Hunting ISIS (2018): Season 1, Episode 3 - Casualties of War - full transcript
PJ's unit in Syria attacks the ISIS-held city of Al-Shaddadi, but heavy combat evades them once again. A frustrated PJ heads home to the States, leaving Levi and the others behind. Feeling stuck in Tennessee, Jeremiah seeks to do the
What brought me here?
- Move!
- Adventure, adrenaline.
But in the end,
I think it's gonna be guilt
that'll keep me here.
He's gone.
- A lot of people,
they don't cope so well
coming back
into the civilian world.
- It's hard to get back home
and just relax.
Being here in the states,
I'm as happy as I'm gonna be,
but it's not as good
as it is over there.
- Move! Levi's
always a morale boost.
He's always making jokes.
- We are here at the upcoming
Taylor Swift concert.
My mom and dad,
they don't exactly know
that I'm here right now.
- PJ is focused on fighting
street to street.
Until he finds that, I don't
think he's gonna be at peace.
- ISIS,
one of the most dangerous
terrorist groups on earth.
They've brutally conquered
territories
all across the Middle East
and spread fear
across the globe.
Their goal is to create
a worldwide Islamic state,
and they will do anything
to achieve it.
Against the advice
of the U.S. military,
some Americans
are fighting back.
- In the truck!
In the truck!
- This isn't just their war.
It's everybody's problem.
- Hold him!
Somebody grab him!
- Some of us were not able
to just sit back
and watch this happen
on the news.
- We're men of action,
not men of words over here.
- This is their story.
- I'm going through my mags,
cleaning them,
making sure my rifle
is functioning properly.
We're finding faulty rounds.
You don't want to fire
these rounds.
[whistles]
We're now on the outskirts
of the city of Shaddadi,
and it's right up a main route
into Raqqa.
Our goal is simply
disrupt reinforcements
that ISIS can send
between Mosul and Raqqa,
the two major strongholds
of ISIS.
- Fire.
- Roger. Clear.
- I'm currently attached
to a combat infantry unit.
Our job will be
to go into Shaddadi,
locate ISIS, and destroy them.
We have almost no idea
how many ISIS are holed up
inside of there.
Hopefully there's a couple
that still wanna fight.
- Move!
[gunshot]
- Did you get it?
- Clear.
- Kitchen's clear.
- We're good.
- Shit.
- Clear.
- The operation was successful.
They were kind of all scared off
from coalition air support.
Daesh evacuated.
Those of them that made it
out of the city
probably to Raqqa.
Here we are, now victorious,
no Daesh in the city.
Everybody's just kind of
hanging out dancing, partying.
[gunfire]
We celebrate every win.
Every win is important to us
out here with the YPG and YPJ.
[gunfire]
- [trilling]
- The YPJ is the women's
protection unit.
They make up 30 to 40%
of the frontline fighters.
- Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
- Okay.
- Thank you. Thank you.
- Yep.
- Thank you.
They take our houses
and live in our rooms.
- "I seek nothing from this life
but Shahada."
- Liars.
They are liars.
- [sighs]
Lots of different reasons.
I wouldn't say it's because
I like to kill people.
You know, that's such a...
Not only is it
such a stupid thing to say,
but it's not
a very good representation
of, I would say, many of
the people that come here.
Daesh, they're raping woman,
they're killing babies,
they're doing
every despicable act
that you could
possibly think of.
Slavery, extortion.
Anything that I can do
to help stop them,
that's what I'm gonna do.
- Levi's the youngest
in my unit,
but he's one of the most
dedicated guys here.
Levi's a guy who's just happy
being out here
and making a difference.
- Say what?
- "It's hard
to be without you here.
We all miss you."
So I wrote her,
"Mom, everything's hard,
but you have to be strong."
[laughs]
"I know, but when
are you coming home?"
- That's basically
what I get from my father
and my mother and my sister.
"Come home, come home.
Are you done fighting?"
We all have loved ones at home
that miss us.
There's no telling how long
we'll still be in Shaddad.
It'd be nice to know more
as we pulled into these areas,
but there's a breakdown
in communication.
Nothing's
ever translated to us.
Turns out we've become
a support platoon at this point.
We took one KIA yesterday,
a western KIA.
He was a German guy,
so the command is a little iffy.
They're a little sketchy
about sending us forward.
That'll set the tone
for the rest of the operations
in the near future.
Clear.
- I don't like that the YPGs
is confiscating shotguns
and pistols from these guys.
I don't like it at all.
This is personal protection.
They have a right to keep this
to protect their families.
It's not my policy, though.
A pretty jumbled operation.
Teams are getting mixed up.
There's no presence of Daesh
whatsoever, just civilians.
- What I'm always hoping for
is, like, straight up
surrounded by ISIS
and trying to fight
our way out of it.
They're not gonna let me fight
unless I happen to be in a unit
that gets ambushed.
I understand why.
There's reasons why.
Every westerner over here
has, what,
a $200,000, at least,
bounty on their head.
I'm a high-value target
just because I'm American.
ISIS would love to kill us.
They'd love to capture us alive.
Just like they've done
many other reporters
and fighters in the past,
cut our heads off
or burn us on TV.
Me chasing a fight
that would end up in suicide
or me being okay with always
being behind the front line.
Which one do I want?
- Welcome.
- Whoo!
- Whoo!
- Okay.
- Copy that.
- I don't think there's like
a bigger group of jackasses
in the world
in, like, a dangerous place
doing all this crazy shit
than are
the emergency medicine team.
- Let's look at it in a good way
as to how Jorge operates.
Jorge, how old are you?
- I think it's 34.
I'm not sure.
- [laughs]
- My name is Jorge Garcia,
and I'm 34 apparently,
and I'm in support
of these medics here.
When I showed up,
I thought it was a motley crew
that would implode.
- Holy [bleep]!
Can you imagine standing here
three days ago?
- No, we couldn't do that.
- No.
I remember running out in
that field for my [bleep] life.
Oh, no, it was over there.
- You have Derek, you have Pete,
who is a former Marine,
and you have
these Slovakian guys.
- But then he's all tatted up
like he's done time
in San Quentin.
- Who said I didn't do time
in San Quentin?
- I didn't say you didn't.
- Yeah, our vetting process
is pretty lax.
- Yeah.
- And here I am
in the middle of all this.
- Is that how you get all
the salt in your peppered hair?
- Yeah.
- It's just little squirts
of salt?
- Jorge doesn't really have
medical training
outside of basic
military knowledge,
but he's got a camera.
He does pretty good pictures.
- Come on, guys, together.
Close together there.
- It started in Afghanistan.
We had an embedded photographer
with us,
and I was amazed
at the power of the camera.
He sparked an interest in me.
I was kind of jealous.
All I had was a rifle.
The camera was better.
I want to go places where other
people don't really wanna go
so the public
has a better understanding
of these situations.
I'm not a medic, but they
want me to pull security,
and they wanted me
to go with them.
Now my job is to be
in the back of a pickup truck
aiming a weapon around.
I have to protect them.
- Say again, Pete.
You broke up.
- Daesh is preparing to attack
with five V.B.I.E.D.s
and snipers.
- Copy.
- I'm gonna tell Alan, okay?
- Jorge has no fear,
like zero fear.
The guy doesn't wear
body armor or a helmet.
- That armored column
is pushed up farther
than it was before.
- Incoming?
[explosion]
- Hopefully
he doesn't get killed,
'cause Jorge
does everything he can
to put himself in harm's way.
- Bravery is half stupidity.
I can't admire anybody else's
bravery more than him.
He just went into this
[bleep] battle with no armor,
just a camera and an AK.
- Another glorious day
here in sunny Northern Iraq.
- Whoo!
Aah!
It's like, ooh!
Hey, there's a car out there!
Hit 'em!
[laughs]
- Oh, shit.
Suicide bomber!
Suicide bomber!
[laughs]
- Get on him! Get on him!
- Oh, shit!
Oh, shit, that was awesome!
Whoa-ho-ho-ho!
Whoa, it's raining down!
Whoo!
I think it's history,
and I wanted to have
a front row seat
and watch this play out.
- No, I know.
Dude, obviously.
There's an IED connected
to this hatch right here, and--
- Firat said it was right there.
He said the thing was connected.
- Come on in.
- Goddamn it.
I got my hopes up for nothing.
Welcome to Hotel Shaddadi.
If you follow me in here,
this is the humble abode.
We have running water, luckily.
No power, no electricity.
Here's the kitchen, bathroom.
We haven't really
used them quite.
I don't even like using
the bathroom in here.
It just makes this whole
compound stink.
Keep coming.
And in here is the western room.
The filthiest room of them all.
It'd be nice to get
a shower in if possible.
Do you have clean clothes
to put on?
Yeah?
I'm just gonna hold off.
This guy's kind of an asshole.
I don't really like him.
- [laughs]
- Up here on the roof
is where we do guard duty,
fire watch at night.
I haven't quite fought
as much as I wanted to.
I'm a little demoralized.
I came here to fight,
and if I'm not able to fight,
there's no reason
for me to be here.
Black and white,
plain and simple.
- If I were to leave now,
by the time I got back
into Iraq and flying out,
it'd be 11 months for me.
Some people come here for a week
and go home,
some people a couple months.
Most people aren't here
a year or longer.
Surely I'm missing out on a lot.
Life, love.
I definitely miss my family.
- Yeah,
I'm pretty much done here.
- I'm gonna miss these guys.
You forge a brotherhood
out here.
- Oh, you're such a dick.
- Asshole.
- It's going.
Oh, Johnny Vegas
buries him in dirt.
- Buried me.
I don't think I have
anything to counter that.
Oh, yes, I do.
- Oh, you son of a bitch.
- One more?
- Yeah.
We're not ending on that, dude.
[gunfire]
- Yeah, dude.
- Apparently I'm out of here,
probably in the next hour.
I'm headed to another location
that'll take us
to another location,
and hopefully my flight home.
Here I go.
- I'm more than excited
to go back home,
but a little nervous as well.
It's the smuggling that
always presents a problem.
If I get caught at a checkpoint,
that's it, straight to jail.
- Freshman year we were
sitting in shop over here,
and I remember watching us
bombing the shit out of Baghdad,
and I was like,
that's fucking amazing.
That's the coolest thing
I've ever seen in my life.
And I think instinctly
it put something in my brain,
and then it just marinated
and ripened for three years,
and when I became a senior,
I was like [bleep] this [bleep],
I'm gonna go do that.
I knew that was my chance
to become something in life.
It [bleep] worked.
It got me the hell out of here.
I got to go overseas and,
you know, [bleep] [bleep] up
and create my addiction
over there, I guess.
[bleep] rain.
A little over two months now
I've been debating
on what I'm gonna do.
It's hard to get back home
and just relax
and just turn off the switch.
I feel more trapped here
than I do overseas.
It's very hard to be normal and
adapt back to normal society.
If you could transport me
like that,
Fuck, yeah, I'd be back
in Syria in a heartbeat.
I just want to be where
I know I make a difference.
I'm trying to go over
as soon as I can get people
to help contribute
the equipment that I need
and the other means
I need to get back.
I got a few churches
to do phone calls with.
All right.
[sighs]
No swearing, no swearing,
no swearing.
[phone rings]
- You've reached
the main voicemail
for Hunter First Baptist.
- Hey, how you doing?
My name is Jeremiah Woods.
I'm just trying
to touch base with you
and kind of insight you
on some stuff that--
what I've been doing overseas.
[phone rings]
- I'm just trying to get a time
to come in
and maybe talk to you,
link face to face.
- Uh, Christian.
We're all--
- Well, I don't--
- You have a great day.
- Bye-bye.
- All right, cheers.
Southern Baptist
right there at its finest.
Let's do one more.
[phone rings]
- I went overseas
to fight against ISIS
and everything
that's going on over there.
[cell phone beeps]
It's a very tedious process.
I don't feel great about
having to rely on other people
to get me back over,
but it's not me
just trying to get
a free ride over there.
It's me trying to get back
over there so I can help.
All right.
Let's go knock this shit out.
Thanks for taking the time
to meet us, guys.
I appreciate it.
- Yeah.
- Steven.
- Nice to meet you.
- Dave? David?
- That's right, yeah, man.
- I do security work.
I was in the military
for six-and-a-half years,
and went through my struggles
to try to find my calling,
I guess you could say.
I figured I'd volunteer
and go back over there
and start fighting ISIS.
- Is what you're doing
spiritual work?
Is it rebuilding
construction work?
What's the gospel or
spiritual component look like?
- I can get you some literature.
- Does that work?
- Yes, sir, thank you very much.
This is Grace Baptist Church.
This is the church
I actually grew up at.
- Raising the money
to get back over there,
it's proven a lot of obstacles.
I've never done this before,
so having to talk to people
and be direct with them,
it's stressful as hell.
Sitting still for very long,
it makes me uncomfortable.
Being complacent
scares the shit out of me.
It would be a lot easier for me
to stay home
and do drugs and drink
and just party.
I think me going over
is kind of a cleanser,
and to show my family
I'm not a fuck up.
There's nothing I wouldn't do
to get back over there.
- We made it through
the checkpoints.
That tastes like freedom.
I feel so free today,
my mind's
already back in America.
I'm sitting here
watching fireworks.
This is amazing, man.
- Hey, dude.
- How we doing?
- Good. I love you.
- I love you too, Mom.
- You doing good?
- I remember
when he was in the Marines
and he was in Iraq,
we were talking one day
and he said,
"Well, I'm a mama's boy."
And I said, "Son, the other
Marines are gonna hear you,"
and they all yelled out,
"Ma'am, we're all mama's boys."
And it was--it so funny.
- Yeah.
Coming home
was pretty surreal.
A lot of mixed emotions.
- Cheers, man.
- Cheers, you guys.
So I got smuggled into Syria
and then out of Syria.
We're working together.
This is a global force,
and it's kind of important.
Fighting for your life
and those around you
is something you kind of have
to experience to understand.
- You're the modern-day Rambo.
- No, not really.
I haven't lived
in my home state of Michigan
since I was 19.
There's a little bit
of excitement,
there's a little bit of anger,
there's a little bit
of frustration.
Everything just really
comes to a halt.
Every time I come back home,
it's like a different city.
- Work, man. Families.
Everybody has families
these days.
I'm one of the few
that has remained unmarried
and no children.
Every three years or less
I'm moving,
a new state, a new country,
somewhere.
A new job, something.
It's what keeps my mind
actively interested in things.
- I don't know
what he's gonna do next.
I don't think he's found
anything exciting enough
or dangerous enough
to follow up with fighting
against ISIS in Syria.
- Where I'll be a year from now,
there's no telling.
I'll probably find
somewhere else to go
and burn the rest of this
wanderlust out of me
before I settle down.
- This is my chest rig.
It serves
as a universal chest rig
so I can put in anything
from magazines to lenses
if I need to.
We're not at the house
most of the time.
We're sleeping
out on the front line.
We come here to refit,
and then we head back out.
It looks like next week's
gonna be very busy,
so we might not have the
opportunity to come back again.
- We've used half
of our med supplies.
So many casualties,
and we're expecting
so many more.
Mosul is this big circle
with a line
going through the middle
that is the Tigris river.
Now Iraqi army are starting
to enclose around it,
and they're gonna go in there.
So we'll be on the outside of
this two-way shooting gallery,
and as people are brought to us,
patch them up, keep them alive
as best as we can,
and send them on
to the hospitals.
Hopefully with
a pretty good success rate.
I'm not that optimistic.
As the guy who's helping
bring everyone into the field,
I definitely feel responsible
for a lot of things.
I'm just as scared
as everybody else.
Scared shitless
as everybody else.
Every volunteer that comes here,
everyone actually works
the front fucking line.
I don't know what'll go first,
med supplies, transportation,
my sanity.
- When I wake up in the morning,
I think I could be
back in Syria waking up
and it's my turn for guard duty.
I'm sitting over here
thinking about the guys that
are still over there fighting.
And at this point
they're there without me.
It sucks.
I haven't heard from them since
maybe the day after I got home.
I'm not sure exactly
what they're doing,
but they definitely daily
cross my mind.
- I have a lot of good friends
back home.
I'm looking forward
to seeing them.
I'm looking forward
to seeing a lot of people
when I get back home.
- What? I'm not the one
who buys it.
- You know, it's like I'm here.
Just make the most of it.
Besides the work itself,
it's not even really that hard.
At a certain point,
you learn to just embrace
the suck, as it were.
And just remember that what
you're doing is a good thing.
- [speaking
foreign language]
- If something ends up
happening to me,
I would just want my mom
to know that I'm sorry.
Maybe eventually I'll sit down
and have a talk with her,
but for now
I'm just hoping that someday
she can understand
and forgive me
if she has any resentment
towards it, but...
- The Consulate called me
from Turkey,
and the man asked me, "When
did you see your son last?"
And I said, "January,"
and he said, "Well,
do you know where he is?"
And I said, "He's in Texas."
He asked me about hair color,
eye color, tattoos,
and I kept asking him,
"Why are you asking me that?"
He finally said,
"Well, I have to tell you,
"we have reason to believe
that your son was killed
in Syria."
I mean, he could walk through
the door right now,
and I'd just say,
"Well, you should have called.
You should have called,
you know, I've been worried."
It just doesn't...
It doesn't register.
- 24-year-old Levi Shirley
died in the war
against terrorism.
Levi died on July 14th
in a small town about 23 miles
from the Turkish border.
In a letter from the Kurdish
forces, it reads in part,
"With Levi's strength,
it's our belief in the future,
we can all live together
across our differences."
- I found out about Levi's death
from a friend of mine
that was still in country.
[gunfire]
[explosion]
- I loved the kid to death.
- He's lost
five or six comrades,
and each one affects him.
Every time he gets a call
or a message, you know,
he lets me know,
and I can see the hurt.
And I know that he feels bad
because some people's men
didn't come home.
- Slept great last night.
We're gonna go attack Mosul
with three battalions
of British bicycle brigades,
and hope for the best.
This is where the war
gets serious, folks.
- The offensive to take back
Mosul is now underway.
This time an estimated
30,000 troops will be needed.
- From the very first day
I came into Iraq,
people were talking
about the Mosul offensive.
The joke was,
oh, Mosul next week, right?
Like Mosul next week,
and now it's actually happening.
- The Iraqi military is planning
a showdown with ISIS in Mosul,
a battle they hope will push
the group out of the country.
It will be an Iraqi
military effort.
- In addition to the Iraqi army,
Kurdish Peshmerga forces,
Iraqi special forces--
- We're gonna follow behind
like we have in the past,
find our happy safe spot,
and set up there.
Mosul can be something
like my worst fears.
- ISIS has dug in moats,
put in oil,
they've dug big holes,
burned tires, suicide bombers.
- Yeah.
- Everybody ready?
- Yeah.
- [speaking
foreign language]
- Jorge, get in the truck
and get on the gun.
[explosion]
- I've never been in
a full-scale siege battle
like this.
There hasn't been one
in quite some time.
I'm nervous and scared
about so many things.
This is gonna take so long,
just an unending train
of blood and bodies.
[gunfire]
Imagine Stalingrad with GoPros.
- People shouldn't
have to kill people.
War shouldn't happen,
but it's inevitable
and it's gonna happen.
We need to destroy evil
wherever it tries to prevail.
I'll be there for that,
to fight, to help,
to make some kind
of a difference in this world.
I'm ready to get back overseas,
get back over there
where I'm supposed to be
to take the next step.
I mean, I don't know
what's gonna happen.
It kind of makes you scared,
butterflies in the stomach,
but at the same time,
I like that.
That attracts me.
[chanting
in foreign language]
- I can't help but think
what if I would have
been there with Levi?
You know, that's one of my--
one of my friends,
one of my brothers
who would still be here today
if I would have never left.
- I'm still emotional
that he's home.
When he was over there,
I got less sleep,
worried a lot more.
I just kept hoping
and praying every day
I would hear he was okay,
he's coming home.
He finally did come home,
and I'm so happy he came back.
And I said "Don't do this
to your mother again."
- I can't comfortably
sit back here in America
and watch these guys
sacrifice their lives.
I should literally be there
doing things right now.
- Move!
- Adventure, adrenaline.
But in the end,
I think it's gonna be guilt
that'll keep me here.
He's gone.
- A lot of people,
they don't cope so well
coming back
into the civilian world.
- It's hard to get back home
and just relax.
Being here in the states,
I'm as happy as I'm gonna be,
but it's not as good
as it is over there.
- Move! Levi's
always a morale boost.
He's always making jokes.
- We are here at the upcoming
Taylor Swift concert.
My mom and dad,
they don't exactly know
that I'm here right now.
- PJ is focused on fighting
street to street.
Until he finds that, I don't
think he's gonna be at peace.
- ISIS,
one of the most dangerous
terrorist groups on earth.
They've brutally conquered
territories
all across the Middle East
and spread fear
across the globe.
Their goal is to create
a worldwide Islamic state,
and they will do anything
to achieve it.
Against the advice
of the U.S. military,
some Americans
are fighting back.
- In the truck!
In the truck!
- This isn't just their war.
It's everybody's problem.
- Hold him!
Somebody grab him!
- Some of us were not able
to just sit back
and watch this happen
on the news.
- We're men of action,
not men of words over here.
- This is their story.
- I'm going through my mags,
cleaning them,
making sure my rifle
is functioning properly.
We're finding faulty rounds.
You don't want to fire
these rounds.
[whistles]
We're now on the outskirts
of the city of Shaddadi,
and it's right up a main route
into Raqqa.
Our goal is simply
disrupt reinforcements
that ISIS can send
between Mosul and Raqqa,
the two major strongholds
of ISIS.
- Fire.
- Roger. Clear.
- I'm currently attached
to a combat infantry unit.
Our job will be
to go into Shaddadi,
locate ISIS, and destroy them.
We have almost no idea
how many ISIS are holed up
inside of there.
Hopefully there's a couple
that still wanna fight.
- Move!
[gunshot]
- Did you get it?
- Clear.
- Kitchen's clear.
- We're good.
- Shit.
- Clear.
- The operation was successful.
They were kind of all scared off
from coalition air support.
Daesh evacuated.
Those of them that made it
out of the city
probably to Raqqa.
Here we are, now victorious,
no Daesh in the city.
Everybody's just kind of
hanging out dancing, partying.
[gunfire]
We celebrate every win.
Every win is important to us
out here with the YPG and YPJ.
[gunfire]
- [trilling]
- The YPJ is the women's
protection unit.
They make up 30 to 40%
of the frontline fighters.
- Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
- Okay.
- Thank you. Thank you.
- Yep.
- Thank you.
They take our houses
and live in our rooms.
- "I seek nothing from this life
but Shahada."
- Liars.
They are liars.
- [sighs]
Lots of different reasons.
I wouldn't say it's because
I like to kill people.
You know, that's such a...
Not only is it
such a stupid thing to say,
but it's not
a very good representation
of, I would say, many of
the people that come here.
Daesh, they're raping woman,
they're killing babies,
they're doing
every despicable act
that you could
possibly think of.
Slavery, extortion.
Anything that I can do
to help stop them,
that's what I'm gonna do.
- Levi's the youngest
in my unit,
but he's one of the most
dedicated guys here.
Levi's a guy who's just happy
being out here
and making a difference.
- Say what?
- "It's hard
to be without you here.
We all miss you."
So I wrote her,
"Mom, everything's hard,
but you have to be strong."
[laughs]
"I know, but when
are you coming home?"
- That's basically
what I get from my father
and my mother and my sister.
"Come home, come home.
Are you done fighting?"
We all have loved ones at home
that miss us.
There's no telling how long
we'll still be in Shaddad.
It'd be nice to know more
as we pulled into these areas,
but there's a breakdown
in communication.
Nothing's
ever translated to us.
Turns out we've become
a support platoon at this point.
We took one KIA yesterday,
a western KIA.
He was a German guy,
so the command is a little iffy.
They're a little sketchy
about sending us forward.
That'll set the tone
for the rest of the operations
in the near future.
Clear.
- I don't like that the YPGs
is confiscating shotguns
and pistols from these guys.
I don't like it at all.
This is personal protection.
They have a right to keep this
to protect their families.
It's not my policy, though.
A pretty jumbled operation.
Teams are getting mixed up.
There's no presence of Daesh
whatsoever, just civilians.
- What I'm always hoping for
is, like, straight up
surrounded by ISIS
and trying to fight
our way out of it.
They're not gonna let me fight
unless I happen to be in a unit
that gets ambushed.
I understand why.
There's reasons why.
Every westerner over here
has, what,
a $200,000, at least,
bounty on their head.
I'm a high-value target
just because I'm American.
ISIS would love to kill us.
They'd love to capture us alive.
Just like they've done
many other reporters
and fighters in the past,
cut our heads off
or burn us on TV.
Me chasing a fight
that would end up in suicide
or me being okay with always
being behind the front line.
Which one do I want?
- Welcome.
- Whoo!
- Whoo!
- Okay.
- Copy that.
- I don't think there's like
a bigger group of jackasses
in the world
in, like, a dangerous place
doing all this crazy shit
than are
the emergency medicine team.
- Let's look at it in a good way
as to how Jorge operates.
Jorge, how old are you?
- I think it's 34.
I'm not sure.
- [laughs]
- My name is Jorge Garcia,
and I'm 34 apparently,
and I'm in support
of these medics here.
When I showed up,
I thought it was a motley crew
that would implode.
- Holy [bleep]!
Can you imagine standing here
three days ago?
- No, we couldn't do that.
- No.
I remember running out in
that field for my [bleep] life.
Oh, no, it was over there.
- You have Derek, you have Pete,
who is a former Marine,
and you have
these Slovakian guys.
- But then he's all tatted up
like he's done time
in San Quentin.
- Who said I didn't do time
in San Quentin?
- I didn't say you didn't.
- Yeah, our vetting process
is pretty lax.
- Yeah.
- And here I am
in the middle of all this.
- Is that how you get all
the salt in your peppered hair?
- Yeah.
- It's just little squirts
of salt?
- Jorge doesn't really have
medical training
outside of basic
military knowledge,
but he's got a camera.
He does pretty good pictures.
- Come on, guys, together.
Close together there.
- It started in Afghanistan.
We had an embedded photographer
with us,
and I was amazed
at the power of the camera.
He sparked an interest in me.
I was kind of jealous.
All I had was a rifle.
The camera was better.
I want to go places where other
people don't really wanna go
so the public
has a better understanding
of these situations.
I'm not a medic, but they
want me to pull security,
and they wanted me
to go with them.
Now my job is to be
in the back of a pickup truck
aiming a weapon around.
I have to protect them.
- Say again, Pete.
You broke up.
- Daesh is preparing to attack
with five V.B.I.E.D.s
and snipers.
- Copy.
- I'm gonna tell Alan, okay?
- Jorge has no fear,
like zero fear.
The guy doesn't wear
body armor or a helmet.
- That armored column
is pushed up farther
than it was before.
- Incoming?
[explosion]
- Hopefully
he doesn't get killed,
'cause Jorge
does everything he can
to put himself in harm's way.
- Bravery is half stupidity.
I can't admire anybody else's
bravery more than him.
He just went into this
[bleep] battle with no armor,
just a camera and an AK.
- Another glorious day
here in sunny Northern Iraq.
- Whoo!
Aah!
It's like, ooh!
Hey, there's a car out there!
Hit 'em!
[laughs]
- Oh, shit.
Suicide bomber!
Suicide bomber!
[laughs]
- Get on him! Get on him!
- Oh, shit!
Oh, shit, that was awesome!
Whoa-ho-ho-ho!
Whoa, it's raining down!
Whoo!
I think it's history,
and I wanted to have
a front row seat
and watch this play out.
- No, I know.
Dude, obviously.
There's an IED connected
to this hatch right here, and--
- Firat said it was right there.
He said the thing was connected.
- Come on in.
- Goddamn it.
I got my hopes up for nothing.
Welcome to Hotel Shaddadi.
If you follow me in here,
this is the humble abode.
We have running water, luckily.
No power, no electricity.
Here's the kitchen, bathroom.
We haven't really
used them quite.
I don't even like using
the bathroom in here.
It just makes this whole
compound stink.
Keep coming.
And in here is the western room.
The filthiest room of them all.
It'd be nice to get
a shower in if possible.
Do you have clean clothes
to put on?
Yeah?
I'm just gonna hold off.
This guy's kind of an asshole.
I don't really like him.
- [laughs]
- Up here on the roof
is where we do guard duty,
fire watch at night.
I haven't quite fought
as much as I wanted to.
I'm a little demoralized.
I came here to fight,
and if I'm not able to fight,
there's no reason
for me to be here.
Black and white,
plain and simple.
- If I were to leave now,
by the time I got back
into Iraq and flying out,
it'd be 11 months for me.
Some people come here for a week
and go home,
some people a couple months.
Most people aren't here
a year or longer.
Surely I'm missing out on a lot.
Life, love.
I definitely miss my family.
- Yeah,
I'm pretty much done here.
- I'm gonna miss these guys.
You forge a brotherhood
out here.
- Oh, you're such a dick.
- Asshole.
- It's going.
Oh, Johnny Vegas
buries him in dirt.
- Buried me.
I don't think I have
anything to counter that.
Oh, yes, I do.
- Oh, you son of a bitch.
- One more?
- Yeah.
We're not ending on that, dude.
[gunfire]
- Yeah, dude.
- Apparently I'm out of here,
probably in the next hour.
I'm headed to another location
that'll take us
to another location,
and hopefully my flight home.
Here I go.
- I'm more than excited
to go back home,
but a little nervous as well.
It's the smuggling that
always presents a problem.
If I get caught at a checkpoint,
that's it, straight to jail.
- Freshman year we were
sitting in shop over here,
and I remember watching us
bombing the shit out of Baghdad,
and I was like,
that's fucking amazing.
That's the coolest thing
I've ever seen in my life.
And I think instinctly
it put something in my brain,
and then it just marinated
and ripened for three years,
and when I became a senior,
I was like [bleep] this [bleep],
I'm gonna go do that.
I knew that was my chance
to become something in life.
It [bleep] worked.
It got me the hell out of here.
I got to go overseas and,
you know, [bleep] [bleep] up
and create my addiction
over there, I guess.
[bleep] rain.
A little over two months now
I've been debating
on what I'm gonna do.
It's hard to get back home
and just relax
and just turn off the switch.
I feel more trapped here
than I do overseas.
It's very hard to be normal and
adapt back to normal society.
If you could transport me
like that,
Fuck, yeah, I'd be back
in Syria in a heartbeat.
I just want to be where
I know I make a difference.
I'm trying to go over
as soon as I can get people
to help contribute
the equipment that I need
and the other means
I need to get back.
I got a few churches
to do phone calls with.
All right.
[sighs]
No swearing, no swearing,
no swearing.
[phone rings]
- You've reached
the main voicemail
for Hunter First Baptist.
- Hey, how you doing?
My name is Jeremiah Woods.
I'm just trying
to touch base with you
and kind of insight you
on some stuff that--
what I've been doing overseas.
[phone rings]
- I'm just trying to get a time
to come in
and maybe talk to you,
link face to face.
- Uh, Christian.
We're all--
- Well, I don't--
- You have a great day.
- Bye-bye.
- All right, cheers.
Southern Baptist
right there at its finest.
Let's do one more.
[phone rings]
- I went overseas
to fight against ISIS
and everything
that's going on over there.
[cell phone beeps]
It's a very tedious process.
I don't feel great about
having to rely on other people
to get me back over,
but it's not me
just trying to get
a free ride over there.
It's me trying to get back
over there so I can help.
All right.
Let's go knock this shit out.
Thanks for taking the time
to meet us, guys.
I appreciate it.
- Yeah.
- Steven.
- Nice to meet you.
- Dave? David?
- That's right, yeah, man.
- I do security work.
I was in the military
for six-and-a-half years,
and went through my struggles
to try to find my calling,
I guess you could say.
I figured I'd volunteer
and go back over there
and start fighting ISIS.
- Is what you're doing
spiritual work?
Is it rebuilding
construction work?
What's the gospel or
spiritual component look like?
- I can get you some literature.
- Does that work?
- Yes, sir, thank you very much.
This is Grace Baptist Church.
This is the church
I actually grew up at.
- Raising the money
to get back over there,
it's proven a lot of obstacles.
I've never done this before,
so having to talk to people
and be direct with them,
it's stressful as hell.
Sitting still for very long,
it makes me uncomfortable.
Being complacent
scares the shit out of me.
It would be a lot easier for me
to stay home
and do drugs and drink
and just party.
I think me going over
is kind of a cleanser,
and to show my family
I'm not a fuck up.
There's nothing I wouldn't do
to get back over there.
- We made it through
the checkpoints.
That tastes like freedom.
I feel so free today,
my mind's
already back in America.
I'm sitting here
watching fireworks.
This is amazing, man.
- Hey, dude.
- How we doing?
- Good. I love you.
- I love you too, Mom.
- You doing good?
- I remember
when he was in the Marines
and he was in Iraq,
we were talking one day
and he said,
"Well, I'm a mama's boy."
And I said, "Son, the other
Marines are gonna hear you,"
and they all yelled out,
"Ma'am, we're all mama's boys."
And it was--it so funny.
- Yeah.
Coming home
was pretty surreal.
A lot of mixed emotions.
- Cheers, man.
- Cheers, you guys.
So I got smuggled into Syria
and then out of Syria.
We're working together.
This is a global force,
and it's kind of important.
Fighting for your life
and those around you
is something you kind of have
to experience to understand.
- You're the modern-day Rambo.
- No, not really.
I haven't lived
in my home state of Michigan
since I was 19.
There's a little bit
of excitement,
there's a little bit of anger,
there's a little bit
of frustration.
Everything just really
comes to a halt.
Every time I come back home,
it's like a different city.
- Work, man. Families.
Everybody has families
these days.
I'm one of the few
that has remained unmarried
and no children.
Every three years or less
I'm moving,
a new state, a new country,
somewhere.
A new job, something.
It's what keeps my mind
actively interested in things.
- I don't know
what he's gonna do next.
I don't think he's found
anything exciting enough
or dangerous enough
to follow up with fighting
against ISIS in Syria.
- Where I'll be a year from now,
there's no telling.
I'll probably find
somewhere else to go
and burn the rest of this
wanderlust out of me
before I settle down.
- This is my chest rig.
It serves
as a universal chest rig
so I can put in anything
from magazines to lenses
if I need to.
We're not at the house
most of the time.
We're sleeping
out on the front line.
We come here to refit,
and then we head back out.
It looks like next week's
gonna be very busy,
so we might not have the
opportunity to come back again.
- We've used half
of our med supplies.
So many casualties,
and we're expecting
so many more.
Mosul is this big circle
with a line
going through the middle
that is the Tigris river.
Now Iraqi army are starting
to enclose around it,
and they're gonna go in there.
So we'll be on the outside of
this two-way shooting gallery,
and as people are brought to us,
patch them up, keep them alive
as best as we can,
and send them on
to the hospitals.
Hopefully with
a pretty good success rate.
I'm not that optimistic.
As the guy who's helping
bring everyone into the field,
I definitely feel responsible
for a lot of things.
I'm just as scared
as everybody else.
Scared shitless
as everybody else.
Every volunteer that comes here,
everyone actually works
the front fucking line.
I don't know what'll go first,
med supplies, transportation,
my sanity.
- When I wake up in the morning,
I think I could be
back in Syria waking up
and it's my turn for guard duty.
I'm sitting over here
thinking about the guys that
are still over there fighting.
And at this point
they're there without me.
It sucks.
I haven't heard from them since
maybe the day after I got home.
I'm not sure exactly
what they're doing,
but they definitely daily
cross my mind.
- I have a lot of good friends
back home.
I'm looking forward
to seeing them.
I'm looking forward
to seeing a lot of people
when I get back home.
- What? I'm not the one
who buys it.
- You know, it's like I'm here.
Just make the most of it.
Besides the work itself,
it's not even really that hard.
At a certain point,
you learn to just embrace
the suck, as it were.
And just remember that what
you're doing is a good thing.
- [speaking
foreign language]
- If something ends up
happening to me,
I would just want my mom
to know that I'm sorry.
Maybe eventually I'll sit down
and have a talk with her,
but for now
I'm just hoping that someday
she can understand
and forgive me
if she has any resentment
towards it, but...
- The Consulate called me
from Turkey,
and the man asked me, "When
did you see your son last?"
And I said, "January,"
and he said, "Well,
do you know where he is?"
And I said, "He's in Texas."
He asked me about hair color,
eye color, tattoos,
and I kept asking him,
"Why are you asking me that?"
He finally said,
"Well, I have to tell you,
"we have reason to believe
that your son was killed
in Syria."
I mean, he could walk through
the door right now,
and I'd just say,
"Well, you should have called.
You should have called,
you know, I've been worried."
It just doesn't...
It doesn't register.
- 24-year-old Levi Shirley
died in the war
against terrorism.
Levi died on July 14th
in a small town about 23 miles
from the Turkish border.
In a letter from the Kurdish
forces, it reads in part,
"With Levi's strength,
it's our belief in the future,
we can all live together
across our differences."
- I found out about Levi's death
from a friend of mine
that was still in country.
[gunfire]
[explosion]
- I loved the kid to death.
- He's lost
five or six comrades,
and each one affects him.
Every time he gets a call
or a message, you know,
he lets me know,
and I can see the hurt.
And I know that he feels bad
because some people's men
didn't come home.
- Slept great last night.
We're gonna go attack Mosul
with three battalions
of British bicycle brigades,
and hope for the best.
This is where the war
gets serious, folks.
- The offensive to take back
Mosul is now underway.
This time an estimated
30,000 troops will be needed.
- From the very first day
I came into Iraq,
people were talking
about the Mosul offensive.
The joke was,
oh, Mosul next week, right?
Like Mosul next week,
and now it's actually happening.
- The Iraqi military is planning
a showdown with ISIS in Mosul,
a battle they hope will push
the group out of the country.
It will be an Iraqi
military effort.
- In addition to the Iraqi army,
Kurdish Peshmerga forces,
Iraqi special forces--
- We're gonna follow behind
like we have in the past,
find our happy safe spot,
and set up there.
Mosul can be something
like my worst fears.
- ISIS has dug in moats,
put in oil,
they've dug big holes,
burned tires, suicide bombers.
- Yeah.
- Everybody ready?
- Yeah.
- [speaking
foreign language]
- Jorge, get in the truck
and get on the gun.
[explosion]
- I've never been in
a full-scale siege battle
like this.
There hasn't been one
in quite some time.
I'm nervous and scared
about so many things.
This is gonna take so long,
just an unending train
of blood and bodies.
[gunfire]
Imagine Stalingrad with GoPros.
- People shouldn't
have to kill people.
War shouldn't happen,
but it's inevitable
and it's gonna happen.
We need to destroy evil
wherever it tries to prevail.
I'll be there for that,
to fight, to help,
to make some kind
of a difference in this world.
I'm ready to get back overseas,
get back over there
where I'm supposed to be
to take the next step.
I mean, I don't know
what's gonna happen.
It kind of makes you scared,
butterflies in the stomach,
but at the same time,
I like that.
That attracts me.
[chanting
in foreign language]
- I can't help but think
what if I would have
been there with Levi?
You know, that's one of my--
one of my friends,
one of my brothers
who would still be here today
if I would have never left.
- I'm still emotional
that he's home.
When he was over there,
I got less sleep,
worried a lot more.
I just kept hoping
and praying every day
I would hear he was okay,
he's coming home.
He finally did come home,
and I'm so happy he came back.
And I said "Don't do this
to your mother again."
- I can't comfortably
sit back here in America
and watch these guys
sacrifice their lives.
I should literally be there
doing things right now.