American courage

Today, Marine Cpl. Dakota Meyer was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. If you missed this story amidst news stories about passing bills, growing deficits and Solyndra, please read on.

The setting was the remote Afghan village of Ganjigal, on the Pakistan border, where elders had requested aid in repairing a mosque.  Hoping to win hearts and minds, a U.S.-trained Afghan battalion agreed to help.  At dawn, about 100 Afghan soldiers and a dozen U.S. Marine advisers entered the valley where Ganjigal is found, picking their way up a narrow, rocky wash toward the stone houses dug into the far end.

It was a setup.  Hidden inside the houses and along the wash were 60 jihadists from Pakistan.  The ambushers opened fire with machine guns, mortars and rockets.  Immediately the foot patrol was pinned down and taking casualities.

Back at the valley’s entrance, 21 year-old Cpl. Meyer listened to radio calls for artillery fire that were refused by officers at higher headquarters due to concerns for endangering villagers.  Cpl. Meyer hopped into the gun turret of a Humvee and persuaded a fellow adviser, Sgt. Juan Rodriguez-Chavez, to drive him straight into the battle.

When the Humvee lurched into the wash, Cpl. Meyer saw the bodies of roughly a dozen Afghan soldiers strewn across the terrain, some dead and others crying.  With bullets striking his truck, he leaped out, stuffed five wounded Afghans inside, and then hopped back up behind the machine gun and hammered away as the pulverized vehicle crawled out of the wash.

Leaving the wounded in the rear, Cpl. Meyer and Sgt. Rodriguez-Chavez swapped Humvees.  This time the enemy was waiting in a dry streambed.  Rocket-propelled grenades and machine-gun bullets followed Cpl. Meyer as he repeatedly left his armored turret to load the truck with wounded Afghan soldiers…

When Cpl, Meyer and Sgt. Rodriguez-Chavez again dropped off the wounded in the rear, they bumped into a backup American platoon in armored vehicles.  The platoon refused to join them, so they went back in for the third time with no backup, driving into a torrent of automatic-weapons fire so a group of trapped American advisers could escape…

Pulling back out, Cpl. Meyer took count.  Four advisers were still missing.  So he gathered those still willing to risk death…They drove back into the cauldron a fourth time.  After seven hours of fighting, Cpl. Meyer found his four missing comrades, dead.

Thank you Cpl. Meyer for your service.

 

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SoundOffSister

The Sound Off Sister was an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and special trial attorney for the Department of Justice, Criminal Division; a partner in the Florida law firm of Shutts & Bowen, and an adjunct professor at the University of Miami, School of Law. The Sound Off Sister offers frequent commentary concerning legislation making its way through Congress, including the health reform legislation passed in early 2010.

20 Comments

  1. Anne-EH on September 15, 2011 at 10:01 pm

    Truly a “profile in courage”.?



  2. JollyRoger on September 15, 2011 at 10:02 pm

    I? hate being the 1st post for such a solemn issue, but Meyer reminds me of the Ghurkas; they were so fierce that nobody wanted to fight them.? Barry looked pained when affixing the Medal of Honor- I’ll bet he despises our young roustabouts who spread this brand of hope and change!? Poor Barry- go back to being a do-nothing professor 🙂



  3. crystal4 on September 15, 2011 at 11:32 pm

    The President invited Meyer to the White House for a private meeting on the 14th and had a beer with him on the patio outside the oval office…props to the Prez for honoring this hero one on one!



  4. Anybody but Obama on September 16, 2011 at 5:26 am

    This isn’t about zero it’s about an extraordinary young man who risked his life to aid his fellow soldiers. Let us honor the young Corporal and leave the President out of it. ?



  5. winnie on September 16, 2011 at 7:10 am

    Obama actually did the right thing in this instance, so he really isn’t part of the story.? This young man is truly a hero and so humble.



  6. Lynn on September 16, 2011 at 8:11 am

    I’m with ABO and Winnie. This is all about Marine Cpl. Dakota Meyer. Semper Fi



  7. crystal4 on September 16, 2011 at 11:20 am

    Thanks, Mr. president for the personal attention paid to this hero!



    • GdavidH on September 16, 2011 at 5:29 pm

      Obummer had absolutely nothing to do with this except his photo-op.
      Too bad?they don’t assign another hero to?award these medals. Poor kid has to recieve the medal of honor from?the community organizer in chief.?



  8. winnie on September 17, 2011 at 6:25 am

    Just want to make sure that everyone understands that obama did not personally rescue anyone.? Just like he did not personally kill bin Laden.



  9. crystal4 on September 17, 2011 at 7:36 am

    How very kind of the President to have a private meeting with him prior to the public acknowledgment of this marine!



  10. Lynn on September 17, 2011 at 8:22 am

    Yup, O disregards the requests of the Military advisers to either withdraw all troops from Afghanistan or leave enough to do their job and train and protect those troops. He decides to leave 3,000, which is a terrible duty to ask our troops to do.? I guess that makes him kind, but in my book it is an outrageous act of pandering to his Liberal pansies, who are relics of the 60’s hippie days. He erases that all away with a beer with a genuine hero.? Oh Crystal, you are beyond belief! No can’t LOL at this one.



  11. crystal4 on September 17, 2011 at 9:56 pm

    Obama is not a war criminal like Bush.
    making hard decisions does not mean committing war crimes.



  12. Anybody but Obama on September 19, 2011 at 7:37 am

    Crystal you call Bush a war criminal but yet on August 25th you?wrote a racially offensive ?post and I quote ” Rubio should go back to where he came from Cuba”? This was a post about a young man with extraordinary courage and you want it to be about an empty suit that keeps driving the golfcart into a ditch.



    • crystal4 on September 20, 2011 at 7:29 am

      You are obsessed with that…sorry that it was over your head.
      Was tongue in cheek response to all the drooling about how wonderful Rubio is!!!
      It was in response to all the screams of the Tea P’ers about Obama “needs to go back to Kenya”, “where is his birth certificate” and best of all, all those signs with Obama having a bone in his nose, dressed like a tribal chieftan.
      How do you like it ?



    • Lynn on September 20, 2011 at 8:22 am

      Anybody can say their nasty hateful comments are tongue in cheek. Being short most of your comments are over my head, and just as well. I am rejecting all hate from now on.? Have a wonderful sunshiney day, Crystal.



    • Anybody but Obama on September 20, 2011 at 12:39 pm

      You are showing your true colors.? Every time you try and change a subject of a post get ready for it.? August 25th



    • Anybody but Obama on September 21, 2011 at 12:37 pm

      ?Crystal4 (August 25th)I guess it was over my head, I don’t consider a racially charged post to be tongue in cheek or the slightest bit amusing..



  13. Lynn on September 19, 2011 at 8:36 am

    Crystal, President O makes NO hard decisions he reads and follows his old professors agendas.



    • Lynn on September 20, 2011 at 8:25 am

      Still in my peace and love phase. I just realized I almost used a song for a quote, so here goes. Cystal, “have a bright, bright sunshiney day”.



  14. RoBrDona on September 19, 2011 at 1:40 pm

    Actually, O-Hoover has a direct responsibility for the incredibly poorly thought-out rules of engagement that kept any help from our soldiers and the brave Afghans. There were US helicopter gunships hovering 10 minutes away at the start of the ambush and the morons controlling them refused to allow them to engage for OVER ONE HOUR TWENTY MINUTES after dozens of calls for help.? The officers were given reprimands. Our boys are dead, and Cpl. Meyer risked his life brilliantly, but arguably needlessly.



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