Marine Brothers: Siblings serving in Afghanistan

It's not unusual for Marines to call each other "brother," but in one battalion in Afghanistan, many of the troops are also blood brothers. In fact, there are five sets of brothers in the Lone Star Battalion. This posed a problem for their commanding officer, who didn't want to send brothers together into combat, fearing the impact on the family if both were killed in war. Yet for the young men, it's a comfort having their brother at their side. Lara Logan reports from Afghanistan.

The following is a script of "Marine Brothers" which aired on Jan. 8, 2012. Lara Logan is the correspondent. Tom Anderson, producer.

In World War II, there were five brothers serving on a battleship in the Pacific that was attacked by the Japanese. Their name was Sullivan. The Sullivan brothers and their story has become part of American folklore because they all died. That was more than 60 years ago, but their deaths cast a shadow that still hangs over military commanders today and they do everything they can to prevent siblings from going to war together.

There's no official military policy, but it's an unwritten rule. Which is why it may surprise you, as it did us, to find five sets of brothers - all Marines - serving together in the same battalion in Afghanistan.

We tracked them down to the edge of an unforgiving desert in the south of the country, where we met the Beans brothers - two fourth generation Marines who went to extraordinary lengths to go to war together.

We have covered a lot of stories on the war in Afghanistan on "60 Minutes." But this is not a story about war and battle. It's a story about brothers.

Daniel Beans: We kinda felt like we had something to give back to our country. You know, we saw the legacy that we were handed down. And we kinda realized - but without being pushed - but we just kinda realized that, you know, there's so many other people that have given so much more than we did that we can enjoy the life that we enjoy.

This is not the first time the Beans brothers have served together. Daniel, or Big Beans as he's called and his younger brother Joshua, known as Little Beans, were in Iraq three years ago.

Daniel Beans: It was like being with your best friend, you know. We literally, we slept right next to each other. You know, we had...we lived in a little mud hut. But you know, we had a little plywood wall. And I lived on one side and he lived on the other. And that was, you know, pretty much how we lived for seven months.

Lara Logan: Did you talk to each other through that wall?

Joshua Beans: Sometimes I would, sometimes I would knock really softly and wake him up in the mornings.

Logan: You were like his live alarm clock?

Joshua Beans: No. I just, every once in a while I'd knock and make sure he was still there.

The Beans brothers weren't home from Iraq very long when they decided they wanted to go to Afghanistan together. President Obama had just announced he was sending 30,000 more troops to fight there, but the brothers' Marine Reserve Unit in Florida wasn't scheduled to deploy. So they spent the next two years searching for one that was and found the Lone Star Battalion in Texas. The problem was, to serve with that unit they had to come up with a story and an address in Texas.

Daniel Beans: We were opening up a lawn care business in Plano, Texas. That was our reasoning for makin' the move.

Joshua Beans: We had to-- we had to have a reason to move to Texas and join that unit. So--

Daniel Beans: He worked the weed whacker.

Joshua Beans: So I-- that's what we decided we were gonna do is we moved to Plano, Texas, which I still to this day don't know where that is.

Daniel Beans: No idea.

Logan: That's a lotta trouble to go to, to go and fight in a war that not many Americans believe is worth fighting these days?

Daniel Beans: That's the great thing about America. Everybody's entitled to their opinion.

Lt. Col. Todd Zink had an opinion and it wasn't one the brothers would like. As their new commanding officer, he did not think they should serve together and decided immediately to separate them.

Todd Zink: Everyone brings up the Sullivan Brothers from--

Logan: From the Second World War.

Zink: World War II, yeah, yeah. And so I thought it was my responsibility to try to minimize what harm could possibly come to any two sets of brothers.

The story of the Sullivan brothers was turned into this movie called "The Fighting Sullivans," a heartbreaking account of how all five brothers died in 1942 after a Japanese submarine torpedoed their ship.

Logan: There's just something about that bond of family and the idea that, you know, two brothers might not come back that kinda kicks you in the gut.

Zink: Yeah, it does. I could see my own brother and I almost wanting the same thing though, I think, if we found ourselves in the same unit. We're that close. So, as hard as it is, I can kind of understand them to some extent.

Joshua Beans: They have to look at from the other side of the table and say, 'Well, if-- if they were to both die while they were over there then it'd look really bad on us. And their family would hate us.'

Zink: You know, they were very eloquent in front of me, but I still wasn't convinced that this, you know, having them together would be the right thing.

But Col. Zink had no idea what he was up against. The Beans brothers' family is steeped in Marine history. Their grandfather and great grandfather both rose to brigadier general. And the boys' father, Mark, was also a Marine.

Zink: I told 'em I couldn't face their mother if they were both lost, you know. And almost on cue, they presented a letter from their parents.

In the letter, Mark and his wife, Crystal, wrote, "We understand... that both our sons could be lost or injured at the same time but we would rather know that the two of them are together regardless of what happens."

Logan: Was that incredible to you? That the mother and father of these two young men were prepared to go to such great lengths to see them risk their lives together?

Zink: It is kind of incredible. But it may be it's indicative that they really know their sons and maybe what their sons really desired.

Col. Zink and the brothers' company commander, Major Mark Wood, struggled for weeks to come up with a way they as commanders could go against convention and support sending the brothers into combat together.

Logan: You decided what?

Mark Wood: They would not be in the same squad - different squads - and they would not be on the same mission.

Logan: So those were the only restrictions?

Wood: Yes.

Logan: Some would call that a brave decision, considering the risk.

Wood: It's my decision. I would have to live with it.

The Beans brothers had won, but the victory was not theirs alone. There were four other sets of brothers in the Lone Star Battalion and all of them would now be allowed to serve together.

Zink: I've never heard of five sets in one battalion. That's truly extraordinary.

Logan: Unprecedented?

Zink: Unprecedented, yes.

We managed to get eight of the brothers together at a remote U.S. base in southern Afghanistan. The youngest of the group are the Henrichsens, 20-year-old Bobby and his older brother, Cody, who's 23. Gunnery Sergeant Hector Vega looks out for both of them and for his younger brother, Sergeant Francisco Vega, who couldn't make it to the interview. Lance Corporal Matthew Faseler was the only one serving without his brother. Jonathan Faseler was injured during training. Raul Hernandez and his older brother Will are both lance corporals and they also come from a family of Marines.

Logan: Do you worry about your brother out here?

Will Hernandez: I worry about him a lot. When he first got to the unit, I was like a mother hen. You know, he was a Marine but I still feel like, you know, we're little kids again. You know, my mom's telling me, "Take care of your brother."

Logan: What did your parents think about you joining the Marines?

Will Hernandez: My mother actually went into the recruiting office and chewed out the recruiters. So she went in there, you know, raisin' hell.

Logan: So she must have been thrilled when your brother joined.

Will Hernandez: Oh yeah. When he joined, yeah, she was-- she just didn't know what to do. We made the best of it. We comforted her as much as we could. We don't tell her certain things, you know. Or we sugarcoat it. You know. We church it up a lot whenever we call home.

Logan: You church it up a lot?

Will Hernandez: We church it up a lot. And make things sound like, oh, it's fine. Everything's good you know.

This miserable stretch of desert road is where Daniel and Joshua Beans spend most of their time out here. Highway One is the lifeblood of the U.S. war effort - pumping supplies and fuel to every U.S. base across the country.

Convoys like this stretch for miles, up to a thousand tankers long. And the hired guns who guard them rarely wear uniforms.

Daniel Beans: It makes it a little bit nerve-wracking you know, when you're seeing guns, you're seeing weapons, and you're assuming, you know, based on the indicators, that you've got-- that these are in fact private contractors. But at the end of the day, you never know. All you're doing is walking up to a truckload of people with guns.

Logan: And the last thing you want to do is kill an innocent person?

Daniel Beans: Correct.

Logan: But you also don't want it to be you?

Daniel Beans: It's a double-edged sword, yes ma'am.

In this part of Afghanistan, the Taliban still has strong support, in spite of the surge of U.S. troops. But they've changed their tactics. Instead of taking the Marines on in a close-up fight, they're concentrating now on a weapon that costs them little: bigger, deadlier roadside bombs.

This is the scene of a massive attack on the brothers' battalion. Five Marines were trapped inside this burning vehicle. The roadside bomb they hit was so powerful it sent their 17-ton MRAP flying through the air.

Mark Wood: You just don't flip an MRAP. It doesn't happen. It has to be a massive amount of explosives.

Logan: Did you think they could all be dead?

Wood: Of course. Of course.

Logan: What are you telling yourself?

Wood: Bargaining.

Logan: Bargaining?

Wood: Bargaining. I was praying a little bit and asking for it not to be all of 'em. And maybe two, not three, not four, not all five. Just let them-- let a couple survive, please.

For Major Wood, it was nothing short of a miracle that all five men inside the vehicle survived. One of them was crippled for life.

Wood: God was looking after us that day. We were hoping for the best, but we were preparing ourselves for the worst.

There was another event in the brothers' deployment that took a heavier toll. Two of their Marines were killed by a U.S. drone that mistakenly targeted them in the midst of an intense firefight; the first incident of its kind since drone strikes began.

It was Gunnery Sergeant Vega's job to help the men get through it. At 33, he's like the elder statesman and big brother of this group. And even though he's one of four Marines in his family, this was the first time he had been allowed to deploy with one of his brothers.

Hector Vega: Knowing that your brother's here, you almost have to put yourself at a different state of mind if you will. To where, if something does happen, how are you going to react? What are you going to say, what are you going to do? I role play, psychologically prepare myself.

Logan: Do you have a speech? Something you would say to his wife? Something prepared?

Hector Vega: No. How can you prepare, Lara, for things like that? How can-- what can you possibly say?

Logan: In all your years, you've been in the Marines 17 years, have you ever seen this many brothers together serving at the same time?

Hector Vega: No, not at all. It's history in the making if you ask me. I think it's phenomenal. I think it's good.

There's an ending to this story and it's a happy one. All of the brothers made it home alive. The Beans brothers said the experience brought them closer. But for their parents - who wrote that letter that helped send their sons to war together - the worrying didn't stop until both their boys got home to Florida safely.