Lions of Marjah: Combat As I Saw It

Book excerpt: "Lions of Marjah" is a book that I started while fighting the Taliban in the Helmand River Valley Province of Afghanistan. Living, eating and sleeping amongst the enemy. The book begins with an introduction to my history in the corps and drops the reader in when I re-enlisted and moved to 3rd Battalion 6th Marines where I was assigned to Kilo Company 2nd platoon as a infantry Squad Leader. It talks about the challenges that a new squad leader faces when entering a new platoon and the challenges faced by the new guys he means to lead. Next the book introduces the deployment to Afghanistan and the mission that our unit was tasked with. We would be going into Marjah and liberating the people there from the totalitarian grips of the Taliban. We would invade the city of Marjah by helicopter with one other company from 1st Battalion 6th Marines, while the rest of the Companies from both Battalions surrounded and squeezed the enemy in toward us. We would be tasked with seizing and holding Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) objective (OBJ) number 2, which was a land bridge road intersection where a suspected Master Bomb Maker lived and operated. We were to clear and hold the area and await follow on instructions. With stiff resistance and next to constant fighting this took 3 days longer than it was supposed to. The book moves from firefight to firefight through the first 4 weeks of fighting and then breaks down the deployment in sections (chapters) and covers the experiences therein. The sections range from contact patrols to the emotions and experiences of killing another human being to losing one of my own guys. The book has a variety of after-actions and lessons learned from the different engagements throughout the time in Marjah, to share experiences and provide real situations to think about for the warfighters that protect the nation. This book drives at the heart of the infantry community and will really put the war fighting experience in perspective for those who have never been.