![]() ![]() The 10 men we selected for this getaway seemed to immediately relax and settle into the beauty surrounding the Double E Ranch. Ranch owners Erik and Stacy and their family acted as welcome committee, hospitality executives, and new best friends. ![]() Ranch manager Troy arranged and guided daytime activities for the Marines. The Double E’s “horse whisperer” Frank provided breathtaking trail rides and one-on-one instruction. Head chef Coletta and her kitchen staff prepared fantastic meals. The two months during which this campaign was fought are considered the most intense of the Iraqi War.įast forward twelve years, and some wonderful folks in Wyoming, the owners and staff of the Double E Ranch, invited Freedom Alliance to use their property to provide a vacation for Marine Corps veterans of Operation Phantom Fury and Fallujah.Īctually, not only did they donate the ranch and its resources for this purpose, but they volunteered themselves, as well. We just turned around and started shooting and the grenade explodes.Operation Phantom Fury, also called the Second Battle of Fallujah, was a 2004 joint offensive of American, Iraqi, and British forces, led by the United States Marine Corps. It’s like throwing a hand with a grenade in it at us. “We could see the house crumble and then one of the Marines shouted out, ‘Take cover,’ and you could see a hand coming out like a horror movie. “After that, we put 20 pounds of C-4 and blew the house ,” he continued. We trapped one guy on the stairway and kept shooting him and two of our Marines, Marquez and Shafer, who got shot in the arm, they took Kasal out. He said there were two houses pushed together with a second-floor catwalk where the enemy was shooting at them and throwing grenades. We worked as Marines to take care of each other to not leave anybody behind.” “The 3rd platoon took a lot of injuries but the first and second squad from 2nd Platoon worked together with them to get them out. There were Marines trapped inside the house, and we were trying to figure out how the hell we’re going to get those guys out,” he said. “ Kasal went into this house to clear it, and was hit 13 or 14 times. “We blew it - that was one of the lucky days we had.”ĭuring Operation Phantom Fury in 2004, while assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines out of Camp Pendleton, California, Munoz and his team went to help his fellow Marines who were trapped inside a house near his compound. They were already set up, and you would just need somebody to click the send button and that was it. “We found one big cache and had to blow it in place, but I was a little bit scared one day because they used to use those Motorola cell phones. Munoz said he and his team would blow up houses that had big caches of weapons but they always feared being blown up by remote-controlled bombs. We were just kicking and firing, making sure everybody from left to right was still alive.” They didn’t want us there, and they were ready for us. “We were getting incoming mortars, rockets, IEDs (improvised explosive devices) so it was pretty harsh. Munoz said he and his fellow Marines took part in convoys in the Sunni Triangle in the south part of Fallujah in Iraq, during the main push. His most memorable assignment, he said, was his deployment to Iraq. He also coached the rifle and pistol shooting at the Marine Corps Coaches Course. 1, 1998, and he served seven years as a security specialist and infantryman, attaining the rank of sergeant. “He was very professional,” Munoz said of his recruiter. “When I went to the Marine recruiter, he said, ‘What you want is a job. “I was just born to be a Marine,” said Munoz, an Iraq combat vet who’d served in the Corps from 1998 to 2005. ![]()
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