The awesomest SEAL in history (Complete article added)

Average NCO sends us this link to the most impressive bio of a SEAL, I’ve ever read. To show how smart he is, he didn’t use his real name;

Carl, who now goes by that assumed name, seldom stays in one place for long and is temporarily staying at an undisclosed location in San Bernardino County, told his story this week to this newspaper.

It’s a tale of quiet, behind-the-scenes heroism for this descendant of a military family, courage demonstrated in countless fierce battles with a shadowy enemy and on numberless covert nighttime missions. It also includes a medical miracle which Carl attributes to his faith in God.

Oh, well, if he believes in God, he must be legit. But then he tells the story of how he went from Parris Island to BUD/S;

Then, when he turned 17, “they came and got me. At midnight on his birthday, “I was off the bus and following the yellow footprints” on the pavement at the Parris Island, S.C., Marine base, he said.

I didn’t know SEALs used Marines, but he was pals with Dick Marchinko, and he’s the only guy I know who would admit that in public, so his story must be true. Despite the fact that the folks at Free Republic and AR15.com don’t believe him.

Yeah, you need to read the whole article in order to get the “full retard” effect. The reporter must’ve been intending to pull our collective leg, because no one is so gullible that they’d believe some horseshit like this.

For those of you who missed the article before they pulled it down; here’s the whole fairy tale below the jump;

By Glenn Barr, Reporter | 0 comments

Had it not been for a small Coke can in the road in a tiny Afghan village, Carl would almost certainly have been aboard the U.S. Army helicopter shot down in Wardak province in Afghanistan on Aug. 6, killing 22 U.S. Navy SEALs and decimating the proud, elite commando team he once led.

But as things worked out, a lapse in communication between Carl and the driver of his Humvee a year earlier resulted in the vehicle’s passing too close to the crude IED (improvised explosive device), triggering an explosion that killed two SEALs, wounded six others and ended Carl’s active-duty career after 31 years as a SEAL.

Carl, who now goes by that assumed name, seldom stays in one place for long and is temporarily staying at an undisclosed location in San Bernardino County, told his story this week to this newspaper.

It’s a tale of quiet, behind-the-scenes heroism for this descendant of a military family, courage demonstrated in countless fierce battles with a shadowy enemy and on numberless covert nighttime missions. It also includes a medical miracle which Carl attributes to his faith in God.

RETRIBUTION FEARED

It’s also a story Carl fears could get him killed. “There are sleeper cells in this country,” he said. “I don’t know where they are.” But because Navy SEALs (Sea, Air and Land Teams) perform mostly nighttime missions aimed at the heart of the Middle East insurgency, Carl is alert to the possibility of enemy retribution on our own soil.

Accordingly, he is highly guarded about what he will disclose about his military career, and would not permit his photo to be taken.

Still, his is a compelling story that, in at least one instance, is tinged with a chilling dose of the supernatural.

Born in Georgia, Carl had a troubled childhood. His life took a radical turn at age 7 when his father, standing in front of Carl, inserted a .357 Magnum revolver in his mouth and squeezed the trigger.

Soon after, his mother bundled Carl off to a boys’ home, which he said was for “the unwanted rejects of society.”

The leadership traits that years later shone on the battlefield began appearing while Carl was at that institution. “At night we’d go out and play war,” he said. “I was always put in charge of the unit. I decided I liked that kind of stuff.”

IMPROVISATION SKILLS

His ability to improvise in tough situations developed there, too, he said. “I’d get in trouble and always figure a way to get out of it,” he said.

At the home, he was required to attend church each Sunday. “They scared the hell out of you with fire and brimstone,” he recalled.

At four months short of age 17, Carl made a decision that altered his life; he opted to enlist in the Marine Corps. He ranked high on his aptitude tests and passed the physical, he said, and took the oath on April 17, 1977.

Then, when he turned 17, “they came and got me. At midnight on his birthday, “I was off the bus and following the yellow footprints” on the pavement at the Parris Island, S.C., Marine base, he said.

Once the tough training began, he said, he immediately second-guessed his decision, shocked by the reality of boot camp life.

But Carl toughed it out, and after boot camp he was sent to combat demolition school at Fort Irwin, Calif.

“I learned how to blow things up, he said. “C4 (plastic explosive), Claymore mines, anything that would blow up” he mastered.

After about 14 months as a Marine, Carl went home on leave to see his mother. He also ran into an abusive male cousin, who was physically well developed but had grown up a bully.

HE’D HAD ENOUGH

When the cousin challenged his manhood and courage, Carl said, he’d had enough. He raised a revolver he was carrying and shot the bully three times, killing him. Because of his cousin’s unpopularity, even with law enforcement, Carl was never charged, but was able to return to the Marine Corps, he said.

Next on his career path was BUDS (basic underwater demolition school), where, after 366 days of training, he graduated at the top of his class, in late 1979.

His mother and grandmother constantly said he was evil, Carl recalled. “My response was that if I’m evil I’m gonna be the meanest SOB there is. I wouldn’t settle for second place,” he said.

When he heeded the call of Navy Commander Richard Marcinko, founder of SEAL Team 6, to join that unit, Carl was sent to Treasure Island Naval Base in San Francisco Bay. There, in quick order, he mastered languages including Farsi, Arabic, Russian and Polish.

He also worked hard to lose his Georgia accent, which he said made him sound like Gomer Pyle. Marcinko had advised him to modify his speech if he ever hoped to be commissioned an officer, he said.

He took that advice, receiving a commission and eventually becoming the team’s executive officer.

DEMANDING LIFE

Life as a SEAL was demanding, not just for the approximately 290 days a year he was in training, but also on his personal life. Carl’s career was marked by five failed marriages and the death from liver cancer on May 18, 1980, of his first wife.

“None of my wives understood my job,” he said, adding that his absence from home and his three children “was the big elephant in the room.”

He was home enough, however, to respond to his wife Linda’s prayers for him, and he accepted Jesus Christ as his savior. He was baptized July 14, 2000.

At one point that year, Carl left the Navy and took a job driving long-haul trucks for his brother. On one of those trips he pulled his rig over in Mesquite, Texas, and heard in a mini-mart the voice of Osama bin Laden on audio, being monitored carefully by the store clerk.

“He (bin Laden) was preaching death to the Great Satan,” Carl said. “I recognized his voice.”

Though he shrugged off the incident, one a short time later couldn’t be ignored.

As he was nearing Aurora, Colo., he turned on his CB radio and heard the stock market had crashed. Then he pulled into a truck stop and found it virtually deserted.

‘BACK IN ACTION’

“Everybody was in the back, watching a big-screen TV,” he said. “It was 9/11. I saw smoke rising from the tower. I said, ‘We’re back in action.'”

Carl promptly re-enlisted and got his commission back, becoming Team 6’s temporary commanding officer and angering his wife, who complained he hadn’t consulted her first.

On Dec. 30, 2002, Carl left for Iraq. Four SEAL teams, including his, were assigned to scout the country to identify sites later targeted when the U.S. unleashed “shock and awe” the following March.

Carl served nearly eight years in Iraq and Afghanistan, he said. His service ended one day in April 2010 when an IED exploded.

Carl, who at the time was commanding Team 6, was in the turret of a Humvee (high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicle) when he spotted a Coca-Cola can in the road.

“We were supposed to go to port (left),” to avoid it, he said. “I thought the driver heard me.” Apparently he didn’t, because the Humvee continued straight. Though it narrowly missed the IED, it nonetheless detonated, killing two crewmen and seriously injuring Carl.

ATTACKERS REPELLED

He was able to fend off attacking insurgents using an M60 machine gun, and he was evacuated on the third medical helicopter to leave the scene.

His legs were numb, he said, though he could stand. “I didn’t realize how bad I was hit,” he said.

At a field hospital in Kuwait, a medic shot cortisone into his back to calm his muscles, and the pain was intense, he said. Then he was sent for an X-ray, and it showed something in his spinal cord.

After transfer to a military hospital in Hamburg, Germany, Carl learned doctors had determined his spinal cord was not touching from vertebrae five through nine. His condition, called a thoracic spinal cord herniation, prompted his doctor to advise him to get used to life in a wheelchair and to concentrate on strengthening his upper body.

On a Sunday in June 2010, Carl said, he went to a church in Bethesda, Md., near the Naval Hospital. There, elders laid hands on him and prayed.

“I pushed my wheelchair away and went back to my seat,” he said. Later, when he reported for a medical test, the doctors couldn’t believe that, with his condition, he had been able to walk into their office.

‘SHOULDN’T WALK’

“They told me that, theoretically, I shouldn’t be able to walk,” he said. Next, doctors determined the “something” wrapped around his spinal cord, spotted at the Kuwait field hospital, was a malignant tumor.

Carl said he underwent chemotherapy but got tired of it, and refused a complex and risky surgery.

“It hasn’t grown or shrunk,” he said. “My doctor called me a walking miracle case.” Of the 31 people worldwide known to have had this condition, he added, he’s the only one who is still alive and not on assisted breathing.

Carl said he was at a hotel in Fremont, Calif., on Aug. 6 when he heard a helicopter with Navy SEALs had gone down in Afghanistan. He quickly sent e-mails to several of the men he’d commanded. None responded.

Later news reports said Team 6 was on an Army Chinook helicopter that was bringing SEALs to the aid of a stranded Ranger unit in a firefight. The chopper apparently crashed after being hit in the tail by a rocket-propelled grenade.

‘OUT OF PROTOCOL’

Carl said it was “way out of protocol” for SEALs to ride an Army chopper, and for their entire unit to be on one aircraft. “That never happened in my 30 years with the team,” he said, and he can’t explain why it did.

Another thing he can’t explain is an eerie incident occurring in a firefight in Afghanistan. Some time earlier, in another fight, he said, a SEAL had thrown himself on a live grenade, saving his fellow SEALs by his death.

His body was bagged up and shipped out, Carl said, along with all his personal belongings, which were sent to his next of kin.

In a firefight shortly thereafter, he said, the SEALs had used up most of their heavy weaponry and enemy fire was still coming in. At that moment, he said, the SEALs spotted one of their number, charging the enemy position with an M60 machine gun.

The SEAL killed all the enemy and disappeared. When the other SEALs went to examine the dead insurgents, he said, they found a cigarette lighter bearing the SEAL insignia and the initials of the SEAL who’d been killed days earlier.

‘HE’D NEVER BEEN THERE’

“No one but him would have had that lighter,” Carl said. “And he’d never been to that place before.” Carl said the SEALs were deeply shaken at the sight of what 12 of them swear was a ghost saving their lives.

As he sat for his interview, Carl, now 50, looked back on his Navy career.

“I have a lot of survivor guilt,” he said, adding that he suffers frequent bad dreams in which his weapon won’t fire. “I never have come back from Iraq and Afghanistan.” he said.

“I’m proud of what I did but I could have done a lot of things different,” he said. “I could have done a lot of things to help people.”

Category: Phony soldiers