Hunting ISIS (2018): Season 1, Episode 5 - In Our Sights - full transcript

When he decided to back,
I tried to stop him.

He had made up his mind.

- I told him, "Your blood in
the sand over there

ain't gonna change
a damn thing."

Anybody can die,
living's the bitch.

- ISIS infiltrated Kirkuk over
night and laid siege

to neighborhoods
across the city.

- How many human bodies
can I see before

I can't feel feelings?

- He calls it going down
the rabbit hole.

- IV line!



How long can you run before
your mind just snaps?

[explosion]

- 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.

- Over here,
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.

[Sirens]

- [Muffled speaking]

- Shh, shh, shh, shh.

- A father walked up with
his son in his arms.

He had a nice hole
in his chest.

Probably all this from
a mortar.

- [crying]

- Yeah, yeah, I know, buddy.

[crying]

- Shh, it's okay.

- We've got two
IV lines in him.

I rode with him in case his
lung went down,

which there's a pretty
good chance of.

- [Speaking foreign language]

- It's a long drive.

Massive bleeds both legs.

- Massive bleeds both legs.

- Hole in the right lung.

He had like a 50 percent
chance of making it.

We don't get the see the end
of most of our patients.

You put them in the ambulance,
send them back to the hospitals,

and just expect the worst.

It doesn't help knowing that
your patients aren't making it.

It just makes your
day worse.

You feel pretty useless
and empty.

I'm starting to think what does
it matter that I'm here?

ISIS, they know their
end is coming.

They know their time is marked
for them in Northern Iraq.

Eventually ISIS's main body
will be destroyed,

but it's gonna go from fighting
an army of bad dudes

to fighting an insurgency
all over again.

- Today as many as 50 ISIS
fighters attacked

the city of Kirkuk.

- This looks like retribution by
ISIS for what's happening

on the battlefield around
the city of Mosul.

[gunfire]

- I need some bandage.

- The hard fought battle to
retake Mosul from

ISIL forces just
entered a new phase.

- Iraqi forces say they've
retaken all of the east side

of the city, and they're
taking aim at ISIL

positions in West Mosul.

- On the streets there is
a sense of relief.

- But it's some way
off normal.

Many buildings are damaged.

People don't have basic water,
sanitation,

or electricity services.

- Iraqi troops expect a much
more difficult fight

to liberate West Mosul.

- Ambulance, go,
we need these two.

Yeah, yeah.

Are we ready for what's
in Mosul?

You know, three months ago when
we had first started this is,

you know, early November,
we had zero ambulances.

There was two to four medics,
you know,

including me, and so to me,
no matter what happens,

the situation is a hundred times
better than it was in the past.

Will it ever be good enough?
Probably not.

I mean, you're just never
gonna have enough ready

for this kind of thing.

I am also afraid that the battle
for Western Mosul

will be the most intense fight
we've seen in Iraq.

- We are approximately
five kilometers from

the center of Mosul.

There's still fighting going
on in the city.

- We're leaving.

We're gonna go back
and rest and refit.

Jorge's going home.

We'll be back out here
in two days.

- What are you doing
over there, buddy?

You trying to
loosen that?

You have a ball cap on.

- It doesn't matter.

- Dude, please don't.

Jorge, please don't.

THanks. If that breaks,
I'll kick your [bleep] ass.

I mean, I'll try,
and you'll beat me up.

I won't fight Jorge fair.

I'm just gonna punch him
in the dick as hard

as I can and run away.

- Cheers, guys.

- I need to like wrench
this on.

I worry about Pete.

He's pretty scatterbrained
and stressed out.

- The second phase of Mosul
will be something like

my worst fears.

West Mosul is the old city where
streets go down to six-feel

wide, and you can't fit
a Humvee inside anymore.

Those are just gonna be
ground units kicking down

doors where guys can literally
be on the other side of it

and thrown a grenade
across a small alley

and blow those guys up.

There's three-quarters of a
million people on the west side.

That's a lot of people
that are gonna get

fucked up on that side.

I hate that statement

"There's only so much
you can do."

But how do you find out exactly
how much you can do?

It's by trying a lot and failing
even more times,

and I have tried and failed
a lot of times.

And I've figured out
what I can do.

I know my little realm of
possible change,

but that gets smaller every
day it feels like.

- I'm not sure why the truck's
still running,

but whatever's clever
apparently.

Once I came to the decision
of returning,

I called the YPG, asked if they
were willing to receive

me again, and they said yes,
and within a couple weeks

I was back in Syria.

Being immersed in the culture,
I've grown to love and respect

the Kurdish people here.

The YPG and the Kurds,

they're not gonna
stop this fight.

Even if between a hundred of
them they had one Kalashnikov.

They would still fight.

- [speaks in foreign language]
No, it's video.

It's video.
[speaks foreign language]

- Yeah.

- What are we doing
here today?

- The morale and the
upcoming operation?

- The end game of ISIS
is now in sight.

- ISIS currently controls
two major cities,

Mosul in Iraq, and Raqqa,
which they consider

their de facto capital.

- The YPG are involved in an
operation to retake Raqqa.

- A focus on surrounding the
city on the ground.

Similar tactics are being used
in the battle for Mosul

across the border in Iraq.

- For the last three years now,
the YPG have been pushing

ISIS one town at a time,
one city at a time,

one riverfront at a time, and
it's slowly eroding what

ISIS has been able to capture
in the last three years.

Now that Mosul is halfway
liberated,

the last remaining stronghold
for ISIS is the city of Raqqa.

When Raqqa falls, my volunteer
work is done here in Syria

and in the Middle East.

We're just waiting for the word
saying it's okay to go in.

There will be like
probably six of us,

maybe seven, eight--

- Hit the restart button.

- Hit the restart button.

- I first met Jeff and Firat
in Tel Tamir before

the Shaddadi operation.

They'll forever be brothers
of mine.

♪ Go run that game

♪ I love that thing,
what's that tattoo♪

♪ What's that say

- And get outta there.

As guys that have been
here two, three times,

you know, we can share stories,
we can give each other advice.

- There was one guy when we
were getting ready to leave

for the last push that we made
when me and you went.

- Yeah.

- And this guy was just
like walking off.

- They're yelling his name,
"Achmed!"

He's just walking
home, bro.

He's just going.
He quit.

He's like, I'm not going
on this operation.

- He's like, no,
I'm done.

- You know whose
t-shirt this was?

Levi.

- Really?

- Yeah.

His sister sent it to me.

She said it was his
favorite t-shirt.

He wore it so much, they said
they called him "Bear."

- Levi dying was a direct
motivator for me to return.

The fact that he can
no longer fight,

and so I can--I can.

I don't know.

There's probably an infinite
amount of reasons

that ran pretty instantaneously
through my head

as I made that final
decision that yes,

I'm going to return.

But at the same time,
I mean, I can't be

selfish and wallow in
pity for the death

of one person when there are
hundreds dying.

So what we see here,
this was all built by Daesh.

Where we're currently staying
was a compound.

They say it trained something
like 5,000 Daesh.

This is one of the
obstacle courses.

They call it
Commando Course.

[shouting in foreign language]

- The ankle breaker

As we get closer to Raqqa,
we're walking into

the enemies backyard.

They know exactly how
this city is laid out.

They fortified it themselves.

They've rigged these buildings.

They know where everything is.

We're walking in blindfolded.

Ah, if you're watching
this on film,

I bet it looks so easy.

We're gonna be seeing stiffer
resistance fighting

against guys that have been
in these cities for years,

and they're ready
to die fighting.

It's insane walking into this,
but someone has to do it.

The latest news from what
I heard yesterday,

two more Westerners were killed,
one Canadian and one Brit.

Daesh now has their bodies,
and they're using

them from propaganda.

So they're taking video
and pictures with these

dead Westerners to bolster
their cause.

This fucking pisses me
the fuck off,

more than anything.

That puts the KIA of us
Western volunteers,

not mercenaries, we do
this free of charge, at 21.

It's an uphill battle to
say the least,

and the latest word is
that we'll be heading

to Raqqa in less than
one month.

It's a burden on everyone's
shoulders.

When we think about our
loved ones that have

passed over here
fighting the good fight,

trying to spread democracy
and freedom,

they died protecting
a very noble cause,

and this to me is a hero,

and these guys will
always reign as heroes

for as long as I'm alive
in my memory.

- So the operation is
about to start.

[Speaking foreign language]

- I'm more than excited to get
onto the front of Raqqa.

I got you with
that Pepsi, bro.

- Yeah.

At the very least,
in revenge for them that

can't be there anymore.

- We have this massive ISIS
banner that we took

at the entrance of
this town,

and all the guys that were
there, we all signed it.

- I'm taking it
back to America as

a souvenir from the war.

I wanted to be at the
heart of the battle.

Whoo!

For as long as I can remember,
that urge has always been there.

It's this nagging feeling that
I need to do this.

Oh, shit,
that was awesome!

- When the moment
of truth comes,

I can say, hey,
I was there.

I can tell you all
about it.

From my perspective,
this is what I saw.

Whoa, it's raining down.

Puppy, get out of there.

I might have come here
for selfish reasons,

but good comes out
of this too.

We were up in Sinjar Mountain,
it's very cold up there.

On the road back,
this guy was on the side

of the road just a mere
six inches from traffic,

so we took him
with us.

I'm gonna get all the records
in order and bring him

back to America and he'll
be a reminder.

You're gonna be a naturalized
citizen of America.

Make America great again,
little puppy.

I think they came up with
the name Trigger, but --

- Twigger?

- [Bleep] piece of shit.

Ah!

Your teeth are so sharp.

- The future for me, I just want
to shoot with my camera,

and that's it.

I want to be in places for
the next crisis.

Whatever happens next,

I want to be in all
these hot spots.

You need to have that
perspective like you're

there with them, you're not
looking from the outside in.

I try and make people look
as stoic as possible,

or heroic, because I think
that's how they see

themselves, right?

That's how I kind of like --
I see myself in a way, right?

There's so many
forgotten stories,

so many forgotten heroes.

I wanna try
and capture that.

- I think I've been around
for 11 or 1200 patients

at this point, at least.

I've kept a few people alive,
and most of those people

would look at me for one
moment and find more

hate in their heart than
anything else because the

amount of pain that I just
caused them.

This stupid number 14 that
keeps rattling in my head.

It's the number of
pediatric patients I've

ridden with that died.

14 kids, that's a lot.

I've physically felt myself
losing the battle to death,

right through my fucking
hands I've felt it.

And it destroys you when you
know that you've done

everything in your power
and this kid still died.

[crying]

- [crying]

- IV lines, now!

IV!

I don't have time.

- [crying]

- I always had this idea in my
head that dealing with

all this shit, which is pretty
[bleep] horrible shit,

there was always a point
where I could bend,

bend, bend, and I knew when
I would break.

Two nights ago it was
Valentine's Day.

Valentine's Day 2011,
one of my best friends,

Andy, was shot in the neck
and he later died.

This year Valentine's Day
I thought about everything

happened in the three-and-a-half
months before that,

and then I started thinking
about Andy.

Oh, and it hit me like
a fucking tidal wave.

I just wanted out of here
or a while.

I've relied heavily on
several people.

The only reason I'm sane
right now.

That's Alex.

That's my girlfriend.

Oh, she is not gonna enjoying
being a part of this.

She's a photojournalist.

She's in Germany doing an
assignment, which sucks.

- Yeah.

- Pete needs to kind of
get his head right

and come back here
and hit it hard.

Let Pete go relax and I'll
take care of things.

- The battle for Western
Mosul will start.

I will not be here.

Not being here with our
team as they go out,

that does bother me.

- Have fun, man.

- Yeah, two weeks.

- Look at me.

I am the captain now.

[laughs]

- Oh, you've been
waiting for that shit

for a while now.

I'm more worried that I'm
not gonna fit back

into normal society again.

There are very few people
who are gonna understand

what the hell I'm
going through.

- Bad days in Eastern Mosul
were the 50, 60, 70 casualties

a day, and now I think
Western Mosul will dwarf

Eastern Mosul, you know,
120, 130 hard core trauma

patients in a single day.

Video check.

- Roger, I got you.

- Okay.

We are on our way out.

We're gonna begin an offensive
soon without Pete.

I'm nervous, you know.

Pete's good at thinking
on the fly.

He knows a lot about
this stuff, more than I do.

Yeah, I wish he was around,
but it's kind of nice

to know that it's my show
for a little bit too.

- We're moving from village to
village pushing in kilometer

by kilometer coming up the
Euphrates River forcing

ISIS into a defensive
posture within Raqqa

where we will finish them.

We're a quick response force
moving through villages

and going house to house,

and we just move as
fast as we can.

ISIS is well known for their
tunnel systems.

They can tactically withdraw
from one side of the city

and appear on the other
side of the city

within minutes sometimes.

If we're meeting any
resistance or we're

seeing anything sketchy,

we're calling in air
support.

Oh, whee!

The U.S. has been
stepping up

their air support,

and ISIS is steadily
retreating from us.

I'm very optimistic about
this new arrangement.

What I'm looking most forward to
is fighting inside of Raqqa,

liberating the city.

- 40 kilometers to Raqqa.
Here we go.

- Yesterday I was reading one
of these serial tags.

This is a Ford.

Made at home in Detroit,
Ford F550 Guardian.

Earlier today we
were mortared.

We haven't located the
perpetrators.

- Wait, wait, wait.

Wait.

- I hate talking about
my emotions,

can't you tell?

Pete's been in Iraq since
a year ago last November,

and I'm anxious to reconnect
emotionally would

be the best way to put it.

When Peter was nine and his
brother was ten,

his father and
I got separated.

That was tough for the boys,
and they were angry.

He had a huge fight with
his father and myself.

It was one of the few things
we agreed on that Peter

wanted to join the
Marines in January

of his senior year of
high school.

So we always knew it was
going to happen.

When he gets something
in his head and he's

passionate about it,
there's no stopping him.

It's hard to answer a lot of
questions about him,

because I don't know
necessarily who he is

compared to who he was
a year ago.

Pete!

This is a new man
that's here,

and I'm anxious to see
what that's like.

- Hi, Mom!

- Hi, Pete!

- Nice to meet you.

- I'm meeting Alex for
the first time.

She's incredibly significant
in his life.

- Gross.

- Go shower.

- What?

First time I met Alex, it was
really muddy and crappy out.

There was three old ladies
helping their

children across
the street.

It's cold, and these old ladies
are in sandals.

I was about to get out of my
truck and go help them across,

then Alex came out of
nowhere and just starts

like moving the kids.

And I was like,
I am in trouble.

She's got bigger balls than
most of the guys I know.

- I want to Iraq looking
for stories.

I heard from some of the other
journalists that there

were two American medics
treating casualties in

the battle for Mosul,

so I called them up and
they said come out.

When you work in these
high-stress situations,

I think you get to know
people really quickly.

You see their good sides,
you see their bad sides.

I didn't have any feelings for
him when we first met,

but the more we
worked together,

the more I saw him
as like a really

great leader
and a great man.

Someone who has
compassion, drive,

and that's what really
drew me to him.

I think he has a really
good heart.

- Yeah.

I'm a male version
of her.

- I can tell he's calmer when
I'm with him than when

I'm away in England or Germany
or somewhere else working.

On Valentine's Day he called
me and he's like,

I need to leave,
I need to get out.

I was like, then I'll come
with you.

- Oh, my God.

Soon as I got here, it was just
like stress melting away.

I got on that couch,
my mom sat right there,

and it was just easy
as could be.

- We're gonna go dancing!
- Yes.

- You know how you go
south from here.

- Mm-hmm.

- And on the right.

You're not listening,
you're mooning over--

- Mooning?
Swooning.

- As much as I'd love to have
him here and want to

hold him and want todo all of
that at the same time,

he's gonna be
gone, you know, in two days,

so this is just come here,
chill, try to get you relaxed.

- That was between
deployments.

- No, that was right
before the first.

I was like, "Dad, I'm going on
deployment in a couple weeks,

and there's something
I really have to tell you."

And I just sent him
a picture of me with this

perfect little blonde child,

which looked like
it could've been my kid.

He, like, calls my brother
and was like,

"What do you know
about this?"

He's like, "Oh, my God,
he told you?"

[phone ringing]

- And he calls and he
goes, Mom--

- Who is it?

- Hello?

- The intensity of what is
happening in Mosul,

he feels so responsible to be
the one that saves these lives,

and if they don't get it

right they're not gonna
save the lives.

- Apparently there's a problem
which no one's told me about,

I guess because they're trying
to let me enjoy vacation.

- What are you
supposed to do?

- This is the ridiculousness
of the situation.

Other international
medical groups

could not, would not
go into Mosul.

We went in there.

- Derek.

- Hey, where are you guys?

- We are now being told that
I am unqualified,

half of our team is unqualified,
and that it would be better

to have no medical staff there
than the ones that are not

deemed by the international
medical community

to be qualified.

What the fuck?

- Where's IV?
Where's IV?

- For two months we were left
alone because no one

had the balls to come in
there and do this.

Now they're telling
me personally,

[bleep] yeah, my ego
comes into this,

that we're not qualified.

Bureaucracy,
it's just arrogance.

- The ridiculousness that I have
to through just to get

supplies to people on
the front line who

are treating civilians,
it's fucking insane.

[yelling]
[bleep] me.

Ah, I need a minute.

- When it comes to
stress of the job,

he makes his work his life,
and I've seen that explode.

He's not good at knowing
when there needs to

be some sort of breather.

- All right.

We're just gonna run
across this road.

All right, now.

Run in the bar
and lock the door.

Cheers.

The other day she
was sitting there,

and she was like,
"Are you okay?"

I was like, "No.
"I think I wanna cry."

She was like,
"Okay, then cry."

I cried.

So instead of just being like,
no, fuck you, crying,

like sadness, like uh,

pushing it deep down inside,
I was letting it happen.

Holy crap, that was fast.

Thank you.

That's the first time in
a long time I thought-

- You got a little vampire
drool there.

Holy shit, if I wanna be
with this woman,

I have got to be better.

In my personal life I'm pretty
bad at finishing things.

Mosul isn't done.

- No, I'm not.
I'm a journalist.

- What else could I do
with my life?

I'm 27, I don't even have
a bachelor's degree.

I got four years of
Marine Corp.

Alex, this is Nick.

- Hi, nice to meet you.
- Nice to meet you.

- He's also a former Marine.

- Yeah, Iraq and Afghanistan.

- Nice.

- What in the world could I
possibly be doing that

would make a bigger
impact on other people's

lives than what I'm
doing right now?

[gunfire]

- I think spending four years in
a combat role definitely

has defined who I am.

For the most part,
what I know is what I've

seen on the front line.

I'm here as a selfish individual
going to warzones.

- To do bad things to
bad people.

- Ooh, Goddamn!
It's time to saddle up.

Oh, whoo-hoo!