Declassified Video Shows Daring US Rescue of F-15E Airmen in Iran - Newsweek
Declassified video from the U.S. military shows the daring rescues of two American airmen shot down behind enemy lines in Iran.
A two-seat F-15E involved in the operation, which had the call sign "Dude 44," was hit by a shoulder-fired missile near a mountainous area south of Isfahan on April 2 amid Operation Epic Fury, the United States' ongoing war in the Middle Eastern country.
The two airmen with the call signs Alpha and Bravo ejected and landed roughly five miles apart as Iranian forces searched for them. Footage shows the rescue of Alpha while Bravo remained behind Iranian lines for roughly two days.
"At one point when I looked up and saw no parachute, that was the most terrifying thing I've ever seen," Bravo said on CBS News' 60 Minutes, his first public remarks on what happened. "So I paused, right then, and I prayed, 'Lord, your will be done. But if I'm getting through this, I need help.'"
Bravo said that he estimates he was falling at between 70 and 100 miles per hour, describing his survival from such a fall as a “modern day miracle.”
Suffering from a broken back, arm, and shoulder, a sprained ankle and bleeding from cuts and scrapes to his head and face, Bravo managed to climb up a 7,000-foot ridgeline where he thought he would be safer.
Asked how he managed to make such a climb with injuries, he replied, “never let a lack of motivation put you on Iranian TV” as armed groups hunted for the airmen following Iranian TV announcing a bounty for their capture.
Declassified video showed a daytime raid six hours after the incident to pick up Alpha, involving two helicopters from the 21 aircraft deployed. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told CBS News the choppers took enemy fire as they carried Alpha away to safety but the job was only "half done.”
As night fell on the first day, Bravo said he send communications when he thought he was adequately concealed. “I sent, 'God is good,' as a recognition of all that he had brought me through,” he told CBS.
Admiral Brad Cooper, commander of U.S. Central Command, said more than 90 U.S. service members were on the ground, several hundred people were in the air, and several thousand served as support in the rescue mission.
When Bravo's message was received, Cooper said, “now we knew he was alive...let's keep planning.”
However, Bravo had to survive for another day with almost no water and no food. Eventually, his rescue was aided by the CIA which used technology to confuse Iranian forces and pinpoint Bravo's exact location.
American bombers and drones hit Iran's Revolutionary Guard forces nearby. Two large search-and-rescue planes landed in the desert and unloaded helicopters capable of reaching Bravo on the ridgeline.
Video shows elite Air Force pararescue operators known in the military as PJs bringing Bravo out on a U.S. Air Force HH-60W Jolly Green II helicopter.
Bravo told CBS News that seeing the American forces arrive to save him was “one of the greatest moments of my life."
Asked how dangerous the mission was, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Dan Caine told interviewer Norah O'Donnell, "Anytime you go behind enemy lines in daylight, it's gonna be dicey.
"But given the threat to 44 Alpha, the decision was taken to boldly go behind enemy lines in daylight to make sure that we could get to him before anybody else could."
Cooper said before the rescue, U.S. forces had flown about 13,000 missions and that “we had air superiority, but clearly we weren't flying over Kansas.”
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Matthew Cannon and Sam Wilson.
