Cooper, J.

Early Life & Service
John Cooper was a security contractor employed as Director and Founder at Sigma Security Group. Cooper was born to a military family in 1936, his mother working in an arms factory and his father a veteran of both World Wars.

Cooper's primary goal in life was to fill the shoes of his father; he enlisted with the Army out of high school, eventually passing through officer candidacy and earning a position commanding his own rifle company.

Eventually, Cooper was deployed to Vietnam in 1964 in an advisory role, but was later shifted to the command of the MACV-SOG to oversee cross-border operations into Laos and Cambodia. Given control of OPS-99 Group "Sigma," he was responsible for sabotage, propaganda, and surgical strike missions against priority Vietnamese and Russian targets until the end of the war in 1975.

Following the loss of the Vietnam war despite the successes of his group, Cooper would reunite the men from OPS-99 years later, forming Sigma Security Group in 1982. Cooper himself would go on to oversee their first deployment during Operation Tempest in Iraq, and serve as the primary operations director for the security firm.

Later Service & Death
Cooper would oversee Operation Tempest as the primary operations lead for first offensive of Sigma Security Group. In their first deployments working with the Kurdish Peshmerga, Sigma operators would assist in clearing a number of Iraqi strongholds and forward operating bases, paving the way for a full takeover. This cooperation was most notable during the joint raid of Kalae Noowi Airbase, in which Sigma personnel, aided by Peshmerga rebels, targeted and destroyed two SU-25 Frogfoot jets that had been decimating the Peshmerga throughout their push into the heart of the region.

Unfortunately, despite a successful operation, the Iraqi forces had anticipated and accepted the likelihood of Kalae Noowi being lost to the Peshmerga. A SCUD missile, weaponized with sarin nerve gas was deployed to the town, prompting Cooper himself to lead a hasty extraction attempt with four UH-1Y Venom helicopters. While three of these helicopters were successful in landing within Kalae Noowi and extracting Sigma personnel from the chemical attack, Cooper's helicopter was struck by a 9K38 Igla, and crashed within the city limits.

Gravely injured and rendered immobile, Cooper was found trapped under the wreckage of the helicopter by retreating Sigma personnel. He urged them to continue to their extraction, passing operational command of Sigma Security Group to the squad leader in charge of the Kalae Noowi offensive. Sigma operators would later return to the city to retrieve Cooper's body, burying him with full honors atop a mountain overlooking the valley.