In August 2007, a US Army Special Forces team came under fire while passing through a valley in Afghanistan. The call for support went to a nearby base, where an AC-130H Spectre gunship crew was standing by. The crew quickly launched, and shortly later, the aircraft was overhead. This is the type of job the AC-130H was designed for. In the hours that followed, they engaged enemy targets a number of times with both a 40-millimeter cannon and a 105-millimeter howitzer. Lt. Col. Michael Murphy is the commander of the US Air Force's 16th Special Operations Squadron. In 2007, he was a copilot on that aircraft in Afghanistan, and he joins this episode to share the story.
Before his NFL career, Alejandro Villanueva was a rifle platoon leader in the 10th Mountain Division. During a deployment to an especially restive sector...
In 2003, Maj. John Spencer was a platoon leader in Iraq. One night, while waiting in an ambush position, he gave the order for...
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....