Fourteen years ago this Saturday, Lt. Col. David Greene of the U.S. Marine Corps was shot and killed as he flew his Cobra gunship in support of operations in Anbar province, Iraq.
I didn’t know Greene personally, but I was motivated to learn a little about him when President Trump recalled Greene’s life at Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day. And I think you should know a little about Greene.
He was 39 years old when he died on July 28, 2004. Serving on active duty with the Marines between 1986 and 1997, Greene was living in Vermont with his wife and two children when the Iraq War broke out in March 2003. In January 2004, Greene was deployed to Anbar province in support of Marine operations.
It was no easy deployment.
At the time, Anbar was wracked by the rising power of al Qaeda in Iraq, or AQI, and aligned fighters. Led by the blood-drenched zealotry of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and operating from safe havens like Fallujah, AQI utilized a vast network of car bomb factories and torture houses to terrorize Iraq and subdue the moderate Sunni tribes of Anbar. These forefathers of the Islamic State were slaughtering hundreds of civilians in the hope of imposing their fanatical Salafi-Jihadist vision onto Iraq.
And with Iraqi security force leaders in Anbar heavily targeted by AQI and other insurgents, it was up to the Marines to hold the line. That effort fell to Marine officers like Greene and his comrades from smaller elements of the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
Greene was central to these efforts.
Piloting a Cobra gunship, Greene flew in combat support for Marines on the ground. Lacking the abundance of aerial drones that Marines rely on today, the Marines of Anbar 2004 relied on Greene and his fellow aviators to provide them with advance warning of approaching enemies and with air support in the event of enemy contact. There can be very little doubt that Greene saved many lives as he repeatedly fought with Marines on the ground to assault and repel AQI formations.
Neither can there be much doubt that Greene saved many Iraqi civilian lives. After all, deployed along the Euphrates River corridor between Ramadi to Fallujah to Baghdad, Greene would have been responsible for intercepting AQI movements along the highways between their civilian bombing targets. The unknown Iraqi Shia children of Baghdad, a favored target for AQI, who Greene saved will now be young adults. They owe much to someone they’ve never heard of.
That speaks to something deeper here — about Greene, the Marine Corps, and all the branches of the U.S. military.
Whatever your view of the Iraq War, there’s no question that men and women like Greene did courageous and moral work for the nation and humanity. Of course, as a Marine officer, Greene would never want his memory to go before those enlisted Marines who died alongside him. Correspondingly, here are the names of the Marines that Icasualties.org records as also losing their lives in Anbar province during July 2004:
- Pvt. Christopher Reed
- Sgt. Krisna Nachampassak
- Sgt. Trevor Spink
- Cpl. Terry Ordonez
- Pvt. Rodricka Youmans
- Lance Cpl. Justin Hunt
- Cpl. Jeffrey Lawrence
- Lance Cpl. Scott Doughtery
- Lance Cpl. Bryan Kelly
- Cpl. Todd Godwin
- Staff Sgt. Michael Clark
- Lance Cpl. Vincent Sullivan
- Gunnery Sgt. Shawn Lane
- Cpl. Dallas Kerns
- Lance Cpl. John Vangyzen IV
- Lance Cpl. Michael Torres
- Lance Cpl. Timothy Creager
- Sgt. Kenneth Conde
Like their brothers and sisters in Afghanistan, and all those who have fought in every clime and place in past or present, the Marines in Anbar held the line for their nation. During the bloody second battle of Fallujah in November 2004, they would wrestle that city from AQI’s grip. Two years later, the Marines would ally with the Anbari tribes and form a blood bond to annihilate AQI. And thanks to Americans and allied soldiers like Greene, by 2011 Iraq had relative peace and multisectarian cooperation. That would change thanks to other decisions, but there is no question that the U.S. military won the battle, nor is there doubt that Iraqis today have the chance of a better tomorrow.
So remember Lt. Col. David Greene today.
