Thirteen years ago, on August 6, 2011, the US Military Command in Afghanistan loaded 25 Special Operators, including several Members of SEAL Team VI, 5 National Guard Aviators, 8 Afghanis and a US Military K-9 on to 1960s vintage National Guard CH-47 Chinook transport helicopter (Aircraft call sign- Extortion 17) and flew them in to a hot fire-fight in the Tangi Valley of Wardak Province, Afghanistan without cover fire, even though there were two Apache helicopter gunships and an AC-130 Sceptre gunship in the area. These three assets were not allowed to respond due to the insane “Rules of Engagement” in place in Afghanistan. The helicopter was shot down resulting in the largest single loss of US Special Operators in any one incident in history, including 15 members of SEAL Team VI. This article includes an embedded interview with my friends Billy and Karen Vaughn, parents of Aaron Carson Vaughn, one of the members of SEAL Team VI who was killed in the incident. This travesty must not be forgotten.
This is a review of Billy Vaughn’s book about Extortion 17-
“Betrayed” by Billy Vaughn
Before BENGHAZI, There was EXTORTION 17…. August 06, 2011, 2:20 a.m.—Operation Lefty Grove is underway, a highly dangerous mission to take out another high-level Taliban operative, three months after the death of Osama Bin Laden. In the dark of night, twenty-five US Special Ops Forces and a five-man flight crew on board Extortion 17, a CH-47 Chinook helicopter. Seven unidentified Afghan Commandos are allowed to join them. Ground forces have already been engaged in a three-hour exhaustive battle. Extortion 17’s specially trained warriors drop into the Hot Landing Zone to help their fellow warriors. But there’s a problem: the standard chopper escorts have all been directed elsewhere. Mission directions are unclear. Worse, pre-assault fire to cover the Chinook transporting our brave fighting men is not ordered.
On that fateful night, Extortion 17 would never touch down. Taliban fighters fired three rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) in rapid succession. The first RPG shot below the Chinook, but the second made contact in what the military would later describe as a “one-in-a-million shot.” The shot struck a rotor blade on the aft (rear) pylon, shearing off ten and a half feet of the blade. The third shot flew above the falling chopper. Within a matter of seconds, the chopper begins to spin violently out of control and then drops vertically into a dry creek bed and is engulfed in a large fireball. There are no survivors.
The thirty brave Americans lost that night were more than just warriors. They were husbands, fathers, brothers, and sons. Billy Vaughn’s son, Aaron Carson Vaughn, was one of them. Over the next few months as unsettling information on the tragic incident is released to the families, Billy Vaughn becomes increasingly disturbed. Billy discovers that US military forces are not being led to win battles, but have been sent on a fool’s errand to “win the hearts and minds” of other nations. He is told that the US Rules of Engagement have prevented our brave defenders from defending themselves.
Adding insult to injury, Billy learned that a Muslim Imam was invited by our own US military leaders to “pray” over his son’s dead body. As US war heroes lay in their caskets before their last flight home, the Imam damned America’s fallen warriors as “infidels” who would burn in hell. As US military leaders observed the ceremony at Bagram Air Base, the Imam boasted over the deaths of US heroes with words such as, “The companions of heaven [Muslims] are the winners.” Betrayed is a heart rending account in America’s history, an engaging story of faith, patriotism, honor, duty and loss.
Betrayed is not just the biography of an American military family, it is a crucial, true-life narrative that every American must read and understand about their government and the danger America’s military strategy currently poses to all families. Betrayed is a book Billy Vaughn wishes he didn’t have to write. But his son is gone and there are still unanswered questions. He needs to know if finding the truth may prevent another father from standing in his shoes.
