Jeff Beatty Terrorism Expert

"Win Against Terrorism" Preview...

This book is the account of what Jeff experienced in each of America’s most elite Anti-terrorism Organizations.  This book is filled with first person accounts of some of the major events in the war on Terror and provides insight as to how we got here - and where we need to go!

A sample of what it was like to be in the first “Blackhawk Down”:

…we were hovering within 100 feet of Cuban and other troops pouring out of the barracks onto open stake trucks.  Nearly 100 enemy soldiers were firing at us with AK-47’s at ranges of under 50 yards.  From the parallel ridge line just to the east, heavy fire from 6 machine guns mounted on 3 BTR-60 Russian Armored Personnel Carriers was tearing into the Blackhawk airframe.   

But we were not just taking it – we were dishing it out as well.  The enemy troops were jammed in the trucks and the Delta Troopers were deadly accurate in their fire.  With rounds zinging by them and in many cases hitting them, the 12 Delta Troopers in our Blackhawk stayed focused and kept firing from our helicopter.  We realized the only way to avoid being killed by the fire coming our way was to shoot the shooters.  And we did…  I estimate we inflicted in excess of 50 enemy casualties both killed and wounded.  Our courageous Pilot, Captain Keith Lucas, was killed at this point.  An enemy soldier with an AK-47 was just 20 yards off the nose of the helicopter and fired at close range hitting Keith multiple times.  He seemed to have died instantly.  Co-pilot Chief Warrant Officer (CWO) Price was now flying. 

 

…severely damaged, with Keith Lucas killed and most of the other 16 on board wounded, we were flying – really fleeing -  towards the southwest corner of the Island and Salinas Airfield where the Rangers were scheduled to conduct a parachute assault in about an hour.  The Blackhawk was doing about 110 knots.  There was a lot of hurt happening among our wounded. In some cases, men were flopping around on the deck of the helicopter like fish out of water, writhing in pain and dangerously close to going into shock. 

The Blackhawk’s transmission housing had been shot away and we were all covered in hot red transmission oil so that it was difficult to see who was bleeding or just covered with oil.  I felt myself get hit in the head and the stomach. It was with great trepidation that I touched my hands to my head and stomach to assess any damage. My hand was red - was it transmission fluid or blood or both, I did not know…the oil cooler on the Blackhawk was on fire with 3 foot flames coming out of the left rear of the helicopter, yet it flew on.   I was concerned that if our Co-pilot, CWO Price were to get hit now, we would surely crash, so I began to get up to go sit in Lucas’s lap – to fly Co-pilot for Price.  As a former Army helicopter Pilot, at least I could fly the Blackhawk to safety.  But I never got past the get up mode. 

 

Our flight of Blackhawk’s was about 50 feet above the trees as we zipped past a 23mm Russian anti-aircraft gun.  It was only about three hundred yards away.  It started firing at us.  Of the 5 aircraft in the flight, we were the one on fire and trailing smoke. Like all predators, these gunners focused in on the wounded or weakest in the group for a kill.  They hit us at least 3 times. 

You could feel the aircraft shudder with each impact.  The engine screamed and whined and over sped and you could feel the hydraulic flight controls getting mushy and going unresponsive – making the Blackhawk hard, and soon impossible, to control.  We were going down. We were going to crash and we were flying at more than 120 miles per hour.

We were headed towards an inlet on the south side of the island and at first it looked like we were going to crash in the water, but at the last second, Price muscled the Blackhawk to the left and we crashed into a small peninsula…

 

…I felt death literally climb up on my back during that crash.  I fought it. I actually yelled at it “NO!” over and over again throughout the crash sequence. I was fighting death and gritting my teeth determined I would not let death win.  The Blackhawk tore itself apart.  The Rotors snapped off, then the tail boom as we tumbled up a hill and down the other side snapping trees as we went.  We were thrown around the interior like some bizarre circus ride.  People were screaming.  Sparks flew; there was the smell of fuel, the sounds of metal tearing and then the fire…

…I stumbled away from the burning hull…I could hear enemy rifle shots cracking by me…I saw one of my men trapped under the helicopter with 2 other Delta Troopers slowly but surely freeing  him.  I was looking around for the other 4 helicopters to be landing on our crash to rescue us.  That was the plan.  There were no helicopters to be seen, there was no helicopter noise to be heard.  They had gone.  They left 16 of us for dead, trapped, wounded and our backs to the sea on a narrow peninsula.  The enemy knew we were alive and they were advancing…

 

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