Ryan Hendrickson - Tip of the Spear: The Incredible Story of an Injured Green Berets Return to Battle

BAGRAM AIRFIELD

BAGRAM, AFGHANISTAN

JUNE 2010

W hen the bulky C-17 Globemaster touched down at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan and the rear loading ramp dropped down, I was slapped in the face by the summer heatsticky and in the 90s. Then came the smells, which were a mixture of burning trash, raw sewage, and aviation fuel.

I wrinkled my nose, but that wasnt going to change the shit-smelling air assaulting my nostrils. None of this caught me by surprise, though. Before I left Fort Bragg in North Carolina, I heard that Kabul city, twenty-five miles to the south and the countrys largest city with 3 million residents, was an open sewer, home to some of the dirtiest air in the world.

Despite the fetid smells and oppressive heat, I felt like a kid at a pizza party on this steamy June day. I had just graduated from the U.S. Armys Special Forces Qualification Course in Fayetteville, North Carolina, and this was my first time in Afghanistan and my first mission as a Green Beret. I had left the U.S. Air Force for the Army so I would have the chance to take the fight to the enemy up close and in person. My wish was coming true. In my mind, I was a well-oiled machine ready to take on any challenge as part of Special Operations Forces.

When I graduated from Q Course, I entered an elite world as a Special Forces Engineer, which was known as an 18Cor 18 Charliein the SF community. Now that I was being deployed to a war zone like Afghanistan, I would have a lot of duties on the team but chief among them would be finding, removing, or detonating the number-one killer of U.S. troops in the War on Terror: Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), or homemade bombs and mines. While all jobs on my team were extremely important, I was trained to do something that you better not fuck up.

As an Improvised Explosive Device detection expertand I use the term expert looselyI would be directly responsible for my teammates safety while on patrol in combat. If I let my concentration wander or missed one little detail, bad shit happenedmeaning that I or any one of my fellow soldiers could lose a limb or be killed. I would have to do my damnedest to ensure that we all returned home alive and with the limbs we deployed with.

After exiting the C-17 ramp and looking to the horizon, I was taken aback by the almost picture-perfect views of the surrounding mountains. I say almost perfect because I would soon find out that beyond the bases security walls, anyone associated with the Taliban wanted to shoot you or blow you up with IEDs that littered the killing fields.

Carrying my sixty-pound rucksack and dragging a Tuff box full of my gear, I headed out across the concrete tarmac. Beads of sweat dripped out of my pores and drenched my beard. Special Forces soldiers blend in better with the local population if they sported full beards, so Green Berets grew out their facial hair prior to deployment in Afghanistan. I had stopped shaving a month earlier. Id never had facial hair before, but I was pleasantly surprised that a full brown beard grew in and covered my cheeks and chin.

Each step was a reminder that I was the rookie on my team, the new guy on Alpha Company, 2nd Battalion, 7th Special Forces. My role as an 18C engineer was one of six main jobs on a Special Forces team. The others were: weapons expert, communications expert, medical expert, intelligence expert, and leadership.

My teammates had done previous tours in Afghanistan, so the brotherhood theyd formed and the bonding theyd done was something that I hadnt been part of. I was aware that I was an outsider trying to fit in with a bunch of battle-hardened Green Berets since I hadnt proven myself in combat with them. Finding my place wouldnt be quick or easy.

I didnt have to wait long to get out into the field. From Bagram, we made a few brief stops on our way to southern Afghanistan until we reached our home for the next six to nine months of our tourForward Operating Base (FOB) Tycz.

FOB Tycz was a large, comfortable base with the requisite security walls. The Dutch had a fire base adjacent to ours, which meant we were not alone, and the Dutch soldiers turned out to be good neighbors. The base was located in Uruzgan Province, so we were right in the thick of the fight. Like most places in Afghanistan, we were surrounded by towering mountains that gave way to dry desert in the valley below, where FOB Tycz was. We were a short drive away from the Helmand River, which was a lifeline for farming and producing huge marijuana plants, another cash crop.

FOB Tycz had what every Green Beret knows is as important as water on a hot daya good-size gym. We didnt have to have anything fancy, but there were appearances to keep up, and no one likes a flabby Green Beret. Staying buff was the first of three rules that were taught to me while going through training. The three rules were:

1. Always look cool.

2. Dont fuck up.

3. If you fuck up, look cool doing it.