The 18/08 Uzbin Valley ambush of French Paras.
Wounded French Soldiers speak about the Ambush #1
Read the article in French here:
http://www.valeursactuelles.com/publ...rticle_id=3321
English Translation:
The 18/08 Uzbin valley ambush.
What the surviving paras tell about the battle brings a succession of individual acts of bravery to light. Their professionalism ensured not only a low death toll, but to inflict terrible blows to the insurgents.
Monday, August 18. 9 am. About a hundred of soldiers form an armored column made up of two French platoons aboard VABs (light armored vehicles), t More..wo platoons of the Afghan National Army – trained by the French – and twelve American special forces, including an air guidance team. Evaluation by the intelligence service: “Thus far, the menace was due to small groups committing isolated acts... The insurgency has always failed to demonstrate the capacity or the intention of carrying out coordinated actions on a large scale.”
1 pm. Carmin 2 unit, led by adjudant (translator’s note: warrant officer) Gaëtan Évrard, arrives at Sper Kunday. The objective is a pass that reaches 2,000 meters, dominated by sheer crests. The road turns into a steep track. The armored vehicles must stop, troopers has to continue on foot. VABs and their 12.7 mm machine guns position themselves: the pass – located 1,500 meters away from the village – is lined up in the sights. The adjudant gives his orders. The ascent begins.
Adjudant Gaëtan Évrard (34 years old, platoon leader, seventeen years of active duty).
Image hotlink - 'http://www.valeursactuelles.com/public/valeurs-actuelles/html/upload/img/48d8f148a95bdevrard.jpg'
“I form a column as soon as the path starts to wind. Our gear is heavy, the progress is slow. It's as hot as hell. I order the group leaders to quicken their pace.” Each soldier is carrying six magazines of twenty-five cartridges plus a heavy bulletproof vest. A para gets sunstroke. He stays behind with the medic, a caporal-chef (translator’s note: rank between corporal and sergeant) from the 2ème régiment étranger de parachutistes. “I ask the sharpshooters to tell me what they see far away in the distance. Nothing to report, they reply, adding that the first group is 100 meters away from the pass.”
1.45 pm, H hour. In the last hairpin bend, this is Hell all of a sudden. Within a second, the air is filled with detonations, firings in bursts and explosions. It’s an ambush. Reflexes are instantaneous. “Everyone jumps behind the scrawny rocks which line the slope. The position is precarious, the platoon is utterly scattered over 100 meters. An intense fire lacerates the ground for a quarter of an hour.” The paras strive to blend in with the rocks in order to dodge the rounds. “I immediately make the radio contact with the leading group. I hear that my second-in-command and two other guys are hit.”
The noise is deafening. Impacts on the ground whip up a suffocating dust. “I try to take cover behind a big rock with five other paras, including the radio operator and the sharpshooter. There are some other guys a few meters away but I can’t see them.” The ground is being riddled with the fire. It is impossible to go and get the wounded. “Yet, one of my group leader achieves to catch me up. He looks really pale, he staggers, he’s got a bullet in the stomach. We lie him down, we take his bulletproof vest off, his helmet and we apply a compress. Fire comes from the ridges, both from the left and the right. We are caught in the crossfire.”
The paras shoot back forcefully but they cannot see their assailants. Splinters of rock shatter everywhere. “My face is covered with blood, other buddies are shot in the legs, in the arms. Our sharpshooter manages to shoot down a few silhouettes furtively made out over the crest line. We hear the Famas firing higher up.” Now this is proof that the platoon does retaliate. The paras are fighting. And they’re fighting well.
Down in the valley, VABs machine guns spit out belt after belt to contain the Talibans and to allow the platoon to extricate itself from the trap. By two, by three or all alone, the paras dispersed among the rocky battlefield defend themselves. They fight back while the Talibans attempt to approach. “Sergeant Cazzaro shouts at me that the enemy is damn close. I lose the contact with the RMT section in the village but I reach the captain in Tora.” Évrard achieves to maintain the radio contact: “Sir, hurry up! No one is in a position to support me… I’m stuck under heavy fire. It’s Bazeilles around here, my captain. It’s Bazeilles!”
H + 25 minutes. Évrard has asked for air support. Ten minutes later, American A-10s fly over the combat zone. The combatants are utterly interlocked and the pilots have to turn back. That’s what the Talibans were expecting. At the same time, Tora dispatches troops as reinforcements.
Évrard is hit. “I’ve felt a shock in my shoulder but I could still use my hand. I could feel my shoulder tingling but I haven’t looked at it because the bad guys were sniping at us real hard.” Native of the Ardennes, tough, the noncom devotes himself wholeheartedly to his command under enemy fire. “In fact, I got that I was badly hit when we were able to disengage.”
Fire becomes more and more accurate. “We squeezed up because the rounds were hitting really close. It was no longer burst firing but pinpoint firing. I saw my sharpshooter killing a Talib. The dude tumbled down a rock, his sniper rifle followed him.”
The radio has remained out in the open. Évrard holds the handset but the cord is too tight. The operator is busy rescuing the wounded group leader. Desperately, he gives him a heart massage and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. A round goes through his hand. He sits up and shows his hand to Évrard. The blood is pouring. “****! Sir...” Évrard growls: “Wait, what do you think? Keep giving him a massage. We’ll see your injury later! He looked at me and his face broke into the very same funny grin he had every time I was giving him an earful or when he was having a hard time at the commando training.”
Rounds are hitting dangerously close. The operator realizes that the radio is still out in the open: “Sir, I’m gonna get the radio.” He rushes through the heavy fire and comes back with it. “He puts the radio on my knees, under an increasingly violent fire. Bullets ring out very closely. Then... he sits down in front of me, as if to shield me with his body. He looked at me. Just then he’s fatally wounded. I will never forget his grimace and his small grin.” This sacrifice symbolizes Carmin 2’s tremendous cohesion.
The position is unbearable. The paras create a fireball by firing full rounds of bullets at the ridge in order to cover their adjudant who manages to move back a bit. The sharpshooter who had remained near the rock to protect the retreat of his mates got killed. Before he passes away, he has the time to whisper: “I bumped off eight of them... eight.” Évrard finds himself beside another para who has remained with the medic of the Foreign Legion whose knee is smashed. In civilian life, the caporal-chef from the 2ème REP had already saved two people. He will be found dead, after having taken three injured comrades under cover.
H + 2 hours and 5 minutes. Carmin 2 has started to effect a tactical withdrawal, supported by American attack helicopters and A-10s. The support last an hour. Évrard manages to get to the VABs.
8 pm. Night has fallen. Backup from Kabul have arrived. A few paras achieve to pull out. Some others keep on fighting between the rocks, alone in the dark. “We save the cartridges because we had been fighting since eight hours! We had lost all sense of time, the harassing fire had left us reeling.”
H + 8 hours and 15 minutes. Sper Kunday is under control. The first bodies are found. The pass is finally taken at sunrise but clashes continued until noon, on August 19. The fighting lasted twenty hours. About eighty rebels have been killed.
For the duration of the engagement, adjudant Évrard, wounded, have maintained the radio contact with his captain and his men who were applying to push back the Talibans near the pass. He was able to point sergeant Andrieux’ heavy machine guns, 600 meters down below. “We’ve done it just like we’ve learn it at the training!”, they all state.
Wounded French Soldiers speak about the Ambush #1
Read the article in French here:
http://www.valeursactuelles.com/publ...rticle_id=3321
English Translation:
The 18/08 Uzbin valley ambush.
What the surviving paras tell about the battle brings a succession of individual acts of bravery to light. Their professionalism ensured not only a low death toll, but to inflict terrible blows to the insurgents.
Monday, August 18. 9 am. About a hundred of soldiers form an armored column made up of two French platoons aboard VABs (light armored vehicles), t More..wo platoons of the Afghan National Army – trained by the French – and twelve American special forces, including an air guidance team. Evaluation by the intelligence service: “Thus far, the menace was due to small groups committing isolated acts... The insurgency has always failed to demonstrate the capacity or the intention of carrying out coordinated actions on a large scale.”
1 pm. Carmin 2 unit, led by adjudant (translator’s note: warrant officer) Gaëtan Évrard, arrives at Sper Kunday. The objective is a pass that reaches 2,000 meters, dominated by sheer crests. The road turns into a steep track. The armored vehicles must stop, troopers has to continue on foot. VABs and their 12.7 mm machine guns position themselves: the pass – located 1,500 meters away from the village – is lined up in the sights. The adjudant gives his orders. The ascent begins.
Adjudant Gaëtan Évrard (34 years old, platoon leader, seventeen years of active duty).
Image hotlink - 'http://www.valeursactuelles.com/public/valeurs-actuelles/html/upload/img/48d8f148a95bdevrard.jpg'
“I form a column as soon as the path starts to wind. Our gear is heavy, the progress is slow. It's as hot as hell. I order the group leaders to quicken their pace.” Each soldier is carrying six magazines of twenty-five cartridges plus a heavy bulletproof vest. A para gets sunstroke. He stays behind with the medic, a caporal-chef (translator’s note: rank between corporal and sergeant) from the 2ème régiment étranger de parachutistes. “I ask the sharpshooters to tell me what they see far away in the distance. Nothing to report, they reply, adding that the first group is 100 meters away from the pass.”
1.45 pm, H hour. In the last hairpin bend, this is Hell all of a sudden. Within a second, the air is filled with detonations, firings in bursts and explosions. It’s an ambush. Reflexes are instantaneous. “Everyone jumps behind the scrawny rocks which line the slope. The position is precarious, the platoon is utterly scattered over 100 meters. An intense fire lacerates the ground for a quarter of an hour.” The paras strive to blend in with the rocks in order to dodge the rounds. “I immediately make the radio contact with the leading group. I hear that my second-in-command and two other guys are hit.”
The noise is deafening. Impacts on the ground whip up a suffocating dust. “I try to take cover behind a big rock with five other paras, including the radio operator and the sharpshooter. There are some other guys a few meters away but I can’t see them.” The ground is being riddled with the fire. It is impossible to go and get the wounded. “Yet, one of my group leader achieves to catch me up. He looks really pale, he staggers, he’s got a bullet in the stomach. We lie him down, we take his bulletproof vest off, his helmet and we apply a compress. Fire comes from the ridges, both from the left and the right. We are caught in the crossfire.”
The paras shoot back forcefully but they cannot see their assailants. Splinters of rock shatter everywhere. “My face is covered with blood, other buddies are shot in the legs, in the arms. Our sharpshooter manages to shoot down a few silhouettes furtively made out over the crest line. We hear the Famas firing higher up.” Now this is proof that the platoon does retaliate. The paras are fighting. And they’re fighting well.
Down in the valley, VABs machine guns spit out belt after belt to contain the Talibans and to allow the platoon to extricate itself from the trap. By two, by three or all alone, the paras dispersed among the rocky battlefield defend themselves. They fight back while the Talibans attempt to approach. “Sergeant Cazzaro shouts at me that the enemy is damn close. I lose the contact with the RMT section in the village but I reach the captain in Tora.” Évrard achieves to maintain the radio contact: “Sir, hurry up! No one is in a position to support me… I’m stuck under heavy fire. It’s Bazeilles around here, my captain. It’s Bazeilles!”
H + 25 minutes. Évrard has asked for air support. Ten minutes later, American A-10s fly over the combat zone. The combatants are utterly interlocked and the pilots have to turn back. That’s what the Talibans were expecting. At the same time, Tora dispatches troops as reinforcements.
Évrard is hit. “I’ve felt a shock in my shoulder but I could still use my hand. I could feel my shoulder tingling but I haven’t looked at it because the bad guys were sniping at us real hard.” Native of the Ardennes, tough, the noncom devotes himself wholeheartedly to his command under enemy fire. “In fact, I got that I was badly hit when we were able to disengage.”
Fire becomes more and more accurate. “We squeezed up because the rounds were hitting really close. It was no longer burst firing but pinpoint firing. I saw my sharpshooter killing a Talib. The dude tumbled down a rock, his sniper rifle followed him.”
The radio has remained out in the open. Évrard holds the handset but the cord is too tight. The operator is busy rescuing the wounded group leader. Desperately, he gives him a heart massage and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. A round goes through his hand. He sits up and shows his hand to Évrard. The blood is pouring. “****! Sir...” Évrard growls: “Wait, what do you think? Keep giving him a massage. We’ll see your injury later! He looked at me and his face broke into the very same funny grin he had every time I was giving him an earful or when he was having a hard time at the commando training.”
Rounds are hitting dangerously close. The operator realizes that the radio is still out in the open: “Sir, I’m gonna get the radio.” He rushes through the heavy fire and comes back with it. “He puts the radio on my knees, under an increasingly violent fire. Bullets ring out very closely. Then... he sits down in front of me, as if to shield me with his body. He looked at me. Just then he’s fatally wounded. I will never forget his grimace and his small grin.” This sacrifice symbolizes Carmin 2’s tremendous cohesion.
The position is unbearable. The paras create a fireball by firing full rounds of bullets at the ridge in order to cover their adjudant who manages to move back a bit. The sharpshooter who had remained near the rock to protect the retreat of his mates got killed. Before he passes away, he has the time to whisper: “I bumped off eight of them... eight.” Évrard finds himself beside another para who has remained with the medic of the Foreign Legion whose knee is smashed. In civilian life, the caporal-chef from the 2ème REP had already saved two people. He will be found dead, after having taken three injured comrades under cover.
H + 2 hours and 5 minutes. Carmin 2 has started to effect a tactical withdrawal, supported by American attack helicopters and A-10s. The support last an hour. Évrard manages to get to the VABs.
8 pm. Night has fallen. Backup from Kabul have arrived. A few paras achieve to pull out. Some others keep on fighting between the rocks, alone in the dark. “We save the cartridges because we had been fighting since eight hours! We had lost all sense of time, the harassing fire had left us reeling.”
H + 8 hours and 15 minutes. Sper Kunday is under control. The first bodies are found. The pass is finally taken at sunrise but clashes continued until noon, on August 19. The fighting lasted twenty hours. About eighty rebels have been killed.
For the duration of the engagement, adjudant Évrard, wounded, have maintained the radio contact with his captain and his men who were applying to push back the Talibans near the pass. He was able to point sergeant Andrieux’ heavy machine guns, 600 meters down below. “We’ve done it just like we’ve learn it at the training!”, they all state.
