In the second episode in a two-part series, Dan Gade joins The Spear to tell the story of his 2004 deployment to Ramadi, Iraq. After his unit suffered the deaths of two soldiers—the difficulty of which he discussed in the previous episode—his company continued to engage in frequent and heavy action with insurgents. But as coalition forces began to adopt a population-centric approach to providing security, Dan and his company found themselves increasingly conducting missions without the protective armor of their M1A2 Abrams tanks. On one mission, in January 2005, the lack of armor proved almost deadly to him. He shares the story in this episode.
This episode features a conversation with Captain Lindsay Heisler. An aviation officer and Apache pilot, in December 2015 she was part of a mission...
During a deployment in Afghanistan, Chief Warrant Officer 4 Dylan Ferguson was flying an Apache, providing close air support to a special operations ground...
Before his NFL career, Alejandro Villanueva was a rifle platoon leader in the 10th Mountain Division. During a deployment to an especially restive sector...