History Book: The last mission

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NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Monday, June 16th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Up next, the WORLD History Book.

Fifteen years ago the war in Afghanistan is reaching a fever pitch. 2010 is the deadliest year for U.S. troops in the conflict.

On March 17th, a group of Navy SEALs from SEAL Team Six are sneaking into a valley to capture—or kill—a high ranking Taliban leader.

EICHER: One of those SEALs is on what’s scheduled to be his last deployment: thirty-six year old Adam Brown.

Here’s WORLD correspondent Caleb Welde with the story.

CALEB WELDE: Adam and his teammates are hunting down a man code-named: Lake James. According to one Army officer, this Taliban leader “has more blood on his hands than anyone else in his district.” Adam’s helicopter drops below a granite ridgeline in the Hindu Kush mountains.

The SEALs knew this mission would be different. For one of Adam’s teammates…

FEARLESS EXCERPT: Hands down, this was the most hellacious landing zone he’d encountered in his entire career.

Audio from the 2012 book, Fearless by Eric Blehm.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: Nobody in his right mind would fly a helicopter into this ravine, he thought. Exactly why it had been chosen as the LZ.

Adam and his teammates fast rope out of the hovering chopper into the darkness below: ninety feet, onto boulders. They have six brutal hours ahead of them to the target.

On the other side of the world in Virginia, Adam’s wife Kelly has this message sitting in her inbox, sent by Adam a few days earlier.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: I am so proud, happy and fortunate to have you as my wife. I listen to all these songs, and I realize I have the girl I always dreamed of. I wonder how many people can really say that and mean it. I love you, Adam.

Adam and Kelly met under less than ideal circumstances. He was three weeks out of a drug rehab program. She was a Baptist Sunday School teacher at a bar with friends. The two hit it off right away and clarified to each other the next day that the bar was not the place for either of them. They were both new Christians and began going to church together.

Then Adam relapsed. And not just once. Kelly stayed with him nine months. Nine months that eventually left her feeling, in her words, “crazy angry.” Adam eventually concluded it would be best for Kelly if he disappeared for good. Kelly easily guessed where he’d run. He only had one buddy living out of state. Over the phone Adam told her…

FEARLESS EXCERPT: I’m not good for you; that’s why I left. I don’t want you to keep chasing after me.

Kelly told Adam she’d been praying, and praying hard, asking God for guidance, asking him directly if she should abandon the relationship. Adam, she said, God has not told me to leave. I love you.

The day before the conversation, one of Adam’s friends suggested maybe he look at the military. Adam had been interested in the SEALs since highschool. He asked Kelly, “Do you think I can do it?”

FEARLESS EXCERPT: Of course you can, Kelly said without hesitation, even though she had only the most basic idea of what a SEAL did.

Adam became a SEAL in 2000. In 2004 he lost his right eye in a training accident. According to Kelly, he was pretty depressed for a few weeks but then decided “it was just another challenge.” In 2006 a SEAL commander wrote in an evaluation Adam was “clearly in the top one percent of the SEAL community.” Adam passed testing for “Team Six” the same year.

But on March 17th, 2010 in Afghanistan, things are not going according to plan. They arrive at their objective two hours late. An army officer in the area describes the situation like this. Like they’d infiltrated a hornets nest.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: That whole area was swarming with hardcore Taliban, so they snuck into that valley like it was the entrance to the nest, and they crept past all these hornets who were asleep and went straight for the queen that was James.

The SEALs’ weapons … are suppressed. The Taliban’s … are not. The hornets … wake up.

Adam Brown with his family the day he left for his final deployment Photo courtesy of the Brown family

Before he left for this deployment, Adam spent his last weeks in Virginia dreaming with Kelly about life after the military. They want to settle near their family in Hot Springs, Arkansas. They have two kids now. Nathan, ten and Savannah seven. Adam turned thirty-six right before this deployment. During a family birthday party, his kids gave him the perfect gift. They couldn’t hold back the giggles as he opened it.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: Soon Adam was laughing too at the adult sized black and yellow Batman briefs he’d unwrapped. Pulling them on over his pants, he paraded around the kitchen, striking superhero poses. He got down face to face with Nathan and Savannah. “I’m going to make y’all a promise: I promise to wear them on every op I go out on, and” – lowering his voice to a whisper– “nobody will ever know my superhero capabilities. … “You dork,” said Kelly, and the kids cracked up again.

Back in Afghanistan, the superhero fights bravely. But ten minutes into the battle in the hornets nest Adam gets stung. He’s shot in the legs, up his side, and in the arm. His teammates rush to him and begin cutting away his uniform to find the bullet holes.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: As Zeke cut away through the rest of Adam’s pants, he paused for a moment. “The world stopped for a few seconds, and we just stared. He was wearing the Batman underwear his kids gave him.”

The SEALs got their man, Lake James, but at a high cost. Adam Brown died that night in the Hindu Cush mountains. Not long afterward, a family friend, a military representative, and a SEAL in dress blues knock on Kelly Brown’s door. It’s midnight.

FEARLESS EXCERPT: “You sure?” and looked to Christian, who nodded. “I’m so sorry Kelly.”

Kelly isn’t the only one devastated. Adam’s parents also struggle for answers. Tomorrow, we’ll hear their side of the story.

For WORLD, I’m Caleb Welde. Audio excerpts of Fearless are from Penguin Random House audio. Read by Robert Petkoff.

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