Under Distant Stars By Michael Yon

In his book, Gates of Fire, Steven Pressfield offers the following translation of the epitaph engraved on a commemorative stone placed on top of the burial mound of the Spartans at Thermopylae:

Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by,
that here, obedient to their laws, we lie.

He was shot; four months ago—nearly to the day—in a stinging attack that caught the American soldiers driving Humvees through Mosul. But Command Sergeant Major James Pippin realized they were in a “nearside ambush,” and ordered his driver to assault directly into the RPG and machine gun fire. Riding the offensive momentum, the American soldiers dismounted their Humvees, moving into the attack, disorganizing the ambushers. Pippin shot one in the face. Then a bullet found him.

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