Wrench3516
01-30-10, 09:38 PM
:evilgrin:
Combat Experience Guides Battle-Hardened DIs
By Dan Lamothe - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Jan 20, 2010 5:41:49 EST
PARRIS ISLAND, S.C. — Even today, Staff Sgt. Alex Ayala lives with the burden of Operation Phantom Fury.
A senior drill instructor at the recruit depot here, Ayala, 25, was a corporal and squad leader with 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines, out of Marine Corps Base Hawaii, when it took part in the epic November 2004 assault on Fallujah, Iraq.
The violence he encountered there profoundly affected the course of his life, he said. Ayala earned the Bronze Star with “V” device for braving machine gun fire to retrieve two mortally wounded lance corporals — David Branning, 21, and Brian Medina, 20 — from a bloody firefight inside an Iraqi home. He is now teaching his seventh 70-day boot camp cycle, an idea he latched onto rather than leaving the Corps and a decision that has allowed him to shape the lives of thousands of Marine recruits.
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2010/01/marine_combat_di_011810w/
Combat Experience Guides Battle-Hardened DIs
By Dan Lamothe - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday Jan 20, 2010 5:41:49 EST
PARRIS ISLAND, S.C. — Even today, Staff Sgt. Alex Ayala lives with the burden of Operation Phantom Fury.
A senior drill instructor at the recruit depot here, Ayala, 25, was a corporal and squad leader with 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines, out of Marine Corps Base Hawaii, when it took part in the epic November 2004 assault on Fallujah, Iraq.
The violence he encountered there profoundly affected the course of his life, he said. Ayala earned the Bronze Star with “V” device for braving machine gun fire to retrieve two mortally wounded lance corporals — David Branning, 21, and Brian Medina, 20 — from a bloody firefight inside an Iraqi home. He is now teaching his seventh 70-day boot camp cycle, an idea he latched onto rather than leaving the Corps and a decision that has allowed him to shape the lives of thousands of Marine recruits.
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2010/01/marine_combat_di_011810w/