far left element clearing out that way.

It was mountainous, rocky with little wadis (dry stream beds). Steep inclines, rocks and real dense bushes all over the place. It was a really sunny day and all the sun created shadows from the bushes. The way to find the enemy was when they shot at you.

My buddy Vic (Sgt. 1st Class Victor H. Cervantes), was moving down in the wadi. Me and an Air Force guy were up about 10 or 15 meters up the side of a hill providing overwatch.

We got to a spot where I was moving ahead of Vic to keep trying to cover him. All of a sudden I heard gunfire coming back from where I last saw him.

I saw someone moving up through the bushes. He was ducking in and out of trees and I fired at him and from there. I didn’t see him anymore.

I started to worry about Vic. I started hollering for him.

Vic was dead.

I told my buddy to hang tight. I was going to go up and get this guy. But, we decided to wait for the rest of the team to come down.

We shot some smoke and flares up to where I had last seen the guy and tried to get the choppers in on him. We didn’t have any luck with that. When the rest of the guys got there, I told them that I either shot him and he’s dead or he is gone.

The captain had the infantry guys clear down the hill. It is always better to fight that way than charging blindly up an embankment, which is what I would have been doing if had made that decision. Who knows how that would have turned out?

Shortly after they came down, I heard gunfire. I then saw everyone shooting and saw muzzle flashes. So I started shooting at him. There was a lull in the fire and I thought I heard screaming. I yelled if anyone was hit and there was an infantry guy up on a SAW (machine gun) across the wadi from me.

I hopped up and rushed over to him. It was about 150 meters or so. I got up to the wounded guy and he was hit in the arm, leg and head. I took care of him and we got him evaced.

Then we came back down to Vic’s body and started to (carry him out). It was kind of a sense of pride not to put him on a chopper, but take him out ourselves.

We started hearing fire ahead of us. We went around a corner and didn’t see nothing, so the (Air Force guy) went low and I went high just on the other side of the wadi.

I started peeking over the wadi and saw (the Air Force guy) just on the other side pinned down.

I couldn’t shoot from where I was at, so I hopped up and perched up on the rocks and took care of him. After he was taken care of, we moved the rest of the way down.