SENIOR CHIEF PETTY OFFICER BRITT SLABINSKI

COMMANDER, SEAL TEAM MAKO 30

Do you have reservations about attempting the initial landing on the Takur Ghar peak
instead of landing farther away and moving there on foot?

Why did you decide to return to the mountain to rescue Neil Roberts?

Senior Chief Petty Officer Britt Slabinski was a longtime Navy Sea Air Land
(SEAL) operator and the commander of a team dubbed Mako 30, an elite
reconnaissance unit during Operation Anaconda. During the operation, his team was
assigned to establish a watch position at the highest point overlooking the Shah-i-kot
Valley, a 10,000-plus-foot peak called Takur Ghar.

BACKGROUND
In his mid-30s at the start of the war in Afghanistan, Britt Slab Slabinski was
already a seasoned and well-respected special operator.1 He had wiry build and reddish
blond hair, and often sported a beard when deployed.2 In the words of his friends and
colleagues, Slab was built like a marathon runner, he was quiet and introspective, and
never wasted words.3

1
While now Command Chief Petty Officer (then Senior Petty Officer) Slabinskis full name has now
become part of the public record, three of the key narratives of the battle for Takur Ghar refer to him simply
as Slab, which is why most of the references here use this name.
2
Sean Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda (New York, N.Y.: Berkley
Caliber Books, 2005): p. 303.
3
Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander (New York,
NY: Berkley Caliber Books, 2008): 276.
 Slab also had a dark sense of humor. In one of his first missions in Afghanistan,
he led a team to rescue the crew of a downed KC-130 refueling aircraft. After trudging
through waist-deep snow, he found the aircraft wreckage, leaking jet fuel and ready to
explode at any moment. Using the Maglite attached to his pistol for light, he entered the
aircraft and found a crew member whose foot was trapped under a structural beam. Slab
joked, Dude, I gotta cut your foot off to get you out of here. Needless to say, the airman
started screaming, before Slab said, Im just kidding. Slab, however, thought, Hey, we
could all be dead in a minute, so what else is there to do but put some humor in it? He
wrenched the crewman from the beam and carried him out, saving the airmans foot and
earning the Navy/Marine Corps Lifesaving Medal in the process.4
Slabs path to Afghanistan started decades earlier. He came from a military
family; his father served as a member of the Underwater Demolitions Team, the
predecessor to the SEALs, from 1953 to 1957, but subsequently left the service a
decision he always regretted. Slabs father would regale his young son with his exploits
and take Slab to his military reunions.
Slabs family life, however, was not happy. His father never fully adjusted to
civilian life and became increasingly bitter over time. As his home life deteriorated, Slab
wanted to get away. After graduating high school, he tried college briefly, but found that
it was not for him. And so, Slab followed in his fathers footsteps and in 1986 and joined
the Navy.5
Slab became a SEAL right after graduating boot camp and trained as a medic.
Slab found his niche in this secretive world, joining ever more elite units. In 1994, Slab
became a member of Joint Special Operations Command. Two years later, he became the
commander for an elite reconnaissance unit of SEALs.6 Throughout the 1990s, he fought
in many of Americas small wars around the world. Of note, he served in Bosnia,
where he met an Army Delta Force officer named Pete Blaber, whom he later worked
with during Operation Anaconda.7 Throughout these missions, Slab earned a reputation
for competence. In Blabers estimation, Slab was one of the most proficient operators
hed ever known,8 and a man he inherently trusted.9

OPERATION ANACONDA: THE PLAN

Operation Enduring Freedom, the campaign to destroy al Qaeda and topple the
Taliban that had harbored them, began October 7, 2001. The combination of Army
Special Forces, U.S. airpower and Afghan militias routed the Taliban more quickly than
had been expected, but al Qaeda fighters still remained a focus of operations. By early
January 2002, intelligence reports identified al Qaeda remnants assembling in villages of

4
Malcom MacPherson, Roberts Ridge: A Story of Courage and Sacrifice on Takur Ghar Mountain,
Afghanistan (New York, N.Y.: Delecorte Press, 2005), p. 13.
5
Ibid., 12. Timeline is based on a comment that Slab had served 16 years in the Navy by the time of
Operation Anaconda.
6
Ibid., pp. 12-13.
7
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, p. 203.
8
Ibid.
9
Blaber, The Mission, The Men and Me, p. 276.
the Shah-i-kot valley. Shah-i-kot was located in the mountainous and remote Paktia
province along the border with Pakistan, roughly 80 miles southeast of Kabul,
Afghanistans capital city. (See attached map of Afghanistan for the Shah-i-kots regional
location) Senior U.S. leaders were concerned that the enemy would flee over the border
to Pakistan, as they had a month before during the battle of Tora Bora. U.S. Central
Command (CENTCOM) intelligence had been tracking developments in the Shah-i-kot
and CENTCOMs forces in the region began drafting a plan to target the remaining
pocket of al Qaeda fighters and prevent their escape into Pakistan.
The terrain of the Shah-i-kot valley made for a difficult operating environment.
The valley itself was 5,000 feet above sea level. Two parallel valleys the Upper Shah-
i-kot and the Lower Shah-i-kot ringed by steep mountains comprised the area. The
eastern valley, the Upper Shah-i-kot, was at a significantly higher elevation and was not
populated. The Lower Shah-i-kot (later just known as the Shah-i-kot valley) was five
miles long and more than two miles wide.10 A high ridgeline, which was four miles long
and a mile wide, rose several thousand feet above the plateau and formed the western
wall of the valley.11 It was nicknamed the Whale due to its shape, which reminded the
Army planners of a prominent ridge at their premier training center. The eastern ridgeline
of this valley was even steeper. Its highest point was 10,469 feet above sea level and was
known as Takur Ghar.12 A narrow ridgeline protruded into the southern end of the valley
and was called the Finger.13 The floor of the valley was habitable, with roughly a
couple hundred Afghans living in each of four small villages: Marzak, Babulkhel,
Serkhankhel and Zerki Kale.14 The mountains were riddled with caves, which offered
ideal hiding spots for enemy fighters. Whoever controlled the decisive terrain along the
ridgelines, specifically those on the Whale, the Finger and the eastern ridge, had an
important advantage.15 (For an overview of the Shah-i-kot, with both its uninhabited
upper valley and the lower valley where Operation Anaconda would take place, see
attached map, The Shah-i-kot Valley)
The campaign to crush the al Qaeda presence in the Shah-i-kot would be called
Operation Anaconda, and would involve Task Force Mountain, a hastily-assembled
group of U.S. conventional forces, Army Special Forces (included to equip, train and help
to lead sympathetic Afghan forces) and air support as well as a collection of Afghan
militiamen. Task Force Mountain, directed by Major General Franklin Buster
Hagenbeck, who had his forward headquarters at Bagram Air Base north of Kabul, would
not be the only coalition force on the battlefield, however.
Operation Anaconda included a parallel command structure, Task Force 11,
answering not to Hagenbeck but instead to the overall regional commander, the chief of
U.S. Central Command, Gen. Tommy Franks in Tampa, Fla. In fact, Task Force 11 also
reported indirectly to the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) at Fort Bragg, N.C.
Over the years, JSOCs elite or black special operations forces Navy SEALs, Delta
10
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, p. 43.
11
Ibid., pp. 43-44.
12
Ibid., pp. 43-44.
13
Ibid., p. 43.
14
Ibid., p. 44.
15
Ibid., p. 106.
Force and Army Rangers responsible for killing and capturing high-value targets across
Afghanistan, had become a kind of separate service. JSOCs commander, Maj. Gen. Dell
Dailey, also liked to rotate units and commanders regularly, believing that his command
would bear a large burden in the global war on terror, which he thought would be a
long and arduous campaign. Thus Brigadier General Gregory Trebon, a former transport
pilot for special operations forces, oversaw Task Force 11, playing a key, if also
controversial, role in the campaign in the Shah-i-kot. Slab and his Navy SEAL team
would be grouped under Task Force 11, and would suffer from the personality conflicts
within the organization, particularly that between Trebon and Blaber, whose Advanced
Force Operations reconnaissance teams were a key element in Operation Anaconda. (For
a diagram of the command arrangements, see attached, Chain of Command)

SLAB AND MAKO 30 ARRIVE IN THE SHAH-I-KOT

Slabs involvement in Operation Anaconda began relatively late in the game, on
the morning of March 3, 2002; the battle had begun the day before. The SEAL leader
and his team arrived in the special operations safe house in Gardez, 18 miles north of
the Shah-i-kot. By this point, the opening moves of the main conventional fight of the
battle had taken place with the Afghan attempt to enter the valley turned back and a
furious contest erupting on March 2 between the U.S. 101st Airborne Division and the 10th
Mountain Division troops who landed in the valley and the al Qaeda troops dug in atop
the Whale, the Finger and the eastern ridge of the Shah-i-kot.
Slab was the leader of one of the two SEAL teams code-named Mako 21 and
30 respectively who arrived in Gardez within hours of the start of the operation.
Unlike other SEAL units that focus on direct action (that is, the kill or capture missions
of high-value targets, such as the raid that ended Osama bin Ladens life), Slabs team
was a reconnaissance outfit. To make matters yet more confusing, the SEALs involved in
Operation Anaconda were part of Task Force Blue, or the Navy component of Task Force
11. Blabers reconnaissance unit, however, was based in the Gardez safe house and had
been operating in the Shah-i-kot area for weeks already. For reasons of service politics,
Slab did not report directly to Blaber who was the on-scene commander but rather
to Navy Lieutenant Commander Vic Hyder. Hyder, too, was a late arrival to the Shah-i-
kot. Hyder was an officer with a lackluster reputation and had already been cited for bad
judgment in previous operations in Afghanistan.16 Nonetheless, he wanted to play a role
in the battle that was raging, and Trebon, too, felt that Task Force 11 was in a position to
play a decisive role.
Blaber and many others in the Gardez safe house were caught off guard by the
SEALs arrival. Blaber thought most of the special operations missions would fall to his
own unit. Hyder, however, informed him that Trebon and Hyder had other plans: Mako
30 and Mako 21 would be inserted into the Shah-i-kot that night, replacing the three
observation posts that Blaber had established days before. Blaber called the deputy
commanding general of Task Force 11 and complained that this plan was unnecessarily
risky, but was overruled. Frustrated, Blaber then pulled his old friend Slab aside and
expressed his concern about inserting SEALs who were unfamiliar with terrain and the
enemy presence in the valley on such short notice.
16
Ibid., p. 300-301.
 Slab responded, I totally agree, but I do what Im told, and were being told to go
in tonight.17 While Blabers men had spent weeks studying the terrain, talking to locals
and reading everything they could lay their hands on about the Shah-i-kot (particularly
the ill-fated Soviet campaigns there), Slab and his men would be entering an ongoing
battle with little idea of the terrain and enemy force that awaited them.
At about 3 p.m. on March 3, Blaber and Hyder devised a rough plan for how the
SEALs should be employed. As the reconnaissance team, Mako 30 would establish an
observation post on Takur Ghar, the 10,469-foot mountaintop that overlooked the Shah-i-
kot valley and the highest point in the area. From atop Takur Ghar, the SEALs should be
able to see the operation unfold and help direct the battle below. Appreciating the value of
the high ground, Blaber had wanted one of his three initial observation posts to be set
on Takur Ghar, but Blabers team had been unable to reach the mountaintop when
inserted a few days before, settling instead for a position in the north of the valley.
Blabers plan for Slabs teams insertion was relatively straightforward. By 10:30
p.m. that night, Mako 30 would stage on the landing strip near the Gardez safe house and
an hour later, at 11:30 p.m., helicopters would drop Mako 30 about 1,300 meters east of
the Takur Ghar. From there, under cover of darkness, the SEALs would move on foot to
the mountaintop and occupy it. While intelligence personnel already spotted enemy
positions at the top of the mountain (although whether Slab and Mako 30 were told about
this later became a point of dispute), Blaber felt that the SEALs night-vision goggles,
better marksmanship and ability to call in airpower would allow them to either defeat any
opposition or, failing that, to successfully break contact and leave the area.18
Blabers original plan, however, quickly ran into two problems: The SEALs were
not keen about making the tiring climb up to the top of Takur Ghar. During the afternoon,
Slab proposed alternative insertion points closer to the top, but Blaber argued that this
approach would risk compromising Mako 30s observation post on the mountaintop,
because al Qaeda fighters would see and hear the helicopters land and then attack the
small reconnaissance team as it moved into position.19 At 10 p.m., a mere 30 minutes
before the SEALs helicopters should have arrived, Hyder went to Blaber with an even
bolder planto land directly on top of the mountain. Incredulous at Hyders tactical
naivetone of the cardinal rules of inserting observation posts by helicopter was never
to land on the observation post Blaber vetoed the plan.20 If landing close to ones hide
site was risky, landing on top of it was extraordinarily dangerous as was changing a
plan only moments before an operation began.
The second problem came with the helicopter movement of the SEALs. At 11:23
p.m., the two Chinook transport helicopters landed at the Gardez airstrip and picked up
the SEALs. At 11:41 p.m., however, a B-52 bomber airstrike in the area prevented AC-
130 gunships, aircraft with sophisticated technology able to detect body heat from the
17
Blaber, The Mission, the Men and Me, p. 275-276.
18
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, p. 305-306.
19
Accounts differ on how much Slab wanted to move the insertion point closer to mountaintop. Naylors
account says he pushed for it, while Blabers own account puts the blame squarely on Slabs boss Hyder
and the rest of the Task Force 11 chain of command. See Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 306; Blaber, The
Mission, The Men and Me, 276.
20
Blaber, The Mission, The Men and Me, 277.
sky, from verifying whether Mako 30s intended landing zone was free of enemy activity,
forcing the helicopters to abort the mission and return to Gardez. While the team waited
on the airstrip, one of the helicopters developed engine trouble and needed to be swapped
out with a new helicopter from Bagram. For this to be accomplished, however, Mako 30s
infiltration time would need to be pushed later, leaving the team with an insufficient
amount of time to move from the original landing zone to the mountaintop under the
cover of darkness.21
The SEALs, therefore, faced a choice. Slab argued that the mission should be
delayed 24 hours. Hyder called his superiors at Task Force Blue and requested the delay.
The Task Force Blue operations officer denied the request and said that Mako 30 needed
to be in place, on top of Takur Ghar, that night. Without talking to Blaber technically
still in charge but cut out of the command chain since Hyders arrival or anyone in the
Advance Force Operations unit, Hyder, Slab and the pilots decided to make up for lost
time by landing on the mountaintop, despite Blabers warnings against this course of
action.22
When Hyder was asked by a pilot if the mountaintop was a safe landing zone, the
lieutenant commander replied, It should be no problem Ive seen imagery. Here, the
difference in philosophy between some whose trust in the power of technology and
above-ground imagery (collected by AC-130 gunships, Predator drones and satellites) to
provide information and those who sought additional sources of intelligence was striking.
Peter Blaber had been studying the Shah-i-kot for weeks, with men in the valley as well
as extensive research on the valleys history, but was not consulted.
Of course, this lack of communication may have drawn as much on a clash of
personality between Hyder and above him, Trebon and Blaber as any difference in
philosophy. Hyder had begun communicating with Task Force Blue in Bagram on a
separate radio frequency, without telling Blaber; this meant that not only could Blaber not
opine or intervene, but his deputy, Jimmy, was also cut out of the loop. Jimmy was
receiving intelligence about an enemy presence on Takur Ghar, but, unaware of Hyders
plan to send Slabs Mako 30 to the mountaintop, did not pass it to Task Force Blue. As far
as Jimmy knew, the decision not to land on the Takur Ghar peak already had been made.
Slab was reassured by one piece of news, however: an Air Force AC-130 gunship,
having scanned Takur Ghar with its heat sensors, had just reported that the mountaintop
was clear of enemy fighters. In any case, if Mako 30 was to reach Takur Ghar before
daybreak, a direct landing on the mountaintop would be the only way. At 2:20 a.m., on
March 4th, Slab and Mako 30 lifted off from Gardez once again, headed for Takur Ghar.23

THE INITIAL INSERTION

About 20 minutes later, at 2:41 a.m., the Chinook transport helicopter code-
named Razor 03 neared Takur Ghar, carrying Mako 30. On their approach to the
mountain, the helicopter pilots saw footprints in the snow, and the SEALs reported seeing
21
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, p. 308-309.
22
Ibid., p. 309.
23
Ibid., p. 311.
a skinned lamb or goat carcass and a heavy machine gun from the helicopters windows.
Slab, however, declared, Were taking the LZ (landing zone), and the mission
proceeded as planned.24 The helicopter was met by seven Uzbek fighters and a hail of
machine gun and rocket propelled grenade fire, which knocked out the helicopters
electric system, hydraulic steering system and one of the two engines.25
As the grenades hit, Razor 03 lurched and its troop compartment filled with
smoke and noise. Roberts, a SEAL and member of Mako 30, affectionately known to his
teammates as Fifi,26 was seated closest to the door ramp. Whether he mistook the noise
and shouting for an order to exit the aircraft or simply lost his balance is matter of debate,
but Roberts fell 10 feet into the snow, near the top of the mountain. Later, AC-130
gunships flying overhead reported seeing a group of individuals on top of Takur Ghar
passing around Roberts strobe light. For the moment though, there was little the
helicopter crew or Mako 30 could do: Razor 03 was in bad shape and needed to land. The
pilots tried to fly to the same landing zone where the other SEAL team, Mako 21, was
located. Unable to go that far, the pilots selected a spot 1,000 meters north of it and
conducted a hard landing a controlled crash landing at 2:58 a.m.27
After the helicopter set down, Mako 30 exited the aircraft and decided what to do
next. After stripping the aircraft of all sensitive items and establishing that none of the
helicopter crew or Mako 30 was seriously hurt, Slabs initial impulse was to march his
team up the mountain and look for his missing team member. He even relayed a message
to this effect back to his headquarters at 3:06 a.m.28 Realizing that the distance from the
crash site to the top of mountain made this course of action impossible, Slab called
Blaber, his old acquaintance from the Balkans. Together, they developed a plan. A second
helicopter, code-named Razor 04, would land and, leaving the Razor 03 crew behind at
the crash site, Mako 30 would return to the mountaintop. At 3:45 a.m., Razor 04 arrived,
but by then signals intelligence reported that al Qaeda fighters were closing in on the
crash site.
As a result, Razor 04 evacuated everyone Razor 03s crew and Mako 30
back to the Gardez safe house.29 The dangers of miscommunication had struck again,
although this time not within Task Force 11 but between it and Task Force Mountain, the
conventional side of the operation. 101st Airborne troops commanded by Lieutenant
Colonel Charles Chip Preysler were only 1200 meters away from the downed Razor
03, but because of a lack of communication no thought was given to joining up with the
Preyslers men before heading directly back to Takur Ghar. Now, Slab and Mako 30
would have to fly 18 miles to the Gardez safe house before turning back around to go to
the mountaintop all while the SEAL Roberts life may have hung in the balance. (For
an overview of the Shah-i-kot in relation to Gardez, see attached map, The Shah-i-kot
and its Surroundings)

24
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 311-312.
25
Ibid., 311.
26
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 35.
27
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 314-315, 317.
28
Ibid., 315-316.
29
Ibid., 320-321.
THE RETURN TO TAKUR GHAR
Back at Gardez, without consulting his superiors, Slab decided he would take his
team, return to Takur Ghar and find Roberts. He gathered the team around and explained
that AC-130 gunships had seen Roberts alive on the top of the hill but surrounded by four
to six al Qaeda members. He concluded, Hey, were going back up there and killing
every one of those mother fuckers.30 Slabs team was now reduced to six people (five
SEALs and one Air Force combat controller who served as the teams communications
expert). They dropped any unnecessary gear (clothing, food, water, batteries) and hastily
prepared for their return the mountaintop. Less than 30 minutes after landing at Gardez,
Slab and his men were aboard Razor 04, bound for Takur Ghar.31
As Slab lifted off from Gardez, he contacted the Air Force AC-130 gunships
circling overhead and asked them to fire on Takur Ghar in hopes of clearing off any
enemy fighters from the landing zone on the mountaintop. The gunships, however,
refused, fearing that they might hit Roberts, whose exact whereabouts were still
unknown. Slab argued with the gunship pilots, but to no avail. Slab was running out of
time: Razor 04 was almost out of fuel. He asked the helicopter pilots to land on the top of
Takur Ghar, even without the preparatory gunfire from the AC-130s, and they complied.
As Razor 04 reached the landing zone, however, it was greeted by a barrage of al Qaeda
gunfire. The helicopter touched down just long enough to unload Mako 30 and then
limped back to Gardez. By the time it got there, the helicopter was in such bad shape that
it needed to be towed the rest of the way back to Bagram.32
On the ground, Mako 30 had stirred up a hornets nest. They had landed within
range of two al Qaeda bunkers that began to fire on them as they exited the helicopter.
According to Slabs account of the event, within 22 minutes of landing on the
mountaintop, al Qaeda fighters killed Mako 30s Air Force Combat Controller Technical
Sergeant John Chapman and seriously injured two other SEALs, leaving Slab with only
healthy three men (himself included).33 Slab needed to regroup. He maneuvered what
was left of his team off the peak by sliding down the mountain on the snow. Slab then
called in AC-130 gunship support and requested backup specifically a Ranger Platoon
from Bagram to help to extract his team and his wounded.34
At 5 a.m., the Ranger Quick Reaction Force, the 911 squad on call to reinforce
Task Force 11 units in trouble, departed Bagram in two helicopters, code-named Razor 01
and Razor 02. While the Rangers flew to the rescue and while Mako 30 hunkered down
on the mountainside, between 5:52 a.m. and 6:07 a.m., a Predator drone circling the
mountain observed a firefight between a man clad in desert-camouflage Gore-Tex pants
and al Qaeda insurgents on top of Takur Ghar. While the grainy Predator drone footage is
inconclusive, there are two interpretations of who this man was. One version says he was
an al Qaeda fighter who looted Chapmans uniform and the fight was between al Qaeda
30
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 67.
31
Ibid., 65-67.
32
Ibid., 87-93, 99-100.
33
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 106-107.
34
Ibid., 109-112.
fighters. A second version states that Chapman was not killed during the initial firefight,
as Slab claimed, but rather that he continued to fight on after the rest of Mako 30
withdrew from the mountaintop.35 Either way, by the time the Rangers arrived at Takur
Ghar, the Gore-Tex-clad man was dead.
As the Rangers reached the Shah-i-kot, they had trouble locating the SEALs.
After all, Mako 30 was hiding on the side of the mountain, trying to treat two serious
casualties and directing aircraft overhead simultaneously. Moreover, without Chapman,
Mako 30 was missing its primary communications specialist. For their part, the Rangers
were still fuzzy on what had happened on top of Takur Ghar. They had received only
fragmentary information about what was happening before leaving Bagram and thought
they would receive a full briefing at Gardez before proceeding onto the mountain. But
this was not to be.36 Arguably, it was not until about 11:15 that morning after a series of
radio calls that they fully grasped what had happened to the SEALs.37
Still, Slab tried to direct the Ranger quick reaction force into his position, but was
largely unsuccessful. He watched as RPGs hit Razor 01 carrying the Rangers and heard
the helicopter crash.38 Later, he directed Razor 02 to a safe landing zone about a quarter-
mile away, using a series of radio calls and an orange panel.39 Razor 02 had stopped off at
Gardez and picked up Slabs boss, Hyder, before arriving at Takur Ghar. Unlike the rest
of the landings on Takur Ghar that day, Razor 02s landing was unopposed. By this time,
however, these Rangers needed to rescue the second group of Rangers on Razor 01 who
were fiercely engaged on the top of Takur Ghar, so only Hyder proceeded to move to
Mako 30s aid.40
Due to the elevation, it took Hyder an hour to an hour and a half to reach Mako
30s position.41 With the two injured members of Mako 30 in dire need of medical
attention, the SEALs needed to get off the mountain. Slab and Hyder led them on a slow
march down the mountain, dragging the wounded to the nearest clearing large enough to
fit a helicopter. After a tortuous six hours of travel, they had moved about 1,500 meters
into the intersection between two draws.42 Unable to reach their headquarters via radio,
Hyder used his Iridium phone to call the SEAL communications room in Virginia Beach
to pass on their coordinates and request a helicopter to evacuate the wounded.43
Eventually, the SEALs lower down the mountain and in what was considered a safe
landing zone were extracted (the Rangers, atop Takur Ghar, would not be able to have
their wounded extracted due to fears at Task Force 11 headquarters about having another
helicopter shot down). Thankfully, both wounded SEALs survived, although one lost his

35
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die,, 338-339.
36
Ibid., 332.
37
Ibid., 360.
38
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 204
39
Ibid.
40
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 353.
41
Naylor claims it was an hour; MacPherson estimates it was closer to ninety minutes. Naylor, Not a Good
Day to Die, 358; MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 230.
42
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 366.
43
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 234.
leg below the knee.44 (For an overview of the events of March 4, see attached, Anaconda
Unfolds (March 4, 2002))

EPILOGUE
Mako 30s actions became the subject of controversy. Much of the attention
focused on why the SEALs decided to land on top of their hide site, especially if the
mountaintop was already occupied by al Qaeda. Slab claimed he never was informed of
the al Qaeda presence on the hill. By contrast, the Task Force 11 intelligence personnel
argue they did brief Slab about the enemy situation on Takur Ghar. Regardless of what
actually was included in the pre-mission briefing, most sources agree that the AC-130s
did not spot al Qaeda members on the mountaintop when they flew over the landing
zones prior to the initial attempted insertion of Mako 30.45
A week after the battle, the commander of the Joint Special Operations Command,
Slabs higher headquarters, General Dell Dailey appointed one of his officers, Lieutenant
Colonel Andrew Milani, to investigate the battle of Takur Ghar. After an extended
inquiry, Milani reached a damning conclusion about Mako 30s actions: The mission
was obviously not a success because Mako 30 never got in. Takur Ghar played no part in
the success of Anaconda. It was an unwanted distraction. Al Qaeda soldiers probably
no more than 20 to 25 of them died on or around the peak. The loss of seven
Americans was not a fair trade.46 Milanis report went on to say that the mission was
only successful insofar as the SEALs and Rangers found and engaged the enemy forces
in the region.47
Related to the question of whether al Qaeda fighters were present on Takur Ghar
was a dysfunctional chain of command within Task Force 11 and a lack of
communication and coordination between Task Force 11 and Task Force Mountain.
Within Task Force 11, the replacement of Blaber with Hyder, the latter new to the
battlefield and the larger operation, and the exclusion of Blaber from certain critical,
higher-level decisions about whether and where to insert Mako 30 may have influenced
the outcome of the Takur Ghar fight. Furthermore, Hagenbeck, commander of Task Force
Mountain, did not even know of Mako 30s initial attempt at landing on Takur Ghar until
SEAL Neil Roberts had fallen from Mako 30s first helicopter and the Chinook had
crash-landed on the valley floor. The support for the SEALs and Rangers on Takur Ghar
would draw important air support from the conventional effort in the Shah-i-kot.
Despite the controversy over his actions, Slab was awarded the Navy Cross the
second-highest citation for military valor for his actions in Operation Anaconda.
Slabs award reads very differently than Milanis report. It concludes, During this entire
sustained engagement, Senior Chief Petty Officer Slabinski exhibited classic grace under
fire in steadfastly leading the intrepid rescue operation, saving the lives of his wounded
men and setting the conditions for the ultimate vanquishing of the enemy and the seizing
44
Ibid., 272-273.
45
Naylor, Not a Good Day to Die, 310.
46
Quoted in MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 289-290.
47
Ibid.
of Takur Ghar. By his heroic display of decisive and tenacious leadership, unyielding
courage in the face of constant enemy fire, and utmost devotion to duty, Senior Chief
Petty Officer Slabinski reflected great credit upon himself and upheld the highest
traditions of the United States Naval Service. Great Britain also considered giving Slab
the Victoria Cross for his actions at Takur Ghar as well.48
After Operation Anaconda, Slab continued his career in the SEALs, serving in
both Iraq and Afghanistan, earning acclaim and rising through the ranks. While most of
his missions remain classified, a few have become public. Five days after Operation
Anaconda and a few months before returning to the United States, Slab led a highly
successful ambush that resulted in 19 al Qaeda fighter casualties, as they tried to flee to
Pakistan.49
In 2003, he helped to rescue Private First Class Jessica Lynch when she was taken
captive after her convoy was ambushed early in the Iraq War.50 By 2008, he had been
promoted to Master Chief Petty Officer.51 And by spring 2011, Slab was serving as the
command master chief or the senior non-commissioned of Naval Special Warfare Group
(NSWG) 2, based in Little Creek, Virginia,52 one of the six major operational commands
of the Naval Special Warfare Command.53

48
Slabinski, Military Times.
49
MacPherson, Roberts Ridge, 283-286.
50
Ibid.
51
Andrew Scutro, Lt. Earned a Navy Cross He Cant Wear, Navy Times, Oct 27, 2008. Online:
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/10/navy_secrethero_102708w/, as of January 15, 2012.
52
110325-N-6214F-001.jpg. Online: http://www.navy.mil/view_single.asp?id=99104, as of January 15,
2012.
53
Naval Special Warfare Group Two, GlobalSecurity.Org, January 15, 2012. Online:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/agency/navy/nswg-2.htm, as of January 15, 2012.