The men guarding the Annex were not uniformed soldiers. They were ghosts—former Navy SEALs, Delta Force operators, and Marine Raiders who had traded their service stripes for polo shirts, tactical jeans, and Glocks hidden under untucked shirts. They were the Global Response Staff (GRS). Their official job was "diplomatic security." Their real job was to be the last line of steel between the Agency and the abyss.
As a Libyan militia convoy finally arrived to secure the area, the GRS loaded the wounded and the dead onto a C-130 evacuation plane. Jack Silva sat next to Rone’s body bag, staring at the floor. He didn’t cry. Not yet. That would come later, alone, in a hotel room in Germany.
Oz Geist took a second round, this time to the arm, shattering the bone. Tig was hit in the back by a piece of shrapnel. But they didn’t stop. They couldn’t. They dragged Rone’s body inside, covered him with a flag, and went back to the wall. HD13 Hours- The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
Having secured the surviving seven Americans from the SMC, the GRS loaded them into the vehicles. "We’re pulling out!" Silva ordered. They drove back through the streets of Benghazi, bullets sparking off the hood of the Suburban. One round pierced the windshield, missing Oz’s head by an inch.
Inside the tactical operations center, a CIA technical officer named "Bob" (the same one who had delayed the rescue) was now pale with terror. He kept calling for air support—AC-130 gunships, fighter jets, anything. But the response from Washington was a maddening loop: "Unavailable. Stand by." (In reality, a Predator drone circled overhead, unarmed, streaming live video to the White House—where officials watched the battle unfold but ordered no military intervention.) The men guarding the Annex were not uniformed soldiers
From the SMC, a frantic radio call crackled through the Annex’s comms: “We’re taking fire! The compound is breached! They’re burning the building!”
Finally, after 20 agonizing minutes, Bob relented. "Go. Get them." Their official job was "diplomatic security
At dusk, the GRS team wound down their day. Some worked out in the makeshift gym. Others cleaned their rifles—HK416s, suppressed MP5s, and M4s loaded with 77-grain Open Tip Match rounds. Rone Woods was on the phone with his wife, promising to be home soon for his daughter’s birthday. "I love you," he said. "I’ll call you tomorrow."
At 12:05 AM, September 12, the second wave began.
For the next two hours, the Annex became a bullet-strewn hellscape. RPGs streaked overhead, leaving trails of white smoke. Small-arms fire crackled non-stop. Oz Geist took a round to the leg that spun him around; he stuffed a QuickClot bandage into the wound and kept shooting. Tig Tiegen’s rifle jammed; he transitioned to his sidearm and fought through the malfunction.