---

Fort Bliss, Texas, August 2nd, 1990

---Kuwait wasn’t foremost on my mind that Thursday. Unlike a lot of people, I had, at least, heard of the place before, having met Kuwaiti students in the old School Brigade, but the political and international implications didn’t sink in.
---In invading Kuwait, Saddam Hussein sought to place himself in control of much of much of the world’s oil reserves. Worse, he was now in a position to invade the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Such an attack would place him in a position to dominate the Middle East. And with the vast oil wealth of the Iraq, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia combined, he might even be in a position to get his hands on nuclear and biological weapons and the missiles needed to deliver them. Saddam Hussein could overnight go from a regional threat to a world-class threat.
---The day after Saddam’s huge army and air force overwhelmed Kuwait’s armed forces the radio was buzzing. At work, people were speculating about what it would mean for us, the soldiers of 2-1 Air Defense Artillery (Hawk) and the rest of 11th ADA Brigade. Before I went home that night my battery commander, Captain Fletcher, asked me to do a short study on the situation in the Middle East, since I had some education on Middle Eastern history and culture.
---I finished it up over the weekend. When I got in on Monday rumors were flying. As a second lieutenant I learned a lot of practical lessons during Desert Shield and Desert Storm. The earliest lesson was that a lack of information leads to speculation and speculation leads to rumor. There were rumors that Patriot units had already left Fort Bliss. There were rumors of sabotage. There were rumors of scheduled deployments. There were rumors of unscheduled deployments. Rumors abounded.
---We were unofficially notified that we would be deploying, but because of the limits of the Air Force’s transport fleet we could not be sure when. This was frustrating, working as if he were leaving next week but never sure that we would indeed be leaving next week.
---Captain Fletcher and our XO, First Lieutenant Pace, worked out a deployment plan. The plan would get an assault fire platoon on the ground as rapidly as possible. Unfortunately, this plan would result in a minimum of support personnel and equipment, and a basic load of only three missiles. This deployment, worked out within the limitations of the lift allocated to us, worked on the assumption that missiles would be available in-theater, but no one knew where these missiles would come from or when more missiles would be shipped out. "If it comes down to a war, it won’t be over in a few days, like in Panama or Grenada." Captain Fletcher warned us.
---My role would be to go out on the "second wave." Until we were notified otherwise, we were to treat the preparations for our deployment as an EDRE, in order to prevent leaks from reaching our enemies in Iraq.
---During this time we received intel of more and more Iraqi tanks and artillery arriving every hour. It appeared that Saddam’s Soviet-style logistics were gathering for another push, this one all the way to the lucrative Saudi oil fields. We also were notified that 2-7 ADA (Patriot) was already on its way to Saudi Arabia. The first of the "Imperial Brigade’s" soldier’s had departed.
---The tendency, looking back 10 years, is for many to discount the Gulf War as not being a "real" war. The Iraqi soldier seemed to be inferior in quality to American soldiers, poorly-led and poorly-equipped. "Of course we won!" and "The Iraqis never had a chance!" are typical responses.
---It was different in August 1990. Saddam held all the cards. He already held Kuwait. His army, while perhaps not as modern as the U.S. Army, was a one of the most modern in the Middle East, certainly one of the largest, and combat-hardened from eight years of warfare with Iran. And he was in the Middle East, while we tried to get our forces their in significant numbers to stop Saddam should he decide to attack Saudi Arabia. US offensive action was unthinkable. Had Saddam attacked, the elements of the 82nd Airborne Division then on the ground would have been fighting for their own survival.
---More than 300 aircraft were in Iraq’s inventory, some of them MiG-29s. The Fulcrum was not a piece of junk; in capable hands the fighter-bomber was capable of inflicting serious damage, especially in the role of a Wild Weasel, or SAM-suppression aircraft.
---But we had little time to think about the potential dangers. Work days got longer and longer until we were either on duty or sleeping. DCUs and other gear were issued for the first time. Equipment was prepped and our maintenance teams worked for 24-hour stints when necessary. "When something breaks it gets fixed NOW," Captain Fletcher told us. "Work like you’re leaving tomorrow." Unlike the current state of affairs, the overseas deployment of a high- to medium-altitude (HIMAD) unit was unheard of. Now it is the norm, but back then we were scrambling and it was all new to us.
---Volunteers came over from the School Brigade. Major General Donald Lionetti, the Fort Bliss commander, authorized personnel to transfer to combat units if they wished to do so. We got Sergeant First Class Hurt, Staff Sergeant Tijerina, and Staff Sergeant Mitchell, all fine, capable NCOs who would prove to be invaluable in the months ahead.
---It was at about this time that Saddam took the first of his hostages, or as he put it "Restrictees." Civilians from the United States and several European countries were denied the right to leave Iraq. Later, these people would be used as "human shields" to protect Iraqi installation of air attack. Saddam’s soldiers also went about raping Kuwait, plundering the small country of whatever could be moved, killing civilians for the simple act of displaying a photo of the deposed Emir, and committing a wanton orgy of destruction. Saddam clearly wanted to send a message that he could do anything he wished with the former citizens of Kuwait and to the hostages he had taken, and there was nothing the United States or any other country could do about it. Whatever gains Saddam thought he would get through these barbarous acts were negated by the sheer loathing that he inspired amongst the nations forming the Coalition.
---Economic sanctions were implemented. Iraqi oil could no longer be pumped out of the country and sold. Goods could no longer be shipped in. Many of the "experts" who touted the sanctions explained that war would be unnecessary; sanctions would force Saddam to come to the bargaining table. They saw even the deployment of a defensive force to be counter-productive. Some of these people even called for the impeachment of the President.
---We are now in the tenth year of economic sanctions. Saddam Hussein is still firmly in power in Iraq. Had we not taken the steps we did he would be firmly in power in Kuwait as well.
---We continued to practice for real war while we waited in limbo. I ran through countless hours in the platoon command post, practicing simulated engagements on the system. We also practiced our NBC drills, aware that we would soon be facing a country which not only had the capability of using chemical weapons but had demonstrated a willingness to use them against their enemies. It’s times like this that make you wonder about just how effective the mask and the MOPP gear would be against the real thing.

---In the end you had to trust in them. What other choice did you have?

Fort Bliss, Texas, August 16th, 1990

---"Have a cigar!" said Lieutenant Pace, our XO.
--- "No thanks, but congratulations!" I responded.

---Lieutenant Pace’s wife, an officer at the Fort Bliss Finance and Accounting Office, had just given birth to their first child, Joe Junior. Joe himself was still in the United States only because of a quirk. He was supposed to leave the night before with an advance party to Saudi Arabia.
---Lieutenant Pace, knowing his wife would give birth within a few days asked the brigade S-3 to go on a later flight that he knew would be leaving shortly. He pointed out his circumstances and the fact that in all his years in service he had never asked for anything. Also, it wasn’t as if he was trying to get out of going . . .
---Well, it wasn’t taken in that way. "I can get somebody to replace him in a heartbeat . . . first lieutenants are a dime a dozen."
---It all turned out for the best. Lieutenant Pace stayed with us, where he was really needed. And from what I heard the people who left on that mission had little to do until the 11th ADA Brigade main body arrived.
--- Shifting priorities forced 2-1 ADA to prepared both a rail and an airlift plan.
---This period was extremely trying for the soldiers of 2-1 ADA. Continuous and seemingly arbitrary changes in our mission kept us jumping. No sooner had we finished a rail plan than we would learn we were going by air. Then after we had airload plans ready for both assault fire platoons and a headquarters slice, we would learn that there would only be enough lift for a single platoon and no support element. The only good thing about our shifting priorities is that it kept us busy.
---We began receiving desert equipment for the first time. We received desert ponchos for use at night (striped, to confuse night-vision devices), tan water cans, and sunglasses. We also got some quart canteens, but they were nearly useless because the thin plastic bladders were easily punctured. The carriers were put to a lot of good uses, though. Later we would receive DCUs, which most of us had never seen.
---It was about this time that Task Force Scorpion was formed. Colonel Joseph Garrett, the 11th ADA commander, was already in Saudi Arabia with the Imperial Forward. He had instructed Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore, 2-1 ADA's commander, to form a Hawk-Patriot task force composed of all batteries and the maintenance company of 2-1 ADA, Batteries A, B, and E of 3-43 ADA (Patriot), and the ICC from 1-43 ADA (Patriot). Once deployed, Task Force Scorpion would able to provide a combined antiaircraft and antimissile capability for XVIII Airborne Corps. The key was electronic integration between the systems, which was only made possible by new hardware and software fielded less than six months before.
---Saddam, having shot himself in the foot by seizing "human shields," now attempted to garner Third World support for his regime by painting the struggle between the Coalition and Iraq as a confrontation between the rich countries of the world and the poor. His country was indeed poor, having squandered billions of dollars fighting Iran for the oil-rich province of Arabistan. But the promise of free oil to any poor country sending a tanker through the Coalition blockade was an empty one.
---Having physically readied most of our equipment, we readied ourselves in our tactical and technical proficiency. We ran numerous scenarios with our IOT simulator, especially ones featuring anti-radiation missiles, or ARMs. We had little idea of what Iraq actually possessed in the way of these weapons, which were solely designed for the destruction of surface-to-air missile systems and associated radars, but we knew that some of the models he might have gotten his hands on were potentially very dangerous for Hawk. In the old days, when I was an enlisted fire control operator, standard procedure for dealing with an ARM was to shut down the radar. The ARM would no longer be able to home in on the system and would explode somewhere else. Newer ARMs, however, could "remember" the SAM’s location, and slam into it without the radar’s signal to home in on.
---As a result, we trained for hours to lock on to the ARM with the system and shoot it down before it reached us. If you hit it, great. If you missed, you were dead. At least, in the simulation.
---We also worked to sharpen our system skills in other places as well. For instance, missilere load. Every TCO had to be trained on missile movement. For the lieutenants, this involved guiding the reload crew in their efforts to transport the missiles from pallet, where they were kept in readiness, to the launcher, using the transporter-loader. Missile movement was a time-consuming business, made challenging by the preciseness of the procedure, the sheer weight of the "birds," the tendency of various hooks, plugs, rails, etc. not to line up properly, and the fact that you were dealing with high explosives and potentially dangerous solid fuel.
---Before the invasion of Kuwait there seemed to be no rush to get us ready to go. Now, everyone wanted us TCO-qualified . . . yesterday.
---We were fortunate that the battalion had received its share of personal computers. Without PCs to help with the paperwork involved in getting deployed, the endless rosters of every kind the chain of command asked for, the new load plans, the memorandums requesting this or authorizing that, I don’t know what we would have done. Interestingly enough, I read later how the U.S. government had engineered a computer virus and arranged to infect some of Iraq’s computers, crippling them.

--- Information Warfare had come of age.

Fort Bliss, Texas, August 28th, 1990

---"Flush!" I yelled.
---SGT Gonzales, my spotter on the other side of the missile pallet, shook his head. "Not flush! You’re off by about a half an inch, Eltee."
---Under the watchful eye of SSG Irvine, the EMMO missile movement evaluator, I had no choice but to back the loader-transporter off. Bringing it back a meter, I used hand signals to tell the operator to hold track on his right, hoping it might bring the awkward-looking machine even with the missile pallet.
---This time it worked. "Flush!" I yelled.
---"Flush!" Gonzales responded.
---The world was going crazy, and I was spending my time trying to get missile movement qualified. Not that getting missile movement qualified wasn’t important (as I would find out several weeks later), but as silly as it sounds, I wanted to get over to Saudi "before it was all over."
---"Raise." I said, pointing upward with my thumb. By "raise" I was really telling the operator to lower the forks, which was the correct next step. The machine operated as clumsily as it looked. Which was why practice was important.
---The Marines had proposed allocating some of their airlift quota to take one or more of our batteries to help protect their lodgment in Saudi Arabia. The downside to that was they would not let us bring the majority of our vehicles. We would be sacrificing our mobility, which we felt was very important to our survival. We turned them down.
---I watched the fork slip into place. "Indexed!"
---"Indexed!" Came the response.
---"Pre-load!" I told the operator, pantomiming the release of the twin brakes. He began to raise the front of the tracks off the ground by applying downward pressure on the pallet.
---Many of the soldiers were becoming CNN addicts. TV sets were set up in dayrooms and "war rooms" in all the batteries of Task Force Scorpion. It was remarkable that there were actually American and European reporters in Baghdad, even though a virtual state of war existed between the growing Coalition and Iraq. Especially when Saddam’s own propaganda machine had veto power over what was broadcast. CNN never hesitated to air Saddam’s newest speech. Would CNN have broadcast Hitler’s speeches live from Berlin if they had been around during World War II?
---"Extension out!" I said, signaling palm out.
---The upper assembly moved out to meet the dummy missiles mounted on the pallet. Once we had the boom flush with the "birds’" skin, I ordered the crew to lock them down.
---In retrospect, broadcasting Saddam’s speeches probably hurt him more than helped him. Still, I never cared for CNN, especially when they seemed to have a love affair with the protesters. If 10 people showed up in front of Camp Backwoods, holding up signs saying "No Blood For Oil," "Hands Off Iraq," and "Ban the Draft,"--even though there was no draft--it made national news. Meanwhile, no one was allowed to broadcast from Occupied Kuwait.
---The crew rapidly locked the Hawk missiles down and hooked safety straps around their fuselages. As the locking levers were engaged the loader operator called out: "Center red, left red, right red! All red lights illuminated, lamp test good, hydraulic pressure good."
---After confirming the locking mechanism, I had the crew release the pallet’s restraining pins. I signaled for retraction, then had the operator hold position after moving a few inches. I checked for gaps between the boom and the missiles with the whisker bar, and finding none, had the operator pull the missiles all the way in.
---Once the removal procedure was complete the operator was literally surrounded by missiles: one to his right shoulder, one to his left shoulder, and one over his head, above the protective "halo." While one of the crewmen ground-guided the transporter to the launcher we would be using, I went to the j-box that controlled the launcher and the down-range area.
---"We’re doing a reload on Launcher One. Are all launchers in safe?" I asked, using the language officially scripted for this purpose.
---The j-box operator did the mandatory lamp test and confirmed "All launchers in safe." He spoke into the headset to the TCO: "Crew down range at Launcher One." He then gave me a "thumbs up." "Good to go, Sir."
---It was hard to concentrate on the job at hand sometimes while events swirled all around us. And not all of it was broadcast on CNN. There was a rumor about a Patriot computer being stolen from the Tobin Wells Site. And, closer to home, an incendiary device was set off in 1-43 ADA’s battalion headquarters, close to where Bravo 2-1 was. Iraqi-sponsored terrorism wasn’t far from our minds.
---After doing the necessary checks on the launcher we began the process of transferring the dummy missiles from the transporter to the rails. It was a time-consuming chore, especially when the worn-out missiles had trouble getting locked down. Finally, after a third try with no safety violations, we completed the missile movement drill.
---"How did you think you did, Sir?" SSG Irvine asked.
---"I think we did OUTSTANDING." I replied, double-checking Charlie arm.
---He just chuckled a little. "You passed, Sir. You didn’t do outstanding, but you passed."

---So we were one step closer to ready.

Fort Bliss, Texas, September 13th, 1990

---"That’s ALL RIGHT!" I said, having blasted the target with my Egyptian-made Brigadier pistol. We were all having a good time at the Fort Bliss Rod and Gun Club.
---I put away the Brigadier and pulled out my M9 pistol. Considering that this was the first time I had ever fired the issue weapon, I didn’t do too badly.
---LT Pace, SGT Stackpoole, and myself were participating in the "Desert Shield Shoot-Out," a battalion competition designed to spur competition amongst the batteries while waiting to deploy. In addition to my Egyptian 9mm, LT Pace had his own Russian Tokarev automatic. Unfortunately, we discovered that we would not be permitted to take them with us to the Gulf.
---The shoot-out was more than just simple target practice, given the circumstances under which it was organized. The competition was designed to make the shooter hit both accurately and quickly, under less than ideal conditions.
---It was too bad for CPT Bryant that points weren’t given for style. Our battalion chaplain was blazing away at targets, the cross on his cap (worn SWAT-style for the competition) shining away as he attacked the imaginary "bad guys" with enthusiasm. As he nailed targets, we couldn’t help ad-libbing for him: "Do unto others . . . FIRST!" Blam! Blam! "Here’s a benediction for you!" Blam! Blam! "Peace be with you . . . PERMANENTLY!" Blam! Blam!
---It was a little unsettling deploying with a chaplain whose role model seemed to be Dirty Harry.
---On my own run, I managed to hit several of the targets in quick order but caught a major penalty when I had a bullet get lodged in the barrel of my 9mm. I won the "Safety Hazard" Award for last place, since I lost so many points trying to clear my weapon.
---The next day Fort Bliss arranged a sendoff for us. That was more than a lot of Patriot units got. We ran around post, as spouses and soldiers from non-deploying units lined the streets. Some held signs, others flew U.S. flags in our honor. In response, our soldiers chanted as loud as I ever heard them: "TWO-ONE, TWO-ONE, TWO-ONE …!"
---We finished the run near the Replica Museum, marching onto Noel Field. We formed up behind our guidons and colors, next to the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment.
---MG Donald Lionetti, the Chief of Air Defense Artillery, addressed the formation. He told us how important ADA’s contribution was to the Desert Shield buildup, how vital our role was to be in defending our armed forces against air and missile attacks. "You are making history!" he concluded.
---Afterwards we ran back to the brigade area, then to 2-1’s quad. LTC Kilgore spoke to us in what was to be the last time we would all be together as a battalion.
---"It seems like we haven’t stopped going since [Exercise] Roving Sands," he told us, "but we’ve got to keep going. We’ve got to be ready to leave tomorrow if we have to."
---Our soldiers were pumped as we were released to go back to our batteries and back to our mission of getting ready to go.
---The next day, a Saturday, we picked up our remaining DCU issue at the warehouse. Everyone scrambled to get their patches sewn on (there were no desert patches available, so we wore our standard green ones). From then on we wore just the six-color desert camo uniforms, nicknamed "chocolate chip" by the soldiers.
---We also constructed wooden cargo containers for our vehicles, to make the most of our mobility. The carpentry shop knocked out whatever we needed, and we even had wooden crates mounted on empty missile trailers, just to give us more space.
---While I was driving around I listened to the radio. The latest news was the closure of the embassies in Kuwait City by the Iraqis. Since the Iraqis considered Kuwait to be the "19th Province" of Iraq, they wanted foreign diplomats to relocate to Baghdad. Saddam had expressed willingness before to "negotiate" for Kuwait’s future, but with this move, he had gone beyond the point of no return. To surrender Kuwait now would be to surrender territory that was now officially part of Iraq.
---I was unexpectedly placed on 24-hour duty to keep the system up for Patriot-Hawk integration. We spent hours, keeping our link up and practicing our IOTs, before we found out that the Patriot battery had shut down and gone home without telling us. Needless to say this did not bode well for our future cooperation. I released the soldiers and locked everything up at Tobin Wells.
---On September 17th. CPT Fletcher ordered all the equipment roadmarched in preparation for rail load.
---We took extra care road-marching our Hawk system. The loaders were strapped down extra good, and we double checked latches, hooks, and tie downs on the radars and launchers. Our battery set would be out of our hands for weeks and we weren’t taking chances.
---The Pulse Acquisition Radar was the hardest piece of equipment to deal with. The largest radar in the system (its antenna was about five meters wide when assembled) it was also the least popular. It was referred to as an "ARM magnet" by Hawkers, because of its outstanding radio-frequency signature.
---The most difficult part of road-marching the PAR was taking apart the antenna, which broke down into five large and heavy pieces that had to be lowered carefully to the ground--or as carefully as a metal antenna segment COULD be lowered eight feet to the ground. I helped out and even had some fun with it. Not many soldiers got training on the PAR any more (it was being phased out), but I still remembered what I learned on it when I was an enlisted Hawk crewmember. It felt good to work with the equipment "hands on" again.
---While the equipment was being roadmarched and secured, our support gear was being stuffed into trailers and trucks. I was a little worried at the sheer volume of material; would we be able to move very often with all the bags, parts, camo, diagnostic equipment, etc. that the unit owned? I was told not to worry about it; we would be getting additional trucks in-country.
---With rail-load imminent we received a disturbing bit of intelligence. There was evidence that Saddam was preparing his air force for dispersal to other countries, ones friendly to him, or at least hostile to us. Using foreign bases Saddam could widen the scope of his air operations and make our job far more difficult. He might conceivably even launch strikes on Coalition states not normally within range of his aircraft, such as the UAE and Egypt.
---The next day our turn at the rail head came up. While waiting in our staging area we received some last minute issues, which included cases of MREs. Somehow we found space on board the already heavily-laden trucks. While we crammed yet more gear in the trucks the unit markings were carefully covered, to hide our identity from the enemy (or the media).
---The first of the four chalks left at 0730 for Biggs Army Airfield. Once the vehicles were guided onto the flatcars battery teams began tying them down, placing cardboard on the windshields and mirrors to protect them, and tagging them with bar code stickers. With this new system a soldier could verify the contents of an entire train just by walking its length and scanning the stickers with a special "gun." What once took hours now only took minutes.
---Transportation Corps trainmasters rearranged our chalks as they arrived. They mixed and matched prime movers and towed loads to get the most assets on the train. The equipment would become even more mixed when it arrived in the port of Beaumont, Texas, and was placed on board ship.
---At the same time we were loading up a SHORAD unit was busy with their train. We thought it was 5-62, loading up Vulcans and Stinger vehicles. Vulcans had proven most useful as an infantry support weapon in the recent fighting in Panama, and Stinger of course had proven its worth in the hands of Mujideen fighters during the long war in Afghanistan.
---Captain Fletcher personally walked up and down the line, making sure a good job was done on the vehicles. As a final step to our rail load, the crates and other equipment were banded over with steel ribbon, just to make sure no one tampered with our cargo.
---We were finished by 1900 and the BC held a formation. "You’ve done a damn good job here today." He told us. "Just a few more things to tighten up, but we can take care of them tomorrow. You can be proud of the job you did here today."
---After dismissing the troops, CPT Fletcher held a key personnel meeting nearby. We all tried to relax for the first time that day as the sun set behind the Franklin Mountains. "We’re sending the Advance Party out this weekend. I want names from each of the platoons as to who needs to be on it."
---The platoon leaders and platoon sergeants took notes. "Also, we’ll be sending a team with the train to help load the ship. It shouldn’t be too tough."
---"How long before the equipment gets to Saudi?" Lieutenant Williams asked.
---"Around 30 days. And since we’ll have to be there to unload it, that should give you some idea of how soon we can expect to go."

Fort Bliss, Texas, September 26th, 1990

---With the departure of our equipment by rail from Fort Bliss all that was left was to close out the barracks, arrange for a rear detachment, and get ready to go ourselves.
---Intelligence stated that Iraq was relocating its tanks to western Kuwait, as to be in a position to outflank any direct assault to liberate Kuwait City. Everyday more and more stories came out of the occupied country about Iraqi atrocities. Also, several Jordanian, Yemeni, and Iraqi diplomats had been expelled for casing out Allied targets in Saudi Arabia.
---On the lighter side, it was funny to see the news report about Hussein’s custom-built Cadillac being impounded near Chicago. The limousine was equipped with armored plating, bulletproof glass, and punctureless tires. No doubt a reflection of Saddam’s huge popularity in his own country.
---The "Peace Train" departed a few days before, a separate train containing our Hawk missiles. We sent it out with armed guards, just in case of a terrorist attack.
---It took a couple of days for the train to get to Beaumont, but there was only one incident on the way. Lieutenant Bruder, our battalion S2, told me that in San Antonio some protesters met the train chanting "Hell No, we won’t go to war for Texaco." As if anyone was asking them to.
---"It was cute, but dumb." Bruder told me.
---The U.N. declared an "air blockade" of Iraq. A rumor was floating that enforcement of the blockade would be by way of surface-to-air missiles, like Hawk and Syrian SA-3s. I thought this was unlikely, since the preferred method of controlling airspace is by way of armed interceptors.
---Already there were leaks in the blockade: Jordan allowed two Iraqi airliners use of its airports under the pretext that the UN resolution was "poorly worded."
---Iraq chose this time to "remind" embassies still in Kuwait City that they must turn over the names of any non-diplomats taking refuge within their walled compounds. The penalty for harboring "aliens" (in other words, Kuwaitis who chose not to wait around and get murdered) was death. It all sounded like something the Gestapo would do.
---Anti-American demonstrations were carefully choreographed in Baghdad for television. Remarkably, every Iraqi seemed to know the same phrase in English: "Down, down Bush!" Protesters held up empty food cans (presumably to show how we were starving them) and signs with anti-American slogans in English. Every once in a while a "protester" would hold up a sign upside down, but a uniformed arm would reach from off-camera to correct it. I often wondered if the media didn’t realize they were being used or if they just didn’t care.
---On October 3rd we had a visit from the Army Chief of Staff, General Carl E. Vuono (left). The auditorium of Fort Bliss' Soldiers Hall was packed with officers from the deploying units of Fort Bliss. "In the face of the Iraqi legions," Vuono told us "the American soldier pulled out his bayonet and drew a line in the burning sands and said, for all the world to hear, ‘Hussein, here we will stand!"
---Following applause at the end of his speech General Vuono told us "You know, I have a certain fondness for Fort Bliss. Some years ago, the 3rd Cav got a brand-new 2nd Lieutenant named Vuono right out of West Point. It was the start of a very rewarding career." He couldn’t finish for the sound of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment cheering one of their own.
---While a vocal minority voiced their despair and outrage at U.S. involvement in the Gulf, other Americans were showing their support. Taking a break, Captain Fletcher, Lieutenant Pace, Chief Dungy, the first sergeant and myself went to Red Lobster for lunch. We were taking advantage of the lull between the deployment of our equipment and our personnel flights out to get one last good meal.
---Once it would have been unheard of to see a soldier wearing desert camouflage, but it was getting common enough around El Paso these days. Nevertheless, we seemed to be drawing a lot of attention in the restaurant.
---As we were getting ready to leave an elderly lady and her husband came over to our table. She put her hand on Pace’s shoulder told us "I just want to tell you boys that we appreciate what you’re doing."
---"Thank you very much, Ma’am," Captain Fletcher told her, speaking for all of us, "you don’t know how much that means to us."

---It was one of the proudest moments of my life.

---"You’re best bet for survival is to think of yourself as a target." Lieutenant Bruder told us as he began his terrorist threat brief. "Terrorism can strike anywhere, and if you take it seriously all the time you won’t make mistakes."
---Saddam considered terrorists to be an auxiliary of his armed forces. He had ties to several groups, like the PLO and the Abu Nidal Organization, and hoped to hit us in areas where we might prove vulnerable and to provide intelligence on forces deploying to the region.
---During his brief Bruder told us what we would need to do to stay on guard against terrorist attack. "Watch out for things like cars tailing your convoy once it has left the port area. That may seem overly paranoid, but people have already been caught and arrested doing it in Saudi Arabia."
---"And don’t assume that anybody who is in uniform is a member of the Saudi Armed Forces." Bruder continued. "Jordanians, Yemenis, and maybe even Iraqi commandos might try posing as Saudis in order to get information and cause confusion amongst the Coalition forces.
---The threat posed by irregular forces was too great to ignore. The U.S. Army relies on all sorts of sophisticated weapon systems to reach the enemy wherever we wish to hit them. Cruise missiles, fighter-bombers, stealth fighters, and attack helicopters all contribute to our "reach." The Iraqis, lacking the ability to enter Saudi airspace with impunity, would have to rely on commandos and terrorists to strike us in our billeting areas and ports.
---We looked at the opening of the old Kuwaiti-Saudi border to refugees with suspicion. Not only was Saddam attempting to destroy the national character of Kuwait by terrorizing its inhabitants then giving them a means to escape, but we also believed he did it to infiltrate his commandos into Saudi Arabia before hostilities actually began. U.S. Marines were reporting incidents of sniping within the kingdom and grenade attacks. In addition to the landward approach, some commandos had been killed or captured attempting amphibious landings. Suspicious "fishing boats" appeared off Saudi Arabia’s east cost, possibly surveying future landing sites.
---Lieutenant-Colonel Kilgore briefed us one last time. He told us the he had the highest confidence in his officers. "I also want to thank you for all the hard work you’ve put in over the last few weeks. We’ve overcome a lot of obstacles to get where we are now."
---He looked at us all closely "I want you to take this seriously. I’ve seen too many soldiers acting like this is another FTX [field training exercise] when we’ve actually got people getting shot over there."
---Bruder then took over, giving us a detailed briefing on enemy dispositions in the Kuwaiti Theater.
---It was clear from the disposition of Saddam’s forces that he was digging to receive our attack. His intent was to channel and slow our forces, then to use his elite Republican Guard divisions to attack and destroy us within Kuwait.
---But that did not mean that Saddam was no longer a threat to Saudi Arabia. Lieutenant Bruder informed us that Iraq could still go on the offensive with what he had in Kuwait in 36 hours after the order was given.
---Saddam’s Scud missile force, consisting primarily of Al-Hussein variants, were being shuffled about in an attempt to keep us guessing as to where they were at any given time. One bit of good news was that one of the chemicals used in the missiles’ fuel was difficult to store, almost impossible to replace, and deteriorated at a set pace. The intelligence assessment was that the Iraqis would no longer be capable of launching missile attacks within a few months. This would prove to be overly optimistic, as later events would prove.
---Lieutenant Bruder then began briefing the air-breathing threat, which concerned our Hawk unit more than Saddam’s Scuds. "Overall pilot training is poor, about what you would expect for a third-world country. But there are some elite units in the Iraqi Air Force trained in nap-of-the-earth flying. Most pilots, however, will stay above 500 feet."
---We had to smile at that. At over 500 feet Hawk could hit them before they knew it.
---"That does not mean you can write them off." Bruder continued. "Their best pilots are very good. They’re the ones who will get what little fuel Iraq has. They are also the ones trained in Wild Weasel tactics."
---That hit home. Any air defender with any sense has to respect the special training SAM killers get. If you don’t you’re likely to be killed by an anti-radiation missile. "Fixed-wing aircraft are most likely to be used against strategic targets. Rotary-wing aircraft will be employed to give the troops close air support. We’re likely to see both."
---Major Barrie Smith, our battalion executive officer, then briefed us on the sector we would be defending in Saudi Arabia. "Our initial operational sector will be north of the port of Dammam on the Gulf Coast. Once we pick up our equipment in Dammam, we will deploy along the north-south highway, which runs from Kuwait City through Dhahran. This is the Main Supply Route for the Coalition forces being deployed in the theater."
---A glance at the map showed anyone with a bit of tactical sense how vital that road was. It was one of the few roads in the Eastern Province that could support the logistics need of a large force. No doubt someone in Baghdad had already looked at a similar map and came to the same conclusion. If there was an avenue vulnerable to air attack, it was that north-south axis.
---I turned in everything I owned was turned. My household goods, my car, everything I wasn’t actually taking with me had been placed in storage. I was assigned to be chalk commander for the next flight out.

Fort Bliss, Texas, October 18, 1990

---The day before our flight I left my apartment for the last time. The battery commanders who had soldiers on my flight did a great job of getting their people’s bags to Biggs Gym for contraband inspection. Once the bags were looked over, they were stored until the plane came in.
---After final checks of our masks and one last scrub of the manifest, we returned to the barracks. All soldiers were then released so they could spend one last night with their families. The next formation was scheduled for 0430.
---I had no family in town, so I stayed on a cot in the barracks. You can imagine my annoyance when I received a call soon after we released everyone.
---Some captain called and tried to chew me out. "Why didn’t your guys pick up the mats?!" He demanded.
---"What are you talking about?"
---"Your guys didn’t pick up the mats when you were done with bags inspection. We’ve got a basketball game tonight.!"
---I was unimpressed. "Then have the players pick them up."
---"YOUR guys were supposed to pick them up!"
---"No one told me. We’ve already released our soldiers before the flight out tomorrow."
---"You’d better get it squared away."
---I hung up on the guy. "Are you going to recall them?" SGT Torraca, the CQ on duty, asked.
---"Are you crazy? I’d never get a hold of most of them in time anyway."
---Despite the dire threats of the captain the night before, no serious repercussions arose to prevent my shipment out to the potential war zone the next morning.
---Torraca woke me at 0300. I dressed and shaved. At 0330 we began drawing our weapons.
---The sky was crystal clear with a few falling stars as we rode the bus to Biggs Field. At the Biggs mess hall we had a steak-and-egg breakfast. CPT Fletcher (the BC) and 1SG Melanson got there on the same bus I did. Then we went to the DAACG.
---At the DAACG we called roll one last time, then had the soldiers stand on a pallet supported by four scales. By putting people on ten at a time with their gear we got an accurate weight for the aircraft.
---Despite very precise instructions on how large carry-on baggage had to be, a few people overdid it. The loadmaster walked over to what looked like a huge blue bag that was almost as tall as he was and asked "WHO does this belong to?" A soldier sheepishly acknowledged ownership amidst the nervous laughter of the chalk.
---The oversized bags were put off to the side to be placed in the hold, along with the ammunition. Then they began loading the plane, with all the smokers boarding first (unimaginable these days!), then lower enlisted non-smokers, senior enlisted non-smokers, and non-smoking officers. I felt secure knowing that I would be flying to the potential combat zone as far as possible from those smokers!
---Lieutenants Williams and Whitmire came out to see us off, as well as MAJ Smith (BN XO). "I’ll see you guys on the other side." I told them.
---Just before I boarded the plane I looked through a huge box of donated books. I found a copy of Agatha Christie’s They Came to Baghdad. I decided I had to take that one!
---Our plane finally lifted off at 0810.
---Five hours later we touched down at our first stop: Gander, Newfoundland. We walked out to the terminal but there wasn’t much there, just an information desk, a café, and souvenir shop. Some Cubans held over there from a Soviet airliner milled around, eyeing our desert uniforms with some distaste. Cuba was one of the few countries that had voiced support for Saddam.
---We lifted off a little more than an hour later. The crew served us another meal, then started a movie, the Hunt for Red October. It was hard watching it with Lieutenant Richardson; he kept finding faults with the film. He had served on the USS Dallas before he ended up in ADA.
---We landed in Charles De Gaulle International in early morning dark. We taxied to an isolated part of the airport, then were told that we wouldn’t be allowed off the plane for "security reasons."
---There was a crew changeover, and some maintenance work was done. We were waiting to take off when I noticed a metal box sitting near the door. "Who does that belong to?" I asked one of the other officers.
---"I don’t know," he replied. "Maybe one of the crewmen forgot it."
---I felt a chill down my back. Images of the airliner exploding in mid-air started going through my head, as paranoid as we had gotten about terrorism. We started checking and were about to have the pilot call for French security to come back to the plane. Finally, though, a stewardress came by and identified the box. "Oh, that belongs to one of the mechanics we’re taking with us on this flight." We all sighed with relief as the plane got airborne.
---In six hours we landed in Cairo. As we taxied to where we were to take on fuel for the final leg of our journey, we were told we would only be on the ground for 30 minutes and no one would be allowed off. In the distance I could see six or so An-12 "Cub" transports scrapped near a runway, a reminder that Egypt had only recently been a Soviet client state.
---As we parked and took on fuel a stairway was wheeled up to the door of the aircraft. I went over to the door to get some fresh air and noticed at the foot of the stairs a lone soldier with a rather nasty-looking machine pistol.
---"Only one guy to protect all of us?" Asked someone in the back.
---"More like he’s here to keep U.S. from getting off." I laughed.
---Egypt was a contrast. Coca-Cola billboards competed with mosques in the distance. And although Egypt and the United States had recently been on poor terms, we were now allies in the Coalition being formed to eliminate the Iraqi threat.
---We took off, and soon we were winging our way east over the ancient land of Egypt. "If you look over the left side," The pilot announced "You can see the Pyramids and the Sphynx."
---As luck would have it, I was on the right.
---Too keyed up to sleep, I finally dozed off on this, our shortest leg. I was woken by the stewardress. "Sir, you need to fasten your seat belt. We’ll be landing soon."
---I looked out of my window and saw the Persian Gulf. "So that’s what they’re always talking about" I thought to myself. Soon we were on the ground, adding some air defenders to the soldiers, airmen, and Marines already in Saudi Arabia.

Cement City, Saudi Arabia, October 20th, 1990

---"All chalk commanders report to the office right away!"
---I grabbed my paperwork and headed for the tiny office. An NCO accepted it and said "You’ll be going to Cement City. That’s about 10 miles away. The busses lined up next to the tents will take you there."
---We made sure we had everybody, then boarded the buses, which would take us out of the Royal Saudi Air Force Base. As we passed through Dammam some of the traffic was civilian, but most was military. U.S., Saudi, and British vehicles were out in strength.
---It was fascinating to see for the first time the mixture of English and Arabic, the clash of western and traditional dress, and the familiar logos of Coca-Cola, Kodak, and McDonalds rendered in unfamiliar ways.
---We arrived at Cement City, a construction site converted to a military holding area. A wire fence surrounded the compound, and MPs patrolled the perimeter. Newly-constructed guard towers marked the boundaries.
---Row after row of GP-medium tents filled the compound on either side of the main road. Several of the tents had handmade signs made from MRE boxes, some indicating the units inside, others of them humorous (like a gas pump being raised Iwo-Jima like) and others just plain wishful thinking ("Big Ben Bar and Grill"). "Diamond Jim’s Nite Club," "Baghdad Truck Stop," and "Frank And Andy’s Duneside Lounge" were just a few of the signs gracing the tents. American soldiers in various uniforms walked or sat around tents, listening to music or reading.
---Our bus stopped in front of a warehouse, one of several permanent structures at the far end of Cement City. Soldiers piled out and began collecting their gear. An 11th ADA Brigade NCO came over and directed us to where we would be bunking down. Soon we were provided with new MREs, ones that didn’t include the dreaded freeze-dried meat patties everyone hated to get.
---Lieutenant Pace (who had departed on an earlier flight) met up with us and started giving us the run down on the set up at Cement City, as well as the warning and procedures in case of a terrorist strike or a chemical attack. So, before we begin getting comfortable we’re reminded of the dangers presented by Saddam’s chemical arsenal.
---Lieutenant Fecteau, one of our battalion’s tactical directors, found me as I tried to relax and get to sleep. "Lieutenant Crabtree? I need the manifest from your flight for Captain Belleperche."
---I had tried to get rid of the thing at the air base, but no one seemed to want it. So now I had to wake Sergeant First Class Harmon, (the chalk NCOIC) and get the precious paper.
---I finally got to sleep after a boombox somewhere else in the warehouse was shut off and exhaustion caught up with me.
---I awoke at 0300. Jet lag would be a problem for me for a while. I tried to read a little, then got ready for 0600 formation.
---0600 formation went fine except one of our soldiers showed up without her protective mask. Despite all the emphasis on the chemical threat, some people just never took it seriously. First Sergeant Melanson sent her running back for it after a thorough chewing-out.
---We were fortunate to have a capable first sergeant like Melanson. He had his quirks, like his intense interest in astrology, but he also made sure soldiers were taken care of and that necessary jobs like guard duty got done. Besides, listening to him talk about astrology was infinitely more enjoyable than listing to Captain Fletcher’s tapes of bagpipe music.
---The messhall was just too big of a problem to get into. The line for breakfast for thousands of soldiers went on and on, and I decided to make do with an orange instead.
---There wasn’t much to do. I walked around, but didn’t take any pictures since that was forbidden. Later Lieutenant Ahl from Alpha Battery came over to talk to Joe Pace about getting some ammo from us. While the batteries were competitive, we also worked together when it came to the mission.
---With nothing to do and still suffering from jet lag I eventually nodded off.
---Captain Fletcher woke me up a few hours later. "James, I need you to take a detail of 20 people over to the port of Dhahran. We need our people over there to help with the ships when they arrive."
---I quickly dressed and started collecting the people I was to take over there with me. I packed up my own gear and collected my rifle.
---Two buses pulled up in front of the warehouse to take us to the port. Between the two of them there didn’t seem to be enough room for all the soldiers in the detail. However, a last minute push by the NCOs got everyone crammed in and we were off.
---We drove back through Dhahran to get to Dammam, and in the process our Saudi driver (who spoke very little English) blasted his horn and made seemingly random lane changes. The only traffic rule I could see in Saudi Arabia seemed to be "anything goes, so long as you use your horn first."
---After passing through several checkpoints we arrived at the port authority and were dropped off in front of Warehouse 20, or at least half of us were. The second bus was nowhere in sight and it would be three hours before it would catch up to us. "The streets in this town are so confusing even the SAUDIs don’t know where they’re going," one of the soldiers in the second bus told me later.
---After I assembled the soldiers and got 100-percent accountability I billeted the detail with the rest of the 11th ADA Brigade in the warehouse who were waiting for our ship. As we claimed a corner M109 howitzers were rolling down the wharf from a nearby ship.
---Later on that day a truck arrived with Staff Sergeant Carey and our ammunition. I told the NCOs to collect a 20-round magazine from each soldier, to be loaded with live rounds. Carey didn’t like that at all.
---"Sir, I don’t think we should be giving out ammo. I’m serious about this."
---"So am I." I fed another bullet into the magazine. "I don’t want our people to be defenseless if there’s any kind of attack."
---Staff Sergeant Carey was lending me his years of experience as a non-commissioned officer by giving me his opinion. On the other hand, I was responsible for the safety of our soldiers who were in a vulnerable position. We ended up placing the loaded magazines in an ammo can and keeping it secured while we were in the port, available is necessary. We kept it that way, even though I got word that Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore, our battalion commander, had authorized us to issue basic load. Until I had confirmation through the chain of command, I intended to keep the stuff secure.
---Despite warnings about sharks, some of the soldiers waded in the bay around the rocks known as "China Beach."
---It would be some time before our first ship would arrive. The morning began with roll call and sensitive items checks, then the soldiers would be left to sleep or entertain themselves. Despite warnings about sharks, some of the soldiers waded in the bay around the rocks known as "China Beach.". Others tried their hands at fishing, with little or no success (although tropical fish were clearly in evidence). Card games were inevitable, especially Spades. Football and Frisbee helped pass the time. And a couple of times transient units organized barbeques, although where they scrounged up hot dogs and hamburgers I have no idea.
---Another way to pass time was to read books or listen to the radio. We had the luxury of showers without the lines you saw in other military areas.
---For a short time I would go out on the pier at night and just sit by myself, thinking. That is, until I saw a rodent that looked like a cross between a hamster and a rat zip out of the shadows, grab a discarded MRE cracker, and zip back again. I lost interest in sitting out by the Gulf after that.
---The importance of the port was reflected in the amount of protection afforded to it. Little Saudi "gun trucks" drove up and down the loading areas, the small Toyota pickups sporting .50 cal machineguns as they patrolled. MP Hummers also ran up and down the piers and U.S. Coast guard motorboats patrolled the water.
---The worst thing I remember about the port was the total lack of communication between the soldiers waiting to unload the ships and the ships themselves. Practically every day we were told that the ships would be in the following day, only to find out the next morning that it was "delayed." "Don’t they have radio?" I asked.
---The big day turned out to be the 23rd. The USNS Algol had arrived with 11th ADA Brigade’s equipment. We had the inevitable safety briefs, including the lesson of a soldier crushed to death by an M1 tank only a little ways from where we were.
---I was made acting S1 for the detachment. My duties consisted mainly of personnel accountability.
---The unloading was a nightmare from beginning to end. I think the main problem was that we had never done this kind of operation before and had no idea of how many people were needed for which job. This resulted in a lot of people spending long shifts at the ship doing almost nothing while others worked almost non-stop.
---I got around for a bit in one of 5-62’s pick-ups that Staff Sergeant Harmon had "confiscated" off the ship. When I asked him about it, he shrugged and said, "None of ours are out yet. Besides, 5-62 doesn’t need it right now."
---I had a bad feeling about "borrowing" the CUTV, as if I was going to be arrested any minute for grand theft auto. "5-62 would be mad if they knew we had one of their trucks." SSG Harmon nonchalantly said.
---And sure enough, on our arrival back at the warehouse a first sergeant from 5-62 was waiting. And man, was he mad. "Where the hell do you get off stealing one of our trucks?" He demanded, adding a few more, colorful invectives.
---My career as a car thief in Saudi Arabia had lasted a total of perhaps two hours.

Dhahran, KSA, October 30th, 1990

---"I’ve got a problem," I said as Wally came into the Hawk PCP. "The HIPIR is dropping every time we try to remote it."
---Chief Dungy came in, and we repeated the problem. "That’s impossible." He said.
---"Wait a minute," Wally said from his headset "they just took it to remote again."
---All three of us looked at the HIPIR status switch. The "Standby" indicator went out and the "Remote" indicator illuminated. Then it went out and glowed red, indicating a fail.
---Dungy simply stared at the indicator and we stared at him. Grumbling, he left the van to go find the fault. Without the ability to use the high-power illuminator we had no means to destroy enemy aircraft.
---Everything was off the ships, and all our personnel had left Cement City. We were set up in a lot near the port, doing system checks, working out problems, and making minor repairs. Shipment by sea did not agree with the Hawk system.
---The IFF housing was shot on the PCP, but we acquired a replacement from battalion. Our battery finally got integration complete, successfully integrating Hawk and Patriot batteries for the first time. We had some initial problems when some numbers were entered wrong for our site location. As a result, our computer thought it was in Turkey.
---The following day my RSOP team prepared to roll out on our first real mission: the defense of the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division, also known as the "Victory" division. Our sector would include a stretch of Main Supply Route Mercedes, the main north-south artery in the Eastern Province. Since TCOs were also in short supply, I spent much of the time helping with the system. Chief ran down and nailed the critical problem with the HIPIR.
---Both fire platoons would send their RSOP teams out together, along with wrecker support. It was a larger RSOP element than we normally went out with while we were in Bliss.

Dhahran, KSA, November 1st, 1990

---My day started at 0330. I started by checking out the vehicles we would be taking, including my own B103 Blazer. Ammunition was distributed, and the NCOs checked to make sure sufficient rations and water were on board to sustain us for three days. Every driver was asked to check their fuel and vehicles were topped off.
---Heavy transporters joined us. These big trucks would take our prefab latrines and our scooploader to our first sites. Only a couple of years before these same trucks and drivers were moving Saddam’s tanks during the Iran-Iraq War.
---We rolled out at 0600, led by a red Saudi MP vehicle. LT Riley rode shotgun and had a blast, talking to the Saudi, who also acted as a guide and interpreter. His father was also a Saudi general.
---"I can visit my mother any time." The lieutenant told Phil. "I just go in his office and say ‘Daddy, PLEASE!’"
---The Saudi LT was also interested in learning about Americans. "How do you get so big?" he asked Phil, who was kind of muscular. "What do you eat?"
---"All kinds of stuff." He replied. "Meat and potatoes."
---"Ham? Do you eat ham?"
---"Oh yeah, ham. I like ham."
---The Saudi made a face and drove on.
---The RSOP team was only on the road an hour before we sustained our first "casualty:" a blown tire on a generator. We left a crew to make repairs and catch up further down the road.
---The road north of Dhahran was boring with no towns, villages or bases and our Vietnam Era surplus trucks frequently broke down.
---The road was boring. north of Dhahran there was nothing, no towns, villages, bases, nothing. Just sand and overpasses every few miles. I couldn’t imagine what the overpasses were supposed to lead to.
---There was a second breakdown before we reached our first scheduled stop. Our convoy pulled into a Saudi gas station, a sort of roadway oasis complete with mosque, a Thai restaurant, an Indian restaurant, and several pumping stations.
---Riley and I dismounted to check vehicles. That’s when we discovered we had a problem.
---Riley was chewing out the driver on one of AFP II’s vehicles. "But you said you had fuel when we left!" Riley sputtered.
---"What’s up?" I asked.
---"He’s on empty. He didn’t top off before we left." Riley gestured at the convoy. "We’ve got no tanker and we’ve got no jerry cans. What am I going to do?"
---I looked around. "It’s a gas station. Let’s see if we can buy some diesel."
---With the help of the Saudi sergeant we purchased enough diesel to top the truck off. The good news was that it only cost $4.00 U.S. to buy the diesel. The bad news was that we were too far along to replace the driver. Riley was stuck with him.
---As we pulled out of the "oasis" we passed a Saudi family and their car. They cheered and waved at us as we left.
---SGT Young laughed. "They’re saying ‘yeah, go get ‘em!’"
---We lost three more trucks on the way. The mechanics we had with us really earned their pay that day, and they kept us moving. All our vehicles were ancient, and as we were due to be deactivated we could not get new ones. We had a hard enough time just getting spare parts.
---A battery of M198 towed artillery pieces passed us going the opposite direction then pulled off to the side of the road, apparently to set up a firebase. We couldn’t help noticing that they were fully equipped with HEMMTS and Humvees.
---"Meanwhile, we’re stuck with Vietnam surplus." SGT Young commented.
---We reached the Crossroads well before dark. This reference point on our map marked where the two RSOP elements would split up and establish the two Hawk firing positions. Seven miles to the east would be Bravo Two. A few miles to the southwest was where my team would set up Bravo One.
---Finding a good place to set up was more difficult than we thought it would be. There were several large hills (or small mountains) to the west of the road. None looked as if they were any higher than the rest. Finally we found one that seemed to be highest, both from our own observations on top of it and the data from the map. It was ideal from many other points of view too: there would be some concealment for the site from the road due to a small set of hills to the east, there was a relatively flat and level plateau to the north, perfect for setting up the launchers, and the high points where we wanted to place the HIPIR, CWAR, and PAR radars could easily be reached by truck. From here we could see for 20 miles. The radars would be able to see even further.
---The first antennas went up that night. The Bravo One site began taking on their appearance it would have when it got its unofficial nickname: Radar Hill.

Radar Hill Site, November 2nd, 1990

---An eventful day all the way around. Bravo Two was kicked off its site by a colonel from 24th Infantry Division. "What the hell are you doing on my hill?" the deputy chief of staff asked. Lt. Williams tried to explain the importance of having a Hawk fire platoon on that real estate, in order to provide an umbrella of protection over the divisional headquarters, but the colonel would have none of it. Ron had to go further south, to a less optimal position.
---The 24th Division put a battalion of tanks on that hill.
---I had trouble just drawing water for our soldiers. "24th Division only." I was told when I went over to their logbase.
---"We’re assigned to you."
---He looked at our bumper number. "My orders are to let divisional units only in."
---"Look, we’re here protecting you from air attack!"
---The sentry looked at our beat-up CUTV with skepticism, but finally waved us in. It would only be one of many times we would have trouble with the units we were supporting. ADA units were treated like the orphans of the Army. It was a case of "patch prejudice:" if you didn’t have the right patch you didn’t get good service.
---After getting water we drove back to the site and got stuck within sight of Radar Hill.
---"We didn’t get stuck yesterday." I said.
---"Different sand." Sgt. Young replied.
---"Brandenburg, go up and see if you can get us some help."
---"Yes, Sir." Spec. Brandenburg grabbed his rifle and started climbing.
---I sat there for a while, checking out where our next site would be. That’s when I noticed something was wrong.
---"Hey," I said leaning closer to the windshield. "Isn’t that the scooploader?"
---"Where?" Sgt. Young asked.
---"Up there, on top."
---He just stared.
---"WITH THE WHEELS STRAIGHT UP!!!" I added with emphasis.
---"Holy . . . !" and sure enough, the machine was sitting upside down on the peak of Radar Hill.
---When we got freed we rushed straight up to where the scoop had been digging out a hole for the CWAR on the peak. Spec. Brown, the operator, was sitting on a rock smoking a cigarette. "You O.K.?" I asked.
---"Yeah, just a little shook."
---I looked at the way the scooploader fell in the hole. "How did you manage not to get hurt?"
---"The tire blew. I jumped when it was tilted about halfway."
---"A miracle you didn’t get hurt." I said, amazed.

Radar Hill Site, KSA, January 5th, 1991

---It was the worst day the battery would experience during Desert Shield.
---December had brought cooler weather and, miracles of miracles, drizzle in the desert.
---It was sometime in the afternoon when I walked over to the first sergeant, who was peering towards the road with his binoculars. "What’s going on?" I asked him.
---"Dunno. Looks like some kind of accident."
---Over a mile in the distance a cluster of emergency vehicles were gathered, lights flashing. Then a rescue helicopter on its way to the accident buzzed Radar Hill. "Looks like they have injuries too." First Sergeant Melanson muttered.
---It would be nearly an hour before we found out that the accident involved two of our own. A fuel tanker sent out earlier had flipped while trying to make a sharp turn for the site. Sergeant Davis, who was wearing his seatbelt, got beat up a bit but did not sustain any life-threatening injuries. He would be back with the unit within a couple of days.
---Specialist James Brown, the mechanic who had narrowly avoided serious injury when the scoop loader tipped over with him in it, was not so lucky. He suffered severe internal injuries and trauma to his spinal column. He was rushed first to a CASH, then to a fleet Marine hospital, pending airlift out of the theater.
---Brown was a nice guy. He didn’t have an enemy in the world. I think everyone was praying for him that night.
---The following day the BC had a morning formation to inform everyone about what had happened. A combination of slick road and a full load of fuel had combined to cause the tragedy.
---I got the thankless job of inventorying Brown’s gear for shipment back to his family in the States. It made me angry as I made the list, but I couldn’t figure out why.

[Editor's Note. Specialist James Brown died several days after the accident]

---War was reaching out to touch us. On December 2nd two Scud launches in Iraq had triggered the entire air defense network and had us hopping in anticipation of a first strike.
---The detection of the radars associated with the SS-1 missile triggered a "Scud alert," a warning that missiles were going to launch within the next few minutes. We were scrambling as our siren went off. Then our early warning network detected missile burn. The "Real Thing" was on its way!
---Both Scuds (al-Husseins, actually) came down in the far west of Iraq. Apparently, he missiles were either meant as a demonstration of Iraqi strength, a test of Coalition resolve, or a test of chemical warheads for the al-Hussein missiles.
---We knew Saddam desperately wanted chemical weapons for his missiles, but the problem is more complicated than simply filling a container with gas. If the gas is released to soon, it dissipates before it reaches the ground; if it is released too late, it burns up in the impact, leaving a toxic liquid. The tests looked ominous in that light.
---Afterwards, Pace took string from the launch point to the impact point, then swung it in an arc to demonstrate range.
---We were just within range of the missiles.
---A second Scud alert sounded on December 15th, but no missiles were fired this time. However, itchy trigger fingers and carelessness nearly resulted in tragedy that night too.
---It was dark when the Scud alert came down at about 1900 hours. Everyone was tense, because we didn’t know what the Iraqis had planned. Would they launch Scuds in conjunction with terrorist attacks, hoping for success by one of the two means? No one was sure.
---I was in the CP with the battery commander, Staff Sergeant Lacher, and Lieutenant Pace, waiting for an "all clear.” Suddenly we all heard a distinctive "pop, pop, pop!"
---"That was gunfire!"I said, pulling out my 9mm. "I’ll check it out!"
---Captain Fletcher later told me he didn’t know which made him more nervous: the gunfire or the fact that I had run out in the dark with my pistol at the ready.
---I ran with our medic from point to point, trying to ascertain where the shots had come from. No one could tell me for sure, although everyone agreed that they had heard shots.
---Then the PA system crackled with Staff Sergeant Lacher’s voice: "All personnel to the bunkers!"
---I was in Staff Sergeant Kincaid’s fighting position when the announcement came on.
---"Sir, does that include us?" he asked.
---I considered the situation for a moment. The Iraqis may or may not be getting ready to launch a scud attack. If they did launch it was unlikely that our lone Hawk battery would be the target. If we did happen to be the target, it was even less likely that the missile would land within a half-mile of us, seeing as how the missile’s built-in error would be maxed out at our range.
---On the other hand, we definitely heard shots. And if the Iraqis did intend to launch commando raids, what better time than when everyone is paralyzed by a scud alert?
---But, in somewhat flawed logic, I concluded that commando raids are only launched in movies. "Take your people to the bunker," I told Kincaid, then took the medic in tow as we headed for the junction-box bunker.
---I spoke to Sergeant Gonzales, who was as mystified by the shooting incident as I was. Suddenly he stiffened.
---"Hey! There’s someone downrange!" he said in an urgent whisper.
---I looked out. Sure enough, there were figures moving in the dark around Launcher 3.
---"Status of the launcher?" I asked.
---"Missiles armed. Umbilicals connected. J-box in safe for now. Current status ADW Yellow, the last I heard."
---Gonzo jumped up with his weapon. "I’m going to go check it out. If you hear any shots, rock and roll man!"
---One of the other launcher dogs responded "You got it."
---"No one fires without permission!" I amended.
---I took the handheld radio from the medic and called the BC.
---"Sir, this is Crabtree. We have intruders in the downrange area."
---"Who?" ---"I don’t know yet, Sir. Gonzales is investigating."
---I signed off, thinking "Great. Gunshots to the left of us, intruders on our right, and the possibility of a missile coming down straight over our heads."
---Gonzo returned after a few minutes.
---"They’re from the unit next door. They wanted to see what all the shooting was about."
---"Did you tell them to get the hell away from the missiles, on the off-chance we might need them?!"
---"Yeah!" And sure enough we could see the figures moving rapidly away from the launcher and its three birds.
---A soldier came up to me at the bunker. "Sir, I know who fired the shots."
---I got the name from him and reported it to the BC. "Send him and Sergeant Mitchell to see me immediately!"
---Overall, the whole affair was very unpleasant, but the soldier who had decided to lock and load his weapon without permission got it far worse. He had been running out in the desert doing an imitation of John Wayne, with his M16 on "auto," when he tripped and pumped several rounds into a sandbag. The rounds could just have easily have gone into another soldier.
---On the 9th we listened to President Bush’s speech. Diplomacy had failed. Saddam doubted our resolve. By the time the president was done speaking it was clear which way the wind was blowing. "You ever hear an ultimatum before?”"I asked the soldiers with me. "Well, that’s what it sounds like."
---I wrote a couple of letters home, then I sent some film and the three journals I had kept to this point in a package to my parents. I wanted them to know our story in case anything happened to me.
---Now the deadline was January 16th. Nothing to do but prepare. . .

Radar Hill Site, January 16th, 1991

---President George Bush's deadline passed with no response from Iraq and no attack by the Coalition.
---At our Hawk site the HIPIR had broken down, leaving us combat ineffective. Maintenance was working on it around the clock.
---We wore our MOPP suits all the time, waiting for a potential chemical attack. But nothing happened. Nothing all day.
---At 2200 Captain Fletcher called all senior NCOs and lieutenants to the CP. I figured this would be it.
---The BC entered the CP, and we were called to attention. Captain Fletcher motioned everyone to relax. "The moment we have waited for has arrived. The war begins at 0300."
---"I want everyone to take their NBC pills. Keep an eye on people for side effects. People have reported headaches and nausea." These were the small white pills we were issued to help atropine work better against nerve agent poisoning.
---"I want full manning of the perimeter beginning at 0200." The NCOs jotted notes, already working out the new guard roster.
---"We will be moving within two days. Any questions?" No one stirred. "Good luck."
---During my evening shift I looked for the vast air armada that would be sent against Iraq. The air traffic only seemed slightly heavier than usual on the eve of what would become known as the Air War.
---The Tactical Director came on the headset and began verifying our new frequencies. We had changed them in order to thwart Iraqi efforts to detect and identify us, our last act before the hostilities began. Our wartime freqs were all confirmed.
---After being relieved by Wally, I thought I would never get any sleep, but I was out like a light once I hit my cot.

Radar Hill Site, January 17th, 1991

---I woke up at 0600. The war had been on for about three hours.
---Wally wasn’t in our tent. I turned on my radio and lowered the volume. A news broadcast was discussing the first of the air strikes, so the fact that the war had started was obviously no longer a secret. Later when I tried AFN the frequency had been jammed. I don’t know what the Iraqis thought they were accomplishing by jamming it, unless it was meant to hurt morale.
---Radio Baghdad was not jammed, but was no longer broadcasting in English. "Baghdad Betty," the Iraqi woman with the "oh-so-British accent" would no longer entertain us with tales of Marine atrocities at sea or ask us if we were willing to die for a cheap barrel of oil. Instead, the Arab voice seemed to be extremely indignant. Imagine! Bombing them just because they had invaded one of our allies!
---The HIPIR was operational once again, although not operating at peak capacity. Soldiers were busy getting everything ready for our first move since occupying Radar Hill.
---Off-shift personnel not busy packing tried to sleep in the SCUD bunkers. Wearing MOPP suits and keeping their weapons close by, some of the soldiers who couldn’t sleep listened to AFN, which was no longer being jammed. "American warplanes have struck targets all across Iraq and Kuwait, along with Saudi, British, and Kuwaiti aircraft. Baghdad was struck early this morning and antiaircraft fire lit the sky. Apparently the fire was ineffective."
---So much for Saddam’s ADA. We heard later on that the dictator had the commanding general of the Air Defense Command shot for incompetence.
---There was also news that Jordan was making official statements about "the betrayal of the Arab state." No such statements were made following Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. Jordan had apparently settled on the status of cobelligerent, not taking an active part in the war but clearly sympathetic to Iraqi interests. This was pretty much the same status of Spain to Hitler’s Germany during World War II.
---Cruise missiles had been sent in to cripple Iraq’s command and control network. Coalition aircraft had followed these attacks, destroying key air defense facilities and ripping holes in the Iraqi air defense network. Each air defense site was fighting the war on its own, to be destroyed by our planes or left to whither on the vine.
---On our side the "Hail Mary Move" had begun. From Radar Hill we could see the columns of tanks, artillery, APCs, and support vehicles moving along the road. The entire Army was repositioning itself to smash the Iraqi ground forces.
---Our role, for the time being, was to protect this vital transportation artery. If a few Iraqi aircraft got through (a very remote possibility) they could create havoc amongst the vulnerable units on the road. So far, all the aircraft we were seeing were "friendlies." The IQAF (Iraqi Air Force) was hiding out in reinforced hanger-bunkers, apparently waiting for the Coalition to run out of bombs.
---Day One was uneventful until Iraq began firing its Scuds again. But this time they were not on their way to unoccupied desert.

Radar Hill Site, January 18th, 1991

---"SCUD LAUNCH! SCUD LAUNCH!" Joe’s voice pierced the darkness. "ALL PERSONNEL TO THE BUNKERS!!!"
---0300. Wally and I were asleep in our tent, but not for long! We grabbed our gear and ran to the bunkers.
---In the packed space of the bunker we waited. Then, the info was relayed to us from the CP: Multiple launches confirmed. Target: Israel.
---The attacks were kept up all morning, but nothing aimed at our sector. We listened to one civilian radio announcer broadcasting from Dammam. He calmly noted the sound of air raid sirens coming on, and we noted the stupidity of remaining above ground when you have warning that missiles are on their way to your position.
---"What was that?!" The announcer blurted. "It looked like a rocket or something." We looked at each other. Best guess was that it was a Patriot intercept (a guess later confirmed).
---I got word that I would be taking a minimal RSOP team to our new positions near the Iraqi border: myself, Lieutenant Riley, and Staff Sergeant Tijerina.
---"Our own part of this has been moved up." Captain Fletcher told us, once we had an "all clear." "The RSOP team will have to move out immediately in order to link up with a brigade PADS team at King Khalid Military City."
---He pointed to the map. "Task Force Scorpion will be divided into three ‘cells’ composed of two Hawk AFPs and a Patriot battery each defending XVIII Airborne Corps." He pointed to Rafha. "Our cell will be just 20km from the border."
---The move was at least 600 kilometers. We got our details, including the fact that the rest of the battery would be following at 1645 the following day, giving us at least a day lead to set up the new sites. "Where’s my map?"I asked the BC.
---"I don’t have one to spare. You’ll have to get one at KKMC."
---That did not leave me with a good feeling. I had bought a tourist map from the PX at Dhahran; I hoped that it would suffice to get us to KKMC, which was not shown on non-military maps.
---A check to confirm frequencies and callsigns, then we were off in B6. Staff Sergeant Tijerina had fueled up prior to departure and we had enough MREs and water to last us for the mission.
---It was good to be on the road. No matter what happened, at least we wouldn’t be on constant Scud alert.
---Traffic was busy but not terrible as we proceeded north, but when we reached Nai’riyah and had to turn west, it was bumper to bumper. As we crawled on the ground helicopters flew overhead, sling-loaded with vehicles and cargo. Attack helicopters also patrolled along the road, providing a security screen.
---The further west we went the thinner the traffic became, and we were able to make good time. At the critical intersection of Hafir Al Batin we turned south, where we hoped to hook into an access road for the mysterious KKMC.
---We found the Saudi Air Defense Compound just outside the main gate of KKMC. We passed the metal crossed cannon and missile monument of Saudi air defense and proceeded to 11th ADA Brigade’s forward headquarters.
---An NCO met us there. "If you want the PADS team, you’ll have to get to the tactical operations center. If you want to eat, you’ll have to head over to the mess hall now; they’re getting ready to close."
---We had time. We grabbed something to eat (the food was marginally better than what we were getting on-site) then went to see about getting some space for the night. First Sergeanrt Lippincot of 11th ADA Brigade's Headquarters and Headquarters Battery found us a couple of cots, then gave us a quick brief on the compound: where to go for a Scud attack, what to do for a ground attack, etc., etc. My mind was on getting a map and getting out the next morning, so I didn’t pay much attention. I would regret it later on.
---We had to drive deeper into the compound to find the TOC. It was situated in huge protected bays. Vehicles belonging to the Air Force and the Army were packed inside. It took a while to find the S3.
---The S3 was not pleased to see us. We had no map. Then he was mad because I didn’t have the grid coordinates for our new position. They were in the vehicle, but so far, without a map, the coordinates had been worthless.
---Then we found Staff Sergeant Tanis, the PADS NCOIC. He handed me a gray box. "What’s this?" I asked.
---"It’s the commercial navigator."
---I turned it around, looked at the back, noted the transistor radio-style antenna attached to it. "How does it work?"
---"You mean you don’t know?"
---After a short discussion we came to the conclusion that the PADS team would have to go with the task force RSOP teams (none of which had yet arrived) and shoot the site locations with its superior global positioning equipment to ensure success.
---A soldier stuck his head out of a nearby van. "Weather radar just came up."
---There were a couple of tense minutes. The weather radars associated with the Scuds were monitored; the Iraqis would fire them up in order to get a picture of atmospheric conditions along a missile’s path, then adjust the ballistic firing data to compensate.
---There was a discussion amongst the officers present as to whether or not a Scud warning should be sent out based on the weather radar shoot. It became academic when the soldier came back, announcing "radar shutdown."
---One of the officers told us "They do that all the time. I think they’re getting wise to the fact that we can detect them."
---We went back to our cots to try to catch a few hours sleep before an early start the following morning. We weren’t settled in very long before the sirens started going off in the distance. Then a chemical alarm, rigged up to provide early warning, began to add its peal "SCUD LAUNCH!!!”" a soldier yelled.
---The building started emptying fast. It was empty by the time I had my right boot on. "Come on, Sir!" Staff Sergeant Tijerina yelled.
---"Go! I’ll catch up!" I struggled with the other boot, automatically grabbed my rifle and mask, then ran outside.
---The sirens were screaming in the distance. Someone had killed the lights. There was no one in sight.
---The sirens droned on and on. I hated that sound, a sound I had heard in documentary films and war movies. But this was no movie and my life might depend on finding the Scud bunker.
---I couldn’t remember the directions to the bunker and finding the thing was almost impossible in the dark (a "Scud blackout?!"). I finally gave up just as the sirens began winding down.
---KKMC had not been the target. We tried to get some sleep, but the sirens went back off after midnight. "Hold tight," someone said as they talked to the TOC on the phone. "It may be a false alarm. The Saudis overreact sometimes."
---There was a pause. "The TOC says it’s a false alarm."
---There was a collective sigh of relief.

KKMC, January 19th, 1991

---We hooked up with Lieutenant Benagras, a Patriot officer from Echo Battery, 3-43 ADA, at 0500. Tanis and his PADS team were at fuel point too. We rolled out, even though we were having problems with the GPS receiver.
---We made good time along Tapline Road, the border road which later became notorious for the number of vehicle accidents during the war. There was another 300 kilometers to go, and we covered the distance that morning, reaching the town of Rafha.
---Literally, Iraq was just up the road on our right. We got to work trying to locate, mark, and lay out our sites.

Rafha, January 20th, 1991

---We woke up to the sound of a Blackhawk helicopter patrolling tapline road. The sky was overcast. Dawn was muted. Our RSOP Blazer sat next to the road, waiting.
---We got ourselves cleaned and shaved. The day before we had completed the survey of Bravo One and Bravo Two sites, but there was no sign of the main body of the battery. It was a long jump from Radar Hill, though. All we could do was wait.
---We had other visitors. I told a captain from the 82nd that I had no idea where his stuff was supposed to be set up. An all-female MP patrol waved at us enthusiastically. And of course, there were the locals…
---"Did you see that, Sir?" Staff Sergeant Tijerina asked as I concentrated shaving in the driver’s side mirror.
---"See what?"
---"Those Arabs!" he said, looking down the road at a pick-up that was rapidly disappearing in the distance. "They had an AK-47 rifle and were arguing."
---I was getting used to T.J.’s jokes. "Sure they were."
---"No, really. There were three of them and they were arguing about who would get the rifle."
---I dismissed it as another one of Tijerina’s exaggerations. "Let me see the radio."
---The day before we had tried to get AFN on the shortwave, but the only thing we could understand was Radio Netherlands English Service. Today I hoped to do better.
---I picked up a station playing some rock music.
---"What station is that?" Lieutenant Riley asked.
---"I don’t know. We’ll have to wait and find out. Might be AFN."
---When the music stopped a female voice announced: "This is the English-language service of Radio Moscow. And now for the news!"
---Glasnost or no glasnost, Radio Moscow wouldn’t normally be considered a reliable source of information, but we had been out of touch with the world for two days. And there was no doubt a lot going on.
---Mainly, Radio Moscow discussed the problems of the different Soviet republics, which at this time were chaffing at the bit for independence. Then it went into information on the Coalition Air Campaign then being waged over Iraq, and new Scud attacks against Israel and Saudi Arabia (the Soviet announcer called them "ballistic missiles," thus avoiding references to their NATO codename or the Russian name R101). Unlike the first strikes, these claimed lives.
---"We now return to our music program," Comrade Announcer told us. She was followed by a DJ who sounded all the world like someone who you might hear on WKRP as you drive between Dayton and Cincinnati: "Hey, this is Sergei Androvovitch and you’re tuned to our Rock n’ Roll Hour. Our first dedication goes out to Mikhail down in the Georgian Republic . . ."
---"This must be some kind of joke!" I said.
---". . . who wants to hear some Beatles! So . . ."
---"It can’t be real," Phil agreed.
---". . . for Mikhail, here’s 'Back in the USSR,'" the DJ finished with a flourish.
---"All right!" TJ smiled. "Radio Moscow!"
---"This can’t be. That guy sounds just like an American. Like he’s from Detroit or someplace."
---I thought maybe it was an Iraqi "black" station, purporting to be broadcasting from the USSR but actually sending Iraqi propaganda our way under false pretenses. But all doubts were dispelled when the DJ came back on.
---"And now, let me read a letter from one of our fans in Canada," said the American/Soviet DJ. "It reads ‘Dear Radio Moscow; I have been a devoted listener for many years now and enjoy the alternative music and viewpoints your station provides.'"
---"ON RADIO MOSCOW?!" I muttered. I envisioned a left-winger with a portrait of Karl Marx below his moose head. A guy sitting on his couch, sipping Labat Beer and muttering "So, religion is the opiate of the masses, eh?"
---The DJ continued to read: "’However, I must protest the recent change in your station’s format. The clearly Americanized DJ playing decadent rock and roll music is the sort of thing that one can find anywhere on the AM or FM bands. Please STOP or I will have cease listening to Radio Moscow. Signed, Carl Morton of Canada.’"
---There was a slight pause, then the DJ finished with "Well, I guess it’s ‘Hello Sting, Goodbye Carl!’"
---We all looked at each other. "I guess the Cold War really IS over," I said.
---Later, a major from the 82nd Airborne Division came by looking for the future location of the DIVARTY. I shook my head and told him I couldn’t help him.
---He started to drive off, then seemed to have second thoughts. "Has anyone briefed you on the local situation out here?"
---"No, Sir."
---He gestured to the west. "That village is pro-Saudi." He then pointed to the east, the direction from which the Arabs had driven that morning. "THAT village is pro-Iraqi. Don’t be caught in THAT village after dark."
---"'Stay out of that village after dark.' Right, Sir."
---"Oh, and the local chief or emir or whatever went ahead and started handing out weapons. Be careful!"
---I turned to Staff Sergeant Tijerina, who didn’t say anything but just sort of smiled like "I told you so."
---At about 1000 the BC arrived in a lone Stinger vehicle. "The rest of the convoy is about 40 minutes away," he told us as he climbed out. He looked kind of haggard from the 600 kilometer trip, but otherwise ready to go.
---I briefed him on the locations of our sites and on the local situation. He told me, much to his own surprise, that only one vehicle broke down on the long jump, and that he had to leave a generator on the side of the road.
---Soon, the rest of Bravo 2-1 ADA arrived near Rafha. The 600 kilometer trip was the longest jump any Air Defense Artillery unit made during the so-called Hail Mary move, perhaps the longest of any unit. The two Hawk fire platoons were operational by the end of the day. Many of the soldiers fell asleep on their equipment after completing their systems checks.

Rafha, January 21st, 1991

---At stand-to the next morning Captain Fletcher addressed the soldiers of Bravo Battery. He hailed them for the tremendous effort, but made it clear our job was not over. He pointed out how the border, and by inference the enemy, were only 20 kilometers away. "The danger here isn’t from Scuds, it’s from artillery." (Later, inside Iraq, one of our vehicles spotted a 2S1 122mm self-propelled gun. With its 30 kilometer range, the heavy gun could easily have hit us in Rafha)
---We began digging in, laying out concertina, and emplacing our machineguns. Anti-tank rockets, what we had of them, were kept ready.
---There were practically no other Coalition forces in the area yet. An Iraqi division, the 45th Infantry, had been identified across the border by intelligence. Our worst fear was that the Iraqis would figure out what was going on before the rest of the XVIII Airborne Corps could arrive and would launch an attack to seize the critical road intersection, cutting an important Saudi pipeline in the process. We would no doubt push them back, but it would probably be costly.
---As it turned out, this scenario would be played out, but not at Rafha, on the Coalition left flank, but at Khafji, along the Gulf Coast and on the right flank.
---We had problems with the site. The proximity to the garbage dump of Rafha was one, and it meant that swarms of flies were always around. Another was that we were on top of some desert route ("road” would have been too ambitious a word) and had problems with the locals driving through our site. They would weave around concertina and zigzag at high speed between trucks. With such a large desert I still don’t understand why they had to go through us, even if it was force of habit.
---Finally, fed up with these Arabs endangering both themselves and our soldiers I ordered "STOP THAT VEHICLE!" as yet another pick-up whizzed through our site.
---One of the soldiers calmly walked in between two of our parked trucks, stood in the path of the rushing pick-up and raised his rifle to his shoulder.
---The pick-up literally skidded on sand. The soldier gestured with the barrel of the rifle. The Arab driver, smiling nervously and nodding, drove out of the site in the direction he pointed. After word got out about how serious we were about intruders on the site, the Arabs drove well around our perimeter.
---We began painting the official coalition emblem: an inverted "V." This brought to mind the days just before the Normandy invasion, when white and black stripes were painted on the wings of Allied aircraft. Like the wing stripes, it was hoped that the inverted V would allow us to correctly identify French, British, Saudi, Kuwaiti, Syrian, and Egyptian vehicles and distinguish them from those of the Iraqis. This was especially important, considering the variety of arms bought by the Iraqis on the international market.
---Newspapers found their way to us on the border. There was the Desert Storm Edition of the European Stars and Stripes, the next best thing to the hometown paper, and the English-language Saudi Gazette, which featured a section for Americans called "Stateside." The Gazette also ran "The Man of the Hour" each day, featuring a Saudi citizen who had volunteered for the Royal Armed Forces. The U.S. media tended to downplay the role of the Arab forces in the Gulf, but they were the ones with the most to lose. When it was all over, we would be going home. The Saudis, Kuwaitis, Qataris, and Bahrainis would have to live with the end result, whatever it was.
---And the Kuwaitis couldn’t go home unless we won. Two brigades of volunteers and many individuals who served with U.S. forces were also ready to cross over and take on Saddam’s war machine.
---From our vantage point in the desert we saw a unique aspect of the Gulf War. American cruise missiles were used to hit targets too dangerous for manned aircraft or ones that required pinpoint accuracy. The missile navigates to its target by referring to a computerized map, which means that it needs some sort of landmarks to verify its position. There are few of these in the desert.
---Rafha and its road intersection was one of the few landmarks. We could actually see the contrails of the missiles launched by our ships in the Red Sea as they followed the road to our west, then make a sharp left-hand turn north, into Iraq.
---It was quite a sight.

Rafha, January 27th, 1991

---I was getting very frustrated.
---The Voyager, as the hand-held piece of (expletive deleted) I was handed was called, was useless. It was supposed to be a GPS-type receiver (it looked like an old-fashioned transistor radio) that could verify the RSOP team’s position by satellite.
---After reading the instruction book which came with it, I was rapidly coming to the conclusion that this thing was an off-the shelf model bought by someone in the Army to make up for the lack of "sluggers," as the militarized GPS receivers were called.
---The problem was in some of the built-in limitations spelled out in the instruction book: "Do not use near large sources of metal." No military vehicles. "Do not use near running motors." No generators. " Do not attempt to get a fix near electro-magnetic sources." No radios. I had trouble envisioning what you could use this thing for. Was it designed to navigate sailboats? The instruction book was remarkably silent on this aspect.
---But we needed it to verify the site location once we moved into Iraq. It was vital that we had the proper position.
---The Voyager could not get a satellite fix while in the site, which was understandable given its rather narrow operating parameters. I next moved out 100 yards or so from the site perimeter. The machine still could not pick up the two satellites necessary to calculate a fix. So I moved out into the open desert until I could barely see the site in the distance.
---I turned it on and waited. I got a fix on one satellite but couldn’t pick up a second one. I put the Voyager down, figuring my movements might be "confusing" it. Still no fix. Then I took off my LBE with its weapon and ammunition and placed them 20 feet away, along with my mask and Kevlar helmet, on the off-chance that the metal in my gear was interfering with its reception. The machine still could not get a lock.
---I concluded that it wasn’t the environment: the machine was simply useless. I could have stripped down naked, and the thing still wouldn’t have worked. We would have to find an alternative.
---Our first week on the Iraqi border had been interesting. Back at Radar Hill we had only seen a hostile on our scopes once, and that was a MiG-25 trying to "spoof" our radars. Up here on the border we "saw" hostiles all the time, even though they were at extreme range.
---Coalition planes were always over Iraq. We could watch, and occasionally some planes would vector toward us as if they intended to enter Saudi airspace, but they always turned at the last minute.
---One "Blazing Skies" drill had occurred on the first night we were in our new position. A diamond (the symbol used by the computer to denote hostiles) suddenly turned from the melee around Baghdad and headed south . . . right for us.
---I hit the siren and the crew responded immediately. Between instructions I tried to reestablish communications with the tactical director at battalion headquarters. I could not engage without instructions from the TD.
---"One-Six? One-Six? I have a designated hostile inbound. One-Six?" There was no answer. We were experiencing all sorts of commo problems in our new location.
---"Downrange clear. Launchers standing by." I heard over the headset.
---"Roger."
---I watched as the diamond came within range. But without guidance from the TD our rules of engagement allowed us only to fire if the target committed a hostile act, such as dropping paratroopers or bombs. By the time the commo link was reestablished the errant Iraqi had already left the dangerous vicinity of our missile batteries for the danger zone occupied by Coalition fighters.
---The following night there was another incident. A hostile began making a run towards Saudi airspace. This time I had a good link with the TD: "One-Six? This is Bravo Two. I have a target and request permission to engage."
---"Show me the target," I heard over the headset. I sent a pointer showing, on the TD scope, the location of the hostile track on the TD scope.
---There was a minute or two of waiting (which seemed longer) while Sergeant Young, Captain Fletcher, and I discussed the target. It was a lone aircraft that didn’t seem to be in a hurry to go anywhere. If it was an Iraqi attempt to sucker us into giving away our location, it was a suicidal one.
---"Bravo-One, One-Six. There are too many friendlies in that sector."
---"Roger," I responded "but I can bring him down without endangering."
---"Negative, Bravo-One."
---I took my headset in disgust. "I forgot that the Air Force is supposed to get all the glory."
---We were so tightly controlled that, in effect, Air Defense Artillery was only being used as a deterrent for enemy aircraft and to shoot down Scuds. But at this point we were still convinced that the Iraqi Air Force would be left with a choice between destruction and fighting. And when that happened we would be waiting.
---"Intel reports that only small numbers of enemy aircraft are being destroyed in air-to-air combat and on the airfields," the TD said over the headset the following night.
---"They must be saving them for the ground war," responded one of the other TCOs.
---"Fine," Someone else responded. "That means we’ll get a shot at them."
---Not everything was going our way. On BBC radio we heard that some Allied pilots had been shot down and captured by the Iraqis. The enemy was forcing them to make statements on television that the war was wrong, that they didn’t think we had any business in the Middle East, etc. The tactic boomeranged badly: the captives were so obviously mistreated, and possibly tortured, that it put in doubt everything being said. Everything about the Iraqis was crude, even their propaganda.
---The Coalition made it clear that POWs (or EPWs, "Enemy Prisoners of War”) would be treated according to the Geneva Convention. In response, Saddam hinted he might do the same thing, if the Geneva Convention was also applied to Palestinian terrorists. Once again, Saddam took an opportunity to try to link his unprovoked aggression against Kuwait to the situation in Israel.
---On the following day there was yet another opportunity to engage. This time, during daylight hours.
---One of Charlie Battery’s TCOs came on the headset: "Four-One [TD], I have a possible hostile track. Sending pointer."
---I looked at my own scope and saw Charlie’s target. The TD came on "Just ignore him," I shrugged and continued looking through my mail.
---A minute later the TD changed his mind. "Zero-Eight, engage hostile track. It is a confirmed hostile."
---"Damn!" I looked at my radar operator, Sergeant Young, who couldn’t hear the TD over his own set. "The TD has just given Charlie permission to engage a track!"
---"All right!" he checked his controls and looked at the scope.
---The target in question was some distance from the Bravo One site, although I could pick it up on the long-range display. I listened on my headset for a "missile away" from the Charlie TCO, but instead Charlie claimed their system could not engage.
---"Charlie says they can’t shoot." I told the RO. "Now the TD is giving it to Alpha."
---The Alpha TCO was reluctant to say the least. "Target is above the designated ceiling."
---"Roger." The TD said. "Engage the target."
---"Speed is also too low."
---"Understood. Engage."
---I turned to Young. "I don’t believe this. The TCO won’t shoot!"
---"Ask him to give us a shot!"
---I looked and shook my head. The range was too great.
---After a moment of silence the Alpha TCO came on again: "Target will be hard to acquire. It is now outbound."
---The frustration was growing in the TD’s voice. "Understood. Try anyway!"
---At this point I was standing because I couldn’t remain seated anymore. "What is with them?!"
---Even though each TCO wanted to be the first to engage with Hawk, and even though there was a lot of competition amongst the battalion’s platoons for that honor, someone had to shoot something down, if for no other reason than to show the Air Force that we had a role to play in this war too. It was frustrating to be so close and have a Hawk battalion given the order to engage a track refuse to shoot.
---"Unable to get a lock." Came from the Alpha Battery TCO.
---"Roger!" The TD answered. "Zero-Eight! Engage that track!"
---"They’ve switched back to Charlie Battery," I told Sergeant Young.
---"Uh, Four-One this is Zero-Eight. HIPIR is non-op."
---"You’re not going to believe this," I told Young. By now I was trying to guess whether, at our range, a Hawk could hit that slow-moving target near the border. Officially, the track was beyond normal range, but I speculated that the lack of maneuver on the part of the target meant that the hydraulics would hold out on the missile until it struck the target.
---We watched it turn north, probably oblivious of the attempts to destroy it. I got off the headset for a moment to tell the CP what was going on when Sergeant Young yelled "More Hostiles!"
---Putting the headset back on I heard the TD say "At least seven in-bound targets. 160 kilometers and closing."
---I reached back for the field phone and told Staff Sergeant Lacher "We’ve got inbounds, confirmed hostiles. One-sixty and closing. It looks like this is it."
---"If I were you, I’d hit the siren." He replied.
---I turned and held the siren switch for at least a good ten seconds. The wail practically drowned out my voice as I yelled "Check the codes!”"to the PCPO. Then into the headset mike "J-box, stand by to take One, Two, and Three to ‘operate.’ Is the downrange area clear?"
---"Roger! Downrange is clear. Standing by."
---Lieutenant Whitmire came and checked the scope, then picked up the field phone to keep the CP informed.
---Minutes ticked by. "Update on tracks?" One of the other TCOs asked.
---"No change in status." The TD replied. "I’ll let you know when they’re about to come within range. Targets will be designated for Bravo-One, Bravo-Two, and Echo-Three. There should be enough targets for everyone."
---But as the minutes ticked by the enemy planes simply loitered to the north, well out of range. Then they retreated.
---It was about this time that the Iraqi planes began to flee to Iran. We couldn’t be sure whether the Iraqis were defecting to Iran in order to save their own lives, or if the Iraqis had cut some sort of deal of convenience with the Iranians in order to base them where they could threaten Coalition ports and airfields in the Eastern Province while flanking the air defenses deployed along the Saudi frontier.
---If the Iraqis thought they could use Iran as a "safe haven," which would be free from the danger of Coalition attack, they were mistaken. Word had already come down that there would be no safe havens for the bad guys; Iraqi planes would be struck wherever they were based.
---Newspapers reported that Saddam had authorized his pilots to commit suicide attacks in support of the war effort. The thing was, the Iraqi planes we had watched on our radars didn’t seem to be eager to commit suicide . . . authorized or unauthorized. The fact that the pilots were eager to fly to Iran, which had only recently finished fighting Iraq in a bitter 8-year war, said a lot about Iraqi morale.

KKMC, January 31st, 1991

---My first trip to King Khalid Military City proper I made in my capacity as pay officer. I was dropped off at battalion headquarters, where I joined other pay officers from batteries for the long trip to KKMC. We rode in the battalion’s white Suburban.
---It was 1100 before we reached the big gate of the city. I couldn’t help noticing the prominent “no cameras” sign. I kept mine out of sight.
---After going through the main gate we traveled along empty desert quite a ways. But the emptiness was deceiving. The installation seemed to rise from the desert as we approached it. Built during the Saudi oil boom, King Khalid Military City was an impressive base by any standard. It had high-rise barracks, huge administrative buildings, long warehouses and, of course, the ever-present mosques. A mosque was visible from just about any point in KKMC.
---We drove around the complex looking for the finance detachment where we could draw funds. We passed Mock City, an empty concrete town where weapons exercises allowed soldiers to hone their urban combat skills. We passed a “Wolfburger” stand, where G.I.s were lined up for a free burger, we passed the “mini-mall,” which was a Saudi shopping area, and we passed the warehouse converted to a PX.
---We found the detachment near the Emerald City, the huge central mosque in the heart of KKMC. We parked in a wide tunnel near the base of the mosque.
---We proceeded through an area of KKMC that seemed deserted. The complex was clearly built to house a large population that even now the city didn’t possess. Empty dry-cleaning shops, photo developers (why do they have photo shops in a complex where photography is forbidden, anyway?), and forlorn parks were scattered around, but there was no sign of occupancy, recent or otherwise.
---We found the ARCENT finance detachment housed, appropriately enough, in a vacant bank, complete with vault.
---After drawing money, eating lunch at the officer’s mess, and picking up some things at the mini-mall, we proceeded to the Air Defense Compound where 11th ADA Brigade (FWD) was established. I hoped to pick up some military maps there. While there, I decided to look up Captain Regan, my former platoon leader when I was enlisted. He was now a TOC officer.
---I signed in to the inflatable building that housed the CRC and looked around. Rows of computer consoles were set up with airmen and soldiers operating them. Along one wall was a huge Plexiglas display that represented the Saudi northern frontier and the air defenses set up along it.
---An NCO explained the set-up to me. Patriot coverage was represented by blue fans, U.S. Hawk as blue circles, and Saudi Hawk as green circles. Captain Regan came over and showed me a nearby status board that included not just U.S. and Saudi ADA assets, but those of the French, British, Egyptians, and other allies. “Where are the Syrians? I know their division has to at least have S60 guns.”
---“We’re not too concerned with SHORAD stuff.” He told me. “Although the Syrians do have a SA-6 regiment deployed with their division.” He indicated a large orange circle that formed a link between the coverage of the Army units protecting VII Corps and Marine and Saudi coverage in the east. “Of course, they don’t have NATO IFF capability and they are not really integrated into the net. We’ve been sort of directing traffic around them.”
---I pointed to the Syrian Circle of Death. “An SA-6 unit? Would I be able to check it out?” The SA-6 was Soviet system most like Hawk.
---“No. They’re kind of touchy about their missile system.”
---I was genuinely surprised. “Why? It’s been around for years.”
---“Yeah, but to a country like Syria it’s a secret weapon.”
---Captain Regan continued with the tour. Another status board was marked “Scud Killers.” It listed sorties and grid coordinates. “These are missions sent in to destroy the missile launchers, once a Scud has been fired or recon has located one inside Iraq.” As we spoke an airman walked up and erased one of the lines with a rag, writing in new information with a marker. “As you can see, it’s a pretty sophisticated operation.”
---Across from the board was an unmanned console with its keypad stacked on top of its CRT. “What’s this one?”
---“That used to be our Scud early-warning station for the local area. We’ve stopped using it, since the Iraqis don’t seem to be interested in targeting KKMC.”
---“Well, thanks for showing me around. Maybe I’ll work in one of these someday.”
---“Hopefully it’ll be a more modern one.” Captain Regan told me in return.
---To get back we had to head north to Hafir al-Batin, then west along Tapline Road. The long trip in the dark didn’t get me back to the Bravo One Site until well after dark. The driver was unfamiliar with the area so we ended up wandering around the desert until we saw the outline of the Hawk launchers in the dark. We started to approach the site when we were cut off by a vehicle approaching from the site.
---We stopped the Suburban and the battery pickup stopped as well. Then the doors flew open and Sergeant First Class Yelle and Staff Sergeant Harmon practically leaped out, their rifles aimed at our civilian vehicle.
---I opened one of the windows. “Hey! It’s all right!! It’s me, Lieutenant Crabtree!!!” I held up the briefcase with the money. “We just got back.”
---The two NCOs lowered their rifles. “You’ve got to be more careful, Sir.” Sergeant First Class Yelle told me. “There’s been a lot of stuff going on.”
---The “stuff” he was referring to was Saddam’s attacks along the border. At least three areas had been affected: Khafji (where the Iraqis had managed to get across and hold the deserted town) an empty stretch on the frontier, and the area around Hafir al-Batin.
---The Iraqis in Khafji had been cut off almost immediately. The enemy’s 5th Division was pounded by Coalition airpower and artillery, then assaulted by a Saudi/Qatari force which liberated the town. In the first combat action since Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait, the Iraqi’s had been given a bloody nose.
---BBC1 was calling the attack “a suicide raid.” Units all along the border nervously watched and waited in case Saddam tried a similar assault in other sectors. Reports were bouncing around the commo nets of strange vehicles wandering around unit assembly areas and weapon sites. It was no wonder that our vehicle, zigzagging in the desert with no lights on, got the reception it did.
---Another report concerned two drivers lost near Hafir al-Batin. It was suspected that the two were taken prisoner before the Iraqis withdrew back across the border. One of them was Specialist Melissa Rathbun-Nealy, a soldier stationed at Fort Bliss. She had become the first American female POW taken since WW II.

KKMC, February 2nd, 1991

---“Hey,” I said pointing out the other soldiers “those guys are Czech!”
---These guys looked out of place in a desert war, wearing wool uniforms and riding in a Soviet-looking jeep. I figured that they must have been members of the chemical company sent by Czechoslovakia as their commitment to the Coalition. The last time I was at KKMC I had seen some of the nurses sent by Poland.
---The New World Order! It was big in 1991.
---I went to the bank and drew supplemental pay. Soldiers had asked for twice as much as what they normally got on “payday,” and I didn’t have enough the first time. Thus the second trip.
---Carrying $5,000 on me, we went to the officer’s mess for lunch. The place was packed.
---I sat down with Staff Sergeant Tijerina at a table where some Syrians were eating and talking. They stopped talking when we sat down. “Someone should tell them that we’re on the same side” I thought to myself.
---The stew wasn’t very good. I liked it even less when I fished out what looked like an animal joint. THEN the Syrians started talking again. “Oh great.” I thought “I got the best part, too.”
---On the long way back “home,” we caught a real rarity: rain in the Saudi desert. We managed to pick up AFN (which was out of range in Rafha) and listened to a little on the way back.
---After one song the DJ came on and said “Did you hear that?” There was a pause. “That was one of our Scudbusters!” Apparently the city from which the broadcast was made was under attack.
---The DJ played something else, and I just stared out into the rain picked up by our headlights. It wouldn’t have been hard to pretend at that moment that I was somewhere else, even back in the States. But I realized for the first time really that we wouldn’t be coming back, none of us, until this whole thing was over.
---We passed through Ronald Reagan Air Force Base (RRAFB), the unofficially-named forward air base along Tapline Road, in silence.

Rafha, February 11th, 1991

---Ever since our arrival in Saudi Arabia, site security had been a problem. A Hawk or Patriot site covers a lot of ground, far more than the number of people we had could cover. We were promised that, in wartime, our units would be augmented by additional personnel to pull perimeter security.
---What we got was a platoon from “A” Co., 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry of the 10th Mountain Division. They were “loaned” to us until such time as the 101stAirborne Division needed replacements. They were not happy to be assigned to us “duckhunters.”
---The soldiers had been at Fort Drum just the week before, and one told us how he had even gone skiing just last weekend. “Well, you won’t be doing any more skiing for a while,” Captain Fletcher told them.
---The Infantry guys were a godsend. Even without their SAWs (which they had been told to leave behind), they aggressively patrolled the areas around the two Hawk sites at night, and provided additional protection during the day. Lieutenant Williams told me he was even training their platoon leader to be a TCO at Bravo II. We also cross-trained some of the Infantry in the use of the Stinger, but we limited access to the missiles themselves to our own Stinger teams.
---That night there was an exchange of artillery fire in our sector. During my shift I stepped out to listen to the distant roar of the guns. Iraqi patrols were also active along the frontier but were outmatched by our superior sensor assets. We routinely tracked the patrols and allowed them to return or destroyed them, whichever was to our greatest advantage.

Rafha, February 13th, 1991

---The French Daguet Division was the light armor element of XVIII Airborne Corps, and their staging areas weren’t far from where we were set up. They often visited in order to trade stuff, like uniform items and rations. They actually LIKED MREs, or else the French Foreign Legion used them as some sort of sadistic punishment.
---The French would trade for all kinds of stuff. But we didn’t realize how far they would go until First Sergeant Melanson, our top wheeler-dealer, came into the CP one day…
---"Sir, you’re not going to believe this deal!"
---Captain Fletcher turned. "What is it?"
---"Well it’s like this. They want to trade a truck for one of our females."
---"They WHAT?"
---"Before you say ‘no,’ remember that we need another towing pindle."
---"They want to trade a HUMAN BEING for a truck?!"
---"Oh no, Sir!" The first sergeant replied, looking genuinely shocked. "They don’t want to KEEP her. They just want to BORROW her for a few days."
---Needless to say, we never got that additional truck.

Rafha, February 18th, 1991

---"No ADA unit has ever come this far, this fast." LTC Kilgore told us. As he stood in the middle of our horseshoe formation it seemed as if the battalion commander was taking the measure of each of us.
---The soldiers paid close attention to him as he spoke of the confidence he had in each of us, no matter what the Iraqis threw at us. It wasn’t exactly a pep rally, because his concern for us was evident. There were real hazards ahead on the other side of that imaginary line that separated Iraq from Saudi Arabia.
---"On or about D-Day+2 to D-Day+6," his orders read, "TF 2-1 deploys C-squared and air defense fire units; establishes coverage of XVIIIth Airborne Corps operational areas to protect priority assets and maneuver forces, conducts sustainment operations, and conducts air defense operations to kill the TBM/hostile air threat."
---In other words, we were getting ready to push out. And our next site would be somewhere in the Ba’athist Republic of Iraq.
---Bravo Battery had weathered so many Iraqi Scud launches that new launches (rarer and rarer as the days went by) hardly concerned us at all. But none of us had forgotten that Saddam had other weapons…
---"NOW HEAR THIS!" SSG Lacher’s muffled voice came over the loudspeaker. "ECHO BATTERY HAS BEEN HIT BY A NERVE AGENT! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!!!"
---Echo 3-43 was only a couple of kilometers from us. Within sight of our position. Well within range, depending on the agent used and the wind...
---I was outside the PCP when the alert sounded. Almost automatically I held my breath and closed my eyes. I didn’t take another breath until my mask was firmly in place.
---I ran into the van where Private Williams was on RO duty. He looked confused as he asked "Are we masking? I thought I heard on the headset that Echo got hit by something."
---I slammed the door shut and sealed it. Turning, I punched the button on the overpressure system. "MASK!" I ordered him.
---"Something about a nerve agent," Williams continued calmly.
---"Damn it, get your mask on!" For some reason the overpressure system wasn’t coming on to scrub the air in the van. The environment might already be contaminated.
---Williams was blissfully speaking into the headset mike. "One-Six? Are you still on? One-Six?"
---"WILLIAMS, GET YOUR MASK ON NOW!!!"
---Williams finally opened his carrier and masked. I found the filter circuit breaker that was preventing the overpressure system from kicking on. Pressure came up and the green light indicated that the Van’s questionable air supply had been purged and replaced by filtered air. We unmasked and I prepped the system for an engagement. At the moment our IFF was non-op, but if someone identified a "sprayer," be it a Frogfoot tactical bomber or a Hip helicopter, we could nail him.
---Over the headset I heard LT Fecteau, the TD on duty, come up. "Zero-seven, Zero-six; why are you at MOPP-4?"
---"Report from Echo Battery indicated possible chemical attack," I responded.
---"It is highly unlikely that just your sector would be singled out for attack."
---Better to be cautious and alive, I thought to myself, than carefree and dead. "Maybe, but the fact is Echo went off the air after saying something about a nerve agent. SOMETHING happened."
---After a couple of tense minutes, Echo Battery came back up on the net. "We’re all right. One of the NBC alarms went off by accident and it scared one of the dogs. He began acting like he had nerve agent poisoning."
---"Tell Lacher," I said to Williams, but before he could pick up the phone it rang.
---Williams listened to the field phone’s piece, then told me "All clear. Sergeant Lacher says it was all a mistake."
---"No kidding?"

Rafha, February 19th, 1991

---Our RSOP teams were suppose to meet at the intersection of MSR Texas (the road that led to as-Salman in Iraq and, ultimately, Baghdad) and Tapline Road. PFC Meister and myself were early, so I pulled out a book and started reading.
---Fifteen minutes later my CUTV was jarred as something hit the back. "What the . . .?"
---"It’s OK, Sir," Meister chimed in. "It’s just Lieutenant Riley."
---Bravo Two’s CUTV pulled alongside of us. "Sorry about that," Riley said. "Didn’t see you."
---There was nothing else alongside the road for miles. "You didn’t SEE us?"
---The argument was headed off when Captain Fletcher pulled up in one of our few hummers. "Seen Captain Pollard yet?"
---"No Sir. No sign of him."
---"Well, we’re going ahead to recon the route." Captain Fletcher proceeded northward, to check out the drive to the holding area just outside of Iraqi territory.
---While we waited for Captain Pollard we broke out the newspapers and tried to get caught up with what was going on in the world.
---A Soviet peace plan then bouncing around seemed to be getting a lot of attention. It proposed that the Coalition stop bombing Iraq, and Saddam would in turn pull out of Kuwait. It seemed obvious though from his previous behavior that Saddam would merely use the bombing moratorium to improve his defenses in Kuwait and try to wait us out. He would tell his people that he had defeated our air forces and THAT was why we had stopped. And as proof he would still be in Kuwait.
---Saddam’s promise to withdraw from Kuwait had to be placed in context with his OTHER promises: He promised not to invade Kuwait, and he did. He promised early on that he would withdraw from Kuwait in a week, and he annexed that country to Kuwait. And finally he made claims that he looked forward to war with the Coalition.
---Now that he had it, it would seem he had changed his mind.

Rafha, February 23rd, 1991

---The ground war was scheduled to begin the following morning.
---General Schwarzkopf’s strategy was sound and simple: the Arab Joint Forces Command in the far right of the line would cross the Kuwaiti border, hopefully pinning down the Iraqi occupation forces.
---VII Corps, in the center, would cross the border northwards, then wheel to the east to strike at Iraq’s reserves in their flank and rear. They would be dealing with Iraq’s elite Republican Guard.
---Our Corps, the XVIIIth Airborne, was to cross the border on the ground and by helo-lift to protect VII Corps’ left flank and prevent Iraqi reinforcements from coming from Baghdad and other parts of Iraq.
---When I awoke I began collecting all my things. I requisitioned one of the "hefty"-type body bags (so-called because it resembled a green garbage bag) and rolled up both the mattress and sleeping bag in it to keep them dry while the weather turned nasty. I would have gotten one of the nice padded body bags, but our unit received very few of them. They made a nice lightweight sleeping bag except for one thing: they didn’t unzip from the inside.
---While waiting for the word to break down and move out some soldiers played baseball or football.
---Joe called me in to the CP and handed me some money to go buy chicken at one of the Rafha restaurants. Sergeant Black drove us into town. American, French, and Saudi vehicles were crowded along the streets, but we managed to find a spot, and I sent Black inside to get the chicken.
---While I waited in the Blazer I noticed a line of soldiers waiting for the Saudi payphones. Then I realized: THE PHONES ARE WORKING! The Ground War is about to start tomorrow, and the phones are still working! At the very least these guys were probably dropping inadvertent hints about what was to come.
---Black returned to the vehicle carrying aluminum parcels of chicken and fresh pita bread. "How much of the money did you spend?"
---"All of it, Sir."
---"ALL of it? It would have been cheaper to cater."
---It was almost dark by the time we got back to the site and handed out chicken to the soldiers. After our dinner we took the little white pills for protection against nerve agent poisoning. At midnight we would take fresh MOPP suits out of their sealed packages and stay in MOPP-4 until further notice.
---At 2200 I was awakened by Wally to go on shift. When I got to the van the system was down, this time for power failure. Power generation was one of our greatest weaknesses: the 15kw generator we were provided simply couldn’t stand up to the strain of constant, 24-hour-a-day operations, not to mention the strain of transportation and field conditions. Whenever we voiced our concerns about the generators maintenance would respond by telling us that the problem was in the failure of our operators and mechanics to take proper care of them. I don’t care if we had given the monsters oil changes three times a day and kept them in tents to keep the rain of them, nothing would have improved the operational rate of those machines, except perhaps spare parts, which we never got.
---During peacetime a power drop was an annoyance. In an air combat environment it was potentially life threatening, especially now, with our forces about to cross the Iraqi and Kuwaiti borders. Saddam might fling the Iraqi Air Force at us following the beginning of the Ground War, in the hope that they might slow our advance.
---Sergeant Hernandez, our generator section chief, came in and told me it was okay to power back up. We powered back up. Then he came in and told me we were running off the wrong generator. We powered back down. After we switched cables, Hernandez gave us a thumbs up. We brought the system back up. Then the whole system crashed.
---"What a way to start a campaign," I muttered.
---We finally got the system up and running. I watched the night sky on the radar. Unknowns, Positive Friends and the occasional Hostile danced on the scope. Midnight, and any chance for a negotiated peace, passed without comment.

February 24th, 1991: G-DAY

---Captain Fletcher returned from battalion headquarters with news on how the ground war was going: the French had advanced at least 30 kilometers into Iraq, meeting no resistance. Our release time to head north was 1400.
---Everyone clustered around the radios. There was little news to report, but it was being reported constantly. It was clear that many prisoners were being captured all along the front, even as Saddam Hussein was claiming to be winning the war. It also seemed that we were suffering few casualties and that so far chemicals had not been used. It seemed almost certain that his troops would use them eventually, in desperation. [Evidence emerged after the war that indicates Saddam Hussein may have authorized the use of chemicals weapon.] However, weather did not favor the use of chemical weapons when the Ground War began, and that seemed to be a factor in the decision by Iraqi field commanders NOT to employ them).
---Only one incident caused excitement while we were waiting. All of the heavy weapons had been collected from the bunkers and the .50 caliber machinegun had been remounted in its gun ring on B31. One of the soldiers decided he wanted to get a picture of himself "manning" the fifty.
---What no one told him was that the Infantry soldiers had remounted the gun and, in accordance with the SOP they were familiar with, they also loaded and primed it.
---While the soldier’s friend aimed the camera he grasped the handles of the gun, intending to aim it directly at the camera. The handle triggers responded with a short burst in the general direction of the photographer, making for a far more realistic shot than he intended. Unfortunately, after that near-death experience, the pictures didn’t come out!
---1400 passed, with no orders to move up. People began to get tense, thinking about what was waiting for us somewhere up Military Supply Route (MSR) Texas.
---Finally, while I waited at B103, a short wail from the siren set the site in motion at 1600. But as the air defenders began breaking the Hawk system, the Infantry put their masks on and started putting on their MOPP suits. I grabbed my rifle and walked over to the nearest one. "HEY! It’s all right. That’s the signal for march order. That’s why we’re taking down the site."
---They unmasked, the squad leader muttering "It would be nice if you told us these things, Sir."
---Over the course of the next couple days the Infantry would be cursing us "Duck Hunters," the REMFs (anyone who is not Infantry is a REMF) they were stuck with while the "Real War" went on just down the road.
---After I helped the crew take the birds off Launcher 2, we drove B103 over to the rapidly disappearing Entry Control Point and waited for the rest of our convoy to form up on us. Our vehicle sported a small American flag on the whip antenna, to help ID us as Americans. Bright orange and red signal tarps were placed on the roofs of some of our vehicles and IR-reflective tape went on weapons, also in the hope of showing our own aircraft that we were on their side.
---At about 1930 we started to roll up, Wally, TJ, and myself in the lead vehicle. "Is that all of us?" Wally asked.
---I looked back and counted lights. "Yeah, that’s everybody."
---We were on the first leg of a short journey that involved many stops along the "Road to Baghdad."

The Iraqi Frontier, February 25th, 1991

---0730. Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore came out to meet us in the battalion staging area, bringing mail and claymores. Some of the mines we received earlier were defective. Wally decided to hang on to the new ones until we reached the corps staging area.
---“Let’s go,” Captain Fletcher told us. I walked between the two rows of vehicles, signaling “MOVE OUT!” The engines of the trucks fired up. I almost didn’t hear the sound of Private Rebner’s voice: “Hey sir! Are you taking him with you?”
---I looked around, but didn’t see anyone. Then I looked down and saw Scud, a puppy someone had found in the desert. He had a habit of tagging along behind whoever fed him last.
---I picked him up and handed him to Rebner in the cab of one of the trucks. “Find some space for him.”
---We proceeded north, but had gone barely a kilometer before we stopped behind a medical unit convoy already on the road. We were strung so far back that we blocked the MP checkpoint for MSR Texas. For the rest of the Ground War the road would be one big traffic jam as Coalition forces tried to feed as many units as possible into this one constricted artery. There was virtually no traffic coming in the opposite direction.
---A light drizzle started, just enough to make everyone cold. The canvas roofs of the vehicle cabs had been ordered removed, leaving our soldiers exposed to the rain. Some tried to improvise some sort of cover while crawling north.
---Parts of MSR Texas were new, carved into the desert with bulldozers. Dirt was piled on either side and the road was smoother than many of the ones we had been on.
---Between short jumps down the road we ate and listened to the radio. The news was allgood: few casualties for the Coalition and no setbacks anywhere along the line. Ten thousand Iraqis were reported captured, and I wondered how many of those were from our sector.
---A convoy of French vehicles heading south passed us at one point. The convoy included three busses, and as they passed us many of the OD-uniformed soldiers inside cheered and waved. “What’s happening?” someone asked. “Are they evacuating the Saudi soldiers to the rear?”
---“There aren’t any Arab soldiers in our corps.” I said. Taking a closer look. Then it clicked: “Those are Iraqis!” I grabbed my camera.
---Iraqi POWs seemed happy to be headed south.
---The soldiers of Bravo Battery climbed out of their vehicles to get their first look at the enemy, the enemy we had been told about in briefings, the enemy we had seen on CNN marching into Kuwait. One of the soldiers muttered, “They’ll have it better than WE will tonight.”
---“We’re flying an American flag and bringing up missiles in an invasion of their country, and they’re HAPPY?!” I asked in disbelief.
---“They’re probably happy to be going south, seeing as how all these missiles are going north!” TJ replied. And in retrospect, with all the constant air attacks, the harsh treatment of the Ba’athist government they served, and the appalling lack of food and medical care probably made ANYPLACE preferable to Southern Iraq.
---The EPWs were the source of our traffic jams. They were surrendering in such huge numbers that they were causing logistics and transportation problems. By giving up the Iraqis were doing what armed resistance could not accomplish: they were slowing down our advance!
---A medical unit passed us on the right, swinging wide of the road. The busses had slogans written on the sides, “Warp Bus,” “Texas or Bust,” “Stealth Bus,” and the like. The medical personnel had the windows open and they yelled and cheered as they headed north.
---There were some extremely old ruins throughout the area we were now moving through. The Saudi Ministry of Education, Department of Antiquities and Museums had markers and signs forbidding entry. The silent ruins had undoubtedly seen thousands of soldiers and hundreds of armies crossing this desert.
---We finally reached an MP checkpoint near the corps holding area. The MP bent down and asked me for some kind of form.
---“WHAT?” I asked, incredulous.
---“Yes sir,” the soldier replied. “You have to have the same form as everyone else before you can proceed past this point.”
---Suddenly I understood why it had taken so long for us to travel just a few miles down the road. “Are you telling me, soldier, that the Army even has a form for invading another country?”
---“Sir, it’s for road clearance.”
---I had to admit to the MP that I did not, in truth, possess the all-important form. “But my battery commander or Captain Pollard might. We’ll send somebody back to check.”
---Finally the vital form was found and, bureaucracy satisfied, we were allowed to pull into the holding area.
---We had traveled 12 miles in 12 hours.

The Iraqi Frontier, February 26th, 1991

---0100. After topping off our vehicles and parking them in convoy order, we were picked up in the same green busses that had been hauling POWs just a few hours before. They took us to a mess tent that was operating on a 24-hour a day basis. From the looks of things this was also where POWs were being fed on their way south.
---And to top it off it started to rain. No sign of Iraqi Air Force planes or helicopters, but now the cabs in the heavy trucks would be soaked for the rest of the trip north.
---While we were standing in line I told Staff Sergeant Lacher “Now you can say you were treated as well as an Iraqi POW.”
---He replied coldly “Sir, if I was an Iraqi POW, I’d be dry right now.”
---Point taken. I managed to get a few hours sleep in the RSOP vehicle before the next round.

---Great. I thought to myself. Just great.
---After getting all our stuff together and getting back on MSR Texas, my RSOP team found itself following a convoy of trucks carrying 8-inch shells for the artillery. It was hardly comforting to be near the biggest potential fireworks display in the Middle East.
---Barring Baghdad itself, of course.
---So far MSR Texas had been straight, but now it started to curve and wind, making it difficult for large trucks to negotiate. In fact, one was tipped over on the side of the road and another pulled off rather than try.
---I knew we had to be close to the Iraqi border but I wasn’t sure HOW close. We passed a concrete marker near an abandoned concrete strongpoint. There were improvised fighting positions made of rocks, but no sign of any soldiers, either Iraqi or Coalition. An abandoned volleyball net blew gently in the wind.
---Further on, we passed another, larger pylon, and this one featured a metal Saudi seal. Still there was no fence or series of markers defining the frontier.
---The road suddenly turned to the left and connected with a hardtop road. We had to avoid a huge bomb crater placed squarely where the permanent road ended. It looked as if the Air Force had made their point: “Don’t even THINK of going further than this!”
---Only a hundred yards up the road we came upon an old guard post. A first lieutenant, an enlisted MP and a full bird colonel standing there flagged us down. “Watch,” I muttered, “they’re going to ask for that damn form again.”
---The LT asked me some questions about our serial, and I told him what I knew. Then the colonel asked “Were there any problems with the road?”
---“Well sir, there was a 10-ton with a trailer that was ditched on the side of the road and an ammo truck pulled over to adjust its load…”
---“But nothing wrong with the road itself, right?”
---“No sir, the road is fine.”
---“Then go ahead, and good luck!” The colonel looked proud of himself as we moved forward. He was either in charge of the engineers or else a transportation officer in charge of traffic movement. Either way, he looked like he was having the time of his life.
---A sandstorm hit us, a bad one, reducing visibility to almost nothing. Despite the weather, the French continued to fly helicopter patrols along the length of MSR Texas, the rotors of their machines painted with Normandy-style black and white “invasion stripes.”
---I watched as a pair of helicopters attempted to maintain formation with one another, even as they were buffeted about. The rotors came dangerously close at one point and I was sure that I was about to see my first in-flight collision. The pilots were either courageous or crazy.
---The helicopters were vital to maintaining the security of MSR Texas. We had by-passed many Iraqi outposts, and soldiers would continue to wander in over the next couple of weeks, surrendering for the most part. But there was always the chance that the magnitude of Iraq’s defeat might not register, and armed resistance would result.
---Traffic moved slowly, a kilometer at a time. The sandstorm finally cleared for a while. For as far as one could see, in either direction, a line of Army vehicles stretched from horizon to horizon.
---The sandstorm resumed, although weather would clear slowly throughout the day. The American flag on our whip antenna went back and forth in a crazy dance. The signal tarp on the roof of the RSOP vehicle rapped constantly on the metal roof. We tried to listen to the radio, but we could only get a single AM station broadcasting in Arabic. We had not been able to pick up any English-language broadcasts since the day before.
---The sandstorm resumed, although weather would clear slowly throughout the day. The American flag on our whip antenna went back and forth in a crazy dance.
---The sandstorm cleared again. I saw some debris to the west of the road and walked over to investigate. The debris consisted of empty 8-inch gun canisters, thrown to the ground after the rounds were fired. The fact that they were here meant that there must have been some Iraqi positions within range worth shooting at.
---Captain Fletcher moved up on the left side of the road to reach us and see how we were doing. The rest of the battery was still miles behind. We checked our location with the “slugger” and the map and found that we were still 31 kilometers short of our next site.
---Suddenly an aerial “column” of French helicopters zoomed north: Gazelles, Pumas, even some Bo-105s charged purposefully. It looked as though they had suddenly received a mission of some kind.
---The soldiers in B104 finally managed to pick up the BBC on the short wave. The news was that Saddam had ordered his soldiers out of Kuwait.
---While we were relieved to hear it, none of us thought that Saddam was doing it for humanitarian reasons or in the interests of peace. Saddam was pulling out because he HAD to. The Iraqi army was facing a defeat of catastrophic proportions and the dictator now sought to save what he could in order to preserve his power base.
---A TV crew drove up on the left, filming as they went along. Wally, taking a nap, woke up at the sound. “What was that?”
---“A television crew. They were taping the convoy.”
---“WHAT? Y’all mean CNN missed me?”
---A while later I stepped out of B103 to see if I could spot anything up ahead.
---The infantry NCO riding with his team in B114 was impatient to move up, as were all of us. “What’s the problem, sir?”
---The thunder of artillery could be heard up ahead. “I don’t know. I guess they’re still clearing resistance.”
---“Well, why don’t we pull off on the right side of the road?”
---I shook my head. “We’ll just wait here.”
---“But we could go around!”
---“For all we know the area off the road is mined. So unless you’re section is willing to walk ahead of the vehicles . . .”
---The sergeant never offered me any more ideas after that.
---1700. The traffic jam finally broke. We moved forward, still hoping to reach our site before dark.
---Just a few miles down the road we saw the first evidence of serious resistance. Automatic weapons lay abandoned on deserted sand berms, bunkers with empty gun ports faced the desert, unoccupied trenches led away from the road. Anti-aircraft guns were set up in parapets and the distinctive bulldozed triangle forts could be seen for miles. Iraqi tanks were still parked in hull-down positions, making them hard to hit. And every weapon we passed, from tanks to machineguns to artillery pieces, faced the same way: south.
---Few of the positions looked as though they had seen any combat, although one looked as though it had been singled out for destruction from the air. Amongst the Iraqi positions were concertina-wire “corrals” set up for collecting POWs.
---We began to reach higher ground. This was a good sign, it meant we were reaching the area we wanted to set up in.
---It got dark before we reached the vicinity of As-Salman, and rain began pelting us. Lightning (or maybe artillery) flashed in the darkness.
---An MP checkpoint stopped us, then let us move on after checking us out. The abandoned bunker complex the MPs seem to be guarding looked menacing, but showed no signs of fighting.
---We turned east into the desert, using an Iraqi road sign as a landmark. Once we left the road the terrain seemed to be littered with rocks, some as large as a loaf of bread and others as small as marbles. We passed a group of fighting positions made up of piles of these rocks, defending a small perimeter. There were no clues as to whether the missing defenders had been Iraqi or American.
---We reached the high ground, Site 289. The infantry team dismounted and rapidly went over the terrain, announcing it secure within a few minutes.
---The RSOP team quickly went about the familiar job of laying out the site, despite the scattered rocks that made every step difficult.
---Marker stakes were laid down with chemlites, making them easy to see in the gloom. Positions were verified. All was in readiness for the arrival of the 1st AFU.

Site 298, February 27th, 1991

---It was after midnight when Bravo arrived. There was confusion, due to the darkness, to some vehicles being out of serial order, and to the addition of some HHB elements that were “sliced” to Bravo Battery, but everyone pushed to get the Hawk system up and operational. Still it was 0500 before everything was fully operational.
---Soldiers crashed out just about everywhere. I cleared some rocks on the ground, lay out my sleeping bag, and was out in a couple of minutes.
---0700. Captain Fletcher woke me and told me to report to the CP. I grabbed my stuff and headed over.
---“We’re expecting a movement warning order. The RSOP team has to be ready to go in 30 minutes.”
---Another jump already! We were constantly moving, keeping the Iraqis off-balance; instead of pausing and consolidating our already enormous gains, we would continue to press until the enemy ceased to exist as a viable force.
---Adrenalin overcame my lack of sleep as I collected the team and got back to work. We loaded up all our gear, picked up the signs, and topped off our fuel and water.
---I reported back to Captain Fletcher, who told me he had received the MWO, but it did not appear as if we would have to move for two more days.
---“Is this the Big Jump?” I asked.
---“All the way to the Euphrates!” he answered.
---It looked like we had some more traveling to do…

---Bravo Battery had moved far ahead of the rest of the Air Defense net. Bravo-One was located at Site 289, Bravo-Two at Site 299. A rat rig provided commo with the rest of the battalion, but for the most part we were on our own.
---That morning I took the Blazer out to check out the immediate area, to find out where the nearest units were set up, water points, etc. SFC Tijerina and SPC Brandenburg went with me.
---We found that our nearest neighbors were the French. The 6th Light Division was set up in camps all around Rafha, and they had a large helicopter field to the west of our site.
---North of us was more debris from the war: Iraqi equipment destroyed or abandoned during the Coalition advance. We called one area we passed “the Valley of Death,” because it looked as though an entire battalion had been found and destroyed in place. Tanks, armored personnel carriers, jeeps, trucks, generators were all scattered about, many of them burned and others with holes in them. The unit looked as though it had been destroyed from the air. Surprisingly, I saw no bodies amongst the wreckage.
---Then again, I didn’t WANT to see any.
---On the way back I decided to check out some Iraqi tanks off on one side of the road. As we pulled off the road an object we had mistaken for a bunker as we headed north turned out to be a small generator painted with rectangles designed to look like firing ports and surrounded with sandbags. A flexible hose directed the exhaust some distance away.
---I never figured out the logic behind that. Why disguise a generator as a bunker, and trade one military target for another? Perhaps the Iraqis thought that we wouldn’t waste a bomb on a mere bunker.
---As we drove on an open field towards the tanks, Staff Sergeant Tijerina asked “Hey, this place has been cleared, hasn’t it?”
---“Oh, of course it has.” I airily replied. “I’m sure there’s been lots of vehicles through here,” I said, looking at the tire and tread tracks that crisscrossed the field.
---“I just don’t want to run into any mines.”
---“If there were any mines there would be warning signs.” Then I thought about it a little more. “But just in case, try to follow the tank tracks.”
---TJ just gave me a dirty look. Then he looked in the rear-view mirror. “MPs.”
---“What are they doing?” I asked, trying to get a look myself.
---“They’ve pulled off the side of the road. They’re just sitting there.”
---We kept going until we got within 50 feet of one of the tanks. “This is as close as I’m going,” Tijerina said as he shut off the engine.
---I climbed out of the CUTV. “You getting out?” I asked Brandenburg.
---“Yeah, sure.” He answered as he grabbed his rifle. “But if I had known we were going on an adventure I probably wouldn’t have come.”
---I looked back where the MPs were, but they were still just sitting next to the road. Then I turned to face the tank.
---It was an old Soviet T-55 painted a mottled green. I didn’t see any markings on the hull, no numbers or emblems. As we cautiously approached it from behind I couldn’t make out any damage on it, although some of the skirt plates were missing and some loose parts were scattered around it.
---Then I noticed the main gun rounds lined up in a neat row next to its treads and an open crate of machinegun ammunition sitting on the hull. If the tanks had been hit, then the ammo would have cooked off. It was intact, which meant…
---“You’d better chamber a round. It doesn’t look as if this tanks been knocked out.” And I pulled my 9mm pistol out and did the same.
---In retrospect, it was probably pretty dumb. If there was anyone in the tank and they didn’t want to surrender, my puny 9mm and Brandenburg’s M16 wouldn’t have changed their minds.
---A quick look around made it obvious that the tank was abandoned. We breathed a little easier and started taking some pictures.
---At this point the MP vehicle turned away from the road and started heading towards us. “Well, I’m probably in trouble now.” I told TJ and Brandenburg.

The MPs stopped, got out of their vehicles, and walked right past. “Find any grenades?” One asked.
---“Ah………no.”
---“Did you look inside the turret?"
---“No, not very closely.”
---The MP SSG waved to his buddy. “Let’s check it out!”
---I talked to the MP driver. “I thought you guys were coming over to chase us off.”
---“Nah, we’re just driving up and down the road blowing these things up.” He looked to the side, as if he didn’t want to be overheard. “I don’t think we’re supposed to be doing that.”
---Later on, back at Site 289, we looked at some of the material that had been collected in our part of Iraq. It included damaged AK-47s found buried in nearby bunker complexes, license plates pulled from Iraqi military vehicles, ammunition crates marked “Ministry of Defence, Amman, Jordan,” and Iraqi documents and map overlays. The last of these indicated defensive positions and unit orders of battle, and normally would have been considered valuable intelligence sources. However, the positions indicated on the maps were now abandoned; the units involved in captivity behind Coalition lines.
---Iraqi defeat in the west appeared total.

Site 289, February 28th, 1991.

---I woke up when the PA system began playing the Queen song “We Are the Champions.”
---Totally confused, I grabbed my gear and walked over to the CP. Staff Sergeant Lacher told me the news: “A cease-fire has just gone into effect. It’s all over!”
---We had received new orders by teletype. They read:

------1: TF 2-1 ADA units will remain in place and continue to defend their current positions.

------2: B 2-1 will remain in place and provide air defense coverage for the XVIII ABN Corps retrograde from Iraq. On order, B 2-1 will re-deploy to pre G-day location in conjunction with the 6th Division (Fr).

------3: TF 2-1 will reconfigure communication links as necessary and release the appropriate equipment back to parent unit.

------4: First to Fire- Damn Right!

---With the cease-fire in effect, Bravo Battery was the only dedicated 11th ADA Brigade HIMAD unit inside Iraq. Only one other HIMAD unit was able to push into Iraq before the war was brought to a close: TF 4-43 ADA, serving with VII Corps in the center. It had been deployed from 32nd AADCOM in Germany to augment 11th ADA Brigade.
---We had not sustained a single casualty during the push, and Saddam had not unleashed his chemical arsenal on us as expected. It was hard not to think of the whole thing as a miracle.
---A cease-fire didn’t necessarily mean an end to the fighting. We remained on guard in case the Iraqis attempted to use their surviving aircraft in a counter-attack. And there were still pockets of Iraqi troops in the desert who had been bypassed by the Coalition push north. Many, were unaware of either the cease-fire or the extent of their defeat and were now trying to reach their own lines, even though they had no idea where those lines now were. Our infantry section vigorously patrolled the perimeter of the site, especially at night.
---As we would later find out, the Iraqis still had a trick or two up their sleeve.
---The Iraqi armistice could just be a prelude to a new offensive of some kind, perhaps using some of the aircraft saved in bunkers. Besides, sincere or not, the Iraqi military authorities had lost communications with many of the units bypassed by the Coalition during the Ground War. Unaware of the armistice, they were attempting to move north, to their own lines, and could run into us. XVIII Airborne troops rounded up POWs every day within the Coalition lines.
---B103 towed in an Iraqi mess trailer. I shook my head when I saw it. “Sergeant TJ, this is taking souvenir hunting a little too far.” ---“I found it in the Valley of Death.” He told us as some of the NCOs gathered around. Our Mess Sergeant, Sergeant First ClassYelle, seemed particularly interested, as we had been forced to leave our MKT behind in Saudi Arabia when we pushed forward. After a careful examination he said, “Looks like a pressure cooker. I wouldn’t use it, though.”
---“That’s fine.” Said Mitchell. “We’ll use it to haul concertina.”
---Opening up the Iraqi MKT’s chests, we found dinner plates still loaded inside. Instructions on use were in English, but the machine was actually made in Germany. There was an eight-pointed star with the number “12” in Arabic, almost certainly a unit emblem of the 12th Infantry Division, the former owners of the mess trailer.
---The trailer was driven over to the motor section, to have a flat repaired and to be stripped down to its frame.
---Other “search and destroy” teams would come in with some amazing items while we were in Iraq, including duffelbags crammed with the personal gear of missing Iraqi soldiers, weapons, and photos of soldiers in heroic poses.
---Iraqi chemical gear included European-style protective masks (although some seemed to be of domestic manufacture). Their chemical treatment material was most primitive. Protective oversuits were rarely found, and these were often orange and were probably meant for industrial use.
---Weapons included a whole series of Soviet Bloc items, mostly AK-47s, although we would also locate machineguns, RPG rocket launchers (with rounds), and grenades. A nearby unit even found a Dragunov sniper rifle.
---One grenade had a plastic casing and looked similar to a Chinese-style fragmentation grenade. It had Arabic markings and was probably made by Iraq’s industrial base.
---Fuel found in the bunkers and in Iraqi vehicles was of a remarkably poor grade. Even the stuff in their lamps was a crude black fluid that smelled when burned. All the oil in Iraq’s possession did them no good in the end.
---In one bunker, a large one, a British-style officer’s mess was found intact. A long table, at least 12-meters long, occupied the space. Chairs were spaced almost exactly six inches from the edge of the table. It was almost as if the Iraqis expected to return.
---Another bunker had papers spread out all over the place. I picked one up and below the Arabic text was a single number (in western characters). It looked familiar, but I couldn’t place it.
---Only later did I realize the number was the frequency for Bravo-1’s HIPIR. The Iraqi’s must have picked it up prior to our ground attack.
---An Iraqi supply dump was found nearby. Every soldier in our unit was supplied with a BDU-style OD Romanian-made hat marked for use by the “Popular Army.”
---Bravo Battery equipment, not to mention its soldiers, was worn out by the time the ceasefire came.
---Pictures of Saddam Hussein were everywhere. A mural was located down the road (and apparently used for target practice by someone), magazines always had at least one picture of the guy, and bunkers contained frame pictures of him. A wristwatch was even found by one soldier bearing the face of the "Beast of Baghdad." Apparently, time had run out for Saddam.
---Newspapers and magazines found in the area did not date before January 28th. An Iraqi journal found by one of the soldiers also stopped on that day.
---An intact ZU-4 antiaircraft machinegun was pulled into the site and set up as a ground-defense weapon. Ammunition was plentiful, especially in intact AAA sites.
---Our equipment was worn out. Most of the vehicles and Hawk equipment we had brought to the Gulf was either old or refurbished. Vehicles were missing windows, rear-view mirrors, and other bits and pieces. The missile system was becoming a nightmare to work with because of the high failure rate of our generators and the war weariness of the components. Knowing that we were the only battery in sector, we did our best to remain operation, but one eight-hour shift went by with hardly an hour straight of fully operational, or Green, time, due simply to minor failures.

Site 289, March 2nd, 1991

---I returned from a “search and destroy mission,” getting some good pictures and finding a few souvenirs. As we rolled up it seemed as if SOMETHING had happened from the way people were acting at the Hawk site.
---A 34th Ordnance Company soldier came up to me and asked “Did you hear? Bravo Two accidentally fired a missile!”
---“Yeah, right.” I replied. I knew it was virtually impossible to accidentally fire a Hawk.
---But at the CP I got the full story. At about 1600 a live missile had indeed been launched from Bravo Two.
---The firing was a result of a series of mistakes, any one of which should have been inconsequential, but together had circumvented the safety procedures and had made it possible to fire an actual missile during firing functions.
---Mistake number one was the fault of the downrange crew. They decided not to disarm the missiles, nor did they insert the safety keys. They ran firing functions on Launcher One, letting the fire commands go to simulators attached to the launcher’s umbilical cables. Once Launcher One checked out, the crew hooked the umbilicals back to the Hawks, relying on the junction-box operator to disable the launcher according to SOP.
---At the j-box the operator made the second mistake. Misunderstanding his instructions, he enabled Launcher One as well as Launcher Two, returning it to “operate” instead of leaving it in “safe.” Launcher Two was now equipped with simulators, but Launcher One had live missiles hooked into the system.
---The third and final mistake was made by a lieutenant in the Platoon Control Post. He failed to note on his panel that he had two and not just one active launcher. Launcher One indicated three missiles available where there should have been none. “Three…two…one, fire.” He “fired” the simulator on Launcher Two. The downrange crew noted that the launcher responded correctly, providing super-elevation and lead angle.
---The ADP, the electronic “brain” of the Hawk system, noted that although a fire command was sent to and received by Launcher Two a missile did not actually leave. In accordance to its programming it considered Launcher Two to have a failure which might affect its performance and “looked for another launcher to switch to.
---Normally during firing functions the ADP would not have an alternative launcher to switch to. But because of several errors, Launcher One was available. The ADP switched from Launcher Two to Launcher One. The lieutenant did not notice.
---“Three… two… one, fire.” He pressed the button. The command went through the J-box, directly to the launcher. To the horror of the downrange crew, Launcher One responded by super-elevating and providing lead on the imaginary target.
---Once the launcher was properly positioned the firing circuit was completed through the umbilical and the solid rocket motor ignited on the selected Hawk missile. One of the crewmembers was just a few feet from Launcher One when the missile streaked off the rail, quickly reaching Mach 3.
---The accidental launch resulted in an incredulous pause, then a flurry of panicked activity at Site 299. The lieutenant ran outside to see for himself what had happened. Soldiers ran out of vehicles and tents to get a look at the finger of smoke pointing upward in the sky. And the platoon leader, Lieutenant Ron Williams, rushed into the van to press the self-destruct button, hoping to avoid accidentally hitting one of our own aircraft or caused some other kind of mischief. Crewmen checked on the downrange personnel to see if they were hurt (they were not) and the Infantry guys just cheered. “Do that again!” one of them yelled.
---The launch was detected by AWACS. This information was relayed to directly by radio to 11th ADA Brigade’s headquarters at KKMC. And then brigade called down to 2-1 ADA to ask “What the Hell is going on up there?!”
---Over the next several days an investigation was initiated and everybody in the chain of command came out to see for themselves what had happened. Captain Fletcher drove out the same day. The following day a helicopter brought up Lieutenant Colonel Kilgore. The day after that it was Colonel Garrett, the brigade commander. The day after that it was some general from XVIII Airborne Corps.
---“At this rate,” I told some soldiers as we watched the latest batch of officers land, “General Schwarzkopf will be here the day after tomorrow.”
---The worst part of it was, the mistake the lieutenant made was an easy one to make… in peacetime. Every TCO I had ever met had done it at least once. Hell, I had done it. The only difference was that when I did it we were training with simulators. The lieutenant had the misfortune of doing it while he had live missiles hooked up.
---Had the accidental launch taken place anywhere else but Occupied Iraq, and any other time except the tenuous cease-fire, punishment would no doubt have been meted out all around. After all, the missile had cost the American taxpayers $250,000. Instead, the “Crew of Shame,” as someone once called them, were allowed to redeem themselves.
---Once we were back in the U.S., the launcher was painted with a stencil that read Launch, 2MAR91, Iraq.” It was always used in ceremonies requiring a Hawk launcher.
---Later that same evening, Captain Fletcher ordered the battery into MOPP level One. S2 informed the BC that Iraqi prisoners had told of a plan to employ chemical weapons that night. It seemed that it was Iraqi self-preservation rather than American skill at interrogation that brought the plan to light: Upon surrendering, EPWs were asking for French or American protective masks to replace the shoddy ones they had been issued.
---The story told to Coalition intelligence officers was that a chemical attack had been planned for March 2nd. It was unclear as to whether or not the attack might still be carried out; the Iraqi command and control network was in shambles. Many units were unaware of the cease-fire and others equipped with chemical weapons might not receive the order rescinding the attack.

Site 289, March 3rd, 1991

---Just after midnight there was a knock at the PCP door. It was one of the French liaison officers. He told us that their radar was picking up unknown helicopters. “Are you picking up anything to the northeast?”
---“No, but a low-flying helicopter would have to be pretty close for us to see him. How far out was he?”
---“Forty kilometers.”
---“In this terrain we might see him at thirty.” It would have been easier just to bring the French officer in, but security restrictions prevented it.
---“Well, two gazelle helicopters have been sent. They have the valid codes.” He said in a way that made it clear he was concerned for their safety.
---“OK, thanks. We’ll look out for them.” The French officer nodded and ran back to his vehicle and his radios. I closed the door and got back on the headset. “Three-Zero, Zero-Seven, this is Zero-Eight. French report unknown helicopters to the northeast.” I looked at my scope but there was nothing coming in on the CWAR.
---Three-zero responded “Roger, Zero-Eight. Datalink with AWACS is still down.”
---I switched to intercom and told the j-box “The French say we’ve got some unknown helicopters out there. Look sharp and keep everybody clear of the downrange.”
---“Roger! Downrange area clear.”
---I couldn’t help smiling. “We’ve been through all this before.”
---“That’s for sure.” Replied Sergeant Young, without taking his eyes off his scope.
---There were no targets in the northeast, but there was a jam indication. Something was out there.
---More beating on the door. This time the French officer sounded a lot more concerned. “There are troop movements and helicopters converging in on our positions. The whole division is on alert!”
---“I’ve got a jammer in that area,” I replied. “It might be something but so far no definite targets. Let me know if you find out anything else.”
---I returned to the scope. NOW we were getting a target, one that would disappear, then reappear a few seconds later, just a little bit closer. The target appeared to be using terrain masking to come in under our radar, a manuever a friendly aircraft would not do, especially with every Iraqi radar between us and Baghdad knocked out.
---“It looks like they’re homing in on the PAR.” SGT Young reported. And he might well have been right: we had reason to believe that some Iraqi helicopters had been modified as a kind of low-speed Wild Weasel, carrying enough jamming to disrupt a specific system then firing an ARM in to destroy it.
---It wasn’t worth the risk. “I’m dropping the PAR.” I reached up to the control panel and shut it off with a single push of a button. “It won’t do us any good against helicopters anyway.”
---Lieutenant Fecteau was monitoring over the headset. “This may be a silly question, but can you get a TAS lock on these targets?” She was hoping that the Tracking Adjunct System camera attached to the HIPIR might give us a good look at them.
---“That’s a negative.” I told her.
---Sergeant Young agreed. “We’ve got the cheapest model available. No infrared capability.”
---“That wouldn’t do us much good anyway.” I added. “What’s the silhouette of French helicopter going to tell us anyway?” We still wouldn’t know if it was one of OUR French helicopters of one of THEIR French helicopters.
---Suddenly a target popped up within five kilometers of us, moving at high speed right towards our position. Self-defense criteria clearly stated that we would have to practically be bombed by a plane pulling a 40-foot flag in broad daylight piloted by Saddam Hussein himself before we could shoot at him, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I hit the siren.
---The target was still out there, popping in and out, when Captain Fletcher came in to see what was going on. I quickly briefed him on the situation.
---The BC wasn’t entirely awake, but he was conscious enough to give me an order: “Don’t fire on him!” he told me, indicating the unknown.
---“I’m not, sir, but I’m going to be ready for him in case he tries anything.”
---The situation slowly, very slowly, defused. The unknown helicopters disappeared back into the night. The Iraqi troops headed away from our lines. And the expected chemical attack never came.
---There was an odd rumor that began to circulate the next day: the Iraqi helicopters had made it to As-Salman and sprayed the town with acid, apparently as punishment for falling into American hands. I found it hard to believe, as it didn’t seem to be supported by our radar picture. Besides, if the Iraqi helicopters had made it that far, I would think they would use nerve gas or something like that instead of acid.
---I was never able to find out how the story got started. The town of As-Salman remained off-limits the entire time we were in Iraq.

Site 289, March 4th, 1991

---General Schwazkopf met with Iraqi military representatives at the Iraqi village of Safwan, between Kuwait City and Basra. The Coalition weaponry, M1 Abram tanks, M2 Bradley AFVs, Apache helicopters, Patriot missile launchers, that made Iraq's defeat possible was put on display for them to see: the only thing missing was a fly-by of Coalition airplanes, but that was cancelled as unnecessary; the Iraqis had already seen enough of our planes to last a lifetime.
---BBC news was now hooked up directly over the headset. We listened to reports that the first of our POWs had been released. There was also a news item on the revolution in Iraq; it seemed that the Kurdish minority in the north were making a go at getting rid of Saddam and his henchmen once and for all. In the south, the Ba-athist dictatorship was also apparently losing control of the areas inhabited by the Shi-ite minority. At the time, Saddam’s regime seemed to have just a few days or a couple of weeks existence at the most.

Site 289, March 5th, 1991

---I was pulled off shift by Lieutenant Whitmire to investigate a mine incident that took place in which an HHB vehicle had been damaged. The driver pulled off the road and felt something explode under the pick-up truck. It shredded the tires and bounced the front end of the vehicle, but otherwise hardly damaged it.
---Someone in the chain of command wanted the location identified and marked. Suddenly, I was the one person in the battery who really knew how to operate a GPS.
---I found Sergeant First Class Tijerina in the GP medium. “Come on, we got a mission.” I told him.
---“Where are we going?” He asked as he started to get off his cot.
---“We’re going to go look for a minefield.”
---TJ started to lie back down on the cot. “Gee sir, I’ve been driving ever since we got here. Why don’t you take Wailikainen?”
---Specialist Wailikainen, sitting on another bunk, was surprised to find himself nominated for the job. “Huh?”
---“Just get the vehicle…”
---Our route took us south of Site 289 along MSR Texas. Eventually we overshot the area where the mine incident took place and reached an Iraqi radar site. We drove in a little closer so we could get a good picture of it.
---I later learned that this site was part of an early-warning network and the first target hit inside Iraq. Struck by fixed-wing and rotary-ring aircraft, the loss of the site produced a “hole” in Iraq’s radar coverage, a hole through which much of the Coalition air armada traveled on its way to other Iraqi air defense sites. Its destruction led to the unraveling of Iraq’s air defense net.
---The area had taken massive hits. One of the concrete buildings had a huge hole in the roof where a bomb had entered. Nearby radar vans had been chewed up by gunfire, probably by an A-10’s gatling gun. To make certain that the site could not be re-used, several cluster bombs had been dropped, as evidenced by the empty casing scattered about and clearly marked as anti-personnel cluster bombs. Destruction was total.
---We turned back north and after a short while came upon the location of the “mine.” Although we couldn’t identify the exact spot where the explosion took place, the area where we were had no defensive positions for a minefield to support. In fact there did not seem to be any other mines at the location. The report I sent up stated that the vehicle was probably a victim of one of our own bomblets, originally intended for the radar site but dropped short or thrown clear of the target. This would explain the small size of the explosion and why there didn’t seem to be any other explosive devices in the area. Nevertheless, the site location provided by the GPS was sent up the chain.
---Mail came up later that day, delivered by some of the battalion staff officers. We hadn’t seen any of the staff for a couple of weeks, certainly not since we crossed into Iraq. They came prepared with cameras and one the lookout for souveniers. We were happy for the mail, but it would have been nice to have gotten some desert boots as well. Many of our soldiers had boots that were literally falling apart on them.

Site 289, March 6th, 1991

---A big sandstorm blew through, reducing visibility to just a few feet. It blew itself out by dark.
---The following day, while Lieutenant Pace and myself were in the CP, one of the infantrymen told us they had found a bomb nearby. “Where?” Joe asked.
---“Near the showers.”
---“How could there be a bomb inside the site?” I asked. “It was cleared before we moved in.”
---“It was attached to a parachute; it must have blown in with the storm. Can we blow it up?”
---“Mark it and make sure no one goes near the thing.” Joe told him.
---“But we already moved it down into the crater.”
---“You WHAT?” I yelled as I turned to face him. “That’s crazy! The thing could have been equipped with an anti-tampering device!”
---I was really mad. The thought of someone getting himself killed after the war was over, especially with something dumb like playing with a bomb, just bugged the hell out of me.
---We were lucky no one was hurt.

Site 289, March 10th, 1991

---Every day brought explosions and plumes of smoke. The Coalition was about to leave southern Iraq, having accomplished the mission of liberating Kuwait. We were destroying whatever might be of military value within occupied Iraq.
---I was informed that I would be the OIC of the battery rear detachment and to prepare to move out. I would be in charge of preparing quarters and offices for the unit’s return.
---Soldiers of Bravo Battery, 2nd Battalion, 1st Air Defense Artillery, begin the long journey home.

Site 289, March 13th, 1991

---We departed Saudi Arabia after a long trip back from Iraq. Our route took us to Rome, Ireland, and finally Fort Bliss.
---The reception was overwhelming. As we exited the 747 people were lined up on either side of the walkway leading to the hanger. I never in my wildest dreams thought that there could be such a welcome home. Signs, balloons, yellow ribbons, and banners were everywhere.
---Maj. Gen. Donald Lionetti, the Chief of Air Defense Artillery, was there to address the returning troops, telling us how proud he was of the “heroes of Desert Storm.” It was odd to hear ourselves referred to as heroes. I know that I didn’t feel like a hero. But the U.S. armed forces had accomplished something heroic. We had moved an army into the desert, supported by firepower from the U.S. Navy and the Air Force, and had defeated a huge enemy force. Our enthusiasm was high, because we were asked to do the job we were trained to do. Our strength was high, because of the lavish attention spent on the military during the Reagan Era. And our morale was high, because we had confidence in our own abilities and the abilities of our Coalition allies.
---It was several hours before I slept, even though I had been awake for several days it seemed. I was too tired to sleep.