A Marine captain who helped coordinate the rescue of Army Pfc. Jessica Lynch in Iraq has been awarded the Bronze Star medal for heroic action. The medal was given to Capt. Thomas "Tad" A. Douglas, 27, on Tuesday while about 40 members of 2nd Force Reconnaissance Company watched at their Camp Lejeune training complex. "Those who served with him know and understand why he is deserving of this award," said Lt. Col. Jim Reilly, commander of the recon unit.
A special U.S. team rescued Lynch from an Iraqi hospital on April 1. Reilly gave Douglas orders to head north of the Kuwait-Iraqi border for three days to find the enemy and report back. At the time, Douglas was commander of the company’s 5th Platoon, which went to Iraq from North Carolina as part of Task Force Tarawa. The Marines in Douglas’ platoon identified the hospital where Lynch was held and gathered information to assist the Special Forces raid. They also set up a landing zone for incoming helicopters and put snipers in place to protect the raid force. "We stayed in place during the day because you had to worry about compromise and the unknown," Douglas said. "We went over all our immediate action drills, identified a rally point and how to extract, but the driving force was not letting my Marines down." Reilly said the platoon stayed in place for two or three days. When it was time to return to the Task Force Tarawa command post, the unit found out that some Baath Party officials were in Nasiriyah, shooting civilians and telling them the Americans would be defeated. Douglas said the Marines entered the Baath Party building and took prisoners. "We found out later that they contributed to the injuries and movement of Jessica Lynch," Reilly said. Reilly said Douglas’ platoon completed 22 missions, including meeting with tribal elders to allow peaceful surrender of the towns of Al Kut and Al Hamza.
I talked to one of the guys involved w/this a while back. The whole "Lynch Hoax" debunked by talking to any of these guys. |