The commander of 2nd Battalion, 227th Aviation Regiment during Operation Phantom Fury (Al Fajr), Lieutenant Colonel William K. Mooney Jr. and his unit of 16 UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters conducted daily logistics runs in support of this November 2004 combined-joint assault to retake the Iraqi city of Fallujah. At the time, 2-227 was also tasked with supporting the Iraqi interim government with personnel movements, and this included the transportation of Iyad Allawi, the interim prime minister, to what was presumably a meeting with U.S. military commanders in Fallujah shortly before the operation commenced. In this interview, Mooney discusses at length a key mission his aircraft flew during a critical moment of the battle. With the soldiers of 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment (Task Force 2-7) black on 120 millimeter mortar rounds, he oversaw an emergency resupply that normally would never have been attempted. Mooney, however, "hand-selected the best crews [he had] in terms of flight hour experience” and, in the end, the two-Blackhawk flight successfully delivered the needed ammunition. As Mooney stated, “The hardest part wasn’t necessarily the enemy, it was the environment. Battling the low visibility and the weather conditions at that time made things difficult.” About the operation as a whole, Mooney called it “the best example I had personally seen of true joint service communication and cooperation and joint warfighting. It was extremely impressive,” he added, “how the Army and the Marine Corps worked together, both in the air and on the ground.”

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