Restrepo Page #6

---

it was Vandenberge.

I yelled back it was Vandenberge

that was wounded, bring a medic.

He was just bleeding real bad.

His whole left side of his body

was this real dark red color.

And all he kept on saying was,

"Hey, help me, guys. Help me."

just rocking back and forth.

Saying "I'm bleeding out,

you gotta save me. l'm dying."

Just stuff like that.

Started handing him

gauze, tourniquet.

Just started packing

the wound with gauze.

l had my finger

knuckle-deep in his arm.

Ended up stopping the bleeding.

I'm asking,

"Where are the guys at?

Where's the Taliban at?

Where's the enemy at?"

Last time he saw them,

they were 20 feet away.

And just was I was

going to give him an lV,

Sergeant Stichter

and Doc Old got there

and carried on from there.

Sergeant Patterson and all them took over,

and I pushed out with Cortez.

We didn't bound,

we didn't do anything,

we just ran in a straight line

and got to Rice as quick as we can.

At that point I kind of realized,

"Hey, l'm stable.

"You know, I been here

ten, fifteen minutes.

I'm still breathing,

I'm not going into shock."

Kind of evaluating myself.

So basically just gave them orders to--

"Hey, you need

to maneuver your guys.

And push up

and clear across that hilltop."

As l went up,

I didn't see anyone there.

I took a knee and set up security,

and when I turned to my right,

I saw Sergeant Rougle just laying there.

I ran up and I saw

Sergeant Rougle's body

and it didn't even click.

I ran past him.

I saw his face, how it was,

kind of messed up.

I wanted to cry, but didn't.

I was shocked, honestly.

I was shocked because I saw

Sergeant Rougle just laying there.

It was-- It was chaos.

And when we finally had a second

to stop and think,

that's when l realized that

one of my good friends

had gone, you know,

and I started hearing about

Sergeant Rice, Vandenberge.

I didn't even know that they

had been hit at that point.

And...

I need a--

Yeah, time out. Hold on.

I'm just trying to keep

my train of thought.

Have that box ready.

Have the next goddamn box ready.

Hey, I need immediate

suppression on 2251.

They enemy's pushed up

on the high ground--

We're not getting sh*t.

512255, if we've got A-10s,

I want gun runs from east to west

coming in, okay?

The hill's been taken over by the enemy.

That hill right here?

WiIdcat's hill.

All right, we're going to go around

to the east and go around.

Hey, Abdul!

Get the f*** over here!

tell these guys we're pushing up

on this f***ing ridge.

Hey, he wants us to go up

over this hill and bum rush it.

There's f***ing dudes right there.

If we do that, we're going to have

to f***ing lay down some--

We're going to have

to lay down fire first.

- Yeah, but we--

- We can't get a hold of them.

We don't know where they're at.

That's why we have

to lay down fire first.

Look, they took fire

from right over here.

Okay?

Hey, who's down?

We got Sergeant Rougle and them up?

Hey.

What?

Where they at?

Just keep down.

- Get down.

- What?

- What's going on?

- Just chill out, dude.

- Chill the f*** out out.

- Who's over there?

Oh, my God.

Shut up.

Move, man.

Is Sergeant Rice still alive?

- He's alive?

- He's going to make it.

- There's nothing we could do.

- Where's everybody else?

Hey, we've got friendlies here

and friendlies to your six, right there.

Vandenberge all right?

Vandenberge's already--

He's stable right now.

That ain't Sergeant Rougle.

You're lying, right, man?

Why would I lie about

something like that?

Where'd he get hit?

I got to see.

Don't look at him.

ls it bad?

Tell me, dude.

Tell me, dude.

It was quick.

It was quick.

There was nothing we could do, bro!

Where the bad guys at?

Battle Six Romeo, this is two-six.

I've pushed to the site

of the KIA, break.

Right now we have the hilltop.

It's in the same vicinity as my last grid.

Right now we're going

to move the wounded in action--

there's two of them--

back to LZ Eagles.

When Captain Kearney

told me up by the LZ

that Staff Sergeant Rougle was killed,

it was gut wrenching.

You know, there's different

levels to quality of fighters.

He was one of the best,

if not the best.

And l think that was what was tough

for a lot of people was,

you know, kind of knowing that

in the back of their mind,

well, if the best guy we have

out here just got killed,

where's that put me?

What's going to happen to me?

What's going to happen

to the guy to my left, to my right?

Hey, we're going down here

to get the wounded first.

- Hey, let's go.

- Let's go.

It was a coordinated attack.

They drew all our attention

over to there from here.

These guys over here

also returning fire from there.

They f***ing flanked them.

You can see where the path is here

where the f***ers came up.

Okay, where's this f***ing compound?

I want it destroyed.

Let's go.

- Stichter, destroy it now.

- Yes, sir.

After we go ahead

and get the KlA out of here,

I want gunmetal to search

directly to my west.

Hijar believes that he has a blood trail,

I want them to be getting

down low to try and PlD

and see where this guy's stopped.

It's likely that where

we find this son of a b*tch

is where we find everybody else.

Hijar, make sure he understood that.

Watch the pine trees.

Just on the north side of that,

you can see a house on the corner.

As it cuts like that?

It comes almost like an L shape.

- See the terraces right there?

- Got it.

Okay, now, the f***ing

far southeast side,

there's a f***ing-- there's a dude

on the roof down in that house.

- About a thousand meters.

- Roger.

Hey, Raeon's got a guy

to our northwest

on top of a building

walking around, over.

- Any other info?

- No.

He was looking up this way,

and he just came off the roof,

and he went back in his house.

Roger, acknowledge.

Raeon, next time you see that dude,

take his head off.

Where's that range finder at?

He was a good dude, man.

Sergeant Rougle?

- You want a real cigarette?

- Yeah.

I'm worried about the rest of the guys.

They've been taking it real bad.

One Alpha's kind of

blaming it on himself

because we couldn't

push over the top,

but the thing he's got to understand

is they f***ing--

He was dead instantly.

There's nothing you can do right there.

Actually, l can't even sleep, honestly.

I've been on about four or five

different types of sleeping pills

and none of them help.

That's how bad the nightmares are.

I prefer not to sleep

and not dream about it,

than sleep and...

just see the picture in my head is...

pretty bad.

That actually stuck with me

for the rest of the deployment.

Stuck with me through

coming back here to Italy.

I still obviously haven't...

figured out how to deal

with it inside.

The only hope

I have right now is that

eventually l'll be able

to process it differently.

I'm never going to forget it.

Never going to even let go of it.

l don't want to not

have that as a memory

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes