No One Left Behind- Vets Rally to Assist
Responding to frantic calls for help from Afghan interpreters, known as “terps” in danger for their lives, US veterans are turning to as best as they can.
The Vets forged lasting bonds with their terps, who worked and bunked alongside them and occasionally saved their lives. The stunning Taliban victory over Afghan forces has left tens of thousands of American allies stranded, and is prompting the frantic efforts by military Vets to get their former colleagues out.
David sends.
U.S. veterans revive long-dormant escape networks to save Afghan interpreters
Corky Siemaszko
The distress call came in over WhatsApp the same day that Kabul fell to the Taliban.
“’Gunny,’” the voice from far away said, according to the recently retired Marine who received the call Aug. 15. “I need help. The Taliban are trying to hunt me.”
The caller was an Afghan who served as an interpreter with his unit a decade ago, the retired Marine, who held the rank of gunnery sergeant at the time, told NBC News.
“We became friends and stayed in touch after I left Afghanistan,” he said. NBC News is not identifying the retired Marine, who lives in California, to prevent the Taliban from connecting him to the interpreter. “He said he was already getting death threats and he was worried about his family.”
Immediately, he said, “I kicked into overdrive and started calling other members of my unit” and quickly discovered they had heard from three other terrified “terps” who were also in danger.
“We formed a group and started asking ourselves, ‘Who do we know on the ground in Kabul who could help us? How do we get the four “terps” and their families to the gates” of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, he said.
Such veterans groups have popped up across the country since the shocking Taliban takeover two weeks ago.
If the current administration allows our allies to swing in the wind, who in their right mind will help us in future conflicts? With so much wrong that is patently obvious to anyone with a basic military background, the incomprehensible actions of Biden and his handlers snowball into disaster.
Leave it to the NCOs to rally up to assist our friends.
Thanks, David.
Category: Afghanistan, Guest Link, International Affairs
Had to be done….(sorry not sorry…)
https://imgur.com/o3kvTaj
Our terps in Iraq were mostly Chaldean Catholics and I made it a personal mission to get them out before the US left, even putting them up at my own house as needed. We knew how bad things were going to get there despite the Obama rosy intelligence estimates of ISIS. They are all living productive lives in the US now with their families.
Two joined the US Military and after serving enlistments went on to good paying jobs as contractors. They didn’t have to sign up but they did it anyway, mostly out of pure gratitude. They are all fully Americanized now.
They took the same risks we did, even if it was to escape their native country where they were treated as hostile by their government because of the God they chose to worship. Basically the same reason that many Europeans came here back in the colonial days. Anyone that is willing to lay their life on the line like that for our cause in hopes of a better life for their selves and their families is a brother.
“Leave it up to the NCOs to rally up to assist our friends.” WORD! BZ to the troops for jumping in and doing what they can to help out. “it is better to have tried and failed than to have not tried at all.”
From what I understand they make ossifers by performing lobotomies on Sgts.
It would be a Gunny that figures it out.
I don’t know.
My terps were all assholes. They believed all kinds of conspiracy theories, like the jews rule the world, and when I pointed to poor jews in Israel and elsewhere, they told me those were not really jews.
They also trafficked all kinds of contraband, providing alcohol for joes. I am sure there were drugs too.
They would find jobs as terp to friends in exchange of a percentage of the salary. They were very good at identifying the our guys that were decision makers and had control of the purse. On their time off they were hanging out at the bazaar with local national merchants and doing all kinds of deals.
But I get it. You guys like those assholes because they spoke englesse and served as a limited window into that world.
They did their job well enough, and got compensated handsomely for the risks they took. I don’t think we owe them anything. Bringing them here might be a bad idea.
I’d say everyone has different experiences. Your deployments were likely very different than mine.
Our worst terps were US Soldiers who were Sudanese immigrants. We had several. They were universally lazy malingerers who felt special because they were bonus babies. They didn’t even speak Arabic well and were mostly clueless on reading and writing. Trying to get them to soldier was like dealing with the worst guy in your platoon except they were all like that.