01x11 - Objective Berlin

[bunniefuu]

MAN: We want to fight the enemy.

That's why we joined
the Ranger Battalion.

MAN: Every mission you
understand the risks,

and those risks
definitely were amplified

the minute that we stepped
off that aircraft.

It was crazy. I mean, it was chaotic.

This was a very different type
of objective for all of us.

MAN: It was just a series
of chaotic events.

MAN: You could be the most
well-trained bad-ass in the world.

Doesn't matter if you have no
training or all that training.

If it's your time, there's nothing

you can do about it
if you're gonna die.

I think everyone in special
operations community,

has a sense of invincibility.

We're untouchable.

Every -year-old kid already has that.

And then you give him the
best training in the world,

the best gear,

surrounded by the best people,

and now you truly believe it.

MAN: The First Ranger
Battalion deployed

in the beginning of August of .

Our platoon was pretty excited

to get the chance to go to Afghanistan.

We knew we had a big opportunity there

to really bring the fight to the enemy.

MAN: We were operating
out of Fob Salerno,

and it was basically at capacity.

It was very crowded.

They were packing us into
these tiny little tents.

You could literally touch the guy

to your left and to your right.

We're working out together.

We're eating together.

Everything we're doing,
we're doing as a team.

I remember being a little nervous.

I think that's normal for
everyone's first deployment.

But knowing that you are
surrounded by the best people

that the Special Operations
community has to offer,

and knowing that I have their back

and at the same time they have mine,

that's a really good feeling.

Jason Dahlke was one of the best
that we had in Ranger Battalion

as far as being physically
fit, mentally strong.

JORDAN: Everybody looked up to him.

And instead of just being the best,

he wanted to make
everybody else the best.

MICHAEL: He had a way of teaching

that was unlike anything
I'd ever experienced

since being in the m*llitary.

When he's teaching his guys,

it's not just to teach that one person,

but it's to benefit the group,

and he was very,
very adamant about that.

He just really wanted
people to succeed.

I mean, he really, he really did.

And from what I hear from the guys,

he was a great teacher
and a great leader to them.

I met Jason in middle school.

We were, like, or , probably.

He was in one of my Spanish classes,

and I remember him being
the crazy redhead

who was talking all the time.

He was always on the go.

He was really active,
really adventurous.

Jason just loved to be outside.

I remember once
he called me and told me,

"I think I'm gonna enter into
a triathlon that's on base."

I'm like, "Okay. When?"

"Today. I'm gonna do it
this afternoon."

He ended up doing it
with his mountain bike

that he just happened
to have in his truck.

He had his MICH...

his m*llitary helmet,
not a biker's helmet...

and he ended up winning the race.

I mean, it was absurd.

I've never met anybody like him.

Even his walk was
this bounce and this, like,

shoulders back, chest forward,

and he was bouncing
when he came in the room.

His presence was just there,

and he was going to make
everybody there happy.

Even deployed, I never felt alone.

I always knew he was there
and thinking about me.

He'd been on three deployments to Iraq

and this would be his third
deployment to Afghanistan.

And there was something
about this last deployment

which made me very nervous.

We begin this hour with Afghanistan

and some very hard facts.

Taliban forces are on the rise again.

Al-Qaeda training camps
on the Pakistani side

of the Afghan border
are said to be full.

NEWSCASTER: Militants continue to train

and launch terror att*cks
into Afghanistan.

And once feuding Taliban commanders

have pulled together for the
common goal of fighting the U.S.

In , in terms of the
broad scheme of Afghanistan,

you had the Haqqani
and you had the Taliban,

and they were able to still
be a problem for the U.S.

eight years after
we entered Afghanistan.

JORDAN: There was lots of fire fights.

It wasn't just doing nightly raids.

It was night raids and
then getting in big fights

with an actual... an enemy that knew
what they were actually doing.

MICHAEL: The Americans and the Taliban

had almost become good
at fighting each other.

So we knew that it was gonna be
a rough... a rough deployment.

JORDAN: Objective Berlin came down.

I think we had been in country
about a month or so.

Third Battalion had found

that there were a number
of training camps

near the Pakistan border,

and they basically requested

a company from First Battalion

to help them hit all of these camps.

MICHAEL: Our intelligence
analysts had begun monitoring it.

A lot of enemy movement in the area.

GREG: We could see that there
was a large set of bunkers

and a bunker system built into
the side of this mountain.

And we could see these tent systems,

and there was reports of

possibly enemy weapons caches
and anti-aircraft g*ns.

JORDAN: The camp is very
important to the Taliban.

We thought us hitting
the mountain would definitely

disrupt their leadership network

because there had to be
somebody important in there

with everything that they had.

- MAN: Roger, I copy.
- MAN ♪ : Impact. Impact.

GREG: We'd gotten word that
they were gonna be doing

a kinetic strike before
we were gonna land.

MAN ON RADIO: Good m*ssile.
Good m*ssile.

A kinetic strike, basically,
is dropping large amounts

of bombs or ordinance on the area

in efforts to eliminate the bad guys.

MICHAEL: They were gonna
send us in to just make sure

that the air strikes
had done their job.

GREG: We were supposed
to land at , feet.

And then our objective at
the top of this mountain

was right around , to , feet.

One private was taken from each squad...

four privates total.

I was selected from weapons

and Eric Hario ended up being selected

from third squad.

Eric Hario and I,

we met back in the training cycle.

I had just gotten to Alpha Company,

First Ranger Battalion,

and he had been there
for a month prior.

When you looked at Eric,
you had this big bulky guy.

Huge forearms.
He reminded me of Popeye.

Just these giant forearms
sticking out from his T-shirt.

And he had tattoos. He looked mean.

I remember when I first met him.

The team leaders would start
to get a little bored,

and so they would send all of
our privates from w*apon squad

over to another squad
to try and wrestle.

I drew the unlucky straw of having
to try and wrestle with Eric

who came from a background
of wrestling and football.

Here I am this little...
I was pounds.

And so we entered the cage,
and the last thing I remember

is Eric having me in this headlock

and my head bouncing off the concrete

and me thinking in the back of my mind,

"This is a really bad situation."

I drew the wrong kid to mess with.

And we were laughing later on.

I believe he said something
to the effect of,

"Hey, man, I'll help you work
on those wrestling skills,"

or something like that.

As it led up to the planning
for Objective Berlin,

the final manifest call came
out and our names were on it.

We were super excited
that we had been selected.

As we took off, I mean,
this is my second mission.

This is Eric's very first mission.

We were just both looking
forward to the opportunity

to go out and do our job.

[RADIO CHATTER]

MICHAEL: I took a look out the
window of the helicopter,

and the terrain, it's so vast,

and it's just emptiness out there.

And I remember thinking,

"They want us to climb up this."

These mountains are straight up.

JORDAN: We'd only been
in country for a month,

living and training at sea level,

and this mission was going to be

over , feet elevation.

So not only walking up a mountain,

but doing it while fighting
was gonna be a huge challenge.

I've heard that this
was an area in the world

that Alexander the Great
couldn't even conquer

because the terrain
was just so challenging.

I vaguely remember someone saying

we just got radio chatter
that the enemy knew

that we were coming just because of
the bombs that had been dropped.

You know, "The Americans are coming."

Get your g*ns ready.

"Get ready to fight."

JORDAN: As we were coming
in and started taking fire,

the pilots made
an assessment on the spot

that they could actually
land the aircraft.

MICHAEL: When you land
aircraft in an area like that,

they are the biggest target
on the b*ttlefield.

Every enemy combatant
that's in that area,

they know that somebody's coming,

especially when it's at night.

GREG: We de-clipped.

I run off to the right. I take a knee,

and my team leader and I
are pulling security.

The sh**ting is going on.

My team leader grabs me
and pulls me down.

Come on. There's a bunker right...

There's an enemy bunker built
into the side of the mountain.

It was so well camouflaged
that we didn't even see it.

Clear.

JORDAN: I'm hearing reports
that there's just enemy

coming in from every direction.

There's so much that they call off

the next wave of helicopters

because they want
to use the air support

to sh**t the guys that are coming
over the ridge lines at us.

The enemy was quickly eliminated.

GREG: I was, like, a -year-old kid,

second mission, first deployment.

To step off into a valley
in which the enemy

was prepared and precise
and ready to att*ck,

it was very eye-opening.

My name is Greg Buechner.

I am originally from a small town

called Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

From an early age, I knew that I
was destined for the m*llitary.

I just remember going to
all these old yard sales,

getting these old uniforms,

and I'd lay in the bushes

and practice my ambush techniques.

Me and all my friends
from the neighborhood

would just sit there and recon
certain people in our neighborhood

and write notes about them, like,

"This person left
their house at this time."

Yeah, we definitely
kept the place safe.

I learned about the Rangers
and their capabilities.

I knew that was going to be my route.

I signed up at , and then I left

two weeks after high school graduation.

As a private coming in,
you've read all the books

and you've watched all the movies.

This is the first time you've
ever been out of the country,

and you're shipped to a warzone.

And it's good to know
that you have brothers

who care about your well-being.

Once the contact ceased
and it got a little quiet,

almost eerily quiet...

MICHAEL: ...that's when the guys
started getting on the radio,

saying, "We got friendly
wounded in action."

GREG: Once you hear that one
of your buddies got hit,

you start to run scenarios
through your head.

Who is it? Is it bad?
Are they gonna make it?

[WHISPERING]

Yes, sir.

GREG: I wasn't very seasoned yet

with operating under night vision.

You have no depth perception.

You can see the rocks down there,

but you don't really know
how far they are away.

So I tripped and fell
two or three times

as I was running over.

I was able to reach
this large amount of people

that were taking a knee.

It looked like they were working.

I remember just kneeling
over closer and closer,

and that's when I was able to look,

and I could tell at that point
that it was Eric.

They had his helmet off,
they had his body armor off,

and they were trying
to assess his wounds.

Ten minutes prior, we're seated across

from each other in the aircraft.

An hour before that, we were talking

about the things that every
-year-old talks about...

girls and w*r.

And now all of a sudden,

we found ourselves on this b*ttlefield

and he's laying there
with multiple wounds.

And that's when it hit me really hard.

I look at his situation...

in his late teens,

six months of Ranger experience,

from the Midwest,

and then I looked at myself...

, six months of experience,
and from the Midwest.

Our stories paralleled each other,

and that's when it became
extremely real to me

the possibility that it could be me.

Given the fact that they were
working on him so frantically,

that told me that that was a good sign.

JORDAN: It came over the
radio that he's stable.

What happened to Hario was that
he stepped off the aircraft

and was sh*t within
the first seconds,

hit in the neck, collar bone area.

MICHAEL: When I first
found out about it,

it was almost like this shield

of invincibility is gone.

GREG: They loaded him into the aircraft

and we sent a great medic with him.

That was a big stumbling block,

but we're gonna make it
through this, you know?

And so will Eric.

But it was crazy to think
that it happened so quick

when we ran off the back
of that aircraft.

And I had a feeling that we
were gonna be in for a fight.

CASTER: The U.S. is
sending tens of thousands

more troops to Afghanistan,

but right now it seems the Taliban

have never been stronger.

Part of landing,
the beginning of any mission,

is to dominate the terrain
and establish control.

MICHAEL: We had mountains
on either side of us,

really vast ridge lines that almost
circled our entire position.

My fire team began moving to the north,

which was gonna bring us
to the base of the mountain

that our target was on top of.

My squad was a lead element
for this target.

As a lead element, you're gonna be
the guys that are in the front.

My name is Michael Ross.
I'm years old.

I grew up in Syracuse, New York.

I didn't grow up
in a big m*llitary family.

I didn't have the typical
childhood that you hear

a lot of guys in the m*llitary...

you know, they grew up hunting.

I didn't sh**t a g*n
till I went to Basic.

I grew up skate boarding
and snow boarding.

I didn't play football.

I think everyone changed
after September .

Our whole country, obviously,
had almost a facelift to it.

Something sparked inside of me
when that happened.

There was some sort of, almost an anger

or a rage, you could almost call it.

I felt like something
needed to be done.

And so I had tattoos

and the Marine Corps,
they hated tattoos

just as much as the Army does now.

I had them below the elbow,

and that kind of funneled me
into the Army.

I enlisted in May of .

I knew that I wanted to fight.

I had that desire in me.

I wanted to be the tip of the spear,

the guys that go in first.

GREG: Ross was definitely
one of those guys

that you kind of look up to.

He's a super humble guy,
so he won't tell you this,

but he was actually
awarded the Silver Star

for something he did
later in his career,

which is a true testament
to the Ranger that he was

and the man that he is.

He was definitely one of the guys,

when you're moving through
that difficult terrain,

he'd look around to see how
everyone else is acting,

especially as a younger private.

Him and a couple other guys,

they were still doing everything right.

I had taken a quick pause

when we heard contact from behind us.

[g*nf*re]

GREG: I was worried that enemy movers

may be coming from multiple directions.

[g*nf*re]

JORDAN: I moved to the eastern
side of the landing zone,

because they said there were
guys coming from the west.

Jason Dahlke was sitting
a few feet from me.

o'clock.

I'm gonna paint the targets.

Light 'em up.

He was using his laser
to illuminate the ridge line.

- [g*nshots]
- Lift to left.

- [g*nsh*t]
- Tango down.

Dahlke, go. Let's go.

Someone comes over the radio
and asks me to move

where more guys are coming over.

Some guy that got...
had been dead earlier

sat up and sh*t at Jason
from pretty close range.

Talk to me.

We take off his helmet

and start taking off his body armor

and our hands are covered in his blood.

We realize he's pretty
seriously wounded.

He was sh*t in the side
a couple of times.

And I remember standing
over him and looking down

after we'd taken his kit off,

and I remember standing over him

and refocusing my NODs on his face.

It was the first time
I had a surreal experience,

where I kind of just
like denied who it was.

At this point there wasn't
really anything more

for me to do besides
sit there and watch.

I grabbed my sh**t and we moved
back over to where we were walking.

As we were sitting there
pulling security

basically wiping
the blood off of our hands,

I was like,
"That was Dahlke, wasn't it?"

And he said, "Yeah."

They packaged him up
and the next two helicopters

came in for the rest
of the ground force.

When you have a friendly
k*lled in action,

when the helicopter's
coming in they say,

"Hey, we have X amount of
people coming in on aircraft

and we're loading one angel
on an aircraft."

And, I mean, everybody knew that
Dahlke was dead right away.

MICHAEL: Looking around, you
could see on our guys faces

we had just gotten kicked
in the chest pretty hard.

GREG: Jason, who was arguably

one of the most respected
Rangers in our group,

for someone that had his skill
set, and his knowledge,

and his physical ability,
and his mental ability...

if he can be k*lled,

we all have a target on our back.

_

_

MICHAEL: Our mission was to go

and deal with this training camp

on this mountain.

So, yes, we get these
casualties out of the gate,

but we haven't even started.

As the sun started coming up,

you started being able to see

these peaks around us.

That kind of put everything
back into perspective

of just how small we were
in this vast area.

GREG: I think all of us kind
of came to the realization

that this could be our night.

This could be our time to go.

And I saw that sunrise,

and it was a very iconic moment,

how in the middle of
a really dark time...

you can still find beauty.

JORDAN: We started moving up,

and the terrain was terrible.

It was some of the harshest
terrain I've ever seen.

MICHAEL: It was hands and knees.

This slate rock that they have there,

it crumbles underneath your feet.

You're holding onto roots and limbs.

There was a tree at one point,

and I remember thinking,

"I can take a break for five seconds

if I can get to this tree."

That was my mini-objective.

"I need to get to this tree."

JORDAN: It's hard to describe
it, but I've never been

on any mountain similar to that.

A lot of jagged rocks,

sharp edges that could
actually tear your clothing.

Very few places suitable
to even sit down on.

With the weight our guys
have on their backs,

they've cracked these rocks in half

and it makes them tumble backwards.

I think I was pounds at
the time... my body weight.

I think I weighed
with all of our gear on.

And that's not even the heaviest.

There were guys that carried
much more than that.

JORDAN: Within the first minutes
or so of making our way up,

we see a dead Taliban
with a backpack full of RPGs.

We have the dog handler
bring his dog up

just to sniff around and see if
there's anything booby-trapped.

[BARKING]

He sets up to sh**t an RPG at us.

We all sh**t him
at the same time, basically.

One of the b*ll*ts strikes in
the backpack full of rockets.

I remember feeling a giant
heat wave come off of it.

I was close enough to feel
the heat from it.

GREG: It was crazy. It was chaotic.

The dog ended up getting
a decent wound to the face

and the dog handler
was seriously wounded.

He needed to be medivac'd,
that was clear,

and we knew we had
to continue moving on.

So we start booking it up
the side of this mountain

the best we can with the difficult
terrain that we're given.

We reach a point on which
we're able to hit a plateau.

We set up a makeshift patrol base.

JORDAN: Everybody's face
has been covered in dirt.

They're extremely winded
trying to carry

all this weight up the mountain.

GREG: Generally, you
want to stay silent.

You're trying to conceal yourself.

And all of a sudden,
we hear this yelling.

[MAN SHOUTING IN NATIVE LANGUAGE]

JORDAN: At this point,
everybody shuts up immediately

so they can hear him.

We realize it's some voice
just echoing across

between the ridge lines.

I start scanning immediately
and I see a head pop up.

GREG: There he was right in front of us

on this adjacent mountaintop
dressed in white.

He was waving his arms
and screaming and yelling.

And what it seemed like he was doing

was calling to the enemy,
spotting for them,

maybe telling them
where our position was.

By this time, we can hear him.

We think he's saying,
"Stupid Americans!"

I had already basically ranged out

all of the key
terrain features around us.

I'd estimated it to be
between six and meters.

It was a tough sh*t,
mountaintop to mountaintop.

There's no telling what the wind
was doing in the middle of it,

and at elevation.

Jordan Whitlow, in Ranger
Battalion, is a sn*per legend.

I became a sn*per
after this deployment,

and a lot of it has to do

with seeing Jordan on this mission.

JORDAN: I grew up in Iowa and Indiana.

I guess you could say I had a
normal Midwestern childhood.

I was also the Dennis the Menace type

that would be running around
with a frog in my pocket

trying to catch snakes out in
the middle of nowhere in Iowa.

When I was six years old,

before the Internet
was a big thing for us,

my mom would take us
to the public library,

and instead of going to
the children's book section,

I would go and check out the
books about m*llitary history,

and I was pretty fascinated with
sn*pers as a kid growing up.

I knew that the Rangers
was an elite unit,

and so in October of ,

when I was years old,
that's when I signed up.

It just so happened that in

they needed more sn*pers
in the Battalion,

and so they opened it up
to some of the junior guys.

I went through the assessment process,

and I was one of three
other guys to get selected

to join the sn*per platoon.

I was the youngest guy by
probably five years.

GREG: Definitely admired
him from afar, yeah.

I'd heard that he'd grown up
in the sn*per section,

which was extremely rare,

and he was obviously good at his job.

He proved it that day.

- [g*nsh*t]
- Nice.

The squad leader yelled,
"Holy [BLEEP], you hit him."

MICHAEL: From yards,

that type of engagement,

across from ridge line to ridge line...

it's virtually impossible
to gauge your wind.

Couldn't have been placed any better.

It's just one of the most
impressive things I've ever seen.

I'd like to say it was pure talent,

but I think it was mostly luck.

MICHAEL: After these
casualties that we had,

to see that we were still
capable of putting

the boot on the enemy
was a very uplifting thing.

[RADIO CHATTER]

JORDAN: The radio that our
linguist was carrying,

listening to their
radio traffic, he said,

"They came over the radio
and said, 'Hey, don't move.

They can hit us from there.'"

It was kind of like a giant
middle finger to the Taliban.

We're here and we're gonna
move up this mountain.

_

We had just walked probably hours,

fighting through the valley,
up the mountain.

MICHAEL: Initially, we
started seeing tents.

Every enemy combatant
that's in that area,

they're very mobile.

These guys don't live in houses.

We cleared through the tents

and then we pushed forward
into what I would consider

the primary objective,
the bunker complex

at the peak of the mountain.

Coming up was the objective area,

which is where the majority
pre-as*ault fires had occurred.

The trees were literally nothing
more than splintered stumps.

Trees that had been once or feet

were now reduced to four-foot stumps.

It smelled like
a pine tree air freshener.

So at this point we found
enemy weapons caches,

large amount of machine g*ns
and grenades.

There were just fighting positions

and weapons scattered everywhere.

One of the initial things
we found was a ZPU...

an old Russian anti-aircraft g*n,

and it was pointing directly

at our helicopter landing zone.

It's designed to
bring down an aircraft.

JORDAN: We inventoried any actual

serviceable weapons that we found,

and made this giant cache
of weapons, blew it up.

MICHAEL: We had done it.

We had gotten up there.

We had cleared the objective
and completed the mission.

To do that after being
dealt such a blow

in the beginning with Dahlke,

and then to see it
through to its fruition,

it just reinstilled
how I viewed these guys.

It was a very proud moment
to be a part of that.

JORDAN: As we're sitting
up there pulling security,

I remember thinking we got updates

about all the guys that were wounded,

and we knew that we lost Jason Dahlke,

but we didn't know about Hario.

I walked to the middle
of the patrol base

and I asked the platoon sergeant

what happened to Hario.

He just looked at me
with a blank stare and said,

"He didn't make it."

And I didn't know him well,

but I knew he was a good guy.

I knew he was only years
old, his first mission ever,

d*ed, basically,
stepping off the aircraft.

MICHAEL: Initially we
were told on the ground

that there were some complications

on the medivac bird with Hario,

but that they were able
to work through them.

They were able to
revitalize him a few times.

You hold onto that glimmer of hope,

and then when you get told otherwise,

you know, I mean...

you know, so.

It was a...

it was a challenging moment for me...

...trying to grasp what just happened.

MICHAEL: You'll never stop
wondering could I have done more?

Could we have done
something differently?

That never leaves.

You have a quick second
to think about the family

which I, um... you try not to do,

but it's... you know
that there's gonna be

someone that comes
to their door and tells them

that their son was just k*lled.

My name is Becky Hario,
and I'm Eric Hario's mother.

Eric was born and grew up
in Monroe, Michigan.

He was very popular there.

He played every sport you can imagine...

football, baseball, wrestling.

He was a handful.

He was... we have three
sons, my wife and I,

and Eric was the most athletic.

He had a weight set
outside our front door.

Every time he'd go out somewhere,
he'd do a couple reps,

and always competed with his friends

to see who could lift
the most amount of weight.

JIM: Eric was an honest,
hard-working person.

He wanted to earn things
as opposed to be given things.

I told him, "Do what you want to do.
It's your life."

And he wanted to be in the m*llitary.

He really loved his country,

and he wanted to fight for his country.

I actually talked to him
the night before the battle.

He knew he was going to a battle,

but he couldn't really tell me that,

but I know at this point
that he had to have known.

It was a very beautiful phone call.

He says, "I love you all very much",

and, Mom, you're always in my heart."

And then the phone line went dead,

so that's the last I heard from him.

JIM: I was in Minnesota,
and the phone...

my cell phone rang. It was my son Mark.

Just... yeah, my brain
shut down for a little bit

trying to figure out what to do next.

He got home later in the day

and we kind of fell apart together.

Just a lot of talking,
a lot of hugging,

a lot of crying,

but honor, too.

Eric was honored
to serve for his country,

and I think he was honored
to die for his country.

When you become a Ranger,
you've got to be ready

to fight, but you've
gotta be ready to die,

because it might happen.

_

_

We had a memorial two days
later on our compound,

and they have their g*ns
set up with their boots

and their dog tags and their helmet.

We all knew that symbol.

You know, that stuff has to be cleaned,

and that's something that
you really don't think about.

Our platoon made the call.
"Hey, we're gonna do it."

I remember all of us privates
sitting around in silence.

MICHAEL: You're asking kids that
were friends with the deceased

to clean blood off of their gear.

You can't be trained for that.

You can't teach a guy
how to lose a friend,

or how to lose what
we consider a brother.

MAN: We gather this evening
to honor the memories

of Private First Class Hario
and Staff Sergeant Dahlke,

who sacrificed their lives so that
others did not have to sacrifice.

They were true patriots and comrades

who gave of themselves willingly.

They fought and destroyed
an incredibly determined,

tenacious, and evil enemy that night.

When the dust settled that
day, Alpha Company

had destroyed the enemy
on the objective

and owned the training camp,

thus eliminating his ability
to terrorize others.

Unfortunately, this victory
came at a tremendous cost,

a cost that we are all struggling
to put into perspective.

I saw a lot of hard men
who I'd never seen

show emotion before show emotion.

That's a true testament to
what these men meant to us.

JORDAN: You know, when a guy dies,

you got to inventory his things

and send them home.

My cot was in one corner

and Dahlke's cot
was in the other corner.

All I remember is they started
inventorying his stuff

and basically creating a
checklist of all of his items,

and I just turned around on my cot,

and that's when I let it go.

And, hey, I remember
not wanting anybody

to hear me crying or anything,
so I didn't sniffle.

I just had tears and snot
running down my face.

I don't remember how long, but I
just sat there for hours like that.

One f the last conversations,
I remember him saying,

"I'm with the best guys I can be with.

They're gonna bring me home."

I specifically said that time,

"You have to come back to me."

He was just very, very confident that...

I mean, he was coming home.

I don't think Jason ever thought

something would happen to him.

GREG: One thing that I took away

was that b*ll*ts don't discriminate.

You can be on your very first mission

or you can be on your th mission,

and you can be among the most
highly-trained warriors

that our m*llitary has to offer,

but at the end of the day,

if it's your time, it's your time.

And that night,
I took a right off the bird

and Eric took a left.

It really is luck.

From Berlin on, when our guys would
get their boots on the ground,

we knew what
the possibilities were now.

More than anyone, we knew
this is what could happen.

We'd seen it.

JASON: It's because of
guys like Jason and Eric

who aren't able to be here anymore

that I put my best foot forward

in everything that I do.

It's very moving to see this many lives

that he has touched.

His spirit, really,

what we learned from Jason,

it's never going to end.

_

Eric kind of emulated Jason.

They worked out together.

And the gymnasium
that was named after them

just proves they're going to live on.

It's called the Dahlke/Hario CRTF...

Combat Readiness Training Facility.

It's a gym.

They have to name
it something complicated.

It's a nice room, and by the
front door is a big display case

and it talks about Jason and Eric

and why it's called
the Dahlke/Hario room.

It's a building where the
Rangers can go and work out,

and they can look up to the two guys

who their picture's on the wall

and try to walk in their footsteps.