Chapter 1
Lieutenant Colonel Jacob Elliott Turner glanced down at his trusty olive drab plastic Timex watch. It was February 23, 1991, 0400 hours local, 0100 hours Zulu (Greenwich Mean Time). Jake twisted around in the turret hatch of his M3 Bradley Scout Fighting Vehicle and flipped down his night vision goggles. Arrayed behind him were more than a hundred vehicles, engines idling, and black-out driving lights on. Jake pressed the transmit button on his radio breaking squelch twice, the signal for his unit to advance.
Two M1 Abrams Tanks to his front moved out smartly, hitting the gap in the earthen berm under full acceleration, and crossing the FEBA (forward edge of the battle area) into Iraq. Jake's driver pulled out behind the tanks keeping fifty meters to their rear. The tanks spread apart once they had passed through the gap bull-dozed in the berm and sped forward side-by-side fifty meters apart. The tanks rode just inside the markers emplaced by the combat engineers that signified the boundary of the lane they had cleared of mines. The mine field was a little over one mile wide; traversing it through the narrow cleared lane put Jake's task force in a vulnerable position. The defenders of this sector could concentrate artillery fire on the lane at any moment.
The brigade intelligence officer had said that the local Republican Guard Artillery Brigade had been rendered combat ineffective, but Intel weenies were notorious for being wrong. The best bet was to get his unit through the minefield as fast as possible. Jake turned back around and looked behind him. He was gratified to see a double line of tanks and Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles hauling ass while still staying spread out as much as possible.
Jake was the commander of a combined arms task force consisting of his mechanized infantry battalion, with a company of tanks attached. In addition, he had lobbied for and gotten a military police company to handle any prisoners of war they captured. Task Force Seminole Warrior was spearheading the assault into Iraq in this sector because of their high degree of combat readiness. Jake's task force was the only National Guard unit leading any of the division's three incursions. It was highly unorthodox for the Battalion Commander to be in one of the lead vehicles, but Jake believed you could only lead from the front. His Executive Officer and Staff were two-thirds of the way back in the order of march.
The time it took to pass through the mine field seemed an eternity but was really only two minutes. Once clear of the last marker Jake's driver slewed the Bradley to the right and brought it to a stop, while the tanks formed up in a diagonal line echelon left and tore across the open desert. The battalion's scout platoon followed the first six tanks and surged forward to take point. Behind the scout platoon, a platoon from A Company pivoted right after passing Jake's position. They would provide a screening force on the right flank for the rest of the units.
It took twenty-five agonizing minutes to get the entire task force through the mine field. By the time the battalion supply train was through, the front of the task force was halted ten miles deep inside Iraq having made their first contact with the enemy. Satisfied that his unit was intact and moving as planned, Jake had his driver hustle him toward the front.
Jake caught up to the forward elements of his force just as the sky was starting to lighten in early morning nautical twilight. Jake was prepared for the sight that greeted him but it was still surreal to see hundreds of Iraqi soldiers with their hands raised trying to surrender to his scout platoon. In the background, three Soviet made T-55 tanks smoldered in ruin, victims of the wire guided TOW missiles carried by the M3 Bradleys.
Jake broke radio silence for the first time since leaving the assembly area. He called the military police company forward then hopped down from his perch and walked toward the mass of Iraqi soldiers. In Arabic, he asked to speak to the ranking officer. After some shouting back and forth, a middle-aged Iraqi Colonel stepped forward. Jake saluted the surprised colonel and brought him over to his Bradley. Jake handed the man a canteen and they shared a drink.
"It is a wise leader who does not wastefully scatter the bodies of his men in the sand," Jake said in Arabic.
The Iraqi Colonel looked at the westerner in surprise. The man's Arabic was nearly flawless.
"I don't believe our supreme leader will share your opinion," the Iraqi said.
"That's true," Jake allowed, "but at least you aren't alone today. Other units are reporting the capture of thousands of prisoners all along the border."
Just then, a flight of three AH-64A Apache attack helicopters broke over the northern horizon, their empty stub wings attesting to the good hunting they had had. The Apaches spread apart and cautiously approached the Americans and their prisoners. Jake called to the rear and reported sighting the gunships to Brigade. Word was quickly passed to the aviation battalion and then to the gunship pilots. The lead copter wagged his aircraft side to side then the deadly Apaches streaked by overhead. Jake heaved a sigh of relief; he was more afraid of the gunslinger Apache pilots than he was of the Iraqi armor. The chopper jockeys tended to shoot first and ask questions later. Jake knew that the majority of combat losses during this conflict would be from friendly fire. But the Iraqi Colonel's fearful expression at the appearance of the AH-64s gave him an opening.
"Do you think we can save some more of your men from senseless slaughter tonight?" Jake asked.
As the Iraqi Colonel was discussing the surrender of his unit with Jake, a five ton cargo truck came rolling up along with three Humvees full of MPs. The truck was carrying a six hundred gallon rubber water bladder and pulling a water trailer with an additional four hundred gallons. The truck came to a halt and Timothy J. 'Tiny' Johnson, the Headquarters Company First Sergeant, jumped out of the passenger side door. Jake reckoned that talking Tiny into joining his unit in 1977 was one of the smartest things he had ever done. Since being deployed in October of 1990, Tiny reckoned it was one of the dumbest things he had ever done. Jake had the Colonel call forward his ranking noncommissioned officer. Tiny conversed with the NCO in passable Arabic to set up a line so that the Iraqi troops could get some water.
It took less than an hour to sort the POWs out. By seven, the task force was on the move again. Task Force Seminole Warrior's incursion into Iraq was near where Iraq and Jordan's border meet Saudi Arabia. Jake's mission was to interdict the highway between the Jordanian border and Baghdad. It was seventy miles to the highway and Jake planned to be sitting on it by noon.
Winter in the Syrian Desert was the rainy season with most of the five inch yearly total falling between December and April. It had rained just two days ago so the coarse sand was packed and perfect for armored vehicles. The weather was cloudy and cool, the high temperature for today expected to be in the mid fifties. Tonight there was a fifty percent chance of rain with a predicted low of forty.
The lead elements of the task force reached the paved, high speed highway at eleven-twenty. When Jake rolled up fifteen minutes later, the Alpha Company commander had already posted security and set up a road block. Jake called the engineer platoon forward to sweep for mines; until he was sure the road was clear his vehicles were staying off it. The engineers arrived at twelve-fifteen, it took them twenty minutes to check a quarter mile section of the road and pronounce it clear. Alpha company, two tank platoons, and the scouts moved across the road to set up the northern half of the battalion's perimeter. Delta Company would do the same for the southern half. The road provided a natural point to anchor each semicircle of troops. The battalion's perimeter was almost a mile and a half in diameter.
Gary Lockwood, the Battalion Command Sergeant Major, had already organized the battalion trains and was busy making sure that a POL (petroleum, oil and lubricant) point was established to refuel the armored vehicles, diesel for the Bradleys and JP8 gasoline for the fuel guzzling turbine-powered Abrams. Jake checked the refueling area then made his way to the battalion command post on the north side of the highway. Tiny's men already had a couple of medium sized tents set up with field tables and radio gear between two M557 command tracks. Jake was choking down an MRE (meal, ready to eat) while reviewing the latest intelligence reports with his S2 (Intel Officer). New intel products were sparse because the dense cloud cover and sandstorms typical of this time of year had reduced the effectiveness of satellite and aircraft imagery. The latest intel sitrep (Situation Report) reported that advance all along the line was being held up while thousands of prisoners were being processed.
"Good call on the MPs, boss; without them we would still be at the border," the S2 said.
"Lucky guess," Jake replied.
Before the S2 could say anything else the radio operator manning the division command net called Jake to the radio to take a call. The person at the other end of the radio was Jake's Brigade Commander, Colonel Osteen. Jake took some furious notes as the Colonel gave him a mission warning order. After signing off the radio, Jake turned to his Executive Officer, Gary Cooley.
"Command and Staff meeting in fifteen minutes. Tell the company commanders to make sure their XOs stay on top of refueling and rearming," Jake said.
It took closer to twenty minutes before everyone straggled in. Jake used the time to do a quick map recon of the mission with his Operations Officer. When everyone was assembled, Jake took the floor and read them the five paragraph field order he had hastily written.
"Gentlemen, this is a field order, take notes. A Special Forces team looking for SCUD launch sites is pinned down near the town of Ar Relbat thirty kilometers east of here. The team says they are in sporadic heavy contact with at least two companies of infantry. Tactical air is weathered in for at least the next three hours so we have been tasked to extract them. Bravo and Charlie Company, along with two tank platoons will be the assault force. We move out in thirty minutes. Major Cooley will be in charge of the Base Camp while we are forward. I will be with Bravo Company. We will use the battalion's alternate radio frequency for this mission. Everyone make sure you have at least one radio check with your subordinate units and each other. Alpha Company, be prepared to reinforce. Delta Company I need three Bradley from you to transport the Special Forces guys. Send them with driver, gunner, and track commander -- but no riflemen. Headquarters Company, I want a medic on two of Delta Company's Bradleys and First Sergeant Johnson on the third. Scout Platoon Leader stay with me; the rest of you go make it happen."
Jake's troops stood up, saluted and moved out. Jake briefed the young lieutenant in charge of the scout platoon on what he wanted. Without anything in the air, the scouts were going to be his only source of tactical information. The lieutenant saluted and hurried to get his troops on the road.
Thirty minutes later, the scout platoon's three M3s kicked up a spray of sand as they sped off. Jake gave them a five minute head start then ordered the rest of his force to move out. The flat, open desert and hard granular sand allowed Jake to up the pace to thirty miles per hour. Jake figured they were about three miles from their objective when the Special Forces team leader radioed him.
"Warrior six this is Saber one-zero. Are you guys close? Because we have company; I count three T-72 tanks, five BMPs and six BTR-60s armored personnel carriers, they are moving with dismounted infantry looking for us, over."
"Saber one-zero we are about five minutes out but we'll speed it up. Keep your heads down, out."
On his intercom mike, Jake hustled his driver up then called the scouts to have them halt where they were. Next, he called the tank company commander.
"Bulldog six this is Warrior six, be advised that our friends have spotted three T-72s and nine APCs. Go get 'em, over."
"Roger, Warrior six."
The tank formation surged forward. Jake radioed the Battalion Command Post and updated Major Cooper. Jake told Cooper to relay the information about the tanks to division headquarters at once. T-72s were signature vehicles of a Republican Guard armored regiment, a unit unaccounted for in anyone's plans. Briefings by Central Command had said that the only units known to be in this area were two poorly equipped infantry divisions at less than half nominal strength.
Captain Daniel Solomon looked through the commander's thermal sight of his M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank. It was dusk but the cloud cover was dispensing with early evening nautical twilight. After a few jerky motions of the display, the Iraqi armored vehicles popped into focus. Solomon rapidly issued orders to his other tanks as his gunner painted the leftmost T-72 with the laser range finder. The range finder fed the distance to the enemy tank into the fire control computer. The fire control computer took fewer than five seconds to signal it had a firing solution. The turret slewed around and stabilized on its gyros as the muzzle of the smooth bore 120MM gun elevated. When the ready light illuminated, the gunner fired.
All seven tanks fired almost simultaneously. The rounds had barely cleared the tubes before the turrets rotated toward their secondary targets. Down range, six of the seven rounds found their mark. The T-72s were all hit, Daniel had double targeted each tank. The high explosive, anti-tank (HEAT) munitions devastated the Soviet built tanks and one of the BMPs before the occupants ever spotted the speeding behemoths that caused their death.
The scout platoon pitched in by knocking out three of the lightly armored BTR-60s with their Tow II missiles. A second salvo by the American tanks ended the issue, as all twelve Iraqi vehicles lay smashed and lifeless. The engagement had taken fewer than thirty seconds. The dismounted Iraqi infantrymen beat a hasty retreat back towards the town of Ar Relbat as the Americans bore down on them. The irony of his situation was not lost on Daniel Solomon: he was a Jew, in a tank, in the desert, fighting one group of Arabs to free another group of Arabs, and both groups wanted him and his people dead.
Jake radioed the Special Forces team leader and had him pop a smoke grenade. It took a second for him to see the puff of yellow about a kilometer off to his two o'clock. Jake radioed the vehicles with the medics and Tiny Johnson; then the four Bradleys converged on the smoke. Jake halted the advance of the rest of his troops and had them form a skirmish line about two hundred meters in front of his location. Jake stopped fifty meters from the smoke and surveyed the area. He watched in amazement as shapeless masses of desert started standing up one by one. The Special Forces guys had on ghillie suits that had blended them into the sparse vegetation and sand so well you would trip over one of them before you knew they were there.
"Someone here call for a taxi?" Jake asked.
"Thank you, Sir," the Chief Warrant Officer leading the team said. "I've never been so happy to see a bunch of leg (derisive term for non-airborne personnel) tank jockeys in my life."
"It gets better, Chief," Jake replied. "You were just rescued by the Florida National Guard. Or motto is 'If we kill them all, we can go home sooner'."
There were ten men on this Special Forces Team instead of the nominal twelve. Five men hopped into one Bradley and four settled into the second. Jake asked the team leader to ride with him. Jake pulled the unit back until they were about five kilometers from the edge of the town.
Jake thought for a minute about rejoining his battalion but decided against it. Something was fishy about the Ar Relbat and its defenders. Jake decided he needed more information before he gave up the tactical advantage his unit's surprise appearance gained them. Jake called the tank company commander over as well as the Special Forces Team Sergeant and Tiny Johnson.
"How long have you guys been here, Chief?" Jake asked.
"We've been on the ground for eight days but most of the time we were about twenty klicks (kilometers) away watching the road. Checking out this town was our follow-on mission. We got here two nights ago. Last night we started to recon the town when an Iraqi outpost spotted us. There wasn't supposed to be anything here, let alone Republic Guards."
"Have you seen anything?"
"Absolutely nothing until we were spotted and had to go to ground. We did notice that there are no women or children here, though. Saddam has gone to a lot of trouble to keep us from seeing whatever is in that town," the team leader concluded.
Jake had a sudden vision of the Iraqi exodus from Kuwait and the column of vehicles that the Air Force pilots had destroyed. He radioed for both of his line company commanders to join him.
By seven in the evening Charlie Company and one tank platoon was moving south, two miles past the highway they turned east. Five miles later, they turned north and spread out along the highway waiting in the darkness to ambush the Iraqis if they tried to flee.
Jake sent out two groups to set up heavy observation posts, each with two Bradleys and a tank. One he positioned northeast of the town and the other northwest. He also had two dismounted squads move forward to set up OPs between his base camp and the town. By eight o'clock, everyone was in place. Jake called back to brigade to update Colonel Osteen and see if the weather was looking better for tactical air support for the morning.
Colonel Osteen told him that there was an AC-130 gunship on its way to loiter around the area until a forward area refueling point could be set up near his battalion's command post. Jake was near the area where the Scuds fired into Israel were thought to have come from. Central Command wanted to exploit the task force's presence, so they were being reinforced with an attack helicopter company and three 105MM towed howitzers.
Satisfied that security was in place, Jake unrolled his sleeping bag next to his Bradley and sacked out.
Half way around the world in Palmdale, it was one-thirty in the afternoon when Jake fell asleep. Melissa Turner was at the Turner's ranch watching CNN with one eye as she reviewed some paperwork. Right now, a general from CENTCON was briefing reporters on the events of the day, inset at the bottom of the screen was a film loop showing the Kuwaiti oil fields blazing interspersed with scenes of destroyed tanks and vehicles. Melissa was appalled at carnage and devastation. She was also worried about her man, she instinctively knew that he was in the thick of things; to do less was not his style. Melissa focused on the television as the general showed a video of Iraqis surrendering in droves to coalition troops as blown up tanks burned behind them. Just as she refocused on the report she was reading, the phone rang.
The caller was Carol White, the wife of the service manager at Palmdale Honda and an officer in Jake's unit. Melissa, as the head of the family support group for Jake's battalion, received many such calls from other wives. Jake had asked Melissa to make the family support group really function to help the spouses and families left behind when the battalion deployed. The battalion's wives were a tight group now, quickly coming to each other's aid.
"Melissa, I just saw Sammy on CNN capturing some prisoners," Carol said excitedly.
"I thought those guys looked familiar, but its hard to tell with all that gear they wear," replied Melissa.
Melissa chatted with Carol a few minutes before hanging up. The call confirmed her suspicion that Jake and his men were not sitting in the rear guarding the PX as Jake had kidded they would be. Melissa recalled the burning tanks in the video clip and shuddered, they were already in combat. Well, at least Carol and the other women's significant others were in good hands with her Hubby leading them. But who was taking care of her Baby? Yes, Jake was still her baby even after sixteen years of marriage. This separation was longer and harder on her than any had been in the past.
The funk Melissa was about to get into evaporated when the door burst open and her children spilled through it. Erika walked in behind them a little more decorously. Erika had picked them up from school today as she was in town anyway.
"Mom, we're home," Jake Junior announced unnecessarily.
JJ and Mikayla plopped down on either side of her on the couch.
"What's the latest?" JJ asked.
Melissa related to her son and daughter the call from Carol White. She put on her bravest front for them because Mikayla was scared to death about something happening to her father. JJ worried too, but he worked hard to keep from showing it. His dad had asked him to be the man of the house until this mess was over. JJ took the responsibility seriously.
"Boy, if dad's on those guys' case, this thing will be over in a hurry," he said reassuringly.
Melissa looked at her son fondly and ruffled his hair. Jakey, (she could think it but he had a cow if she said that name out loud) at fifteen was probably the handsomest young man she had ever seen. That was not just a mother's pride talking either. Every woman she knew thought the same thing. Jakey was tall for his age, as his father had been, and shared the same coal-black hair and dark blue eyes. The younger Jake differed from his father in that he had the slender muscular body of a swimmer and his skin had Melissa's light olive cast. His features were classically handsome as opposed to his father's rugged good looks. Jake was a junior at JFK High, captain of the varsity swim team and number one in his class. He was also a hot commodity on the dating market. As soon as he was allowed to date on turning fifteen, a steady stream of older girls with cars were at the door to pick him up. Yep, he was Jake's son all right, thought Melissa ruefully.
Mikayla Turner was twelve and in the eighth grade. In the last year she had grown two inches and, at five-six, was the same height as her mother. Mikayla was at the awkward stage between pretty girl and beautiful teenager. She was skinny, wore braces, and was convinced that she was destined to be ugly. The only person who could convince her differently was half a world away sleeping in the Syrian Desert. Even her normally irrepressible nature was subdued without her Daddy around. Melissa worried about her daughter but knew as soon as Jake walked through the door all would be right again.
Erika brought the mail in and handed it to Melissa. There were letters from Jake in the delivery for all of them. Mikayla grabbed hers and ran to her room to read it. Erika sat down on the arm of the couch next to JJ as he read what his dad had written. Melissa subdued a secret little smile at the way her son leaned towards Erika as he read so she could play with the hair on the back of his head. Erika and JJ had always been close, how close they were now was one of those 'don't ask, don't tell' sort of questions. Melissa did not open the letter from her husband. She always saved them to read when she went to bed. Lord, did she miss him.
Jake was instantly awake as soon as someone touched his shoulder.
"It's time, Sir," Tiny said.
Jake looked at his watch: it was fifteen minutes after midnight.
"Is the gunship up?" Jake asked.
"Yes sir, it arrived about twenty minutes ago, the pilot said they can loiter until zero-five-hundred. I've got them on the secure radio if you want to brief them."
Jake was out of his sleeping bag and at the rear ramp of his Bradley.
"Good idea, what's his call sign?"
"Spectre two-two," Tiny replied.
Jake took the radio handset from the duty radio operator and keyed the push to talk button.
"Spectre two-two this is Warrior six, how copy - over."
"Warrior six, two-two copies you lima-charlie (loud and clear). Man, what did you do to your vehicles?" the pilot responded with a laugh.
"We didn't want you to mistake us for the bad guys," Jake replied.
Carl McClelland had developed a special paint at Jake's request that only showed up on infrared or thermal sights. Jake let each track crew decide how to mark their vehicles. Smiley faces and peace signs predominated, along with some pithy GI humor.
"No chance of that now," chuckled the pilot.
Jake briefed the pilot on his plan to acquire the gunship some legitimate unfriendly targets. The AC-130/H was a Vietnam era innovation and was bad ass. It had a couple of 20mm Vulcan multi-barreled cannons, a 40mm rapid fire cannon, and even a 105mm howitzer, all firing out the left side. It used radar and infrared sighting and computer aiming. The gunships' extraordinary accuracy made them perfect for operation in an urban environment as Jake had in mind.
Jake plan was to feint an attack on the town of Ar Relbat to try to draw fire from within the town. The gunship would mark the location of the Iraqi positions and destroy them as Jake's forces maneuvered. When the gunships finished doing their thing Task Force Seminole warrior would try to occupy the outskirts of the town. Jake was angling to avoid fighting inside the town; his unit was not well trained in military operations in urban terrain. At the same time, he needed to find what it took a Republican Guard regiment to guard before they could destroy whatever it was. Jake hoped that they had found a Scud missile launch site but dreaded the thought that it might also be a chemical munitions depot.
Alpha company rolled up from the battalion CP at 0100 hours, right on time. It took an additional half hour to array his forces in a wide arc to the west of the town. At 0130 hours, they started to advance. It took the formation fifteen minutes to reach the husks of the Iraqi tanks and APCs they had destroyed yesterday. Seeing the whip antenna mast on one of the BMPs gave Jake an idea. He had his driver dash over to the still-smoking troop carrier. Jake dismounted and took a quick look inside. The BMP's turret was knocked askew and the radio perforated by shrapnel so Jake ran towards the next one. He was half way between the two when all hell broke loose. Jake heard a couple of echoing booms right before the sky lit up as the AC-130 started spitting out countermeasure flares. Jake sprinted the last fifty meters, skidding to a stop behind a BTR 50 that had taken a TOW missile from one of his scouts right at its road wheels.
Two of the tanks immediately fired a round into the area where the flash of the missile launch originated. The SAMs fired at the gunship exploded harmlessly in the cluster of flares and chaff trailing the plane's wake. The plane righted itself from its evasive maneuvers and sent a cone of 20mm tracers towards the center of the town. The high explosive incendiary rounds lit up the sky as they rained in at a hundred rounds per second. Secondary explosions shook the ground as vehicles and munitions exploded.
Meanwhile, Jake's task force halted two thousand meters from the edge of town. The scout platoon made a couple of runs towards the town. Moving at max speed, they approached to within a few hundred meters then swerved back out trying to draw fire. The first pass netted some small arms fire that was quickly silenced by a few bursts from the Bradley's M242 Bushmaster 25mm cannon. The gunship, having dispensed with the antiaircraft battery, poured a couple of bursts into houses on the edge of town. The buildings turned out to not be houses at all; rather they were elaborate camouflage for Iraqi armored vehicles in hull-down defilade. The gunship and Jake's tanks had a field day after that discovery as the tanks dispatched the buildings with high explosive rounds before the gunship chewed up the contents.
Jake found a working radio on the third destroyed APC he checked. He keyed the microphone and asked in Arabic to speak to the Iraqi commander. After two minutes of conversation, Jake called for his troops to cease fire. Jake's negotiating position was simple: either the Iraqis surrendered or Jake would annihilate the town and everything in it with air strikes. His troops would stand off and let the B-52s that were on their way from England do the work. The B-52s were a fabrication, but were something Jake could make happen with a radio call. The Iraqi commander took fifteen minutes to make his decision. At 0215 hrs, troops with their hands in the air started to exit the village.
Jake heaved a sigh of relief that his ploy had worked. While the outcome of the engagement was never in doubt, the Iraqi troops were heavily armed and well-equipped. This scenario kept anyone from his unit being hurt in house to house fighting. At 0300 hrs, he accepted the surrender of the somber Iraqi brigadier general who commanded the regiment. Assembled on the outskirts of the town were over a thousand prisoners; the bulk of the Iraqis were in front of Jake, but a few hundred had surrendered to Charlie Company to the west and about fifty were in front of the northern heavy out post.
The rest of Jake's battalion rolled up at 0400. Major Cooper established a new base camp three kilometers from the town out of range of any diehards still in Ar Relbat. Road blocks were reestablished on the highway and the Military Police started processing the prisoners. Jake stood his troops down for some rest as the new arrivals took over security. Jake racked out by his track for a few hours of eyelid maintenance; he planned to enter the town by reconnaissance in force at 0800. The Special Forces team was already on their way into town to look for potential surprises.
Jake woke up at 0700, he was alert, but not all that well rested. Tiny Johnson joined him as he use a heat tab to boil some water for coffee. MREs sucked in general, but the coffee packets first thing in the morning were ambrosia. At seven-thirty, a Chinook helicopter landed a few hundred yards outside the battalion's perimeter and a gaggle of rear echelon weenies piled out. Jake mowed his stubble with his rechargeable electric razor then went to meet the new arrivals. His guests turned out to be the brigade S2 with a Military Intelligence team and a team of chemical specialists. Both teams were there to exploit any technical intelligence Jake's men came across in the town. Jake turned the new arrivals over to Major Cooper. The spooks were going to question some of the prisoners and check out the documents some of the surrendered Iraqis carried. Jake decided that he would take the bugs and gas guys with him.
It took until 0820 to get the NBC (nuclear, chemical and biological) team situated in one of Alpha companies tracks. At 0825, the recon element moved out. Jake was riding seventh in line in the column; a pair of tanks led the way followed by an infantry platoon in four Bradleys. A flight of Apache Attack Helicopters buzzed back and forth over head like big angry dragonflies. Everyone was keeping a sharp eye out because the Iraqi Republican Guard commander said that there were still a couple of hundred Baath Party Special Troops in the town who refused to surrender. The Iraqi commander waffled and basically evaded the question of what the elite troops were doing in the town.
The armored column moved slowly through the outskirts of the town. Jake noted the defensive positions of the Iraqis with interest. They were arrayed in a Soviet textbook defense in depth with interlocking firing positions and fortified strong points. The arrangement would have been perfect ten years earlier when the Iraqis were fighting the Iranians. In the battlefield of the nineties, against the superior air and ground power of the coalition forces, they were useless. What amazed Jake was the degree that the positions were concealed from detection from the air. Every vehicle had a shelter built over it that, from a distance or from above, resembled an innocuous hut. Inside the shelters, armored vehicles were in trenches deep enough so that only their turrets were above ground level.
Jake's attention snapped back to the mission when he heard small arms fire in the distance. His radio crackled to life as soon as the gunfire died away.
"Warrior six this is Saber one-zero, we found your missing Special Troops. They are at the center of town hiding in a very fishy looking Mosque, over."
"Roger one-zero, we are on our way, out."
Jake switched frequencies to the brigade's FM guard or open radio net and took a stab at raising the flight leader of the Apache squadron.
"Apache leader this is Warrior six, over."
"Warrior six this is Nighthawk three-three, go ahead."
"Roger Nighthawk three-three, I need you to direct us towards the mosque in the center of town. Give the Mosque some space, the bad guys are fighting from it, over."
"Affirmative Warrior six, get your lead vehicle on this push (frequency) and I'll guide him, over."
"Roger, three-three, standby for Bulldog six, out."
Jake called Captain Solomon and put him on the guard net with the Apache pilot. Solomon, following the directions from the gunship had them at the Mosque in fifteen minutes. Jake knew immediately that this was not a real Mosque. It was a large, low, rectangular building with the distinctive onion shaped dome and minarets, as had most mosques. This building, however, had a huge set of overhead doors at each end of the rectangle artfully painted over to blend in to the walls when viewed from a distance. Jake deployed his vehicles along the streets that bordered the six foot high wall surrounding the building then called back to brigade for some guidance.
Jake could not by law even set foot on the grounds of the site because the CENTCOM commander had issued a blanket safeguard for all religious sites. Forcing a safeguard was a violation of Article 103 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice; you could get the death penalty for an Article 103 offense.
Colonel Osteen told Jake to stand by and kicked Jake's question up the chain of command. It took an hour for Jake to receive some sort of reply.
'Breach the walls and secure the area around the building but don't touch the building itself, ' he was told. 'A Muslim Chaplain and a Mullah were being sent from Central Command headquarters; they would arrive late that afternoon.'
Jake gave the scout platoon leader the task of breaching the wall. The scout leader backed his M3 up a hundred meters and fired a tow dead on at the center of the wall's long axis. The wall turned out to be two feet thick and so heavily reinforced that it took two of the shape-charged warheads to blow a six foot gap into it. Meanwhile, two of the Abrams had better luck with dispatching the gates at each end of the compound. The tanks took a run at the gates, knocking them both down simultaneously then backing away quickly. The tank at the north gate took a direct hit from a ground launched AT-4 antitank missile but it bounced harmlessly off the sloped front glacis plate, the most heavily armored part of the tank. On orders from Jake, one of the circling Apaches took out the bunker that had fired the missile along with three others that were some distance from the building.
Jake was in no hurry to expose his troops to whatever waited inside the walls. He would wait until he got clearance from CENTCOM then have the gunships rake the courtyard up to the edge of the building before moving in.
At 1500 hrs, the promised chaplain and Mullah showed up. Jake took the Kuwaiti cleric off guard when he spoke to him in respectful Arabic. The Mullah took one look at the supposed Mosque and burst into a harangue about blasphemy and heretics. The Mullah conferred with the chaplain who then briefed the CENTCOM Judge Advocate General's representative traveling with them. The JAG Colonel gave Jake the order that the building they were at was not a mosque or holy shrine and therefore was a legitimate military target. Jake saluted the colonel, shook hands with the chaplain, and received the blessing of the mullah; it was time to rock and roll.
Jake set the Apaches loose on the bunkers inside the walls at 1515 hrs. By 1517, they were all history, pulverized by hellfire missiles. The tanks rolled in through the gates immediately after the gunships made their last run. The tank at the south doors turned his turret around and drove right through the doors. Then backed out of the door way and quickly realigned his gun tube forward. Behind the tank, two dismounted squads moved to flank the doors.
Jake watched as much of the action as he could by standing on the
Turret of his Bradley. He itched to be with the troops but it was not
his place to be. It was time for his men to put the hard training they
had done to practice. Jake was overly absorbed in watching the attack;
thankfully, his other troops were not as the M242 Bushmaster Cannon on
the third vehicle from him opened fire. Jake turned slightly to see
what they were firing at when a three round burst from an AK-47
stitched up his back and knocked him off his perch.