CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan – Good evening, friends. We’re still aboard this forward operating base, conducting interviews for several stories in forthcoming issues of Marine Corps Times. In the meantime, I wanted to share a meeting I had today with the top brass in 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, out of Twentynine Palms, Calif. The unit is on its way back to the U.S. following a grueling seven-month deployment in volatile northern Helmand province. Its Marines were based primarily in Sangin at first, and then gradually spread through Kajaki, Musa Qala and Now Zad districts as the drawdown in forces across Afghanistan…
Browsing: Twentynine Palms
CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan – Good evening, friends. We’re still aboard this forward operating base, conducting interviews for several stories in forthcoming issues of Marine Corps Times. In the meantime, I wanted to share a meeting I had today with the top brass in 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, out of Twentynine Palms, Calif. The unit is on its way back to the U.S. following a grueling seven-month deployment in volatile northern Helmand province. Its Marines were based primarily in Sangin at first, and then gradually spread through Kajaki, Musa Qala and Now Zad districts as the drawdown in forces across Afghanistan…
Within an hour of arriving in Afghanistan’s Sangin district last month, we heard jarring news: Marine units there had been attacked multiple times recently by grenades at close distances. How does an insurgent pull that off, you ask? The district’s “Fish Tank” area is a maze of high walls and tight alleys that allow Taliban fighters to creep uncomfortably close before launching an attack. Sure, they may not get away frequently. For a few fleeting moments, however, they still have the element of surprise. My last long-form story out of my recent embed in Afghanistan went online this afternoon, and…
SANGIN, Afghanistan – Sgt. Johnathan Cook’s instructions to his Marines were clear before they pushed Tuesday morning into the notorious “Fish Tank” section of Sangin. “Everyone knows the atmospherics yesterday got a little weird,” he said. “Keep your head on a swivel. We all know the summer offensive is supposed to start in the next 10 days, so expect we could take contact any time.” The ominous directive came before photographer James Lee and I left Patrol Base Fulod with his unit, an element of Baker Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, out of Twentynine Palms, Calif. Second Squad, 3rd Platoon,…
FORWARD OPERATING BASE TABAC, Afghanistan – In just a few short hours, I saw both sides of Sangin. On one hand, photographer James Lee and I visited a shura, or meeting, that brought together 67 boys and 25 girls at the gates of this base, the headquarters of Dog Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, out of Twentynine Palms, Calif. Most of the children sat obediently in straight rows on the ground as two interpreters and two Marines with a Female Engagement Team taught lessons about geography, civics and poetry. A few hours later, we heard our first gunshots fired in…
The Darkside is coming home. Third Battalion, 4th Marines, will return to their base at Twentynine Palms, Calif., next week following a trying seven-month deployment in Afghanistan. The unit saw heavy combat while patrolling The Upper Gereshk Valley and Nahr-e Saraj district, an area of northern Helmand province just south of volatile Sangin district. Five* members of the battalion died and dozens more were wounded during the deployment, Marine officials said in a news release announcing the unit’s return to California. They handed over control of the area to a joint Afghan-British force headed by 42 Commando, a Royal Marine…
As noted here, Marine Corps Times’ cover story this week will introduce tens of thousands of Marines to Sgt. Maj. Mike Barrett, who will become the 17th sergeant major of the Marine Corps on June 9. One of the threads we explore in that story is Barrett’s life as a junior Marine at Twentynine Palms, Calif. He met his wife while stationed there, and still owns a home in the area. A friend of Barrett’s, former Lance Cpl. Mitchell Ybarra, passed along this photo of those early days in the Corps: The photo was taken outside Barrett’s mother’s house in…
