But why?
Capable of loitering overhead for hours undetected, small fleets of unmanned craft passed imagery to mission planners before and during the raid at Juy Zarin, allowing them to recognize individual fighters, learn their habits, pinpoint where they slept, and identify the types of weapons they carried. A few minutes past 2 a.m.on August 6, 2011, at a dusty forward operating base40 miles south of Kabul, Afghanistan, the rotors of two U.S. Army CH-47D Chinooks began to turn. Learnt of this today, very surprising after ladens raid was covered in the media here.
Donald Trump Retweeted A Conspiracy Theory that Biden Had Seal Team 6 Lightboxes. He was assigned to the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), New Century, Kansas, Tech. As is routine on such missions, two Apache attack helicopters provided extra cover and security for Extortion 17, while circling above was an AC-130 aircraft, a gunship that also provides surveillance. It would never return. Don Brown, a former U.S. Navy JAG officer stationed at the Pentagon, and former Special Assistant United . Lee and his friend Bryan Nichols flew their Chinook into battle several times the first night, dropping off troops at a landing zone (LZ) almost 10,000 feet above sea level. 2 U.S. Navy SEALs from a west coast-based SEAL team. Find the perfect extortion17 stock photo, image, vector, illustration or 360 image. The next night, the pair had orders to drop off more troops in the same spot. But at least you should care about them and appreciate what were asking of them.. According to Glover, improved systems in place enable U.S. forces to monitor a target for days or even weeks prior to an operation, so they theoretically will know of even well-hidden potential RPG shooters throughout a village before transport helicopters first touch down. Spencer C. Duncan, 21, of Olathe, Kan. Tangi valley remained under Taliban control until April 2013, when more than 1,000 Afghan security forces personnel launched an offensive in an effort to clear the area of Taliban fighters. Rest in peace, gentlemen; you will not be forgotten. [citation needed] Doubts about this story were raised by families and other concerned citizens despite the fact that the Navy SEAL team aboard Extortion 17 was a different squadron than that which had killed Osama bin Laden three months earlier. During a previous deployment to Iraq, Carters unit flew dozens of similar raids, which he often planned and led, and gained a reputation for working well with special operations troops. All of them were men of courage, integrity, and honor. The conspiracy theories didnt bother Lee at first. The group probably contained the commander and a few of his bodyguards, while the remaining Taliban fighters offered resistance in an effort to buy the group enough time to escape. Today. Senior Chief Robert James Reeves was one of those Americans. In order to prevent this, American forces called in for support. The group fired two or three RPG rounds from a two-story building, the second striking one of the helicopter's three aft rotor blades. To address some unanswered questions, the committee received briefings, classified and unclassified, on the operational component leading up to the loss of the 30 servicemen and eight Afghan nationals and the postmortem handling of the 30 American servicemen on Extortion 17. Extortion 17 and 16 weren't MH-47s and their crews were not Night Stalkers. It was reported that the Taliban fighters had no information of the helicopter's flight path and that they had been in the right place at the right time. In that incident, sixteen Navy SEALs and Army special operations troops were killed, and three more SEALs were killed in subsequent fighting on the ground. In combat, its mission is to transport large teams of elite assault troops, including Army Rangers and Navy SEALs, to and from the battlefield. American intelligence officials identified this individual as "OBJECTIVE GINOSA." Seven Afghan National Army commandos and one Afghan civilian interpreter were also killed in the crash. Sometimes the enemy succeeds in delivering one of these To whom it may concern projectiles. Two of the SEALs were from a West Coast SEAL unit, but the others were from the Gold Squadron of Naval Special Warfare Development Group, or DEVGRU, sometimes known as SEAL Team 6, said the NSW source..
Robert J. Reeves: A Navy SEAL who died in Extortion 17 - Spec Ops Magazine In March 2009, the U.S. 10th Mountain Division established a base in Tangi Valley after increased Taliban activity in the area. The remaining two fighters ducked into a stand of trees and disappeared from the Apaches infrared scanners. Six minutes from their estimated landing time, Extortion 16 broke away from the lead Chinook and orbited at a location close enough to help if needed. An Afghan official, speaking anonymously a few days after the attack, speculated that the Taliban had laid a trap, that they had purposely put out false information about a meeting involving the Taliban commander. Commentdocument.getElementById("comment").setAttribute( "id", "a62b75e7a99f5de39e28d378788f7ec9" );document.getElementById("c08a1a06c7").setAttribute( "id", "comment" ); Content on this website is free to use and share, but please provide a link back to Spec Ops Magazine as a source. Extortion 17 could be a bigger scandal and betrayal of Americans than Benghazi. The mission had begun about four hours prior to the shootdown, when the two helicopters touched down side by side in Juy Zarin, a village in the bare rock-walled Tangi Valley of Wardak Province. Instead, two rigorous U. S. military investigations followed every moment of the mission to determine what went wrong on Extortion 17s final flight. The SEALs who assaulted Osama bin Ladens compound were drawn from Naval Special Warfare Development Groups Red Squadron, according to several sources in the special operations community.. Enterprise. But no one died. By Upon learning of Tahirs possible location, a U.S. Army Rangers and Afghan Special Forces team was deployed into the valley from the south. God bless all of them- the bravest of the brave. Just as ridiculous as saying [President George W.] Bush was responsible for 9/11, Lee said. Lee earned his wings at Fort Rucker, Ala., then deployed to Pakistan, where he did humanitarian missions, learning to fly into and out of mountainous terrain. Extortion 17 is a name etched in our minds as one of the worst losses our military has ever experienced. The crew of Slasher 02, the AC-130 circling above, flipped the switch on their powerful light. Originally just two people, the group eventually swelled to a total of nine or ten fighters, and the special operations task force commander and the Immediate Reaction Force commander became concerned that it might include Tahir. In fact, the conflict was heating up. Some news stories reported that investigators couldnt find the helicopters black box, referring to the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder. Its like taking a paper towel roll, cutting it in half and strapping it to your eye, Lee said. Connor Mendez, courtesy of U.S. Army. That night, nearly 10 years after the U.S. had gone to war in Afghanistan, Lee believed they were the best team for this dangerous mission. In less than five seconds, the helicopter crashed, killing all occupants, and approximately 30 seconds later, one of the AH-64 Apache helicopters radioed in the crash. "All of this raises the distinct possibility of a cover-up as to . When the auto-complete results are available, use the up and down arrows to review and Enter to select. The downing of the Seal Team Six chinook with all of those team members who participated in the Bin Laden raid and the subsequent request by President Obama to destroy the images that were released only adds to the suspicion around the events. One of the engines flew off, and the other caught fire. 1h 33m "A U.S. Army helicopter carrying 30 Americans, most members of the elite Navy SEAL Team 6 is shot down in Afghanistan. His account of the brave pilots, crew, and passengers of Extortion 17 . It was brought down by multiple shots. American, French and Afghan National Police forces carried out a three-day sweep of the area, and the area was then deemed secure. The squadron that this SEAL belonged to was never mentioned. Ryan Last. Whether enemy fire brought down the Chinook or a tree strike would never be known for sure. Classified reports, published by Wikileaks, teem with notes from pilots and crew of all types of military helicopters who saw RPG attacks throughout the war. The shooters origin remains a mystery. [11], By 16:25, all of the remains were taken from the crash site via ground convoy and transported to Combat Outpost Sayyid Abad. The shoot-down of 'Extortion 17' constitutes the greatest loss of American life from a single battle in the history of the Afghanistan War. The IRF commander then made a critical decision: In order to get everyone on the ground as quickly as possible and deny the Taliban time to react, he ordered the entire force to fly in Extortion 17. Find the perfect extortion 17 stock photo, image, vector, illustration or 360 image. Thirty members of the American special forces have been killed in Afghanistan in the deadliest day of the 10-year war for US military personnel when the Taliban shot down . Tragically, as Extortion 17 was nearing its landing zone, Taliban fighters, hidden in a building, fired two or three rocket-propelled grenades at close range, leaving the pilot no chance to perform evasive maneuvers. Seconds later, with the Chinook just over 100 feet off the ground and traveling at 58 mph, two or three previously unseen fighters emerged from the tower of a two-story building roughly 220 yards south of the helicopter, shouldering RPG launchers. Two investigations of the incident proved inconclusive. The crash is referred to as Extortion 17 by the callsign of the CH-47 Chinook helicopter involved in the crash. There are no survivors. All topics Extortion 17 Documentary Soon after US Navy Cryptologist Michael Strange and the elite SEAL Team 6 capture and kill Bin Laden, they are deployed to Afghanistan, where their Chinook is shot down. At any moment, they could come under rocket attack. For Lee, there was no time to reflect on how close he had come to dying. The RPG is not a laser. Every mission is potentially life-threatening. It means being informed. To reach the crash site, one must wind slowly through the ancient, narrow streets of the villages of Logar to reach the Tangi Valley in Wardak.
Extortion 17 August 6, 2022 marks 11 years since Extortion 17. We were told at that time we were the first unit to make it through a rotation without having anyone killed.. He grew up in Tyler, went to Texas A&M;, joined the Corps of Cadets and stared in shock at the news that two planes slammed into the World Trade Center and another into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. On board the Chinook CH-47D were 15 members of SEAL Team Six, 15 SEAL Team Six Support personnel, 1 Bomb Dog, 7 . 2 U.S. Army personnel from the 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment, part of the Colorado Army National Guard, PO1 John Douangdara & Navy SEAL Dog Bart, Of the 22 NSW members killed, 17 were SEALs, and five were direct support personnel, according to the source in the NSW community. (Smithsonian Books, September 2017). The landing zone had been examined for a previous mission but had not yet been used. Save up to 30% when you upgrade to an image pack. Landing in deserts or mountainsides, the helicopter rotors kick up clouds of sand and dust, causing brownouts that can blind a pilot. Of those 38 lost, 22 were members of Navy SEAL Team 6, the Naval Special Warfare unit responsible for the killing of notorious 9/11 mastermind Osama The team boarded Extortion 17 with Dave Carter and Bryan Nichols at the controls.
PDF AFGHANISTAN: HONORING THE HEROES OF EXTORTION 17 - GovInfo Extortion 17 BRIAN BILL FOUNDATION 31 MILE RUCK FOR THE 31 HEROES OF EXTORTION 17 IN WASHINGTON, DC AUGUST 3, 2019 On 6 August 2011, a U.S. Boeing CH-47 Chinook military helicopter was shot down while transporting a quick reaction force attempting to reinforce an engaged unit of Army Rangers in Wardak province, west of Kabul, Afghanistan. We continue our work at the Museum so that theirservice and sacrifice will never be forgotten. The Chinook is often used to assist in disaster relief, delivering food and water after earthquakes and floods. Cart. The landing zone was small, and the commanders didnt want to split up the strike force. But we are still sending people to another country to fight, and we need to understand why were doing that, he said. It was a good crew, it really was. An official investigation found no evidence of a pre-planned ambush, though it did suggest that other helicopter activity in the area could have tipped off Taliban fighters that more helicopters could be approaching, according to the report. So where did it go?? Sgt. The two may have been those who escaped Apache cannon fire, or they may have split away from either of the groups that formed after the start of the raid.
Extortion 17: 6 Years Later Retired Air Force Captain Says Pentagon A senior Afghan government official, speaking anonymously, said that Taliban commander Qari Tahir had fed American forces false information about a meeting of insurgent leaders and fighters waited for the helicopter from both sides of a steep valley: "The Taliban knew which route the helicopter would take. [12][13], Six minutes prior to reaching the landing zone, the empty CH-47D left the formation as planned. Are all DEVGRUs saved in a sperm bank? [9][11], Six minutes later, the Rangers concluded securing the compound, detained several people and began to move on foot toward the crash site. What are the odds? Andrew W. Harvell, 26, of Long Beach, California, Tech. Its crazy how many times I can think of where me or the guys I was with had to do that.. The two military investigations, one conducted by United States Central Command and one by the multi-service Joint Combat Assessment Team, pored over the details of the crash with excruciating focus and concluded that no planners or participants bore any fault regarding the circumstances leading to the shootdown of Extortion 17. The helicopter, call sign Extortion 17, was on a mission to reinforce American and coalition special operations troops. It requires the highest level of skills from the pilots because they are some of the most dangerous operations.. This tactic was highly successful; hundreds of operations were conducted without firing a shot for years. Joining the 15 members of SEAL Team 6, two pilots and three-man crew inside Extortion 17: ten other Navy and Air Force personnel, eight Afghans and a combat assault dog named Bart. Six weeks later, at around 10:40 p.m., an assault team of Army Rangers and Afghan special operations forces were dropped into an LZ on a mission to capture or kill a Taliban commander named Qari Tahir, who had been responsible for a series of attacks and ambushes in the Tangi Valley, not far from Shank. Published Aug 6, 2018 5:05 PM EDT.
Deadliest Day in Spec Ops History: The Extortion-17 Chinook Crash