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Lone Survivor

ImTheCaptain said:
"I'd like to thank all the brave Pashtuns who saved my life"
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I thought you meant something a little more specific. It's not like he didn't clearly indicate his appreciation in the book itself and it's not like any of them are likely to ever stumble across the acknowledgements themselves. Admittedly, I'm no expert on book acknowledgement etiquette.
 
i didn't think he was really that gracious, even in the narrative. meh, who cares
 
Hijack to original purpose.

WOW. What a powerful, awesome movie.
 
Extremely powerful. Watched it with one of my old buddies from my 09-10 Afghan deployment this past Friday. We both left the theater and didn't say a word for quite some time afterwards.
 
DeaconOEF/OIFvet said:
Extremely powerful. Watched it with one of my old buddies from my 09-10 Afghan deployment this past Friday. We both left the theater and didn't say a word for quite some time afterwards.
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watched with my wife last week. being an army brat i have a different view/appreciation on the military than someone without those ties and i definitely was a little chocked up at the end. the 60 plus year old guy sitting beside me was clearly a vet and crying like someone who has lived it might.
 
Thought is was great sans two aspects:

1) By realistic and original accounts, the number of Taliban they faced were between 15-30, not even close to 200.
2) The two separate instances of them throwing themselves down 20-30 yard rocky cliffs, bouncing and flipping off boulders, then nearly immediately standing up to fight again. There was one broken ankle by one of them as a result. Not even close to realistic.

I wish that the filmmakers would have made more of an effort to make it as realistic as possible. The story itself is powerful enough and doesn't need embellishment.

Also when they were initially discovered by the goat herders, the correct move should have been to tie up both of the younger kids then make the old man hike out with them for about 30 min to an hour. By the time the old man would have hiked back down either all the way to the village or figured out how to untie the kids, they would have had plenty of time to clear the area and radio for help.
 
dalbertthekid said:
In the book Luttrell says anywhere from 80-200 but thought closer to 200.
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Yeah but almost all official accounts, and other third party accounts indicate more like 20 or so. Not even close to 200. Even Luttrell's original report said something like 10-20 and then it just started climbing.
 
bojanglefunk said:
The largest outside of Lutrell are at 100, lowest at 10. Most are in the 35-50 range.

His own after action report reports 20-35. The Medal of Honor paper work climbs to around 40. A speech shortly thereafter you get to 40-50 above and the same number on the flanks and the memoir climbs to 170-200.
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leftcoastdeac said:
Here's an account of some of the misinformation around RED WINGS. This article was written by the author of Victory Point, and published in the Marine Corps Gazette:

http://www.darack.com/sawtalosar/ED-DARACK-RED-WINGS-MISINFORMATION.pdf
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Is there an echo in here?
 
Also, Victory Point talks about the operation as a whole and really reminds the reader of the tragedy of the helicopters going down and the reasons they were there in the first place etc. due to poor equipment, poor changes to the chain of command, poor planning and major issues with the fog of war.
 
leftcoastdeac said:
Ha..I started doing research on Victory Point after you called it out and found that article.
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Oh I meant more the fact that the discussion is being repeated later in the thread. I had never seen that link you sent and thought it was interesting- a pretty succinct summary of what went on. I would send you my copy of victory point except I read it on my iPad so I can't. If you have access to it though I highly recommend it. Breaks down a lot of the joint operations issues and having SOCOM acting independently of the others with no real integration.

ETA: For example, most of the comms issues would have been avoided with better integration as the Marine officers on the ground had already determined that comms equipment the SEALS were carrying wouldn't work in the area they were operating and thus had abandoned them for the more powerful (albeit heavier) options.
 
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bojanglefunk said:
Oh I meant more the fact that the discussion is being repeated later in the thread. I had never seen that link you sent and thought it was interesting- a pretty succinct summary of what went on. I would send you my copy of victory point except I read it on my iPad so I can't. If you have access to it though I highly recommend it. Breaks down a lot of the joint operations issues and having SOCOM acting independently of the others with no real integration.
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I've got it on my short list - glad you mentioned it here as I would not likely come across it through other channels.
 
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