Lone survivor: the eyewitness account of Operation Redwing and the lost heroes of SEAL team 10

by Marcus Luttrell

  Next we flew back across the country to visit the huge family of Petty Officer James Suh. Everyone came to the cemetery to say a prayer for one of the most popular guys in the platoon.

  Chief Dan Healy is buried in the military cemetery at Point Loma, San Diego, not far from Coronado. We all made the journey to northern California to see his family. Then we drove to Chico, and I told Axe’s wife, Cindy, how hard he had fought, what a hero he was, and how his final words to me were “tell Cindy I love her.”

  Danny Dietz was from Colorado, and that’s where he was buried. But his family lived in Virginia near the base at Virginia Beach. I went to see his very beautiful, dark-haired wife, Patsy, and tried the best I could to explain what a critical role he had played in our team and how, in the end, he went down fighting as bravely as any man who ever served in the U.S. Armed Forces.

  But grief like Patsy suffered is very hard to assuage. I know she felt her loss had smashed her life irrevocably, though she would try to put it together. But she sat with Danny’s two big dogs, and before I went, she said simply, “I just know there will never be another man like Danny.”

  No argument from me about that.

  As the year drew to an end, my injuries improved but remained, and I was posted back to Coronado. I detached from SDVT 1 and joined SEAL Team 5, where I was appointed leading petty officer (LPO) to Alfa Platoon. Like all SEAL platoons, it has a near-clockwork engine. The officer is responsible, the chief is in charge, the LPO runs it. They even gave me a desk, and the commanding officer, Commander Rico Lenway, instantly became like a father to me, as did Master Chief Pete Naschek, a super guy and veteran of damn near everywhere.

  But it was a very reflective time for me, returning to Coronado, where I had not lived since BUD/S seven years ago. I walked back down to the beach where I’d first learned the realities of life as a Navy SEAL and what was expected and what I must tolerate; the cold, the freezing cold and the pain; the ability to obey an order instantly, without question, without rancor, the bedrocks of our discipline.

  Right here I’d run, jumped, heaved, pushed ’em out, swum, floundered, and strived to within an inch of my life. I’d somehow kept going while others fell by the wayside. A million hopes and dreams had been smashed right here on this tide-washed sand. But not mine, and I had a funny feeling that for me this beach would forever be haunted by the ghost of the young, struggling Marcus Luttrell, laboring to keep up.

  I walked back to my first barracks and nearly jumped out of my boots when that howling decom plant screamed into action. And I went and stood by the grinder, where the SEAL commanders had finally offered me warm wishes after presenting me with my Trident. Where I had first shaken the hand of Admiral Joe Maguire.

  I looked at the silent bell outside the BUD/S office and at the place where the dropouts leave their helmets. Soon there would be more helmets, when the new BUD/S class began. Last time I was here I’d been in dress uniform, along with a group of immaculately turned-out new SEALs, many of whom I had subsequently served with.

  And it occurred to me that any one of them, on any given day, would have done all the same things I had done in my last combat mission in the Hindu Kush. I wasn’t any different. I was just, I hoped, the same Texas country boy who’d come through the greatest training system on earth, with the greatest bunch of guys anyone could ever meet. The SEALs, the warriors, the front line of United States military muscle. I still get a lump in my throat when I think of who we all are.

  I remember my back ached a bit as I stood there on the grinder, lost in my own thoughts, and my wrist, as ever, hurt, pending another operation. And I suppose I knew deep down I would never be quite the same physically, never as combat-hard as I once was, because I cannot manage the running and climbing. Still, I never was Olympic standard!

  But I did live my dream, and then some, and I guess I’ll be asked many times whether it had all been worth it in the end. And my answer will always be the same one I gave so often on my first day.

  “Affirmative, sir.” Because I came through it, and I have my memories, and I wouldn’t have traded any of it, not for the whole world. I’m a United States Navy SEAL.

  Epilogue: Lone Star

  On September 13, 2005, Danny Dietz and Matthew Axelson were awarded the highest honor which either the United States Navy or the Marine Corps can bestow on anyone — the Navy Cross for combat heroism. I was summoned to the White House to receive mine on July 18 the following year.

  I was accompanied by my brothers, Morgan and Scottie, my mom and dad, and my close friend Abbie. SEAL Team 5’s Commander Lenway and Master Chief Pete Naschek were also there, with Lieutenant Drexler, Admiral Maguire’s aide.

  Attired in full dress blues, my new Purple Heart pinned on my chest, close to my Trident, I walked into the Oval Office. The president of the United States, George W. Bush, stood up to greet me.

  “It’s an honor to meet you, sir,” I said.

  And the president gave me that little smile of his, which I took to mean, We’re both Texans, right? And he said, a little bit knowingly, “It’s my pleasure to meet you, son.”

  He looked at the cast on my left wrist, and I told him, “I’m just trying to get back into the fight, sir.”

  I shook his hand, and he had a powerful handshake. And he looked me right in the eye with a hard, steady gaze. Last time anyone looked at me like that was Ben Sharmak in Afghanistan. But that was born of hatred. This was a look between comrades.

  Our handshake was prolonged and, for me, profound. This was my commander in chief, and right now I had his total attention, as I would have every time he spoke to me. President Bush does that naturally, speaking as if there is no one else in the room for him. This was one powerful man.

  I remember I wanted to tell him how all my buddies love him, believe in him, and that we’re out there ready to bust our asses for him anytime he needs us. But he knows that. He’s our guy. Even Shane in his leopard-skin coat recognized our C in C as “a real dude.”

  President Bush seemed to know what I was thinking. And he slapped me on the shoulder and said, “Thank you, Marcus. I’m proud of you, son.”

  I have no words to describe what that meant to me, how much it all mattered. I came to attention, and Lieutenant Drexler read out my citation. And the president once more came toward me. In his hand he carried the fabled Navy Cross, with its dark blue ribbon that’s slashed down the center by a white stripe, signifying selflessness.

  The cross itself features a navy ship surrounded by a wreath. The president pinned it directly below my Trident. And he said again, “Marcus, I’m very proud of you. And I really like the SEALs.”

  Again I thanked him. And then he saw me glance at his desk, and on it was the battle patch I’d asked Admiral Mullin to present to him. The president grinned and said, “Remember this?”

  “Yessir.” Did I ever remember it. I’d hidden that baby in my Afghan trousers, just to make sure those Taliban bastards didn’t get it. And now here it was again, right on the desk of the president of the United States, the Lone Star of Texas, battle worn but still there.

  We talked privately for a few minutes, and it was clear to me, President Bush knew all about the firefight on Murphy’s Ridge. And indeed how I had managed to get out of there.

  At the end of our chat, I reached over and picked up the patch, just for old times’ sake. And the president suddenly said, in that rich Texan accent, “Now you put that down, boy! That doesn’t belong to you anymore.”

  We both laughed, and he told me my former battle patch was going to his future museum. As I left the Oval Office he told me, “Anything you need, Marcus. That’s anything. You call me right here, on that phone, understand?”

  “Yessir.” And it still felt to me like two Texans meeting for the first time. One of ’em kinda paternal, understanding. The other absolutely awestruck in the presence of a very great United States president, and my commander in chief.

  Afterword

  by Pa
trick Robinson

  In the fall of 2006, Marcus Luttrell was redeployed with SEAL Team 5 in Iraq. At 0900 on Friday, October 6, thirty-six of them took off in a military Boeing C-17 from North Air Station, Coronado, bound for Ar Ramadi, the U.S. base which lies sixty miles west of Baghdad — a notorious trouble spot, of course. That’s why the SEALs were going.

  The fact that the navy had deployed their wounded, decorated hero of the Afghan mountains was a considerable surprise to many people, most of whom thought he would leave SPECWARCOM for the less dangerous life of a civilian. Because even after more than a year, his back was still painful, his battered wrist was less than perfect, and he still suffered from that confounded Afghan stomach bug he had contracted from the Pepsi bottle.

  But the deployment of Marcus Luttrell was a personal matter. He alone called the shots, not the navy. His contract with the SEALs still had many months to run, and there was no way he was going to quit. I think we mentioned, there ain’t no quit in him. Marcus wanted to stay, to fulfill his new obligations as leading petty officer (Alfa Platoon), a position which carries heavy responsibilities.

  To me, he said, “I don’t want my guys to go without me. Because if anything happened to them and I wasn’t there, I guess I would not forgive myself.”

  And so Marcus Luttrell went back to war. The C-17 was packed with all the worldly goods of SEAL Team 5, from machine guns to hand grenades. On board the flight was Petty Officer Morgan Luttrell (Bravo Platoon), a new posting not absolutely guaranteed to delight their mother.

  Marcus had a new patch on his chest, identical to the one on the president’s desk in the Oval Office. “That’s who I’m fighting for, boy,” he told me. “My country, and the Lone Star State.”

  The last words to me from this consummate Navy SEAL were “I’m outta here with my guys for a few months. God help the enemy, and God bless Texas.”

  Acknowledgments

  Many thanks to my coauthor, Patrick Robinson, whose admiration and respect for the SEALs is reflected in so many of his novels. He understood I had made a solemn, private vow to the guys that I would somehow get out and relate the story of their gallantry and unending courage. Patrick made this possible, beyond my hopes. I could not possibly have done it without him.

  I also owe thanks to the senior commanders of SPECWARCOM, who granted me permission to tell my story: in particular to Admiral Joe Maguire; to our judge advocate general, Captain Jo King; and to Captain Barbara Ford, who helped me through the network of naval administration prior to publication.

  My skipper in SEAL Team 5, Commander Rico Lenway, and Master Chief Pete Naschek unfailingly understood my requests for latitude during the long process of writing the book. As their leading petty officer (Alfa Platoon) I owe them my thanks, not only for their cooperation but also for their certainty that the story of the guys on the mountain should be made public.

  I would also like to express my appreciation to ex–Navy SEAL Dick Couch, author of the excellent book The Warrior Elite, the story of the training of BUD/S Class 228. I, of course, was there and appear in his book from time to time, but I referred to Captain Couch’s well-kept log of events for accurate times, dates, sequences, and rate of dropouts. I had notes, but not as good as his, and I’m grateful.

  Thanks are also due to my mom and dad, David and Holly Luttrell, for so many things, but especially, in this context, for sitting down and relating, chapter and verse, the extraordinary events that took place back at the ranch in the early summer of 2005 while I was missing in action.

  Finally, my fellow SEAL and twin brother, Morgan, who came storming into the ranch within hours of the Battle for Murphy’s Ridge, swore to God I was alive, and never stopped encouraging everyone. Devastated by the death of his great friend Matthew Axelson, still too upset to talk about it, he was nonetheless there for me, helping to correct and improve the manuscript…still with me, as he’s always been and I hope always will be.

  Just like we say, bro, From the womb to the tomb! And no one’s ever going to change that.

  — Marcus Luttrell

  About the Authors

  Petty Officer Marcus Luttrell was raised on his parents’ horse ranch in Texas. He joined the United States Navy in March 1999, was awarded his Trident as a combat-trained Navy SEAL in January 2002, and joined SEAL Team 5 in Baghdad in April 2003. In the spring of 2005 he was deployed to Afghanistan. He was awarded the Navy Cross for combat heroism in 2003 by President Bush.

  Patrick Robinson is known for his bestselling U.S. Navy–based novels, most notably, Nimitz Class, Kilo-Class, and Seawolf. His autobiography of Admiral Sir Sandy Woodward, One Hundred Days, was an international bestseller. He lives in England but spends his summers on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where he and Marcus Luttrell wrote Lone Survivor.