“All the indications are it was his actions and that of one of his teammates that protected those who were breaching the compound and made the mission successful”, he said of Wheeler.
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“They were very close”.
“Zack named his son after Josh. I’ve spoken to the family today and they appreciate everyone’s prayers”.
“I think they are just parsing the term “combat”, because clearly it is a combat role, ” Kwiatkowski said. “We do not have combat formations there the way we had once upon a time in Iraq, or the way we have had in years past in Afghanistan”, Carter said. He didn’t belong to a clique – he hung out with everybody, she said.
USA and coalition forces will work to disrupt ISIL’s distribution of oil in a lucrative marketplace, he said, adding that one of ISIL’s “customers” is the Assad regime.
April Isa, now an English teacher at Muldrow High School, graduated with Wheeler. She remembered a amusing, quiet teen with long blond hair who “would keep you in stitches”. “If you look back over the past six or seven months, we have done a few more raids…for different purposes where our troops have been involved. But what we are finding is that the USA is not in the driver’s seat as much, so we are looking to show at least a few of our allies that we can be counted on”, she said. “He had a kind heart and he was a really amusing guy”.
U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the mission produced a cache of intelligence, and US forces supporting Iraqi troops were likely to undertake more raids in the future. “He turned around and said, ‘I’m going to do that, ‘” Isa said.
Dramatic footage has been released appearing to show hostages being freed from an Islamic State compound – in a raid where a USA commando was killed.
The White House announced in May that Obama had ordered a similar operation in Syria that killed Abu Sayyaf, a senior Islamic State leader.
Wheeler’s awards and decorations for his service were numerous and include four Bronze Star Medals with Valor Device, seven Bronze Star Medals, the Defense Meritorious Service Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal, the Air Medal, the Joint Service Commendation Medal with Valor Device, the Joint Service Commendation Medal, seven Army Commendation Medals, the Joint Service Achievement Medal, eight Army Achievement Medals, the Good Conduct Medal (6th award).
He is survived by his wife and four children, as well as his grandparents.
In 2004, he was assigned to Army Special Operations Command, which includes the elite commando unit, known as Delta Force, and was deployed 11 times in support of combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. With the exit of most USA troops completed, Obama declared a formal end to the United States’ 11-year combat mission in August 2011.
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But Wheeler’s death this week from a gunshot wound in a firefight against hostile enemy forces is fueling new questions about whether US military operations in Iraq have quietly expanded into a combat mission. A native of Roland, Oklahoma, Wheeler is the first American to die in combat since the us launched Operation Inherent Resolve, its campaign against the Islamic State group, last year.
