In 2003, a small group of Green Berets rode into battle on horseback — in one of the most technologically advanced wars in American history. They had satellite phones and laser designators. They also had horses, because nothing else worked in that terrain. What happened next belongs in a history book. Most people have never heard of it.

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In 2003, a small group of Green Berets rode into battle on horseback — in one of the most technologically advanced wars in American history. They had satellite phones and laser designators. They also had horses, because nothing else worked in that terrain. What happened next belongs in a history book. Most people have never heard of it.

2026/08/21 Report

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"Horse Soldiers: The Green Berets Who Rode Into Afghanistan on Horseback and Changed the War in 90 Days"

On October 19, 2001 — 38 days after the September 11 attacks — a twelve-man Special Forces team designated ODA 595 parachuted into the Darya Suf Valley in northern Afghanistan, linked up with Northern Alliance commander General Abdul Rashid Dostum, and began one of the most tactically improbable operations in the history of American special operations.

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They rode horses. Not because doctrine called for it — doctrine had not been written for this. Because the terrain of northern Afghanistan, which rises to altitudes exceeding 13,000 feet and presents movement corridors that no vehicle can access, left nothing else available.

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