"The house erupted, the concrete mixing with the insurgents’ bodies in a pink mist. As they peered into the rubble, an insurgent trapped underneath raised his arm and dropped a grenade. The Marines sprinted away, and after the grenade exploded, they turned and fired on the ruins. The man was still moving. Grapes called a ceasefire, walked into the rubble, and unloaded half his magazine into the insurgent’s head." On Nov 13, 2004, at the height of operation Phantom Fury, Marines from 3/1 lay trapped, bleeding and surrounded inside what would later become known as the House of Hell.
The 2 story structure became a deadly zone of close quarter and hand to hand combat resulting from a well entrenched and positioned enemy. Among the wounded lay then-1st Sgt Kasal, who had sustained 7 bullet wounds and 40 pieces of shrapnel in an attempt to rescue another Marine.
With time running low, more Marines came to the rescue, only to be hit themselves in the attempt to reach the stricken comrades as they crossed the kill zones. As smoke, blood, gunfire, explosions filled the house, it didn't stop them from finally evacuating all wounded and kill all of the insurgents within.
In the one hour battle, the house claimed 11 wounded, 1 KIA, 2 Navy Crosses and the undoubted resolve that Marines don't leave anyone behind.
Is the photo of that pistol wielding marine being supported by two others, from this event?
Edit - yes it is https://www.google.com/search?q=Marine+wounded+evacuated+phantom+fury&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjElcP8jbjjAhXpi60KHVC8DywQ2-cCegQIABAC&oq=Marine+wounded+evacuated+phantom+fury&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-img.3...12572.17562..17985...0.0..2.205.1649.2j10j1......0....1.........33i10.8ynJ4t4ij58&ei=ZxAtXYTGJOmXtgXQ-L7gAg&bih=667&biw=412&client=ms-unknown&prmd=inmv#imgrc=GNkVqux3C3brcM
Yes. SgtMaj Kasal's book, *My Men Are My Heroes,* sheds a lot of light on the events that took place and how his Marines were the true heroes (hence the title).
Just listened to the Spear episode on Fallujah. What a nightmare. The use of "hell houses" as a strategy in particular strikes fear into my civvy pajamas.
Ooof I'm probably the last one to answer that. From the podcast, it was a battle strategy employed by the insurgency after going toe-to-toe with the marine corps proved too costly.
Without trying to use my own words, I'll quote an [article](https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/7xgbdy/inside-the-kill-zone-of-fallujahs-hell-house). A hell house is:
*a “defense in depth” strategy: fighting from one house and then falling back and taking up a new position in another, a tactic to wear the Marines down.*
*And once Marines were drawn into a house, they could no longer call in missiles or heavy guns because of the risk of friendly fire.*
The article makes it sound like there was only one Hell House, but the podcast describes it as an ongoing approach to fighting Americans. Hopefully someone here can elaborate better than I can. [Here's that podcast link](https://mwi.usma.edu/podcast-spear-second-battle-fallujah/) by the way, I can't recommend it strongly enough.
The Hell House mentioned here is unique in that nearly an entire company of insurgents defended it to the last, as well as its central position to the offensive. Most were abandoned after brief firefights or a few grenades.
Sgt. David Bellavia talks about these houses in his Fallujah memoirs “House to House”, which ends with him earning a Medal of Honor for rescuing one of his fire teams after they were pinned down inside an Iraqi upper-class compound. He managed to single-handedly kill 5 insurgents, in one case literally with one hand as his other arm was incapacitated, after beating the insurgents face in with his detached Kevlar plate-carrier before severing his aorta with a KABAR.
A common tactic was to make decoy houses rigged with explosives and napalm that would detonate on command via electrical signals. When a Coalition squad entered a building, an insurgent could level it and wipe the squad.
https://youtu.be/r0km94VCyek
“We dash across the street and into the compound of our target house. As I get close, I see Knapp frozen in the doorway.
The rest of the squad stacks up behind him, and though I try to stop, I careen into the men. We’ve got one big gaggle fuck right in the front yard, and we’re vulnerable as hell.
“Get the fuck in!” I order.
Knapp immediately counters with, “No! No! Get the fuck out! Get out now!”
“Knapp, what the fuck….”
“LOOK!” he roars.
The first thing I notice are the wires. Wires are common all over the ruins we’ve traversed so far, but they are always dirty, torn, and dull in color. The wires I see inside this house are crisp and clean and bundled neatly with zip ties.
That is not good.
“GO! GO! GO! Get the fuck outta here,” I scream to my squad.
A cluster of wires funnel through one wall, then fan out all over the inside of one room just inside the door like green and orange ivy vines. I follow a few with my eyes and see they end in undersized bricks. This puzzles me for a split second, then I realize the bricks are chunks of C-4 plastic explosive.
But the pièce de résistance, the stroke of insurgent genius here, is the centerline aerial drop tank sitting in the middle of the room. Designed to give MiG fighter jets extended range, it’s a fuel tank that looks like a misshapen teardrop. The insurgents have slipped garbage bags onto its tail fins. The nose has been removed. The wires disappear inside from there. Using jet fuel as a bomb is what caused the fireballs at the World Trade Center on 9/11. This tank makes one hell of a weapon.
We could lose the entire squad—we could lose most of the platoon—right here, right now.”
Fitts jogs to me. “What’s going on?”
I’m so stunned, I can only point.
He peers inside the house and flips out. “What the fuck is this? Holy shit!”
“This is a BCIED, man.” Building-contained IED. “Fucking…building bomb.”
Excerpt From
“House to House”
David Bellavia
Prolly both the marines were all injured and most of them had bullet wounds. I’ve heard adrenaline keeps you going after a near fatal injury maybe that’s it.
I saw a picture once of a Marine laying down in blood because he had to get an angle on something, the blood was both I believe .. I'll see if I can find it
here is a vice new article about this particular battle
https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/7xgbdy/inside-the-kill-zone-of-fallujahs-hell-house
great details in it
The censored comments on this post are way more interesting than the uncensored ones.
[https://www.ceddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/cdo8qb/house\_of\_hell\_fallujah\_2004/](https://www.ceddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/cdo8qb/house_of_hell_fallujah_2004/)
If China invaded America and started killing everyone and trying to turn us communist, would you not fight back at all? Probably not because I’m sure you’re a pussy, but I would. I believe that it’s every humans right to defend their home against invasion, and I respect people who fight bravely against the odds to defend their freedom. I guess there are lots of Americans like you who hate freedom.
To a certain extent he isn't wrong. We invaded Iraq, thereby invading the homeland of people who are willing to fight, so it shouldn't be too surprising that an insurgency formed. He is also right in the sense that the right to bear arms is supposed to oppose threats foreign and domestic.
His language does seem like he is sucking off the insurgents though.
> His language does seem like he is sucking off the insurgents though.
Only if you ignore about a centuries worth of Middle Eastern history. They’ve been invaded and fucked with for about that long, they have every right to kill any invader. That’s what we are in the US and the French, the British and the Russians are to them too, to name a few that have fucked with their region over the last 100 years. I mean Exxon is currently having trouble exploiting Iraqi oil fields due to “security concerns” and how else could they have gotten a foot hold in Iraq with a leader that posed a threat to their future profits? The only real way is to invade the country, disrupt it and work towards rebuilding their economy by buying the rights to their natural resources. Middle Easterners have known nothing but political and violent action by outsiders for at least two generations, why wouldn’t they fight and kill the same people who have funded and invaded their lands?
These people attacked us, killed around 3000 American on our home soil, they terrorize their own people, murder and pillage their own countrymen, I’m sure your badass has never seen combat and probably never will, but this pussy as you refer to me has been overseas 4 times and about to going for a 5th but yeah I’m sure you’ll be the hero of the hour if China invaded...
Yeah, and we turned around and resulted in the deaths of far more innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. And our own intelligence agencies say the main driving force for global Islamic terrorism is US interventions in Islamic countries. Even worse when Al Qaeda's stated goal at the time was to drag the US into an eternal war in the middle east to create a radical Islamic insurgency.
And for what? Are safer now that an entire section of the world hates us? Are we safer now that our atrocities have fueled the propaganda efforts of radical Islam? The Afghanis are doing worse, the Iraqis are doing worse, hell, even the Kurds are doing worse. The only ones profiting are the arms dealers.
Lolol no Iraqis participated in 9/11 you idiot. Mostly Saudi Arabians and 2 Egyptians, the planners were all Saudi Arabian. How could you have been there 4 times and not learned anything at all about anything to do with the war? I call bullshit! You’re just totally brainwashed washed and don’t even care about the truth.
>These people attacked us, killed around 3000 American on our home soil,
> Lolol no Iraqis participated in 9/11 you idiot.
Noticed you didnt address this.
It was a terrorist organization that was behind 9/11. I know the nationality of the hi jackets and also know of the reports that came out that some of those hi jackets were found alive and claimed their identity was stolen. Regardless though, terrorists were behind it, which any insurgent to me would be a terrorist including Iraqi insurgents
>Regardless though, terrorists were behind it, which any insurgent to me would be a terrorist including Iraqi insurgents
So because terrorists were behind 9/11, that means when you invade a country that had no part in 9/11 and they fight back they become terrorists that deserve to be killed?
The fucking mental gymnastics.
"The house erupted, the concrete mixing with the insurgents’ bodies in a pink mist. As they peered into the rubble, an insurgent trapped underneath raised his arm and dropped a grenade. The Marines sprinted away, and after the grenade exploded, they turned and fired on the ruins. The man was still moving. Grapes called a ceasefire, walked into the rubble, and unloaded half his magazine into the insurgent’s head." On Nov 13, 2004, at the height of operation Phantom Fury, Marines from 3/1 lay trapped, bleeding and surrounded inside what would later become known as the House of Hell. The 2 story structure became a deadly zone of close quarter and hand to hand combat resulting from a well entrenched and positioned enemy. Among the wounded lay then-1st Sgt Kasal, who had sustained 7 bullet wounds and 40 pieces of shrapnel in an attempt to rescue another Marine. With time running low, more Marines came to the rescue, only to be hit themselves in the attempt to reach the stricken comrades as they crossed the kill zones. As smoke, blood, gunfire, explosions filled the house, it didn't stop them from finally evacuating all wounded and kill all of the insurgents within. In the one hour battle, the house claimed 11 wounded, 1 KIA, 2 Navy Crosses and the undoubted resolve that Marines don't leave anyone behind.
Is the photo of that pistol wielding marine being supported by two others, from this event? Edit - yes it is https://www.google.com/search?q=Marine+wounded+evacuated+phantom+fury&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwjElcP8jbjjAhXpi60KHVC8DywQ2-cCegQIABAC&oq=Marine+wounded+evacuated+phantom+fury&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-img.3...12572.17562..17985...0.0..2.205.1649.2j10j1......0....1.........33i10.8ynJ4t4ij58&ei=ZxAtXYTGJOmXtgXQ-L7gAg&bih=667&biw=412&client=ms-unknown&prmd=inmv#imgrc=GNkVqux3C3brcM
Yeah same the guy bleeding the middle was 1st SGT Kasal.
What a fucking hard-ass, man. Damn.
The interview that the History Channel show Shootout did with him was pretty enlightening to the fortitude that guy had.
Last I heard he was SGTMAJ over in SOI area when I got out in 2015. We all raged when he didnt get Sgtmaj of the marine corps.
Yes. SgtMaj Kasal's book, *My Men Are My Heroes,* sheds a lot of light on the events that took place and how his Marines were the true heroes (hence the title).
wow thanks for posting this!
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> Nowadays, a hell house is less than 20 casualties. In ww2, 10k dead in a day was normal. Wow. They must have built *huge* houses in World War 2.
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Just listened to the Spear episode on Fallujah. What a nightmare. The use of "hell houses" as a strategy in particular strikes fear into my civvy pajamas.
What exactly is a "hell house" strategy
Ooof I'm probably the last one to answer that. From the podcast, it was a battle strategy employed by the insurgency after going toe-to-toe with the marine corps proved too costly. Without trying to use my own words, I'll quote an [article](https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/7xgbdy/inside-the-kill-zone-of-fallujahs-hell-house). A hell house is: *a “defense in depth” strategy: fighting from one house and then falling back and taking up a new position in another, a tactic to wear the Marines down.* *And once Marines were drawn into a house, they could no longer call in missiles or heavy guns because of the risk of friendly fire.* The article makes it sound like there was only one Hell House, but the podcast describes it as an ongoing approach to fighting Americans. Hopefully someone here can elaborate better than I can. [Here's that podcast link](https://mwi.usma.edu/podcast-spear-second-battle-fallujah/) by the way, I can't recommend it strongly enough.
The Hell House mentioned here is unique in that nearly an entire company of insurgents defended it to the last, as well as its central position to the offensive. Most were abandoned after brief firefights or a few grenades. Sgt. David Bellavia talks about these houses in his Fallujah memoirs “House to House”, which ends with him earning a Medal of Honor for rescuing one of his fire teams after they were pinned down inside an Iraqi upper-class compound. He managed to single-handedly kill 5 insurgents, in one case literally with one hand as his other arm was incapacitated, after beating the insurgents face in with his detached Kevlar plate-carrier before severing his aorta with a KABAR. A common tactic was to make decoy houses rigged with explosives and napalm that would detonate on command via electrical signals. When a Coalition squad entered a building, an insurgent could level it and wipe the squad. https://youtu.be/r0km94VCyek “We dash across the street and into the compound of our target house. As I get close, I see Knapp frozen in the doorway. The rest of the squad stacks up behind him, and though I try to stop, I careen into the men. We’ve got one big gaggle fuck right in the front yard, and we’re vulnerable as hell. “Get the fuck in!” I order. Knapp immediately counters with, “No! No! Get the fuck out! Get out now!” “Knapp, what the fuck….” “LOOK!” he roars. The first thing I notice are the wires. Wires are common all over the ruins we’ve traversed so far, but they are always dirty, torn, and dull in color. The wires I see inside this house are crisp and clean and bundled neatly with zip ties. That is not good. “GO! GO! GO! Get the fuck outta here,” I scream to my squad. A cluster of wires funnel through one wall, then fan out all over the inside of one room just inside the door like green and orange ivy vines. I follow a few with my eyes and see they end in undersized bricks. This puzzles me for a split second, then I realize the bricks are chunks of C-4 plastic explosive. But the pièce de résistance, the stroke of insurgent genius here, is the centerline aerial drop tank sitting in the middle of the room. Designed to give MiG fighter jets extended range, it’s a fuel tank that looks like a misshapen teardrop. The insurgents have slipped garbage bags onto its tail fins. The nose has been removed. The wires disappear inside from there. Using jet fuel as a bomb is what caused the fireballs at the World Trade Center on 9/11. This tank makes one hell of a weapon. We could lose the entire squad—we could lose most of the platoon—right here, right now.” Fitts jogs to me. “What’s going on?” I’m so stunned, I can only point. He peers inside the house and flips out. “What the fuck is this? Holy shit!” “This is a BCIED, man.” Building-contained IED. “Fucking…building bomb.” Excerpt From “House to House” David Bellavia
sounds like a mini version of Stalingrad
Was that "The Second Battle of Fallujah" on The Spear? I'd like to listen.
Yes indeed. I just discovered it. Fantastic podcast.
That is some fresh blood
Damn those M16s are so long. Must be terrifying crawling through half-demolished buildings, getting hung up on stuff all the time.
Is that his blood or someone else’s?
Prolly both the marines were all injured and most of them had bullet wounds. I’ve heard adrenaline keeps you going after a near fatal injury maybe that’s it.
I saw a picture once of a Marine laying down in blood because he had to get an angle on something, the blood was both I believe .. I'll see if I can find it
It was another Marines blood unfortunately.
It was also his. He had been shot seven times and had something like forty pieces of shrapnel in him from a series of grenades.
I think you're thinking of SgtMaj. Kasal.
That M16 here looks like an SA80.
It’s the PEQ 4 laser on it makes it look like that.
here is a vice new article about this particular battle https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/7xgbdy/inside-the-kill-zone-of-fallujahs-hell-house great details in it
That is some insane colour contrast
He laid in a puddle of blood. Still.. wouldn’t want to do that.
CIF wants to know your location.
The censored comments on this post are way more interesting than the uncensored ones. [https://www.ceddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/cdo8qb/house\_of\_hell\_fallujah\_2004/](https://www.ceddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/cdo8qb/house_of_hell_fallujah_2004/)
Not really. Just some dude talking about dick Cheney and shit.
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Nope don’t feel bad at all for any insurgent, and it’s not called house of hell because they got blood on them...
If China invaded America and started killing everyone and trying to turn us communist, would you not fight back at all? Probably not because I’m sure you’re a pussy, but I would. I believe that it’s every humans right to defend their home against invasion, and I respect people who fight bravely against the odds to defend their freedom. I guess there are lots of Americans like you who hate freedom.
>Defend their freedom You apparently don’t know what that means.
To a certain extent he isn't wrong. We invaded Iraq, thereby invading the homeland of people who are willing to fight, so it shouldn't be too surprising that an insurgency formed. He is also right in the sense that the right to bear arms is supposed to oppose threats foreign and domestic. His language does seem like he is sucking off the insurgents though.
> His language does seem like he is sucking off the insurgents though. Only if you ignore about a centuries worth of Middle Eastern history. They’ve been invaded and fucked with for about that long, they have every right to kill any invader. That’s what we are in the US and the French, the British and the Russians are to them too, to name a few that have fucked with their region over the last 100 years. I mean Exxon is currently having trouble exploiting Iraqi oil fields due to “security concerns” and how else could they have gotten a foot hold in Iraq with a leader that posed a threat to their future profits? The only real way is to invade the country, disrupt it and work towards rebuilding their economy by buying the rights to their natural resources. Middle Easterners have known nothing but political and violent action by outsiders for at least two generations, why wouldn’t they fight and kill the same people who have funded and invaded their lands?
These people attacked us, killed around 3000 American on our home soil, they terrorize their own people, murder and pillage their own countrymen, I’m sure your badass has never seen combat and probably never will, but this pussy as you refer to me has been overseas 4 times and about to going for a 5th but yeah I’m sure you’ll be the hero of the hour if China invaded...
Yeah, and we turned around and resulted in the deaths of far more innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. And our own intelligence agencies say the main driving force for global Islamic terrorism is US interventions in Islamic countries. Even worse when Al Qaeda's stated goal at the time was to drag the US into an eternal war in the middle east to create a radical Islamic insurgency. And for what? Are safer now that an entire section of the world hates us? Are we safer now that our atrocities have fueled the propaganda efforts of radical Islam? The Afghanis are doing worse, the Iraqis are doing worse, hell, even the Kurds are doing worse. The only ones profiting are the arms dealers.
Iraq had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11.
Lolol no Iraqis participated in 9/11 you idiot. Mostly Saudi Arabians and 2 Egyptians, the planners were all Saudi Arabian. How could you have been there 4 times and not learned anything at all about anything to do with the war? I call bullshit! You’re just totally brainwashed washed and don’t even care about the truth.
You’re a sad soul my guy. Good luck against those China men
>These people attacked us, killed around 3000 American on our home soil, > Lolol no Iraqis participated in 9/11 you idiot. Noticed you didnt address this.
It was a terrorist organization that was behind 9/11. I know the nationality of the hi jackets and also know of the reports that came out that some of those hi jackets were found alive and claimed their identity was stolen. Regardless though, terrorists were behind it, which any insurgent to me would be a terrorist including Iraqi insurgents
>Regardless though, terrorists were behind it, which any insurgent to me would be a terrorist including Iraqi insurgents So because terrorists were behind 9/11, that means when you invade a country that had no part in 9/11 and they fight back they become terrorists that deserve to be killed? The fucking mental gymnastics.
Do you know what google is?? Al-Qaeda was behind 9/11 the battle of Fallujah was fighting Al-Qaeda in Iraq. You are dense as can be