13 HOURS By: Mitchell Zuckoff

with the Annex security teamInside account of what really happened in Benghazi

Important characters

Jack Silva: main view of story Ex navy Seal best friends with Tyrone Woods real estate business

Tyrone “rone” Woods: ex navy seal good friends with silva

Kris “Tanto” Paronto: Ex army ranger worked with Benton before and good friends jokester

John “Tig’ Tiegen: ex marine Mark ‘Oz’ Geist: former marine Dave “D.B.” Benton: former

marine scout sniper Ambassador Chris Stevens:

Plot

In the book Chris Stevens was working on making relations with the area of Benghazi good. On the night of 9/11 of 2012 government compounds were attacked with heavy forces and a small group of security contractors worked to rescue Ambassador Stevens and others from one compound. This turned into a last stand against an never ending attack on their compound that lead to multiple deaths and a very big controversy that still goes on somewhat today.

Locations

Benghazi, Libya CIA annex before and after Security annex

The story

It starts off with Jack Silva landing at the Benghazi airport to start his last contracting job. Jack meets the rest of the team and what their background is as well as brief on where things

are, what routes they take to get where, and how things work on the small security compound.

They do a lot of missions on making sure ambassador Stevens is safe when he makes appearances. A week before 9/11 anniversary they were picking up intel and signs of possible attack. The security warned them of possible danger and more likely than not attacks.

Stevens requested multiple times that they need more security but was declined saying the few contractors and hired locals were good enough.

The security contractors checked the CIA annex and found many problems with the structure and security flaws for protection. They did the best they could to make it better.

The Attack

Through the day of 9/11 everything went smoothly but when night came an explosion happened at the CIA annex and many militants came in with guns blazing and makeshift bombs.

Stevens could not get ahold of Tripoli which is the capital. Tripoli got back to Stevens after 2 missed calls but lost connection and could not get it back.

The security contractors Jack and his fellow men got battle ready to do a rescue mission but got a stand down order from the Chief there Bob.

Tanto said they needed a drone to see what was going on and a AC130 gunship. A heavily armed aircraft.

The drone got an ok to go but it would be an hour before it arrived. Washington denied AC130 saying non where close enough.

Security team got a radio call saying “ If you guys do not get here, we are going to die.” With that the security team left their compound and headed for a rescue team against orders. CIA security at the compound did their best to fend of attackers. Security Operators got halted by local forces fighting the attackers and went the rest of the way

on foot. After clearing the compound they could not find Ambassador Stevens but found dead body of Sean Smith who was the I.T. guy for the compound.

Defensive

After the GRS team gets back to the security compound they get accountability of everyone and that everyone needs to stay inside. They set up security measures to withstand the impending attack.

Tanto and others see many people through their night vision sneaking up to the compound but can not see weapons so do not take fire to avoid national disaster. A man takes a kneel and raises weapon while at the same time a grenade goes off inside the compound as a signal for firing to start.

A short lived firefight ensued which after led to the GRS contractors to get a bit for a breather and resupply. Cars started to pile in to a parking lot at the south end and shortly after 40 plus men came walking and bounding towards the compound. Oz noticed a man standing to the rear of a parked car and bringing his arm up to throw something. Oz shots the man which was in the process of hurling a grenade which set off the next firefight.

News and politics

The body was found of Ambassador Stevens and brought to a hospital in Benghazi. It was determined by doctors and officials there that it was Ambassador Stevens.

A team of operators in Tripoli were sent to help the CIA workers and GRS operators in defending the compound. With that team was fellow Seal and friend of Silva and Rone

The talk of Clinton and the Islamic video, protests, media coverage, and whether people agree or disagree with the actions of how it was handled will stay to peoples opinions and should not be used I believe in any way towards this event.

Lost brothers and conclusion

After a long break from fighting and the arrival of the Tripoli operators spirits were lifted even if just the slightest. A plane was scheduled to arrive but only to get CIA workers out not the dead bodies or security teams.

Tanto heard the sound of whizzing and radioed for incoming. The compound started to get hit from mortars.

While mortars fired into the compound. Enemies started charging firing their weapons. On top of one of the buildings building C. Stood, Rone, Oz, Glen, and a DS agent named Dave Ubben

A mortar struck the roof of Building C blowing back Rone leaving him motionless, Oz saw no sign of Ubben, His left forearm was shredded and his hand dangling by tendons and some muscle. Another mortar hit the roof shortly after Filling Oz up with shrapnel and knocking fellow buddy and ex SEAL to Rone the man named Glen was knocked face first and motionless as well.

Tig got to the roof of Building C and gave aid to the living people up there and found the dad bodies of Rone and Glen.

A convoy came for them all after the mortars had stopped falling and the firefights were over. They were convoyed to an airport and took flights back to the U.S. two flights were needed and

OZ with his serious injuries instead of being carried out got off his stretcher and walked onto that flight liner.

Additional Topics 1 Writing effectiveness The dialogue was very descriptive and had the effect of pulling the reader in right away. The author did a great job with knowing how the pace went from slow casual conversations

to going into high gear and explaining and firefight happening with shots barely missing the characters you are reading about and getting a connection with.

I very much loved how with the introduction to each character you got a good amount of background to see where they were from and how their personality was.

With that each character had moments of building personality and expressing it more through different situations and the more serious of times that came.

2 Book and Movie comparison

Seeing the movie earlier this year it is still quite clear in my mind. I believe the movie did well portraying how the middle east is as a society and

how careful people must be over there as was described in the book. Obviously as in movies especially war movies it is overly highlighted whenever an

explosion happens on screen I wish they would have toned that down for this movie.

The commentary and explanations giving from the characters through dialogue in the book was spot on. For in the movie you could feel like they were really there doing it.

The trust and also sometimes disagreements shown through the book in between certain people was shown very clearly in the movie and the details were as well very close if not the same as was on the pages of the book.

3 Interview with author

If I was able to have an interview with the author I would first ask what got him interested in telling this story and how he came about getting in contact with the people from the event. Also, I would like to know if he had prior experience with military jobs or life of himself.

Than of course I would want to know how the people he met to talk to and get the info for the book were in person.

Brave men who did not make it back

Ambassador Chris stevens, Operator Glen “Bub” Doherty, Sean Smith, Operator Tyrone “Rone” Woods