“Book review: Special Ops Soldiers at War”

Book review: Special Ops Soldiers at War

Posted: 20 Jan 2011 07:35 AM PST

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Book review: Special Ops Soldiers at War

By Andrew Sharbel
Staff writer

During my three years working as a reporter at Fort Belvoir, I have developed a profound respect for our nation's Soldiers and the tasks they accomplish while overseas in a combat environment.

I have always been curious about the tasks or operations conducted by our many special operations Soldiers who we, as the American public, never hear about.

Oliver North, a retired Marine and New York Times best selling author and columnist, wrote an in-depth book entitled "American Heroes in Special Operations" on some of the many operations conducted by U.S. Special Forces in Iraq and Afghanistan since 9/11.

Many of the missions he highlights in his book were operations to capture and collect Taliban and other terrorist leaders.

During some of these operations, North was embedded with these operators on peace-keeping missions.

North covers just about all of the many different special operations detachments, including the Army Rangers of the 75th Ranger Regiment; Navy Seals; Air Force Combat Controllers; Joint Tactical Air Controllers; Pararescuemen and many others.

Each battle or chapter is a detailed account of the events of any given mission and closes with the citations of any medals received by members of the Operational Detachment Alpha Teams participating in that conflict.

While the bravery and valor shown by all these men as they fight for our freedom is shown throughout the book, there were two events that stood out to me the most from this book.

The first was the story of U.S. Army Ranger Ben Kopp, a Bronze Star with Valor recipient who took a bullet in the leg, while saving a recon team who was under fire from Taliban fighters.

Despite the best efforts of doctors and surgeons in the field, in Germany and at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Kopp died a week after being shot due to blood loss.

When Kopp deployed, he filled out a form, as all Rangers do, to have his organs donated, if possible.

Judy Meikle, a 57-year-old woman from Winnetka, Ill., was suffering from poor circulation problems for most of her adult life.

The day after they turned off the machines keeping him alive, Kopp saved Meikle's life by donating his heart.

His other organs and tissues were also donated and Kopp was buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.

The second interesting story I enjoyed learning about was the Special Operations K-9 "Argus."

Argus is a Belgian malinois and trains like no other dog in the world. He can parachute into an objective or fast rope in from a helicopter.

He has jumped from 10,000 feet and wears his own special Kevlar body armor.

One of the most interesting things I learned about Argus is he does every training exercise the Green Berets do, including medical refresher training.

Medical refresher training includes Soldiers sticking each other with needles to learn how to administer intravenous fluids in the event of an on-the-battlefield emergency.

Argus gets stuck just as much as the other Soldiers and it is essential for his handler and other Soldiers to know how to save him should he be injured during a battle.

Argus has found dozens of IEDs, thousands of pounds of explosives and has even survived an IED attack.

North does a fantastic job of highlighting the missions, we as American citizens never hear about. The Soldiers shown in his book are American heroes along with their many brothers in the armed forces.

If you are interested in gaining an understanding of what a special operations Soldier does overseas, then this is the book for you.

Posted on 01/20 at 10:23 AM

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American Heroes

Thursday, January 20, 2011