“The Angel of Death” retires from Afghanistan, US aviator who terrorized the Taliban after #11 September
Alison Blake, the American colonel whose post-9/11 battlefield radio broadcasts earned her the nickname ‘The Angel of Death’, announced her retirement last Friday for her final command of the Air Force.
for reason
The airman assumed command of the 1st Special Operations Wing in a change of command ceremony at Hurlburt Field, Florida, and plans to retire later this year.
Black’s 32-year Air Force career began as a survival instructor, teaching aircrew field skills and ground stealth tactics, and ended his service with a wing command at the US Special Operations Forces Center.
However, during the Battle of Kunduz, Afghanistan in late 2001 Black, then a first lieutenant, became the first battlefield ‘Angel of Death’ after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, leaving a legacy in the Air Force and special warfare history, for women in modern combat. With a memorable landmark.
A few weeks after 9/11, Blake was on his first combat flight in an AC-130 gunship flying to the Afghan city of Kunduz. In the darkness below was “Tiger 02,” the callsign of Special Forces ODA 595, a dozen Green Berets who would soon be known as “Horse Troopers.”
As part of Task Force Dagger’s attack on the Taliban, the team fought their way through Afghanistan on horseback. But as Black’s crew raced toward Kunduz, Tiger 02 was outnumbered by a determined Taliban force gathered in a nearby compound.
The birth of the nickname
Once at the top, Blake spoke with the team’s air traffic controller, relayed information about the landscape the women could see from the air, and confirmed target information.
“At one particular part of the mission, we saw a vehicle near our location,” Black explained in an interview for the Air Force. “My job on the AC-130 is to transmit everything we see through our sensors. I was probably the only pilot on the radio, so if I made a mistake, everyone would know it was me. So I was very specific with what I was saying,” he added.
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