In this episode of The Spear, retired Marine officer David Berke joins to share a story from 2006, when he was a forward air controller attached to an Army unit in Ramadi, Iraq. During a movement-to-contact patrol, they began to take fire, and his job became especially important. He declared the TIC—troops in contact—and two Marine Corps F/A-18D Hornets headed their way to provide close air support. Listen as he tells the story, explaining what it's like to work with the pilots in the air to engage the enemy in support of the ground force.
Few books have had the impact on generations of young soldiers as Jim McDonough’s Platoon Leader: A Memoir of Command in Combat. First published...
Rick Jackson enlisted in the Marine Corps in the 1980s, later attending Officer Candidates School and commissioning as an infantry officer. He joins this...
In early 2003, Karl Blanke was a Marine platoon commander during the early stages of the US-led invasion of Iraq, when his battalion was...