Airman's fight-back bravery earns him Bronze Star

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Julius Delos Reyes
  • 95th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. (AFPN) --  Whenever Senior Airman Phillip King looks at his medal, he is reminded of Aug. 8, 2006.

That was the day Airman King, through his brave actions, earned the Bronze Star Medal with Valor.

Col. Bryan Gallagher, 95th Air Base Wing commander, presented the medal to him during a ceremony here July 30.

Airman King, who is assigned to the 95th Security Forces Squadron here, was deployed to Qalat Provincial Reconstruction Team in Afghanistan performing security forces duties with the International Security Assistance Force.

As the Airman describes it, the scorching sun was tingling his neck that day. It was 115 degrees with the dust of the Afghan high desert plains adding to the hellish scenario -- but it would get worse.

Airman King was driving a security forces Humvee in a convoy to assist the Afghan National Police and Afghan National Army in repelling a Taliban attack on a highway checkpoint.

"We knew something was coming," Airman King said. "The village was pretty quiet."

While Airman King's team was traveling on the narrow streets of Ebrahimkhel village, they were ambushed by an insurgent's rocket-propelled grenade. The grenade landed within five meters of Airman King's vehicle.

"All my training kicked in at that point," Airman King said. "I tried to assess the situation around me."

The grenade was just an opening salvo. It was followed by many others and gun fire from at least five machine guns concealed inside a residential compound within 300 meters of the convoy.

Airman King immediately maneuvered the vehicle to cover his teammates from enemy fire. He also fired his M4 and M203 weapons to help suppress enemy fire. Then another rocket-propelled grenade struck his position leaving him with a concussion.

But this didn't deter him from getting up.

"I knew I didn't have to die that day," he said. "I wanted to come back and see my kids and my wife."

As he got up, he exposed himself to concentrated machine gun and small arms fire to direct the placement of defensive fires by ANP troops. This allowed Airman King's teammates to advance to a superior firing position. With small arms fire still coming from a nearby vineyard, ANA and ANP began to mount their vehicles to leave the ambush site.

Airman King adjusted fire against enemy positions until an ANA soldier neutralized the threats with a hand grenade. He then returned to his vehicle and took his team out of the danger zone while taking sniper fire from surrounding rooftops.

In doing this, Airmen King detected another ambush site.

"Driving down the road, I could see machine guns and smoke trails from rocket-propelled grenades," he said. "I took immediate action and turned off the main road to farm land."

But the Taliban forces repositioned to continue firing into the convoy with light machine guns and small arms.

During this time, five Afghan soldiers were pinned down by enemy fire. Airman King maneuvered his vehicle to help the soldiers, eventually freeing them.

At the rally point, Airman King led the positioning of more than a dozen ANA and ANP gunners into an effective perimeter. However, the Taliban continued to barrage the position with machine gun, small arms and RPG fire. They also moved to flank the site to prevent an escape.

A second rally point was established about 300 meters away from the ambush site to request close air support.

"From the time they called in, we waited about 20 minutes," Airman King said.
During that time, the team was just waiting to mark where they were for the air support.

"While we were waiting, we were anxious because insurgents were still firing at us," Airman King said.

Airman King marked the friendly position. In doing this, he exposed himself to high volumes of enemy fire. The arrival of the air support put an end to effective resistance, he said.

"I was glad every one was alive and not hurt," Airman King said. "It seemed like I had a huge weight lifted from me, knowing that I can wake up again."

His actions helped eliminate about 25 anti-coalition militants, saving the lives of more than a dozen Afghan soldiers and police without suffering a single casualty.

"What Airman King did during his deployment epitomizes service before self when he volunteered to deploy to Afghanistan for 365 days," said Master Sgt. Darrin Hooten, the 95th SFS operations superintendent. 

"He sacrificed a year without his family to support the global war on terrorism," Sergeant Hooten said. "He represented security forces, Team Edwards and the entire U.S. Air Force."

The Bronze Star recognizes acts of heroism performed in ground combat, but for Airman King, it was "another day on the job."

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