Revealed: Hunt for Bowe Bergdahl left troops unprotected in infamous Afghan battle that left EIGHT U.S. soldiers dead and 22 wounded and produced two Medal of Honor recipients
- Just 53 U.S. soldiers were left to defend an ammunition depot with no air support or reserves on Oct. 3, 2009, after nearly 350 Taliban attacked a combat outpost and 35 Afghan National Army soldiers fled their posts
- Sources tell MailOnline that 8 U.S. soldiers died and 22 were wounded because additional troops and air cover were diverted to hunt for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl
- 'Those guys didn't have the complete support they needed ... because all the assets and everything were diverted to us,' a member of Bergdahl's platoon said
- Combat Outpost Keating was the site of one of the bloodiest battles during America's engagement in Afghanistan, with 150 Taliban paying for the armed assault with their lives
- Two US Army sergeants won the Medal of Honor, the military's highest award for bravery, in the Battle of Kamdesh in eastern Afghanistan
The hunt
for missing Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl left U.S. military outposts up and down
the Afghanistan-Pakistan border shorthanded for months, costing eight
American soldiers their lives in the Battle of Kamdesh, according to a
Pentagon official.
Kamdesh
was one of the bloodiest battles in America's longest war and earned
two U.S. servicemen America's highest military decoration for bravery,
the Medal of honor.
The
October 3, 2009 battle was so bloody, wounding 22 Americans in addition
to the eight dead, because support and additional troops were spread
out over a vast search area and unavailable to relieve the remote
outpost, the official told MailOnline.
The
bloodbath at Combat Outpost Keating, near the town of Kamdesh in
Nuristan province, lasted more than 12 hours – far longer than it would
have if air cover and supplemental infantry units had been available.
'The COP Keating battle was so deadly because ISAF numbers were so low,' the Pentagon official said, referring to the
International Security Assistance Force, the generic term for the
U.S.-led coalition fighters that included small numbers of soldiers from
Afghanistan, Latvia and other nations.
'And that was because so many U.S. troops were off searching for Bergdahl.'
SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEOS
Combat Outpost Keating was an unforgiving
location in eastern Afghanistan where eight American soldiers lost their
lives following a Taliban attack in which they were outnumbered 6-to-1
President Barack Obama awarded two Army staff
sergeants, including Clinton Romesha, a former active duty Army Staff
Sergeant, the Medal of Honor for their bravery in the Battle of Kamdesh,
a fight that military sources say cost so many lives because soldiers
and aircraft were tasked elsewhere -- hunting for Bowe Bergdahl
Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, shown in a 2010 Taliban
propaganda video, allegedly walked away from his post in Afghanistan on
June 30, 2009, setting off a manhunt along a stretch of the
Afghanistan-Pakistan border that's hundreds of miles long
The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to comment publicly.
An
internal Pentagon report released in 2010 found that air support was
late to arrive at the battle, and no 'quick reaction force' showed up
for 13 hours.
By
that time, Taliban fighters had pushed through fences and overrun the
facility, killing or wounding more than half of the U.S. personnel at
the site and laying waste to most of the base.
American
forces abandoned the outpost days later, but had to bomb its remains
from above in order to prevent the Taliban from carrying away the last
of the live ammunition that it had once housed.
Taliban
spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid bragged to the Associated Press at the time
that 'this is another victory for Taliban. We have control of another
district in eastern Afghanistan. Right now Kamdesh is under our control,
and the white flag of the Taliban is raised above Kamdesh.'
On that same day, President Barack Obama was announced as the winner of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize.
READ MUCH MORE ON THE LINK BELOW!!
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment