America's North Shore Journal

Silver Star[s]

Fayetteville Observer

The men were in a province in southern Afghanistan that is the birthplace of Taliban leader Mullah Omar. It was just after dawn on a hot July day — temperatures would reach 115 degrees — when the team arrived to investigate rumors of Taliban activity in the village of Syahcow. The town was a stopping point for fighters moving between the northern and southern parts of the country.

As Holmes hunkered down on the hill above the village, Logsdon moved his squad of Afghan national army soldiers to the eastern side of the village under heavy fire.

Rocket propelled grenades and machine gun fire landed all around him.

Logsdon was surprised the team faced such stiff resistance. “They hadn’t shown a desire to hold a specific piece of ground,” Logsdon said.

Enemy fighters attempted to get behind the squad, but Logsdon, exposing himself to enemy fire, cut them down.

After getting a foothold outside the village, Logsdon coordinated airstrikes from British fighters and American Apache attack helicopters.

As the Apaches pounded the enemy fighters, Holmes escaped from the hill and met up with American soldiers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade who were called in as reinforcements.

The American and Afghan soldiers slowly pushed to the center of town, fighting from compound to compound.

A paratrooper and an Afghan soldier were mortally wounded as the soldiers pushed deeper into the village. Under heavy fire, Holmes and Logsdon gave the soldiers first aid and then evacuated them out of the town.

“We gave a lot more than we got,” Logsdon said.

By the end of the fight, the Special Forces soldiers with the paratroopers and their Afghan allies had killed at least 15 enemy fighters and recovered more than two dozen light and heavy machine guns.

Neither man considers himself a hero.

“I went in and did my job. No one expects to go and get a Silver Star,” Holmes said.

To them, the medals represent what their team did.

“There were guys that did every bit as much as I did that day,” Logsdon said.