Iraq Vet remembers West's last shoot..!

An Exclusive Publication of Human Events  |  Vol. 4, No. 33

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Neil W. McCabe, Editor

Dear Guns & Patriots,

Iraq Vet remembers West's last shot

Nine years ago this month, a veteran of the Operation Iraqi Freedom talked to me about his brush with history as he remembered watching Lt. Col. Allen B. West draw his 9mm Beretta sidearm and fire it next to head of an Iraqi national he was interrogating.

"If I saw him today, I would definitely talk to him and talk about that incident, and tell him I supported him," said Sgt. James E. Barrington, then a specialist, who was a cannon crewmember assigned to the 4th Infantry Division's 2nd Battalion of the 20th Field Artillery Regiment commanded by West at Forward Operation Base Taji, Iraq.

During this phase of the war, the attacks were coming from remnants of the Iraqi Army or paramilitaries loyal to the Hussein family.

Barrington said there were three main attacks, pot shots at guards, mortars and complex ambushes set for their patrols, he said. "In the ambushes, they would really come at us. They would fire RPG's and be jumping out of palm trees."

The sergeant, said West's actions were appreciated by the Joes, who were going outside the wire every day.

"I tell the story all the time because I thought it was great that he was willing to do something like that to protect us," he said. "In our own battery, we had leadership try not to go out and do anything dangerous, not try to help us out at all, so if you see the battalion commander working for it, you fell a lot better about it."

As the two men drove up, West had already taken the Iraqi outside the detention center, he said. They were about 50 feet away.

"Well, we pulled up and we saw Colonel West yelling at this guy," he said.

"We didn't see the guy saying anything," he said.

"It looked like Colonel West hit him and knocked him down, or it could have just been bash up, but I am pretty sure he hit him and knocked him down," he said.

"Then, he pulled out his sidearm, and grabbed the guy by his collar and pointed the gun at him, yelled at him some more, then shot a round off next to his head," Barrington said.

In the tussle, West held the gun so that it fired into a "clearing barrel," a drum filled with sand and staged at an angle surrounded by sandbag at the detention center's entrance, he said. "I didn't think he was going to shoot the guy. I didn't see that happening," he said.

"After the shot, the Iraqi started talking a lot," he said. "There was no translator, so I don't know how helpful it could have been, I don't know how much Arabic Colonel West knows--but, he was definitely talking a lot."

With the man still talking, Barrington and the lieutenant got out of their Humvee and brought the food into the building, he said. "We dropped it off and left."

It was at least a month before Barrington said he realized that West had left Taji, but apparently he left soon afterwards, he said. "The story was never brought up officially, but the soldiers would talk about it."

The sergeant said from the time of the incident to his unit moving out in November, there were no more casualties and the number attacks on the base dropped significantly.

It could have been because of what West did, or the fact that FOB got a Bradley team as the new Quick Response Force, he said.

Barrington said he found out West was elected to Congress in 2010 as he was at his battalion's the staff duty desk at Fort Carson, Colo.

"My first sergeant was just standing there at the desk reading the 'Army Times,' and talking about the new congressmen, who were elected, who were prior military," he said.

"He didn't say the name, but he started reading the story out loud, because I think he was surprised this guy got elected to Congress after the incident," he said.

"I was like, whoa! What a minute! Is that Allen West? --and he's like, 'yeah,' and I was like 'oh sh#t,'" he said.

"Then, I told him the whole story about what I saw, and he said: 'That's bad ass.'"

Heroes like West, famous and unknown, are this country's secret weapon. He has been a great friend of the Guns & Patriots newsletter and I hope both you and he will appreciate the great articles we've put together this week.

Enjoy,

Neil W. McCabe
Editor,Guns & Patriots