Lions of Kandahar, Major Rusty Bradley
Lions of Kandahar, Major Rusty Bradley
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Lions of Kandahar
The Story of a Fight Against All Odds

Author: Major Rusty Bradley, Kevin Maurer

Narrator: Eric G. Dove

Unabridged: 8 hr 37 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 05/22/2012


Synopsis

One of the most critical battles of the Afghan War is now revealed as never before. Lions of Kandahar is an inside account from the unique perspective of an active-duty U.S. Army Special Forces commander, an unparalled warrior with multiple deployments to the theater who has only recently returned from combat.Southern Afghanistan was slipping away. That was clear to then-Captain Rusty Bradley as he began his third tour of duty there in 2006. The Taliban and their allies were infiltrating everywhere, poised to reclaim Kandahar Province, their strategically vital onetime capital. To stop them, the NATO coalition launched Operation Medusa, the largest offensive in its history. The battlefield was the Panjwayi Valley, a densely packed warren of walled compounds that doubled neatly as enemy bunkers, lush orchards, and towering marijuana stands, laced through with treacherous irrigation ditches. A mass exodus of civilians heralded the carnage to come.Dispatched as a diversionary force in support of the main coalition attack, Bradley’s Special Forces A-team and two others, along with their longtime Afghan Army allies, watched from across the valley as the NATO force was quickly engulfed in a vicious counterattack. Key to relieving it and calling in effective air strikes was possession of a modest patch of high ground called Sperwan Ghar. Bradley’s small detachment assaulted the hill and, in the midst of a savage and unforgettable firefight, soon learned they were facing nearly a thousand seasoned fighters—from whom they seized an impossible victory.Now Bradley recounts the whole remarkable story as it actually happened. The blistering trek across Afghanistan’s infamous Red Desert. The eerie traces of the elusive Taliban. The close relations with the Afghan people and army, a primary mission focus. Sperwan Ghar itself: unremitting waves of fire from machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades; a targeted truck turned into an inferno; the death trap of a cut-off compound. Most important: the men, Americans and Afghans alike—the “shaky” medic with nerves of steel and a surgeon’s hands in battle; the tireless sergeant who seems to be everywhere at once; the soft-spoken intelligence officer with laser-sharp insight; the diminutive Afghan commander with a Goliath-sized heart; the cool maverick who risks all to rescue a grievously wounded comrade—each unique, all indelible in their everyday exercise of extraordinary heroism.

About Major Rusty Bradley

Major Rusty Bradley was wounded during the Battle of Sperwan Ghar in command of a Special Forces A-team, on his third combat tour as a Special Forces team leader. A native of North Carolina, he graduated from Mars Hill College and enlisted in the Army in 1993, serving as an infantryman for six years before earning his commission from Officer Candidate School in 1999.

About Kevin Maurer

Kevin Maurer has been embedded as a reporter with the U.S. Special Forces and 82nd Airborne Division in Afghanistan and Iraq more than a dozen times in the last five years.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Adam on December 06, 2012

Fantastic! Breathtaking! Riveting! I loved this book because this story shows a side of combat and brotherhood often not seen, reported on, or even talked about. More closer to home for me, I was in Kandahar, at Kandahar air base, providing air control, coordinating aircraft, and close air support a......more

Goodreads review by Jean on May 11, 2016

From this book the reader will not only learn about the War in Afghanistan but also about the operation of the Special Forces. Bradley was a Captain in the Special Forces Operational Detachment-Alpha (SFODA) which is a group of twelve highly trained men. Little has been written about the Special For......more

Goodreads review by PowerAvocado on November 21, 2024

When I finished Long Shot by Azad Cudi I wanted more military nonfiction but well, not everything is diamond. I felt it like camp or headquarters porn. They had to hug with their Afghan friends, Afghan soldiers because it helped them to maintain good relations with them, they drank tea with Afghan a......more