Combat· Afghanistan War (Op ENDURING FREEDOM)
Battle of Sangin
Sangin was among the deadliest places in Afghanistan, a Taliban bastion and opium center in northern Helmand where the British had fought to a bloody stalemate before the Marines took over the district.
The Marines of the Darkhorse battalion moved into Sangin to break the insurgent hold, and found a battlefield so thick with improvised explosive devices and so contested that simply moving outside the patrol bases drew fire or cost limbs. Over a grueling seven-month tour the Marines fought hundreds of firefights, pushing the insurgents back from the population centers at a terrible price, the unit suffering the highest casualty rate of any Marine battalion in the war. By the time they handed the district to follow-on forces, the markets had reopened and a measure of normal life had returned. Sangin became a byword for the ferocity and cost of the Helmand fighting, a hard-won and bitterly paid-for success.
Record no. 2