page_title: America's Response Monument
section_title: Soldier photo
hierarchical_section_title: America's Response Monument / Background / Soldier photo
caption_attribution_description: English: U.S. Special Operations Forces, members of Task Force Dagger, and Afghanistan Commander Abdul Rashid Dostum on horseback in the Dari-a-Souf Valley, Afghanistan, in October 2001.
context_page_description: America's Response Monument, subtitled De Oppresso Liber, is a life-and-a-half scale bronze statue in Liberty Park overlooking the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York City. Unofficially known as the Horse Soldier Statue, it is the first publicly accessible monument dedicated to the United States Special Forces. It was also the first monument near Ground Zero to recognize heroes of the September 11 terrorist attacks.
  The statue was conceived by sculptor Douwe Blumberg and first sold in 2003 as a small-scale, 18 inches version. In April 2011, an anonymous group of Wall Street bankers who lost friends in the 9/11 attacks commissioned a large, 16 feet tall version. It was dedicated on Veteran's Day, November 11, 2011, in a ceremony led by Vice President Joe Biden and Lt. Gen. John Mulholland, commander of Task Force Dagger and U.S. Army Special Operations Command during Operation Enduring Freedom.
  The statue commemorates the service members of America's Special Operations forces and their response to 9/11, including those who fought during the first stages of the Afghanistan war. This operation led to the initial defeat of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
context_section_description: During a news conference on November 15, 2001 Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld displayed a photo of ODA 595 riding across a field on Afghan horses. When sculptor Blumberg saw that image, he said he was "riveted" and felt impressed that he had to do something.
  Being a military history nut, an ex-horseman and a patriot, I was just blown away by the image of this 21st-century high-tech soldier on what could have been a 15th-century Afghan horse. It was iconic and ironic at the same time, on so many levels. First, the adaptability of these guys – they weren't trained on horseback. They just climbed up and went ... the first Americans to ride into combat on horses in over 50 years. So I see this picture and said, 'I have to do this.'
  "The visual irony of a 21st-century, high-tech trooper mounted on a ragged Afghan mountain horse, unchanged for centuries, fascinated me." Despite the array of high-tech military gear they carried into battle, it was the trusty Afghanistan stallions that were essential to the campaign's success. The mounted US troops became known as the "horse soldiers".
caption: U.S. Special Operations, members of ODA 595 and Force Dagger, and Afghan forces on horseback in northern Afghanistan during October 2001. This photo  inspired Blumberg to create the sculpture.[6][17]
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