The Sheriff of Ramadi

In this ground-breaking book, bestselling author and former U.S. Navy SEAL Dick Couch follows the SEAL Task Unit in Iraq's Anbar Province between 2005 and 2007, chronicling the unit s deployment in the Battle of Ramadi. Based on extensive interviews with Army, Navy, and Marine personnel who fought in the battle and the author s firsthand assessment of the situation when he traveled to Ramadi in 2007, Couch details the previously unrecognized importance of the SEALS in winning the fight to control Ramadi. Calling the battle the most significant military engagement in the global war against terrorism since 9/11 and the most sustained and vicious engagement ever fought by SEALs, Couch describes the success of special operations forces/Navy SEALs fighting side by side with conventional forces. Couch identifies the SEALs ability to adapt and evolve in this urban battle space and their code of brotherhood as the keys of their success. Among the many examples of this extraordinary brotherhood is the story of PO2 Michael A. Monsoor, who was posthumously, awarded the Medal of Honor for his bravery in Ramadi.The author argues that the lessons of Ramadi should provide a template for future joint combined cooperation in the war against al-Qaeda and their allies. Once an advocate of special-forces control of battle space, Couch is now convinced of the need for increased interoperability as well as increased language and cross-cultural training, and a more streamlined command and communication infrastructure issues he addresses in the book s epilogue. Couch admits that when he began researching the book in the summer of 2006, he thought he would be writing about the SEALs courage in a losing cause, but what emerged is a startling success story of a joint combined forces/special forces operation that has gone underreported.