Niger video shows U.S. forces’ escape

Fleeing soldiers under fire wrote messages home

WASHINGTON — Dramatic new drone video of the Niger ambush that killed four American soldiers shows U.S. forces trying to escape and fighting for their lives after friendly Nigerien forces mistook them for the enemy.

It describes how the fleeing troops set up a quick defensive location on the edge of a swamp and wrote messages home to their loved ones.

The video, released by the Pentagon with explanatory narration, includes more than 10 minutes of drone footage, file tape and animation that wasn’t made public last week when the military released a portion of the final report on the October attack. The video depicts for the first time the harrowing hours as troops held off their enemy and waited for rescue.

There were 46 U.S. and Nigerien troops out on the initial mission in the west African nation, going after but failing to find a high-value militant, then collecting intelligence at a site where the insurgent had been. The team was heading home when it was attacked by more than 100 militants just outside the village of Tongo Tongo. During the firefight, a number of the Nigeriens escaped by truck, but four U.S. and four Nigerien troops were gunned down.

The video depicts seven American forces and four Nigeriens fleeing on foot under heavy mortar and small arms fire. They crossed through a swamp and at about 12:50 p.m. on Oct. 4, hunkered down at the edge of a clearing.

“They wrote short messages to loved ones on personal devices, believing they would soon be overrun,” the video narrator says. Just 21 minutes later, two unarmed U.S. drones arrived overhead and established contact with the team, and after another seven minutes, two French Mirage aircraft screamed across the sky at a low altitude in a show of force to frighten the enemy. A number of militants can be seen moving quickly away.

After nearly three hours of waiting, French helicopters arrived and an American soldier can be seen on the video moving out into the clearing, waving a U.S. flag to help the aircraft locate them.

The video shifts to an overhead view near the team waiting at the clearing and two trucks can be seen moving into the frame. The drone video zooms in on them, and flashes of gunfire light up the screen.

A friendly Nigerien response force had arrived to help and mistook the team for enemy insurgents. For 48 seconds, they fired on the team with automatic weapons until they were able to confirm their identity. No one was injured in that brief gunfight.

During the same time, U.S. Africa Command had launched a search and recovery mission for the one U.S. soldier who was missing, Army Sgt. La David Johnson. The bodies of the others who were killed had been recovered, but Johnson, 25, of Miami Gardens, Fla., was not found until two days later.