By Adam Ashton
Copyright 2014 The News Tribune (Tacoma, Wash.)
TACOMA, Wash. — After 10 minutes of intense fighting, the two Green Berets thought they and their teammates had turned back the Taliban fighters who breached the defenses of their base in a brazen attack last summer.
Sgt. 1st Class Andrew Busic and Chief Warrant Officer 3 Mark Colbert moved methodically through the airfield in southern Afghanistan, checking for corpses and survivors.
“I hear this metallic clinking,” Colbert said. “Tink, tink, tink.”
One of the seemingly dead fighters had rolled a grenade in Busic’s direction. Colbert called it in time for them to brace and survive.
Then the insurgent detonated his suicide vest.
It was that kind of day at Forward Operating Base Ghazni on Aug. 28 when the Taliban carried out a “spectacular” attack on a fortified NATO position that held more than 1,000 troops.
But Busic, Colbert and their teammates stymied the attack and contained it when they rushed to the breach.
The Army thanked them Thursday by awarding them Silver Stars, one of the military’s highest honors, in a ceremony at Joint Base Lewis-McChord.
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