SEAL of Honor (25 page)

The advanced land-warfare phase includes training in intelligence gathering; structural penetration; long-range reconnaissance and patrolling; close-quarters combat; sniper/countersniper skills; advanced driving skills; edged weapons; hand-to-hand combat; extreme environment survival; field medicine; explosives; small-unit tactics; infiltration and exfiltration; snatch-and-grab missions, and prisoner handling.

The teams responsible for areas often covered with snow conduct extreme cold-weather and winter-warfare training, usually in Alaska, Montana, New York, Norway, and Canada. This training covers mountaineering, free climbing, mountain patrolling and raiding, arctic survival and navigation, high-altitude mountaineering, camouflage, concealment and cover techniques, fire and manuvering techniques on skis and snowshoes, winter orienteering, cross-country skiing, evasion and escape, extreme cold-weather diving, snowshoeing, building snow caves and shelters, winter survival, heavy weapons management, and avalanche survival.

The teams responsible for the parts of the world covered by dense jungle and swamp conduct their training in the sweltering and treacherous jungles of Panama or Pineros Island in Puerto Rico.

During the third six-month training block, six platoons, along with their supporting SEAL squadron, Special Boat Squadrons, medical teams, explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) detachment, interpreters, intelligence unit, and cryptological support team, conduct coordinated advanced training under simulated battlefield conditions. A final intense, graded certification training exercise (CERTEX) is then performed by the entire SEAL team using battlefield conditions. The purpose is to coordinate platoon operations under a task force group umbrella while using live ammuition. After successfully completing the CERTEX, the SEAL team becomes a SEAL squadron and is scheduled for deployment.

Ensign Andy Haffele, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy who had recently earned his Trident, arrived at SDVT-1 in Pearl City, Hawaii, in 2003. He was slated to become the third officer in charge in Alfa Platoon, behind the platoon
commander, Lieutenant George Stahl, and the assistant platoon commander, Lieutenant Michael Murphy. Murphy and Haffele quickly became good friends—as Haffele described them, “two peas in a pod.”

Approximately four months after joining Alfa Platoon, Michael and Haffele were leading their platoon in conducting live-fire immediate-action drills (IADs) on Point Man Range at Schofield Barracks. Haffele later described IAD as being “as close to actual combat as you’re going to get without being there.” IADs were necessary, according to Haffele, because “when bullets are flying for real in bad guy country, that is not the time to be involved in live fire for the first time. When it all hits the fan, you will fall back on your muscle memory. Muscle memory is developed in training. Live rounds coming out the end of your weapon are completely different than blanks. You have to train as you will fight. Live fire is necessary.”

Alfa Platoon had been conducting IADs several times a day for the previous week or so. On March 18, 2004, Alfa Platoon had divided into two squads. The second squad consisted of Chris Hall, Dan Healy, Andy Haffele, Shane Patton, Michael Murphy, and Matthew Axelson. Both squads had walked through the exercise without gunfire, and the first squad had completed the live-fire IAD. At about 2:45 PM the second squad, led by Michael, was in squad formation patrolling the assigned training area. Suddenly the range safety officer detonated an explosive charge and fired live rounds behind the squad. The squad’s rear security officer, Chris Hall, yelled, “Contact rear!” Hall, Healy, Haffele, Patton, Murphy, and Axelson, who was on point, came toward the rear to meet the threat. Murphy yelled, “Center peel!” the correct tactical manuever for the situation.

The center peel is designed with human psychology in mind. This tactical manuever is utilized by modern-day military units when a smaller group of troops needs to withdraw from an engagement with a much larger force. Generally it is a sloped or diagonal retreat from the enemy utilizing suppression fire. The diagonal motion of the manuever gives the impression of increasing numbers of soldiers joining the battle, a psychological move designed to demoralize the opposition. The slanting motion also has the benefit of keeping open the field of fire. Retreating directly backward would put the soldier too closely behind his own men, severely limiting his field of fire.

All members of the squad went into their field of fire, the target area directly in front of them. Chris Hall was the first to get his weapon firing downrange; he was followed by Dan Healy. Once Healy began firing, that was the signal for Hall to stop firing, put his weapon on safe, get up, and retreat, tapping Haffele on the shoulder as he passed. That was the signal for Haffele to begin firing. Healy then stopped firing, put his weapon on safe, got up, and retreated, tapping Shane Patton on the shoulder as he passed. That was the signal for Patton to begin firing. When Patton began firing, Haffele stopped firing, put his weapon on safe, got up, and turned to
retreat. He was immediately hit by a .556 green-tip round from Murphy’s M4 and went down to the ground, unable to breathe.

Murphy was the first to get to Haffele, followed within seconds by Chris Hall. With Haffele remaining fully conscious, Michael immediately placed a trauma dressing and direct pressure over the now profusely bleeding wound in Haffele’s right upper chest. The bullet had pierced the right axillary artery, resulting in a tension pneumothorax. Marcus Luttrell, the medic, and Corpsman John Dane quickly arrived and started lifesaving treatment. Dane began inserting intravenous lines into both of Haffele’s arms while Luttrell conducted a head-to-toe emergency assessment. The fact that he might well have been dying never crossed Haffele’s mind until Commander Todd DeGhetto, the commanding officer of SDVT-1, asked for his wife’s contact number. Andy and Chrissy had only been married for seven months and lived near the base. He was loaded onto a backboard and placed in a transport truck and rushed to the helicopter landing area and the awaiting Blackhawk medevac helicopter. Luttrell ordered the pilot to head to Queen’s Medical Center, Oahu’s only Level I Trauma Center. Andy made it through five hours of surgery, fifty units of blood, and the administration of last rights, Chrissy at his side. The next twelve hours resulted in additional surgeries and an additional twenty units of blood.

Following four weeks of hospitalization, Haffele’s attention turned to the physical and occupational rehabilitation of his right arm, which was now nonfunctional. During this time Michael Murphy was a frequent visitor. On several occasions Andy and Michael had heart-to-heart conversations, with Michael expressing extreme remorse for what had happened. During the subsequent investigation by the judge advocate general, Commander DeGhetto repeatedly interviewed Michael Murphy and reported the following.

Commander DeGhetto related that he had absolutely no mental hesitation in making his decision, and stated that had he had any reservations or reason to believe that Mike had not learned from his mistake, he would have been “sent packing,” either back to the fleet or to the street.

Michael Murphy’s Fitness Report and Counseling Record covering the period from March 1, 2004, to January 31, 2005, filed by his commanding officer, documented the following:

CHAPTER TWELVE

—PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH, State of the Union Address, 2002

T
he Global War on Terror (GWOT), or War on Terror, is the common term for the military, political, legal, and ideological conflict against terrorism. It is more specifically used in reference to the September 11, 2001, attacks against the United States and their aftermath; however, America was at war for years before its people and leaders recognized the crisis. Al-Qaeda had been carrying out attacks against the United States and its interests and allies since the mid-1990s.

U.S. forces learned on February 24, 1997, that we were at war with al-Qaeda and radical Islam. On that date, Ali Abu Kamal opened fire on tourists on an observation deck atop the Empire State Building. It would take another year before the American people and her political leaders would come to the same conclusion.

Having been emboldened by their successful attacks against U.S. targets overseas, in the fall of 1998 a meeting was held in Afghanistan between Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Osama bin Laden. During the meeting, Mohammed received bin Laden’s permission to proceed with his plan to attack the U.S. mainland. Bin Laden provided the leadership and finances and was involved in the selection of the participants for the attacks.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda launched the largest and most deadly terrorist attack in history against a sovereign nation, with nineteen hijackers taking control of four commercial airliners en route to San Francisco and Los Angeles from Boston, Newark, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C. At 8:46 AM American Airlines Flight 11 was flown into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 AM, United Airlines Flight
175 was crashed into the World Trade Center’s south tower. American Airlines Flight 77 was crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 AM. A fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, whose ultimate target was the U.S. Capitol, crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, at 10:03 AM when the passengers, aware of the hijackers’ plan, tried to retake control of the plane.

The subsequent loss of life was staggering. In the planes, 246 people died; at the Pentagon, 125; and in both towers of the World Trade Center, 2,627. Within hours of the attacks, the FBI determined the identities of the hijackers. The Pentagon/Twin Towers Bombing Investigation, code-named PENTTBOM, was the largest investigation in world history, involving over seven thousand agents of the FBI alone.