Courage Under Fire

Navy SEAL Neil Roberts' final hours remain shrouded in the fog of war, but a new account of his death provided by other members of the special operations forces tells a dramatic and heroic story.

It was the first night of Operation Anaconda. A special operations helicopter was about to drop off Roberts and the rest of his reconnaissance team when it was hit by rocket propelled grenades.

The grenades didn't detonate but they punctured the fuselage and ruptured hydraulic lines that control the helicopter. It lurched and the tail gunner fell out but was caught by his safety harness. Roberts put down his weapon and pulled the gunner back into the helicopter. But it lurched again and Roberts, who was not wearing a safety harness, fell to the ground - without his rifle.

That helicopter limped away and a second one was hit by machine gun fire. One commando was shot dead and fell to the ground, still clutching his weapon.

According to this account, reports CBS News National Security Correspondent David Martin, Roberts crawled over to the dead commando, grabbed his weapon, opened fire on the machine gun, kept firing until he ran out of ammunition, then stood up and threw his grenades. That's when he was shot and killed.

Overhead an unmanned reconnaissance drone watched as the al Qaeda fighters dragged off Roberts' body. Not knowing if he was dead or alive, a rescue force was sent in after him but was immediately pinned down by mortar and small arms fire.

By the time they finally recovered Roberts' body, the rescue force had suffered five more dead and 11 wounded. For Americans it was the worst single day of the war in Afghanistan, although officers say Roberts could receive the Medal of Honor if this version of events can be verified.

To do that, the military has appointed an officer to reconstruct the entire battle by interviewing every soldier who was there and revisiting the ground where Roberts died.