SEA BRIGHT -- Anthony DelGatto served in the U.S. military, but never thought he did much that mattered.

"It was logistics. Nothing elite," he said, brushing off his time as an airman in the Air Force and later the Air National Guard. "When I was in basic, I had fired a weapon. But never in combat."

That was before the 38-year-old Sea Bright man walked into Syria one dark night this past February to join a Kurdish militia and fight ISIS.

Now back home after four months in a deadly war zone that killed two Americans who were there with him, DelGatto said he went because he felt compelled "to do something," counting up terror incidents around the world and the gruesome stories of what ISIS has done in places where it has seized control.

"There were these people hitting us. They want to kill us," he said.

He's not the only American who has joined the fight against the Islamic State, despite the risks involved and the government's continuing efforts to dissuade them.

Official American involvement in the ground war against ISIS and its self-described caliphate has been mostly limited to U.S.-led coalition airstrikes and support for the Kurdish-dominated militia on the ground in Syria. But included in those forces have been dozens of Americans, Britons and Canadians. Some have extensive military backgrounds, others have never picked up a rifle, and many enter the complicated ethnic conflict barely understanding who are fighting in the battle for territory still held by the extremist group.

U.S. State Department officials say they are aware of reports that U.S. citizens have linked up with Kurdish groups to fight the Islamic State, known both as ISIL and ISIS. But those officials added that any private U.S. citizens or civilians who may have traveled to Iraq or Syria seeking to take up arms "are neither in support of nor part" of U.S. efforts in the region.

"To be clear, the U.S. government does not support U.S. citizens traveling to Iraq or Syria to fight against ISIL," said a State Department official speaking on background, noting that travel to Iraq and Syria "remains very dangerous."

While the State Department has explicitly warned of the risks involved, there is no specific U.S. law against joining the fight with the Kurds. It is unclear how many Americans are there, but some have estimated the number is over 100.

The Department of Justice did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Finding a battlefield

An imposing guy with tattoos that wrap around muscular arms, DelGatto, who has two children, three-year-old twins, served two years of active duty in the U.S. Air Force, and then another two years in the Air National Guard in Rhode Island.

"I didn't do anything to fight terrorism when I did my tour in the Air Force. It was nothing extraordinary," he said. "I hadn't done anything to make a difference."

He had gotten into some legal trouble after his service in a case involving aggravated assault that led to criminal charges.

"I was with someone who I thought was a friend in Rhode Island, and I was with him when he was trying to collect a debt from his dad's business partner," he explained. "A fight ensued, he was charged and I was charged with conspiracy because I was with him."

DelGatto stands outside of Dive, the popular bar at the Jersey Shore where he works as a security guard. (Patti Sapone | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

After moving to New Jersey, DelGatto worked as bouncer at a popular bar in Sea Bright, as well as the overnight shift at the Stop & Shop supermarket in Point Pleasant. There was a marriage and the birth of the twins, and then a breakup. Evenings into the early mornings were spent "checking IDs at the door," he said.

And while he described himself as "your typical football-watching, beer-drinking American," he said he kept thinking about the terror war and of ISIS.

It was a search on the internet that brought him to a social media website about U.S. veterans fighting in Syria. Curious to learn more, he reached out to the website's administrator. Ultimately, he was put in touch with the YPG, or People's Protection Units, as the Kurdish forces in Syria are known, which has actively recruited Westerners.

"I thought I might die there. The support I would get there would be minimal. If I was hurt or killed I might never come back. But I had to come to terms with that," said DelGatto.

It's no secret that many of those who have joined the militia groups have little experience. There appears to be limited vetting, but months went by with only sporadic contact. DelGatto filled out a questionnaire, and then heard nothing. They wanted a copy of his U.S. passport, before going silent again. They gave him a list of what kind of gear he should acquire, and that he would need to pay for it all out of his own pocket.

And just like that, it got real. He was told to buy a ticket for a flight to Iraq.

A friend and former roommate, Laura Zimmerman of Point Pleasant, still thinks it all was "a little crazy."

"He was really into it, but I was very nervous about him going," said Zimmerman. "It seemed like he was taking a shot in the dark. It was pretty surreal. But it wasn't out of character for Anthony. He did what he wanted to do."

Even DelGatto admits it was something of a leap of faith.

He was never absolutely sure whether he was being set up. There was no way to tell for sure if he would end up in a car trunk, or in a hostage video. "You don't know who you're really talking to. I really didn't know," he conceded. "But my heart was so set on this, I just rolled the dice."

Heading to Syria

Before he left, DelGatto said he got a visit from the FBI. They didn't tell him how they learned where he was headed, but he had obtained a visa to get to Iraq and they already knew he had made two calls to the embassy. They asked him a lot of questions. He said they tried unsuccessfully to talk him out of going, but in the end did not try to stop him.

To get to Syria involved a long trip with frequent stopovers.

DelGatto, who had never been overseas, flew from Philadelphia to Madrid, and then to Qatar on the Persian Gulf coast. While waiting at the gate in Qatar for the final leg of his flight to Sulaymaniyah in Iraq, he spotted another American wearing desert army boots. Warned not to speak to anyone until reaching Iraq, both nodded wordlessly to each other, each knowing without saying anything why the other was there.

They did not sit near each other on the flight, but the two met up again after landing in Iraq and DelGatto said they became close. Rob Grodt had been a former Occupy Wall Street activist from Santa Cruz with no military training, but found his way to the Middle East for some of the same reasons expressed by DelGatto.

"Contributing with the revolution is a very big part of why I'm here," Grodt said in a YouTube video posted by the YPG, using the nom de guerre of Demhat Goldman. "This is a fire that may have started here, but it can kindle elsewhere."

Carrying a heavy rucksack loaded with body armor, a helmet and fatigues, DelGatto said he and Grodt were smuggled by YPG operatives into the mountains of Iraq and then crossed into Syria after a 6-hour hike in the dark.

When he thought they couldn't go any further, they came to a road where there were trucks and men waiting for them.

DelGatto said they called out in Kurdish.

"Dem bas Heval!" Hello friends!

Basic training

The Kurds, who have long fought in the region for autonomy, have become a dominant force in the fight against ISIS from the territory they hold in Rojava, a Kurdish-controlled area in northern Syria.

Westerners joining YPG must spend a month in "the academy," learning how to handle weapons, while being taught some basic language skills and battlefield tactics. While they drill for combat, not all see action. When they arrived at the camp, Grodt and DelGatto met Nick Warden, of Depew, New York, who had served two tours in Afghanistan with the U.S. Army, and Luke Rutter, a young British man with no military background.

DelGatto in Syria. (Photo courtesy of Anthony DelGatto)

They came to calling themselves the "50/50."

It was a dark joke out of the movie "War Dogs," in a scene where two in-over-their-heads American arms dealers find themselves in a rickety truck accompanying a cargo of weapons across the Iraqi desert and one wonders aloud: "Hey, seriously. Is this safe?"

The local driver takes a drag on a cigarette. "Yes, very safe," he assures them in heavily accented English. "50/50."

Like 50 percent they live, and 50 percent they die.

It became somewhat of a macabre motto for the group after coming upon the movie on Warden's laptop while they were in Rojava.

"We got a kick out of it," DelGatto said. "A YPG commander said, 'You guys--you guys are the 50/50.' It just stuck. We started carving it into the butts of our rifles and putting it on our patches."

DelGatto said he learned how to strip down a Soviet Kalashnikov rifle and because of his size, was trained with a heavier Russian-made PKM belt-fed machine gun.

Still, he said it was not easy.

"The language barrier was tough, but Rob picked up Kurmanji quick and he got us through," DelGatto said, referring to the ethnic Kurdish dialect many spoke. "There were times when there was no food. Or water. Nick got really sick drinking the water."

For a brief time, DelGatto said he was sent to Al-Shadadi, but pushed to be moved to the Raqqa region of Syria, where YPG forces were preparing to face ISIS over control of the Tabqa Dam.

A former colleague of DelGatto who remains in northern Syria and did not want to be identified because of concerns over his own safety, was interviewed by phone through an internet connection and corroborated that DelGatto had participated in the Tagqa fight.

"He was a soldier. And he fought here," he confirmed.

A deadly war zone

DelGatto did not deny there were periods of fear.

In cell phone videos he posted on YouTube, there are episodes punctuated by the sharp clackety-clack of automatic weapons fire, as he and others hunker down behind concrete walls, or make their way through buildings under apparent sniper fire.

"When we first had a car bomb I was afraid. But then the fear later turned into anger. When someone is driving a car bomb at you and kill themselves trying to kill you--creating a crater in the process--it's an eye-opener," he said.

ISIS fighters overwhelmed by the Kurdish forces would often try to blend into the population. DelGatto said some would shave off their beards and wipe their cell phones, but would be betrayed by the lack of tan lines around their face where the beard had grown, as well as bruises on their shoulders from carrying heavy packs.

Four months in, DelGatto said he learned his mother had died. And personal issues involving his children became a growing concern. "I had a hard time focusing on anything. Every time I closed my eyes, I thought of my kids," he recounted.

While he had agreed to a six-month commitment, he said it became increasingly important for him to come home and the YPG arranged for transportation for him back to Iraq.

After he made it back across the border into Iraq, he discovered a note from Grodt in his pack:

"Handle what you have to handle and get your ass back here. See you in Raqqa, bitch..."

Less than two months later, Grodt, 28, Warden, 29, and Rutter, 22, were all killed in an ISIS ambush on the outskirts of Raqqa. One apparently stepped on a landmine and the others were hit by rocket-propelled grenades, according to YPG press reports.

DelGatto said he has no doubt if he had stayed, he would have been with them at the time.

"Absolutely 100 percent," he said. "We were really tight."

Back home

DelGatto these days is back at work in Sea Bright. He talks often of Grodt and Warden, who he came to know well. Last month he attended a memorial service for Grodt in Zuccotti Park in New York, where the Occupy Wall Street movement began.

"My goal is to tell the world about Nick and Rob and our group, not to glorify us, but to let the public know about what is happening," he said. "I miss talking to them. I definitely miss them."

And he talks of going back.

"Yeah, for sure," he said softly. "I felt like I had purpose there."

Ted Sherman may be reached at tsherman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TedShermanSL. Facebook: @TedSherman.reporter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.