tv An Unlikely Hero CNN August 21, 2013 10:00pm-11:01pm PDT
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that's all for us tonight. let's give a huge thanks to that hero bookkeeper in georgia. antoinette tuff. remember that name. she calmly and cooly talk the school gunman into surrendering, saving god knows how many lives. she may not consider herself a hero, but she is to me. i hope she is to you, too. the jay tapper special "unlikely hero" starts right now. allah akbar. >> october 3, 2009, was the year's deadliest day for the u.s. in afghanistan. a storm of bullets, rockets, grenades and mortars rained down on a u.s. outpost.
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combat outpost keating as it was named was a perfect target. it deep in a valley, surrounded by mountains. the day-long battle left eight americans dead. but alongside the tragedy, the story of combat outpost keating is also one of courage and a bulletproof loyalty that bonds soldiers when most of us would cower in fear. i'm jake tapper. on monday, here at the white house, president obama is scheduled to decorate one of the heroes of that battle with the medal of honor. his name is staff sergeant ty carter, and his selfless actions that day saved lives. earlier this year, a fellow soldier received the same recognition. so for the first time since vietnam, two living soldiers
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from the same battle received the highest honor for combat. it's a testament to the long odds, defending an outpost that some say should never have been built. combat outpost keating was built in 2006, among the 10,000 foot peaks of the hindu cush. built not on the high ground, but in a valley. ty carter's first impression, even as a specialist just three grades above buck private was, it's a deathtrap. >> my stomach dropped. i said, you've got to be kidding me. this can't be real. >> why? >> it's just, from the position i was, and i was just outside the wire, and i could see everything in there. there was no cover except for the buildings. you look at the surrounding mountainside, and you could
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literally pick out fighting positions everywhere. it's one of those things where you have to deny your frustration and push forward, because this is where we're at. this is where we're going to be. you're just going to have to deal with it. >> near the border with pakistan, cop keating was here to win over local villagers with american funded construction projects. and to shut down the route insurgents used to smuggle in weapons and fighters. were you accomplishing either of those tasks? >> from my eyes, no. >> in part, because even the area's roads were perilous. in 2006, when the road collapsed, a young officer was ejected from his vehicle and killed. lieutenant ben keating. the outpost was named in his honor. without safe roads, cop keating
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depended on helicopters for supplies. but the rocky makeshift landing zone and enemy fire meant deliveries were sporadic. leaving the troops to live off mres. >> when the helicopters were able to come, they gave us mail. and a lot of the families of soldiers started shipping us canned foods and snacks and anything like that, and it was -- any time the helicopters came, it was christmas. what are you going to get? you know, i loved red vines licorice. you know, the power bars and the granola bars and all that kind of stuff. knight troop, arrived in may 2009, troops from cop keating had already died. including two camp commanders, captain tom bostic in 2007. captain rob yeskus one year
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later. enemy fire also took the lives of sergeant buddy huey, private chris pfeiffer and staff sergeant ryan fritschy. dozens of others had been seriously wounded. an army investigation would conclude that cop keating was seriously vulnerable. >> cop keating was tactically indefensible. these what these soldiers were asked to do, defend the undefensible. >> the taliban video shows them testing the defenses. they did this from the day cop keating was built. >> you see the muzzle flashes? >> by the time ty carter's unit arrived, the rate of attacks had tripled. >> that summer it would be every other day or sometimes it would be every day. sometimes twice a day. and it wasn't just, you know,
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pop shots. sometimes they would shoot rpgs or b-10s or a recoilless rifle. so it was continuous harassing. >> and your future months there, how much was it just a constant fear that you could be killed at any moment? >> the anxiety was high, but the fear only hit when something was close. when you see the splash on the ground as a bullet impacts or the pop as it zips by your head. you hear the his as it cuts through the air. it is a pop thing. that was close and that's when you are like holy crap. that could have been me. >> before they arrived in afghanistan, several key commanders, including lieutenant colonel brad brown believed cop keating and four other outposts
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in the rejop were not -- region were not worth the effort or safe to defend. why was it so dangerous? >> number one, you are in low ground and surrounded 360 degrees by dominating terrain and i don't mean just a little bit. but it's completely dominating. so your capability to defend yourself is really limited. when you're leaving the base, you're under continuous observation 24 hours a day. there's no way you can leave with any operational security. >> brown, among others, made the case directly to general stanley mcchrystal, commander of all u.s. troops in afghanistan. >> and he certainly agreed that they were -- it was a tactical problem. they were costly and risky. >> but at the time, afghan president hamid karzai was running for re-election. abandoning cop keating might have been interpreted as a lack of american support. so mcchrystal kept the outpost open. >> it was incredibly frustrating. when you come to a common
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agreement that this isn't the type of mission, this is not where we should be doing this, and you agree with that, and you start planning to stop it, and then say yes, i know we've all come to that conclusion, but we're going to keep doing it, it's very hard to explain to soldiers, you know, why. >> after karzai won the august 2009 elections and other u.s. assets became available, the top brass finally approved a plan to leave the outpost. >> our task at keating was to survive long enough to close it down. >> the troops were to start packing up on october 4th. [ speaking foreign language ] >> but on october 3rd, the enemy launched a well-planned attack. when we come back -- >> people were yelling, they were calling out over here, over there. >> combat outpost keating ends
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his was an unlikely path to valor. at the remote outpost, carter had few friends. perhaps not surprising given his background. what were you like in high school? >> in high school, i was kind of a loner, a skinny kind of guy who didn't really get along with anybody and i didn't have a whole lot of good friends. >> carter was raised by his single mother in spokane, washington, with his sister and brother, seth. seth was a year older, with a knack for getting into trouble. >> my brother was into -- i wouldn't say gang stuff, but he definitely had a chip on his shoulder. when i hung out with him, i would get into fights and, you know, vandalism and stuff like that. >> it got so bad, ty's mom threw seth out of the house. why did he go? >> wherever he was going to go. he didn't spend much time at the house any way.
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he was off with his friends and eventually he would just come home and do some bad things and he would get kicked out, and that's how it went for a while. >> with his brother gone, ty straightened up. graduated high school. and headed to the marine corps in 1998. why did you join the marines out of high school? >> one of the reasons was i had gotten in trouble as a teenager, and it was a constant step to push my life in the right direction. >> but you had some trouble in the marines? >> there was one individual that my roommate that i ended up getting into a fight with, and i got in trouble for that, and i lost rank. >> two months later, carter was honorably discharged from the marines. so he headed out hopscotching the country, looking for work and a new purpose. he found staying in a job was a
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challenge. let's just walk through the list of jobs. >> first i started out working with a yacht maintenance service. motorcycle apparel store, armed security, a hot cub spa place, a dairy mill, a sawmill, i worked with a chain saw. >> that's pretty comic. it's an unbelievable list, and it's just five years, right? >> yeah, it was five years. >> here's the thing, you missed the purpose that you thought you had when you were in the military. >> when i was a civilian working, there was nothing there. there was no motivation, there was no purpose. it felt like i was a drone. there was no emotion, there was no pride to go to work, there was no real pride in what you were doing. you were just doing that so you don't get fired or laid off. which happened lot. >> at the same time, carter was going through a divorce and had a daughter to take care of. >> all i was doing was trying to support her in any way i can.
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i couldn't afford to pay child support, and all in all, i was thinking man, back in the service, that was awesome. i was doing what i enjoyed, and i was actually happy to wake up in the morning. >> so carter enlisted in the army. but once again, had a hard time fitting in. >> ty carter wasn't a sociable person. >> then sergeant first class jonathan hill remembers carter as too serious. >> we had a platoon, you know, full of guys that were on the lighter side of life, obviously, and liked to joke around. carter never really got involved. he didn't like it. he thought it was immature, it was childish, you know, a lot of guys didn't really make friends with carter. carter didn't really make friends with a lot of guys. >> carter would eventually make a few good friends. but those friendships would be short lived. combat outpost keating was about to be attacked.
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the first shots ring out at 5:58 in the morning. it is october 3rd, 2009. one day before the 53 u.s. troops at combat outpost keating are supposed to start packing up to leave. they are excited to go. since their arrival, they heard rumors that an overwhelming attack was coming. >> we knew something was going to happen, we just didn't know what. >> now as many as 400 taliban fighters are amassed on the high ground, as the men of the third squadron, 61st cavalry regiment sit in an outpost that is virtually defenseless. >> i was like, if it's my time to go, how am i going out? or even if i get captured and they great both my arms and legs, i still got my teeth and forehead, so i'll be gnawing on ankles.
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so there is no giving up, there is no surrender. you just -- i'm going to be the biggest pain in the butt i can be. >> this dawn-to-dusk battle would test that resolve. the taliban studied how the americans responded to previous attacks. >> when the enemies weren't shooting at us, they were shooting at the weapons. so they were disabling the weapons. >> the insurgents know the outpost relies heavily on mortars, so they make the big guns their first target. killing private kevin thompson as he raises to his post. troops begin running much-needed ammunition to the men on guard duty. but casualties begin mounting. sergeant joshua kirk is killed while returning fire. >> you could hear the rounds coming in from every direction and it was just basically a hornet's nest. >> sergeant first class john hill sees more young soldiers taking enemy fire. >> michael skuza was gunned down
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ten feet outside our door. another soldier, griffin, who immediately ran out the door without hesitation, met the enemy head on and he didn't make it back. >> on the open ground, a humvee equipped with two machine guns and surveillance equipment is returning fire on the opposite end of the outpost. but ammunition is running out. ty carter volunteers to deliver more. carter did not think of himself as a great athlete, and this 100 meter sprint, starting at the barracks, would be a matter of life and death. >> i got to the door and the -- there was bullets impacting the concrete wall in front of me and also the dirt in front of me. and i didn't realize it right then, but i took a step back, not because i was afraid or anything, but because man, i've got to hit this at a running start.
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>> carter is, kind of like for lack of a better words, a robot. tell him to do something, he's going to do it. he's going to do it to the best of his ability. he gathered up as much ammo as he could and he took off. >> and i can see explosions going off and impacts. the more impacts i saw, the faster i ran. >> had you ever seen anything like that? had you ever seen that kind of fire coming in? >> no. it wasn't just the seeing, it was the hearing. there was so much incoming fire, and outgoing fire that there was no break in any type of explosion or sound. >> three men are in the humvee that carter is trying to reach. sergeant bradley larson, specialist stephan mace, and sergeant justin giagos. the men need even more even moro and lubricant for their .50
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caliber machine gun. so he runs back to the barracks through a barrage of enemy fire. >> i remember entering the door and a lot of yelling. i remember sergeant hill telling everybody to be quiet. >> carter returns and he's very sweaty, very tired. >> and he said that we need to know who needs what. and i caught my breath. that's when i yelled, everybody needs everything. >> carter grabs lubricant for the machine gun and ammo. >> right then sergeant francis asks me where i was going. i told him and he said no, you can't go there, you'll get killed. >> carter runs the deadly gauntlet a third time. >> i used cover as i went. this wasn't a straight shot anymore. every time i would sit behind something, another explosion would go off so close. it's like it's time to move. i got across and i opened up the door and giagos, mace and larson were in the vehicle.
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mace was hunched over. in the floorboards there were six inches of hot, .50 cal brass. you could almost taste it in your mouth. just metal i everywhere. smelled like keys. >> the smell of hot brass triggers a chilling reminder of how vulnerable they are, and what enemy munitions can do to a human body. >> then the sinking thought that metal versus flesh, flesh will always yield. >> when we come back, the battle grows even deadlier, when the enemy enters the outpost. >> and then about that time is when i see mace coming around the corner dragging his legs. she loves a lot of the same things you do.
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[ speaking in foreign language ] october 3rd, 2009. hundreds of taliban fighters are attacking the u.s. troops below them in a valley. combat outpost keating is in chaos. specialist ty carter is pinned down in a disabled humvee with three other troops, brad larson, stephan mace, and justin giagos. how often were bullets hitting the humvee? >> it was pretty constant. it was be a tink, tink, or boom and the vehicle would move a little bit. >> at that point, the unit's chief mechanic comes to help. >> that's when i grabbed him. i just yanked him in. he was extremely polite. oh, excuse me, sorry about that, as he was crawling over me. i didn't care. i just wanted to get him in and
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get the door shut. >> now there are five men trapped in the space of roughly the size of a closet. so here your, these five soldiers in a humvee. can you leave? >> no. and we all knew that sooner or later, the firepower is going to breach. >> a rocket-propelled grenade hits nearby. it disabled the humvee's big gun and seriously wounds the men inside. >> it just sounded like a truck hitting another truck, just loud and metallic. and i remember feeling the impact on the side of my face like somebody slapping me as hard as they could. i didn't know if i lost consciousness, but i definitely was stunned to the point where i forgot where i was. once my eyes were open and i saw what was going on, it was like, holy crap, i'm alive, i'm still in.
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this it wasn't a night mire. i checked myself for holes and i didn't find any at the time. i remember hearing martin cursing, yelling this burns so bad. he got peppered really bad with shrapnel. that i think was the time when giagos started making the decision that we needed to get out of there. >> on the other side of the outpost, staff sergeant clint romesha approves a plan to use a truck and a .50 caliber machine gun to rescue the men in the humvee. sergeant joshua hart and two others volunteered. >> i remember talking to hart about before he goes over there, he needs to find a good position to put that truck in, because that was one thing i tried to teach the guys, dead bodies attract more dead bodies. if you go do the same position that someone else is getting shot at, you're going to be shot at, too. >> romesha monitors the radio as hart's rescue team talks to
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giagos in the stranded humvee. >> i remembered listening to him on the radio, the conversation between him and giagos and giagos just telling him this isn't a good spot. you can't do a whole lot, you know, stay away, stay away. giagos, you know, trying to beg hart to stay away and hart doing everything he can to once again help those guys break out. and i mean, it seemed like an eternity, but hart came across the net and said, you know, i got an rpg pointed right at me. and that was the last we heard from hart. >> with the collapse of the rescue mission, sergeant giagos believes their only chance is to make a run for it. >> he said, well, i don't want to do this without everybody's approval or agreement. and i says, no, this is on you.
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you've got the experience and the knowledge. it's up to you, man. you need to lead us. what do you want us to do? he said, well, i think we should exit. and i says, okay, i'll hang back here and provide cover and larson did the same. so it was almost like a football, ready, break. and people started exiting the vehicle. [ gunfire ] >> then they realized the situation is even worse than they thought. >> there's insurgents just 30 meters in front of me. >> in the camp? >> in the camp, yeah. >> had you seen them in the camp? >> i hadn't seen them. >> carter uses the last of his ammunition. he wounds several insurgents, and then he makes a perfect head shot. so the first time you killed someone? >> yes. >> did you -- did you feel anything from it? >> the only feeling i got was
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the same feeling you get when you hit a bull's-eye on a target. the only difference is every time i squeeze the trigger, my head or my mind took a very detailed picture that just kind of lasts with you. >> but the taliban still have the advantage, and the three men carter is covering go down. sergeant vernon martin. >> and i saw him kind of go towards the rocks, jump over the rocks. the last time i saw him is he had blood coming down from his kevlar on the back of his neck. >> and sergeant justin giagos, who is trying to help a badly wounded specialist stephan mace. >> bullets were impacting all around him. he turned to fire and he was taken down. the builts hit him and it spun him around. i yelled, giagos is down. that's when sergeant larson, i
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heard him say, you know, i just took out two guys over here, get back in the vehicle. >> but mace is still out there, still alive. just out of reach. >> about that time is when i seen mace coming around the corner drag -- dragging his legs. he was on his forearms and his elbows, and he went towards giagos. that's when i said hey, sergeant larson, mace is alive. i can get to him. he's right there. i think he looked and he says no, you can't get to him. he says, you're no good to him dead. i knew he was right, but it ate me up so bad. i need a break. hold on. >> yeah. take as much time as you need.
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when we come back -- >> we were low on ammo. everybody around us that was friendly was either wounded or dead. >> the rush to save mace and take the fight to the enemy. peoi go to angie's listt for all kinds of reasons. to gauge whether or not the projects will be done in a timely fashion and within budget. angie's list members can tell you which provider is the best in town. you'll find reviews on everything from home repair to healthcare. now that we're expecting, i like the fact i can go onto angie's list and look for pediatricians. the service providers that i've found on angie's list actually have blown me away. find out why more than two million members count on angie's list. angie's list -- reviews you can trust.
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>> it got to a point where a sniper knew where i was at, and i would open the window and fire across the river at insurgents, and then i remember closing the window, and as soon as i closed it, spark shot out. the two inch gap, the sniper zeroed in on and was trying to put a bullet in the vehicle to get either myself or sergeant larson. >> to make matters worse, taliban fighters are now inside combat outpost keating. >> we were low on ammo. everybody around us that was friendly was either wounded or dead. >> specialist stephan mace was severely wounded outside the humvee, exposed to the enemy. >> he says, help me, please. and i saw the look on his face, and that's the look that tears me up. the look of sheer pain and just need. and i couldn't do anything. >> carter wants to run out and
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grab mace. but the incoming fire is too intention. sergeant larson tells him, it's a suicide mission. >> because of larson, i survived that day. and he held me back when i could have died going to get him, because i was going to go get him. >> time passes and the enemy fire focuses on other parts of the camp. carter thinks he hears a horn from a nearby truck. he darts to it. inside, he finds more ammo, and he realizes now is the time to rescue mace. >> i thought i would ask sergeant larson again, hey, can i go get mace now? he thought about it, and he says all right. you know, but wait for me, i want to make sure that i got you covered. >> so carter again jumps out of the humvee and into the line of fire. how much of the bullets are coming in at this point? >> there were only few, but i
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wasn't really paying attention to that. i was completely blocking that out. there could have been an entire beret of rounds coming in, but my entire focus was on mace. >> carter reaches mace. >> i asked mace, are you still alive? he said yes. and he started to turn, so i turned him over. >> carter ties a tourniquet on mace's legs and stuffs gauze into bullet holes. he then tells mace to pretend he's dead and sprints back to larson in the humvee. >> he says, what is your plan? i said we're going to bring him to the humvee? it's the only safe place. >> larson lays down cover fire as carter runs back to mace. >> i was able to pick him up and carry him up the hill to the humvee. >> enemy fire had taken out their radio, so carter and larson have no idea if any other american troops are alive. carter makes yet another run to find a radio. >> the loneliest, most terrifying movement i've ever done.
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>> he discovers a radio in the dirt and rushes it back. larson radios the camp's operations center for help. and the men there hatch a plan. with massive cover fire, carter and larson carry mace to the aid station. >> we almost stepped on or over the two insurgents that he shot and to my right, i saw an american soldier dead on the ground, and i had a feeling, i couldn't see his face, but i knew it was griffin. we kept on sprinting. every muscle in my body was on fire and i couldn't breathe. and tears were coming down from my eyes because everything hurt so bad. but there's no way i was going to quit. >> were you and mace close? >> no. we met a couple of times at a -- you know, platoon gatherings or every once in a while. >> but you were driven, even though you didn't know anymore >> it doesn't matter. he was wearing our uniform. he's a black knight. at that point in time, he is my blood brother, and i'm willing
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to do whatever i can to help him. >> at the aid station, the medical team gives mace five blood transfusions to keep him alive. the battle now shifts. there's much increased air support. >> the first bombs started dropping. you knew it was going to be okay. it was bad, but they were going to hold it and they were going to take it back. >> american bombs >> american bombs calling on the falling on the enemy. mace at the aid station. and for the first time in hours, carter can exhale. >> i believed in my heart that mace would survive this, and because of that, i was able to find a sense of peace that larson and i had did something to where we -- our actions saved a fellow soldier. >> by nightfall, the battle is over. lieutenant colonel brad brown arrives later that night and over the next few days hears myriads of accounts of heroism.
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but ty carter's stands out. >> the last three soldiers that got out of that humvee with him were either wounded or dead, and tr carter got out under fire and he went forward in an extremely exposed position. after he had been told by larson hey, you're not going to do any good if you're dead, and he did it any way. he hauled him up a bluff under fire, and he gave stephan mace a chance. >> mace had been rushed by helicopter to a well equipped medical unit and into surgery. but it was too late. >> then i overheard that -- i overheard that mace died on the operating table. and that blow destroyed me. i felt that we had failed.
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the idea of all those guys that died, and the fact that i could have been one of them, and i imagined my daughter crying over a flag-draped casket. >> mace was one of the eight u.s. troops to die in the battle of combat outpost keating. the fighting raged from sunup to sundown that october day in the afghan mountains. the battle had ended. but for ty carter, a new struggle was just beginning. ♪
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left face. march. exercise. one, two -- >> ty carter, now staff sergeant ty carter, is back from afghanistan. he's assigned to joint base lewis mcchord, outside tacoma, washington. carter will soon receive the medal of honor for his heroism during a crushing taliban attack. i think a lot of people out there probably think medals of honor go to people who were raised in middle america, two
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parent homes, who were clearly on a path to valor. it doesn't always work that way. >> ty, like every soldier, he's a complex character. i think he looks more like what an average soldier that you meet in any unit on any given day, what he looks like. and a lot of those kids, given the same position and the same -- with the same choices, may have done the same things that sergeant carter did. but certainly he was one of those people that had that capability, that sense. and when the time was there, he did what he needed to do. this is nala. >> this is your dog? >> this is my dog. >> today, carter lives in this bucolic home, not far from the base. >> these are brand new additions to the carter estate. they are labradoodles. >> oh, my goodness.
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>> oh, yeah, oh, yeah. >> they are just barely starting to get their eyes open. >> how old? >> a little over a week and a half, i believe. >> since his return from afghanistan, life here for his wife, shannon, and their three children, appears normal. it is a world away from the bloodshed. even so, his home hints at how the war changed him. >> firing. >> there's a shooting range, so carter can maintain his skills as a sniper, and security cameras all around. >> i got two up there, a couple in the trees back there and a couple in the tree right above the vehicle. >> do you think your experience at cop keating has anything to do with how you've secured this place? >> i think so. even inside my own house i always carry a pistol. dear heavenly father, we thank
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thee for this nice day and the ability to travel two to and from work and other places without incident. >> as the family prepares for a presidential ceremony and the medal of honor, carter is humble when others talk about his valor. >> to him it just brings back those memories and that day and everything they had to go through. to me, it's like, i knew you were a hero all along. you know, i knew. >> carter doesn't feel like a hero, just a survivor. >> the constant ring in my ears is a reminder. >> when a rocket-propelled grenade hit his humvee, carter lost part of his hearing. >> ever since that day, i've had this high pitched ringing in my ears. >> and in the dark, quiet moments, the constant ringing in his head brings him back to the battle. >> when you're alone in your room, and you hear the ringing, that's when the memories start kicking in. you can't sleep because the whole, i should have done this, i could have done this, and you
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see the faces of the soldiers that died or the soldiers that are wounded and you hear the cries. and it's just not very good, happy memories. >> on his wrist, the names of the eight who didn't make it home. carter says one more name should be added to the list. >> ed faulkner was funny. he was an excellent team player. he was basically the guy that lightened the mood for our platoon. >> ed faulkner left the outpost alive. but the outpost never left ed faulkner. he struggled with drug abuse and mental health problems. eventually leaving the army with severe post traumatic stress disorder. faulkner was haunted. he would stay up late at night, watching the videos of the
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attack that insurgents had posted online. in september 2010, not even a year after the attack, faulkner took a fatal overdose of meth and xanax. although there was no evidence of suicide, his friends believe his death was linked to the horror of that october day in 2009. >> i honestly believe that, yes, he was the ninth victim of combat outpost keating. and i also believe that he won't be the last. >> to varying degrees, all the men of black knight troop carry a weight. >> everyone there came away with some type of stress or memory that still haunts them today. >> carter himself has regular therapy for ptsd. >> i didn't believe it was real until i experienced it. i thought it was just an excuse to get out of duty or not do a job.
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but once it hit me and i realized it, i was blown away. how could i be so ignorant? >> and that is ty carter's new mission, to be a voice, to destigmatize the invisible wounds of war. >> what we need to do is take the first few steps. we need to realize yes, this is affecting me and i need to fix this. >> the medal of honor, a symbol of strength, may help him convince others there is nothing weak about seeking help. because even as the war winds down, some of these psychological scars will take years to heal. approximately 60,000 u.s. troops are still in afghanistan. president obama has said no combat troops will remain in the country after 2014, but it remains to be seen if residual
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forces of any kind will be there after that date. i'm jake tapper at the white house. we begin with breaking news. we just listened to 911 recordings. unlike anything we've ever heard before. they tyke you inside that elementary school in georgia when a gunman was holed up with 500-rounds of ammunition. the shooter, a deeply disturbed individual with nothing he says to lose. i want you to hear miss tuff describe what was at stake. >> he actually tried to go out the door where the kids was and i called him back to keep him calm and stay inside with me.
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