A Navy SEAL, a Quadcopter, and a Quest to Save Lives in Combat

Fifteen years ago, when I returned home after fighting in Iraq, a friend asked me to describe the bravest thing I saw anyone do. I had led a Marine platoon in the Second Battle of Fallujah, in 2004, and had seen plenty of heroism--Marines dragging their wounded off machine-gun-swept streets, or fighting room to room to recover a comrade's body. But none of these compared to the cumulative heroism of the 19- and 20-year-old infantrymen who placed their bodies across that fatal funnel--a doorway with a potential enemy inside--every day. Clearing the enemy from the city, house by house, was a game of Russian roulette played on a grand scale. You never knew who might be waiting on the other side of the door.