THE SOLDIER WHO CLEARED A HOUSE OF ENEMY FIGHTERS, ALONE
On his 29th birthday, Staff Sergeant David G. Bellavia cleared a multi-story house of enemy fighters. On his own.
On 10 November 2014, during an offensive operation in Fallujah, Iraq, Bellavia’s platoon was ordered to take an enemy-held block of 12 buildings. The platoon started clearing one house after another, but in the tenth house it was pinned down by enemy fire. Bellavia went to the entrance on his own, drew the enemy fire onto himself and at the same time laid down covering fire so his soldiers could get out of the building.
An infantry fighting vehicle was brought up, but the high walls left it no field of fire. Bellavia then pushed back into the house and came under heavy enemy fire again. He spotted an insurgent preparing an RPG and took him out. In doing so he wounded a second insurgent, who got away at first.
Bellavia noticed that he had an unsecured, dark room at his back. As he entered it, an enemy came down a staircase and fired at him. At the same moment the insurgent he had wounded earlier reappeared and went for the NCO. Bellavia returned fire and killed them both.
A fourth insurgent then burst out of a wardrobe in the bedroom, screaming and firing his weapon as he jumped over a bed to get at Bellavia. The man stumbled and Bellavia wounded him. He followed the bloody footprints up the stairs into a room on the left and threw in a fragmentation grenade. When he entered the room, he saw that it was full of gas cylinders and explosives. To avoid an explosion, he went in hand to hand and killed the insurgent with a stab to the collarbone.
From the second floor Bellavia moved to a door that led onto the roof, where a fifth insurgent was waiting for him. Bellavia shot him in the back and the legs, and the man fell from the roof.
On 25 June 2019, Bellavia received the Medal of Honor for his courage.
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