Vets For Freedom - Founders

Founders

• Wade Zirkle is a graduate of the University of South Carolina and served two deployments to Iraq with Marine infantry units as a Lieutenant. He fought in the First Battle of Fallujah as a platoon leader. Eight Marines under his command were killed in action. Zirkle was severely burned by a suicide car-bomb in Fallujah in 2004.
• David Bellavia is a former U.S. Army Staff Sergeant who served in the 1st Infantry Division (Task Force 2-2). He was recommended for the Medal of Honor, nominated for the Distinguished Service Cross, and received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star (v), and the Conspicuous Service Cross. In 2006 he was invited to attend the President's State of the Union address as an honored guest. Bellavia has been the subject to some notoriety in the military for action he took on November 10, 2004, where he singlehandedly stormed a house full of insurgent fighters at night. He not only fought the attacking insurgents off, he managed to kill them all. Out of ammunition, Bellavia stabbed the last attacking insurgent to death with his pocketknife in hand to hand combat.

In 2004, Bellavia was the subject of a Time Magazine cover story titled "Into the Hot Zone" which won a Pulitzer Prize. According to Publishers Weekly, Bellavia secured a book deal with Simon & Schuster. The book was titled House to House, and was published in September 2007.

Zirkle and cofounder David Bellavia, now a writer, returned to Iraq as civilian reporters in 2006 and embedded with the Iraqi Army in Ramadi. Their articles were published in the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Weekly Standard.

Bellavia and Zirkle appear regularly on CNN and Fox News Channel as representatives of Vets for Freedom to offer commentary on the Global War on Terror.

• Co-founder Owen West is a Marine reservist Captain who served in Force Reconnaissance during the invasion of Iraq in 2003. West is a graduate of Harvard College and Stanford Business School. His first novel won the Boyd Literary Award for best military novel. He has written several articles on the military and outdoor adventures and recently won the 2005 Marine Corps Essay Contest. He lives in New York City with his family.

• Co-founder Joe Worley was badly injured in an ambush in Fallujah in 2004. He was struck by an IED and shot five times in a coordinated insurgent ambush. His left leg was blown off in the assault and he now uses a wheelchair because of a badly damaged right leg. He is the recipient of a Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for Valor.

• Co-founder Sergeant Mark Seavey spent one year as an infantry squad leader in Afghanistan and now works for a veterans organization in Washington. In 2006, he confronted Congressmen Moran and Murtha at a Townhall meeting. The exchange was recorded by C-SPAN. He later appeared on CNN Sunday Morning to give more details, and rebut accusations made against him by the antiwar community. Seavey is a graduate of The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina.

• Co-founder Captain Knox Nunnally is a former Marine infantry officer who served three deployments to Iraq. He is a Purple Heart and Bronze Star recipient. Nunnally has been quoted in USA Today, the Philadelphia Inquirer, and has written a piece on his experiences in Iraq for Per Contra Magazine. Nunnally is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland and is a graduate of the University of Texas School of Law.

• Co-founder Major Chris Neizdiocha was a Marine Infantry Officer who was the recipient of a Silver Star for leading a counterattack that killed 23 Taliban fighters in 2004. He has written a tactical article for the Marine Corps Gazette titled "CAAT and Mouse". A CAAT is a "Combined Anti-Armor Team." Neizdiocha is a graduate of Penn State.