The Spear

In the late summer of 2021, after years of service to his country—including four years at the United States Military Academy—Major Naqib Mirzada, an Afghan National Army Special Forces officer, and his family fled Afghanistan after the Taliban's seizure of Kabul. Arriving at Hamid Karzai International Airport on August 15, amid the US-led coalition's withdrawal from the country, Naqib and his fami...

In 2012, Rich Kent was a platoon leader deployed to Panjwai in Afghanistan's Kandahar province. Tasked with locating an IED cell in a small village just outside his normal area of operations, Kent was leading his platoon along a trail after receiving a tip about the location of Taliban fighters. After inadvertently drifting onto a different trail less traveled, Kent was reorienting his soldiers to...

In 1998, retired US Air Force Colonel Mike "Starbaby" Pietrucha was an electronic warfare officer flying in an F-15E Strike Eagle, enforcing the northern no-fly zone over Iraq in the 1990s. In this episode, he brings listeners into the cockpit as he describes one particular mission during that deployment, when his aircraft was targeted by a radar guidance system for an SA-3 antiair missile. Not lo...

Before his NFL career, Alejandro Villanueva was a rifle platoon leader in the 10th Mountain Division. During a deployment to an especially restive sector near Kandahar, Afghanistan, his unit faced heightened security challenges due to a prison break that freed a large number of Taliban fighters. But Villanueva also had to contend with a unique dilemma: after a member of the Afghan National Police...

As Ukrainian troops continue to fight against invading Russian forces , they are supported by a growing cadre of civilians . Many among this group , however, have no training or experience. Matt Gallagher , a former US Army officer and veteran of Iraq, recently returned from training some of those civilians in Lviv . In this episode, Gallagher talks about his decision to travel to Ukraine, the dif...

In the second episode in a two-part series, Dan Gade joins The Spear  to tell the story of his 2004 deployment to Ramadi, Iraq. After his unit suffered the deaths of two soldiers—the difficulty of which he discussed in the previous episode—his company continued to engage in frequent and heavy action with insurgents. But as coalition forces began to adopt a population-centric approach to providing...

In 2004, Dan Gade’s armor company took over a sector of Ramadi, Iraq, then the heart of the Sunni insurgency. Within days, his unit suffered its first fatality. As a company commander, Gade had the responsibility to lead his troops back outside the wire the next day regardless of the emotional toll Tyler’s death might have taken. In the first episode of a two-part series, Gade describes how his co...

As an executive officer of an infantry company at Forward Operating Base Fenty in Afghanistan, Michael Houghton was heavily involved in one of his company's primary missions: conduct counter–indirect fire patrols. Fenty was routinely targeted and these patrols were important for protecting the personnel and assets located there.  Houghton was responsible for orchestrating the fight as what his com...

In an  episode  of The Spear  released in June 2021, Karl Blanke shared a story that featured the actions of one of his former Marines, Lance Corporal Jackson (a pseudonym). “Jackson” was a machine gunner in the 1st Marine Division and took part in the march to Baghdad in 2003, where he was wounded in a firefight and awarded a Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal with Combat Distinguishing Dev...

In 2011, Todd Angstman and his Special Forces team deployed to Gao, Mali, to provide training and assistance to the Malian Armed Forces. Gao was an important city, the hub of trans-Saharan trade, and had a combined arms task force deployed there, working with Angstman's Green Berets. The Arab Spring and subsequent uprising in Libya led to a decrease in security across northern Mali as displaced Tu...

On August 11, 2004, Staff Sgt. John Borman’s platoon ventured out on what was supposed to be a short counter-mortar observation mission. Except that day, instead of targeting Camp War Eagle, the Mahdi Army targeted John’s observation post with accurate indirect fire. To top it off, John wasn’t even supposed to be in Iraq that day. He was supposed to be in Wisconsin at his sister’s wedding. After f...

In this episode, retired US Air Force Col. Kim Campbell joins to share a story from 2003. A career A-10 pilot, her squadron was deployed to the Middle East at the beginning of the war in Iraq. During a mission, she and her flight lead in another A-10 responded to a call for air support from a US unit engaged with Iraqi troops. On her last rocket pass, she felt and heard an explosion—and knew immed...

In early 2019, Eric Kahle was a first sergeant assigned to an aviation maintenance company bound for Forward Operating Base (FOB) Dahlke in Afghanistan—also known as “ Rocket City .” It was not long before rockets became a common occurrence for the soldiers of Delta Company and Kahle was mentally transported back to his first combat deployment in 2006 to Iraq. That deployment, which saw the loss o...

In the fall of 2006, Rory McGovern was a company fire support officer assigned to a combined arms team operating in the area around Abu Ghraib, Iraq. The day after Christmas, he was on a security patrol in support of a local sheikh’s Hajj send-off party when a shot rang out. McGovern had been hit. He shares the story of that encounter with the sniper and subsequent recovery in this episode.

On December 21, a suicide bomber detonated inside the dining facility on Forward Operating Base Marez outside of Mosul. Twenty-two people were killed in the blast, including Captain William Jacobsen, Matt Sacra’s company commander. Not long after, Sacra was wounded for the first time while serving as an advisor to the Iraqi Army. Following a lengthy recovery, Matt was wounded on his first mission...

In late 2004, Mosul was becoming more and more unstable. Matt Sacra, a Stryker platoon leader, and his soldiers deployed there to help quell the growing insurgency. On November 10, the platoon was ambushed. The next day, it fought as part of a battalion-sized operation. The combat Matt and his soldiers saw over those two days was an experience that, as he describes, left an indelible mark on him a...

In late 2001, Scott Neil was a US Army Special Forces soldier whose team was among the first US forces in Afghanistan—the legendary Horse Soldiers who led some of the opening operations in the war there, just weeks after the 9/11 attacks. While theirs is a well-known story , Scott’s military service extends well beyond that experience. In this episode, he reflects on a twenty-five-year career that...

In 2005, Major General Pat Roberson was the ground force commander for a combined special forces task force in Iraq given the task of melding a battalion of Iraqi forces and a battalion of Kurdish commandos into the newly formed Iraqi Special Operations Forces (ISOF) Brigade.  One night, the ISOF Brigade and Roberson’s Green Berets conducted an air assault into Salman Pak for a nighttime raid agai...

In this episode, host Tim Heck is joined by Lt. Col. Blake Schwartz. In 2009, Schwartz was a Special Forces team leader deployed in Uruzgan province, Afghanistan. Enemy fighters in the Langar valley, a restive area astride a vital road network, were a particular target for Schwartz’s soldiers. Schwartz attempted three times to enter the valley with his forces. On his final attempt, while counterin...

On April 10, 2003, Company A, 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment (A/1/5) was tasked with searching a mosque in Baghdad for Saddam Hussein. The previous night and into that morning, A/1/5 had fought a running gunfight to capture a presidential palace where Marines were wounded and the company gunnery sergeant was killed. Despite the losses the company had suffered, A/1/5 was sent back out into the...

In 2008, Major Corey Faison was a scout platoon leader at Combat Outpost Lowell  in Afghanistan's Nuristan province. The area was a hotbed of Taliban activity and the company at the COP found itself frequently under attack. Faison’s platoon planned to conduct an ambush aimed at killing or capturing a high-value target transiting the area. But while climbing the rugged, mountainous terrain en route...

This episode of The Spear  features a story from US Air Force Major Joe Ritter. An RPA pilot, his story takes place both at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada, where he and his sensor operator, Dylan, were located, and in Afghanistan's Kunar province, where thhey were flying an MQ-9 Reaper during an intelligence collection mission. When an unusual event catches his eye, Joe realizes his MQ-9 Reaper m...

For then-Major Bill “Fenway” Wyman, Sadr City in 2004 was a strange mix of combat and humanitarian missions. Fenway was a civil affairs team leader, advising the commander of the 2-5 Cavalry on how to win local trust, support humanitarian operations, and spur economic development.  In this episode, he recounts a pair of events—handing out backpacks one day and hunting down snipers just a few days...

In 2009, Lieutenant Mike Karlson deployed to Afghanistan, new to both his unit and to his job as executive office of its maintenance troop. During that deployment, he struggled to balance the pressing requirements of his job and some very challenging personal circumstances : his father was terminally ill with brain cancer. After returning home on emergency leave to say goodbye to his father, he wa...

In 2003, Karl Blanke was a weapons platoon commander during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Crossing the line of departure in the first wave, Blanke’s Marines spent three weeks fighting their way north to Baghdad. Upon arrival, his company was immediately tasked with searching for high-value targets in a nearby neighborhood. The fight for the neighborhood saw several Marines wounded. This is the story of...