Post by Mr.S on Jan 23, 2007 8:19:52 GMT 7
"IT WAS NOT A GLOBAL positioning device (GPS) or some other sophisticated monitoring equipment that finally ended the run of Khadaffy Janjalani.
Janjalani’s own voice in the early hours of Sept. 4, 2006, as he sang and prayed hymns from the Koran led to the discovery of his hiding place in the jungles of Sulu province.
But it was the instinct of a young lieutenant to immediately attack that delivered the deadly clincher, ending the long and costly hunt for the mysterious Abu Sayyaf chieftain.
At least, that was the view from the side of the hunters -- given by the soldiers who had been deployed in Sulu to hunt down the Abu Sayyaf and their Jemaah Islamiyah allies.
When the Marine reconnaissance platoon led by 2nd Lt. Romulo Dimayuga chanced upon a small group of armed men resting in hammocks in the forests of Upper Tanum in Indanan town, they had no idea that among that group was the country’s most wanted Abu Sayyaf leader.
Dimayuga said he could not forget the distinct, plaintive voice rising from the midst of the group. The man sounded like he was singing and praying while everyone else was asleep, or just resting and listening to him.
The lieutenant, fresh from the Philippine Military Academy and out on his first field assignment, could not tell for sure if the hymn he was hearing in those wee hours of morning was in Arabic or Tausug.
“I can’t understand Arabic and Tausug. All I was thinking at the time was that, maybe, he was the one in charge because it was early morning, almost 5 o’clock, and he could afford to make noise,” Dimayuga recounted in an interview with the Philippine Daily Inquirer the other day.
“It struck me that whoever he was, he must have been somebody who could afford to make such a noise without being reprimanded or stopped.”
Close quarters combat
Using his night-vision goggles, Dimayuga said he could see that some of the men had awakened and had started to prepare breakfast.
He had no idea what Janjalani looked like and the man who was singing had his head bowed, as though he was reading lyrics from a small book.
Only five meters separated Dimayuga’s men and the armed group.
“We could have waved at each other,” Dimayuga recalled. “A few movements and our bodies would have bumped. That was how close we were, so we had to make a quick decision.”
Attack begins
Being the platoon leader, Dimayuga said his instinct told him he should waste no time. Quietly, he signaled his men to start throwing grenades in the direction of the voice, at the men in the hammocks.
The grenade blasts were followed by volumes of fire from Dimayuga’s troops. Roused from their sleep, the surprised group answered with their own fire.
Sense of panic
“There was heavy firing from them. They were used to close quarters combat. Immediately, there were wounded on our side,” Dimayuga said.
Six of Dimayuga’s men, all on their first field assignments like him, died in the exchange.
Then they heard the distinct voice again, this time issuing commands in a language that Dimayuga and his men could not understand, and assumed it was either Tausug or Arabic.
The cries that came from the voice seemed to create panic among the armed group.
Bullet silences the voice
Then the man stood up.
In seconds, a bullet struck him in the neck and he fell instantly.
As snipers, Dimayuga’s men had been trained to aim at specific targets. Who exactly fired the shot that cut down Janjalani, Dimayuga could not tell for sure.
“I can’t really tell whose bullet hit him fatally since it was still dark when we started the attack,” Dimayuga said.
Reinforcements come
Suddenly, Dimayuga had a sense that he and his men had been surrounded by a bigger group that seemed to have come from nowhere to help their besieged comrades.
Dimayuga was wounded by the firing from the reinforcements.
He said the size of the new group gave him a hint that he and his men must have chanced upon a really important personality.
“The way they retaliated indicated that they had suffered a great loss, but at that moment, we had no idea who it was.”
DNA test
Dimayuga was in Ternate, Cavite, undergoing yet another training, when the Inquirer newspaper reached him on Saturday and broke to him the news: The results of a DNA test taken from a body which the Marines had dug up in the jungle showed that the man they took out with a bullet in the neck was the “emir” (commander or chief) of the country’s fiercest bandit group -- a man linked to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network.
He received the news calmly -- and with pride. The confirmation of Janjalani’s death, he said, brought honor to his platoon."
I listened to an interview of Lt. Dimayuga this morning over DZRH and I was really moved and inspired by the Valor and Patriotism of our Soldiers on that faithful morning of Sept. 4, 2006. Here are some facts straight from him:
-His Platoon has been trained specifically to hunt down the ASG leadership
-They have been tracking and stalking their target for more than a month in the jungle before the encounter
-All this time they lived off Skyflakes crackers and river water to survive!
(Mga walang hiyang Kurakot na Pultiko kayo!!! Imbes na may kainin na MRE (Meal Ready to Eat) mga sundalo natin dahil sa pag-nanakaw ninyo nagugutom sila! You lying, cheating thieves, pag-babayaran din ninyo ang lahat ng ka-walang hiyaan at pag-sasamantalang ginagawa ninyo kung di man sa buhay na ito sa buhay na darating! "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living GOD") errr sorry 'bout that, couldn't help myself...
-It seems of the 27, only the Lt had NVG goggles!
-They were outnumbered: 27 lang sila sa platoon nila, Janjalani's group was around 40 (and before the 3 hour gun battle was over almost 100 ASG fighters who came to the rescue of their fallen leader were surrounding them!)
-They had to wait for almost 4 hours while lying 5 meters away from the enemy, waiting for the perfect time to attack
-Lt. Dimayagu's plan was to cause shock, confusion and damage to the enemy with an initial salvo pf explosions. He achieved this by ordering his men to lobe grenades at the enemy. All in all more than 10 hand grenades were thrown at the general direction (remember it was dawn and they were in a dense jungle) of the "voice" they were hearing
-Of the 27 platoon members, 6 were KIA, 16 were wounded (including the Lt) and only 5 were unscathed by the battle
If this is not HEROISM...then I don't know what is!
May God Bless our Brave and Mighty Filipino Soldiers!
Janjalani’s own voice in the early hours of Sept. 4, 2006, as he sang and prayed hymns from the Koran led to the discovery of his hiding place in the jungles of Sulu province.
But it was the instinct of a young lieutenant to immediately attack that delivered the deadly clincher, ending the long and costly hunt for the mysterious Abu Sayyaf chieftain.
At least, that was the view from the side of the hunters -- given by the soldiers who had been deployed in Sulu to hunt down the Abu Sayyaf and their Jemaah Islamiyah allies.
When the Marine reconnaissance platoon led by 2nd Lt. Romulo Dimayuga chanced upon a small group of armed men resting in hammocks in the forests of Upper Tanum in Indanan town, they had no idea that among that group was the country’s most wanted Abu Sayyaf leader.
Dimayuga said he could not forget the distinct, plaintive voice rising from the midst of the group. The man sounded like he was singing and praying while everyone else was asleep, or just resting and listening to him.
The lieutenant, fresh from the Philippine Military Academy and out on his first field assignment, could not tell for sure if the hymn he was hearing in those wee hours of morning was in Arabic or Tausug.
“I can’t understand Arabic and Tausug. All I was thinking at the time was that, maybe, he was the one in charge because it was early morning, almost 5 o’clock, and he could afford to make noise,” Dimayuga recounted in an interview with the Philippine Daily Inquirer the other day.
“It struck me that whoever he was, he must have been somebody who could afford to make such a noise without being reprimanded or stopped.”
Close quarters combat
Using his night-vision goggles, Dimayuga said he could see that some of the men had awakened and had started to prepare breakfast.
He had no idea what Janjalani looked like and the man who was singing had his head bowed, as though he was reading lyrics from a small book.
Only five meters separated Dimayuga’s men and the armed group.
“We could have waved at each other,” Dimayuga recalled. “A few movements and our bodies would have bumped. That was how close we were, so we had to make a quick decision.”
Attack begins
Being the platoon leader, Dimayuga said his instinct told him he should waste no time. Quietly, he signaled his men to start throwing grenades in the direction of the voice, at the men in the hammocks.
The grenade blasts were followed by volumes of fire from Dimayuga’s troops. Roused from their sleep, the surprised group answered with their own fire.
Sense of panic
“There was heavy firing from them. They were used to close quarters combat. Immediately, there were wounded on our side,” Dimayuga said.
Six of Dimayuga’s men, all on their first field assignments like him, died in the exchange.
Then they heard the distinct voice again, this time issuing commands in a language that Dimayuga and his men could not understand, and assumed it was either Tausug or Arabic.
The cries that came from the voice seemed to create panic among the armed group.
Bullet silences the voice
Then the man stood up.
In seconds, a bullet struck him in the neck and he fell instantly.
As snipers, Dimayuga’s men had been trained to aim at specific targets. Who exactly fired the shot that cut down Janjalani, Dimayuga could not tell for sure.
“I can’t really tell whose bullet hit him fatally since it was still dark when we started the attack,” Dimayuga said.
Reinforcements come
Suddenly, Dimayuga had a sense that he and his men had been surrounded by a bigger group that seemed to have come from nowhere to help their besieged comrades.
Dimayuga was wounded by the firing from the reinforcements.
He said the size of the new group gave him a hint that he and his men must have chanced upon a really important personality.
“The way they retaliated indicated that they had suffered a great loss, but at that moment, we had no idea who it was.”
DNA test
Dimayuga was in Ternate, Cavite, undergoing yet another training, when the Inquirer newspaper reached him on Saturday and broke to him the news: The results of a DNA test taken from a body which the Marines had dug up in the jungle showed that the man they took out with a bullet in the neck was the “emir” (commander or chief) of the country’s fiercest bandit group -- a man linked to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network.
He received the news calmly -- and with pride. The confirmation of Janjalani’s death, he said, brought honor to his platoon."
I listened to an interview of Lt. Dimayuga this morning over DZRH and I was really moved and inspired by the Valor and Patriotism of our Soldiers on that faithful morning of Sept. 4, 2006. Here are some facts straight from him:
-His Platoon has been trained specifically to hunt down the ASG leadership
-They have been tracking and stalking their target for more than a month in the jungle before the encounter
-All this time they lived off Skyflakes crackers and river water to survive!
(Mga walang hiyang Kurakot na Pultiko kayo!!! Imbes na may kainin na MRE (Meal Ready to Eat) mga sundalo natin dahil sa pag-nanakaw ninyo nagugutom sila! You lying, cheating thieves, pag-babayaran din ninyo ang lahat ng ka-walang hiyaan at pag-sasamantalang ginagawa ninyo kung di man sa buhay na ito sa buhay na darating! "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living GOD") errr sorry 'bout that, couldn't help myself...
-It seems of the 27, only the Lt had NVG goggles!
-They were outnumbered: 27 lang sila sa platoon nila, Janjalani's group was around 40 (and before the 3 hour gun battle was over almost 100 ASG fighters who came to the rescue of their fallen leader were surrounding them!)
-They had to wait for almost 4 hours while lying 5 meters away from the enemy, waiting for the perfect time to attack
-Lt. Dimayagu's plan was to cause shock, confusion and damage to the enemy with an initial salvo pf explosions. He achieved this by ordering his men to lobe grenades at the enemy. All in all more than 10 hand grenades were thrown at the general direction (remember it was dawn and they were in a dense jungle) of the "voice" they were hearing
-Of the 27 platoon members, 6 were KIA, 16 were wounded (including the Lt) and only 5 were unscathed by the battle
If this is not HEROISM...then I don't know what is!
May God Bless our Brave and Mighty Filipino Soldiers!
Isaiah 35:4
"Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
he will come to save you."
"Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
he will come to save you."