A favorable situation will never be exploited if commanders wait for orders.

1630 HOURS, ADVANCING TO THE 73 EASTING WITH GHOST TROOP

Ghost Troop was now approaching the 73 Easting disposed in a loose line, with the two scout platoons on either flank and the tanks in the center forming a lazy wedge—Lt. Andy Kilgore’s tank platoon a little to the left and behind Sartiano and Mecca.

A little to the right and behind Sartiano’s tank in the center was Kinsley’s (not his real name) tank platoon, in reserve. Lieutenant Kinsley, a West Point graduate, had joined Ghost Troop just before the squadron deployed to the Combat Maneuver Training Center (CMTC) at Hohenfels, Germany, and was learning the proverbial ropes when war came. Very young in appearance, Kinsley was the archetypal kid in John Wayne’s World War II movies.

Kilgore, an athletic and aggressive University of Tennessee graduate, arrived just in time to take over the 2nd Platoon tanks and deploy with Ghost Troop to Saudi Arabia. His previous service with a tank battalion in 1st Infantry Division (Forward), the 3rd Brigade of the 1st Infantry Division (Mechanized), the rest of which was stationed at Fort Riley, Kansas, was cut short when his battalion was disbanded. Disappointed with the prospect of filling some bureaucratic position in Germany, Andy Kilgore begged to be assigned to a fighting unit that would deploy to the Gulf, and the chain of command finally granted his wish. Despite his short service with Ghost Troop, Kilgore fit in well with Sartiano’s relaxed, caring, but demanding style of leadership.

Figure 11. Ghost Troop Actions on 73 Easting

Curiously, the middle of Ghost’s zone, just ahead of where Ghost Troop’s tanks were concentrated, was bisected by a rise that ran east to west, with small spurs of one or two meters in height leading off to the north and south. As the night wore on, these modest terrain features, together with bowl-like depressions in front and north of Ghost Troop, would shape the conduct of the fight that was to come.

Staring at the cloud of smoke from a burning BMP blowing across his front, Andy Kilgore decided that sitting behind the growing smoke screen made no sense. Patience was not one of Kilgore’s virtues. He called Sartiano for permission to move his tank platoon forward through the smoke: “Ghost 6, White 1, request permission to move forward through smoke, over.”

Sartiano’s response was quick and to the point.

“White 1, Ghost 6, make your move, over.”

“White 1, roger, out.”

As Kilgore’s tanks moved forward through the smoke, Sartiano looked at his watch and saw that it was now about 1630 hours. He concluded, shit, this is dumb. Why not send all of the tanks forward? Nine tanks moving forward would be better than four. So Sartiano got on the radio and said, “White 1, Ghost 6, halt on the far side of the smoke. I will bring up the rest of the tanks, over,”

Thinking that Kilgore had heard his command, Sartiano watched patiently as Kilgore’s four tanks disappeared into the smoke on his left. While he waited for a call from Kilgore that his tanks were halted and ready to fire, he prepared to move the remaining four tanks up on line with Kilgore’s tanks. But the call never came. Then, to put it bluntly, all hell broke loose.

Kilgore’s tanks moved forward. Kilgore opened fire first, yelling, “Enemy tanks direct front, direct frontal fire!” Firing their main guns as they advanced, tearing T72 tanks and BMPs to pieces, the drivers, gunners, loaders, and tank commanders were all filled with that strange emotional mixture of apprehension and elation that is inseparable from offensive action. Yes, they were scared, but they were also ready to kill, nonetheless.

In a few seconds, Kilgore’s four tanks broke right into the Iraqi defensive positions, ripping a big hole in the middle, turning through and around the bunkers that stood near each of the tank and BMP fighting positions.¹

Thanks to the smoke of the burning BMPs, along with the suddenness and force of Kilgore’s assault, his four tanks achieved complete surprise. By the time Kilgore’s tank commanders had finished off the dozen or so BMPs and two T72 tanks in the company strongpoint, the Iraqi defenders had fired no more than two or three main-gun rounds and no antitank guided missiles at all.

Kilgore was relieved. His tank commanders looked around, waving excitedly at each other.

“What a rush,” Kilgore said quietly under his breath while streams of sweat poured over his brow.

But the action was far from over. In the midst of the wrecked and burning motorized rifle company, an amazing event now occurred.

Large numbers of green-clad Iraqi infantrymen suddenly jumped up from the surrounding bunkers and defensive positions and began firing RPGs and AK47s from less than twenty meters away, directly at the four American tanks. While Kilgore’s tanks tried to return fire, a couple of Iraqi troops managed to get into a BMP that wasn’t burning and man the 73-mm cannon in the turret. They got off a round, but it flew too high and just missed Kilgore’s tank.

Realizing that the Abrams tanks were too close to engage with main guns, Kilgore told his tank commanders to maneuver their tanks to bring their machine guns into action as best they could against the masses of Iraqi infantry running and firing at them from all directions. What had started out as an orderly advance now disintegrated into pure chaos.

Unable to see the battle that was raging on the other side of the smoke clouds, Sartiano called Kilgore on the radio. Suppressing the feelings of concern and apprehension he knew must be detectable in his voice, he controlled his temper and repeated, “White 1, Ghost 5, report, over.”

“White 1, this is Ghost 6, answer, goddamn it, over”

“White 1, this is Ghost 6, what is your status, over?”

“White 1, Ghost 6, answer the goddamn radio, over!”

It was hopeless. Kilgore’s radio had slipped off the Ghost Troop frequency. Kilgore couldn’t hear anything and even if he did, what could he do? He had a battle to fight. Fight the battle, then report. That was Kilgore’s thinking, and he was right.

Sergeant Macom, Ghost Troop’s communications chief, hearing the frustration in Sartiano’s voice, dropped down to Kikgore’s platoon net in an effort to figure out what was happening. Upon hearing the chaotic radio traffic on Kilgore’s platoon net, he told Mecca, “Sir, Kilgore’s platoon is in some serious shit. Better tell the old man.”

Hearing the tension in Macom’s voice, Mecca immediately reported to Sartiano that Kilgore was engaging an unknown number of Iraqi troops at point-blank range and was too busy to report.

Sartiano felt that hollowness in his stomach that comes with the realization that for the moment events were beyond your control. He stopped trying to reach Kilgore over the radio. Angry and a little frightened, he kept saying to himself, over and over again: “What the f—k do I do now?”

Pushing forward into the smoke and confusion could make things worse, even cause fratricide. No, Sartiano concluded, Kilgore would have to figure it out.

Kilgore was figuring it out. He knew that his tactic wasn’t working. Neither he nor the rest of his tank commanders could get rid of the attacking Iraqis. They swarmed closer through the bunker complex, partially hidden by the smoke from the burning vehicles in their midst, piling on with their automatic weapons and RPGs.

Kilgore’s tank crews were spraying machine-gun fire from every available weapon to the left and right of the tanks ahead or next to them in order to keep the Iraqi soldiers from reaching the tracks, but it was getting damn dangerous, and there was no time to think.

With his own .50-caliber heavy machine gun Kilgore was cutting to pieces Iraqi soldiers who were now no more than fifteen meters away. Body parts were flying everywhere. The sight sickened Kilgore, but any slackening of fire, and he knew that the Iraqis would be on them.

But soon it became clear that the tank commanders and the gunners inside the turrets could not depress their guns low enough to kill the Iraqi infantry that was now “danger close.” If any of the Iraqi troops crawled up next to the tanks, Kilgore thought, they could probably plant charges on the tracks without ever being seen. Without more standoff, he and his tank commanders simply could not reach the Iraqi troops with their streams of 7.62- and .50-caliber bullets.

“Back up!” Kilgore yelled into his mike at the top of his lungs, “Everybody, back the f—k up now, over!”

Nobody answered, and for a split second Kilgore experienced the anxiety that Sartiano had been feeling. But Kilgore’s men got the message. In a few seconds, the tank drivers slammed their transmissions into reverse and backed up. As the tanks jerked backward, they threw up great clogs of sand and gravel behind them like warships reversing course to avoid running aground. While the tanks moved backward, the gunners fired their machine guns without pause. Iraqi troops unlucky enough to end up behind the retrograding tanks either ran or crawled out of the way or were pinned under the tracks of the Abrams tanks and crushed.

Kilgore recalled seeing one Iraqi soldier whose legs had been completely blown off. He was propped upright and waving at Kilgore who was bearing down on him in reverse. Seeing that the man was still alive and now in the direct path of his right track, Kilgore tried to steer the tank around him, but there was not much he could do. It was a tragic moment that for a split second filled Kilgore with sorrow and empathy, but it changed nothing. Moving the tanks back as quickly as possible took priority.

No more than thirty seconds later, Kilgore’s tanks were on line about a hundred meters to the west of where they had stopped. Now, salvos of red-hot tracers from the tanks’ .50-caliber machine guns poured like water from high-pressure fire hoses into the Iraqi infantry. Despite the senselessness of it all, the remaining Iraqi troops kept coming. Did they think they had driven off the tanks and were winning the battle? Kilgore and his tank commanders had no idea. They just reloaded their 7.62- and .50-caliber machine guns and fired, fired, and fired.

Sixty seconds later the battle was over, but Kilgore wasn’t taking any chances this time. He searched the desert in all directions thoroughly for any more Iraqi infantry.

Iraqi armor continued to burn like giant flares marking an accident on Interstate 95 between Baltimore, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. In front of the four tanks, Kilgore finally concluded, nothing lived anymore. Where once green-colored uniforms had darted in and out of bunkers, there were now only heaps of corpses. The Iraqi soldiers had been blown to pieces. The Republican Guard company strongpoint was now a heavy-metal graveyard.

Other than the blowing wind, the only thing the tank commanders could hear was the sound of their own blood humming in their ears.

When no more Iraqi soldiers appeared, Kilgore leaned back in the commander’s hatch. His eyes filled with tears of relief. Then, Kilgore began wondering, where the hell is the rest of Ghost Troop? He realized he needed to report what had happened. Seeing that the tanks were back on line and in good condition, Mecca beat Kilgore to the punch. He called Kilgore on his platoon frequency, prompting him to report to Sartiano.

Kilgore instantly dropped down inside to check his radio and discovered that he was not on the Ghost Troop frequency. He knew exactly what that meant; “F—k,” he said. When the attack began, Kilgore figured, his right knee had struck the radio switch on the junction box inside the tank, where his “spaghetti cord” to his CVC helmet connected, and had cut communications with his troop commander.

Thanks to Mecca’s call, he dialed up the right frequency and moved the switch on his CVC helmet. Kilgore was almost out of breath when he spoke into the mike:

“Ghost 6, this is White 1, report follows, over.”

“This is Ghost 6, where the f—k have you been?”

“Sir, I mean, Ghost 6, engaged and destroyed a dozen BMPs, tanks, and unknown number of enemy troops, over.”

“White 1, understand. If you ever do that again, I will shoot you myself, goddamn it!”

In retrospect, Sartiano’s comment may seem a bit over the top, but Kilgore knew he’d screwed up. But he was also happy. He and his tank crews had killed the enemy without dying in the process. Not much else he could say at this point, so he kept his response short.

“This is White 1, Roger, sir, uh ... over.”

Kilgore’s charge into the Iraqi position had taken the initiative completely away from the defending Iraqi soldiers. It was in Sartiano’s words a truly great action. How great it was, neither Sartiano nor I would realize until well after the battle was over.

With Kilgore’s tanks back in the fold, Sartiano now moved the troop forward to the 73 Easting, with Garwick’s scouts on the left along what would become much later the seam with 3rd Armored Division, and on the right Haines’ scouts, who were still trying to regain contact with Petschek’s scouts on the boundary with Eagle Troop. A little to the right and behind the screen line that Haines was trying to establish sat 4th Platoon tanks in reserve, under Lieutenant Kinsley.

Meanwhile, Petschek coolly worked his way through the wall of smoke and flame that separated Eagle and Ghost troops from the Iraqi enemy to our front, engaging Iraqi armor and infantry all the way to the 73 Easting. It was here that Petschek discovered for the first time how Iraqi infantry would lie face down over their grenade launchers and machine guns, waiting for the advancing Americans to pass. Their behavior filled him with disgust. Fortunately, the Bradley gunners usually detected the fraud using their infrared sights to see the still living “hot” bodies, yelling, “They’re not dead. They’ve got weapons!”

Petschek later estimated that his platoon fired four hundred rounds of high-explosive incendiary tracer ammunition at point-blank range into dozens and dozens of Iraqi infantrymen who had played this game. The resulting carnage was gruesome.

From the fire-support net, I learned that Sam White’s battery was in place with all eight guns ready to fire, but only four guns from 6-41 Field Artillery were on hand to respond to missions. This situation was not Colonel Adair’s fault.

The pointless nightlong road march to 1st Infantry Division and back to Cougar Squadron had taken its toll on Adair’s artillery battalion. Adair’s troops were exhausted, and their equipment was scattered all over the desert. As the night of 26 February wore on, the numbers and readiness of the artillery systems in the battalion would increase, and they would strike the enemy hard, but for most of the fight we would rely primarily on Cpt. Sam White’s battery.

Fortunately, we had broken the enemy’s back with Abrams tank 120-mm and Bradley 25-mm fire before a single artillery shell went down range. The question for me was, What would happen once we stopped and could no longer advance?

Whenever armored formations are static for long periods, they are at risk. That is when artillery begins to play a significant role. We were stopped. How much artillery would we need now, I wondered?

It was now getting close to 1710 hours, and we still had no positive contact between Ghost and Eagle troops. Restoring contact between Ghost and Eagle, and ensuring that Eagle Troop regained contact with Iron Troop, now three kilometers to our right rear, were critical. Worried that we still had no face-to-face contact on the ground with either Iron Troop or Ghost Troop, I called McMaster again for an update on his progress with regaining contact on the flanks.

Petschek, McMaster said, was on his way to meet Haines at a mutually agreed contact point between Ghost and Eagle troops. McMaster also told me that Gauthier was trying to make contact with Iron Troop on the radio but could not get a response.

Despite Gifford’s entreaties, however, Iron Troop kept telling Eagle Troop that it was in contact and to get off its net. By 1715 hours, Lt. Tim Purdue, Hawk Company’s executive officer, was providing Cougar Forward updates on Iron Troop’s slow but steady movement to the 70 Easting toward the enemy defensive position through which Eagle Troop had punched right at 1618 hours.

Eventually, McMaster got on the Iron Troop command net to say, “Dan, this is H.R., we need to coordinate, over.”

McMaster and Cpt. Dan Miller, the Iron Troop commander, were West Point classmates. McMaster’s personal appeal worked. Gauthier’s scouts regained contact with Iron Troop, and the two troops tracked each other’s positions carefully for the rest of the night. Based on Iron Troop’s movement, Gauthier recommended to McMaster that Eagle Troop not engage south of a 120-degree magnetic azimuth. We established this azimuth as an internal control measure until Iron Troop fell back behind the 2nd Cavalry’s limit of advance, the 70 Easting, two miles behind us.

Figure 12. Cougar Squadron on 73 Easting 1700 hrs, 26 February

Finding Haines, however, turned out to be a tougher mission than anticipated. Petschek knew that Haines’ scouts had dropped back behind the 73 Easting during Eagle’s assault. He was concerned that he and the scout section that moved with him to establish contact might easily be mistaken for an enemy vehicle. As it grew darker, the intensity with which the Iraqi armor burned and exploded increased the danger of fratricide. Petschek decided to move toward the hastily agreed contact point on the seam between the two troops with a scout section of two Bradleys.

Petschek moved out cautiously. He later said that there was no point in risking a firefight with a nervous Ghost Troop gunner who might be doing exactly the same thing, looking for Eagle Troop. With the two Bradleys on his right, Petschek maneuvered around some abandoned bunkers and burning equipment that seemed to mark the perimeter of another Iraqi defensive position.

About 1,500 meters short of where Petschek expected to find the contact point, he sighted between nine and thirteen armored vehicles, including several intact T72 tanks in a circular defensive position. This discovery came as a complete surprise, because the fire and smoke from Eagle Troop’s battle in the south was blowing north along the 73 Easting. As a result, the Iraqi strongpoint that straddled the seam between the two troops had been missed completely.

Fortunately, the Iraqi troops walking around on the ground beside their armored vehicles were looking straight ahead, perhaps anticipating a frontal assault, based on Eagle Troop’s earlier tank attack. None of the Iraqis detected Petschek. No scout likes to admit he was surprised on the battlefield, and Petschek was no exception to the rule, but this was no time to lament the circumstances. The Iraqi soldiers were no more than nine hundred meters in front of his three Bradleys, and any second they might sound the alarm and take him under effective fire.

Cool as ice, Petschek halted his section, erected his TOW launcher, and quickly ordered the firing of two TOW missiles in rapid succession, concentrating his fire on the two nearest T72 tanks.

As soon as the two tanks exploded in flame, all three of his remaining Bradleys opened up with a mix of 25-mm high-explosive incendiary tracer rounds, rounds that glow red hot as they race to the target, and 25-mm sabot ammunition. Like its bigger brother, the 120-mm sabot round, shot from tanks, the Bradley 25-mm sabot has a depleted-uranium warhead, and it flies with amazing speed and accuracy.

The Iraqi BMPs managed to get off a few rounds, but nothing came close to hitting Eagle Troop’s scouts. After three minutes of furious firing, Petschek ordered the group to cease fire, and it continued its trek to Ghost Troop.

A couple of minutes later, Petschek crossed the boundary between the two troops, found Ghost Troop’s 3rd Scout Platoon, drove up, and parked beside a very surprised but grateful Lieutenant Haines. At roughly 1720 hours the two scout platoon leaders exchanged information. After a brief discussion, Haines agreed to follow Petschek back to the point in the desert where Eagle Troop’s left flank would be anchored. On the way back, however, Petschek discovered that one of the Iraqi tanks had escaped detection earlier during the first battle and was now scanning the desert to its front with its main gun.

Petschek decided not to fire a TOW missile, because the warhead would be flying through Eagle Troop. Instead, he moved in close to improve penetration velocity for his shells. Closing with the enemy in a Bradley fighting vehicle is not the recommended solution when the enemy is a T72 tank, but Petschek reasoned it was unavoidable on this occasion. He poured twenty rounds of 25-mm HEAT into the side of the enemy tank until smoke poured from every opening.

Satisfied that the Iraqi defenders were finally all dead, Petschek continued his move south. However, it would be close to 1800 hours before Petschek finally regained contact with Eagle Troop.

Meanwhile, Iraqi armored units began reappearing, about 800 to 1,500 meters to Eagle Troop’s right front. Like large rocks that reinforce a pier protruding into the ocean, mounds of burning Iraqi tanks and armored fighting vehicles began piling up in a “U” around the right flank held by Eagle Troop. It was unclear whether the Iraqis were deliberately throwing whatever they had against the peninsula formed by Eagle Troop’s tanks and scouts along the Cougar Squadron’s right flank with 3rd Squadron or were just retreating across the regiment’s front until they ran into Cougar Squadron, but from 1710 hours on, Eagle Troop’s convulsive tank and TOW missile fire was deafening. Bullets kicked up dirt in front of the tank, periodically pinging off Ward’s hatch and the front slope, but the enemy attacks were repulsed. Nothing remained of the Iraqi forces but wreckage and bodies.

About this time, Burns pulled Cougar Forward in between Eagle 6 and my tank and began engaging Iraqi vehicles with his TOW missile launcher and 25-mm.

Normally, I would have welcomed this development, but there wasn’t much room left along the front where the tanks were positioned, and the noise was deafening. McMaster called me to complain that Burns had positioned Cougar Forward dangerously close to his tank.

I agreed.

When I told Burns to back Cougar Forward off the line, he was disappointed. He made a typical Burns comment: “Shit, I’m just trying to get some scraps off the table.”

It was time to pull back Cougar Forward and set up a temporary static command post twenty-five meters behind my tank. This suited John Hillen, who was now heavily engaged with Dragoon Base on the radio and could hardly hear the command nets over the firing from the tanks and Cougar Forward.

I’LL BE GODDAMNED IF I’LL FALL BACK

In the desert, nightfall normally falls like a hammer, but this time the transition from day to night did not bring real darkness.

Visibility worsened, but it never really grew dark. Iraqi T72 tanks, trucks, and other armored vehicles burned furiously from horizon to horizon. In fact, fires burned well into the night that followed, with secondary explosions splitting the air about every fifteen or twenty minutes until midnight.

With tank and TOW fire coming into their flanks and across their routes of withdrawal, the Iraqi armored formations moving to our front disintegrated and the buildup of burning and tangled wreckage around the peninsula formed by Eagle Troop grew larger and larger.

It was soon apparent to us that the mountain of wreckage provided the Iraqi troops who survived the encounter with new positions from which they could fire at us, primarily with small arms and automatic cannon.

Our inability to advance beyond the 73 Easting granted the Iraqis to our front a temporary reprieve from execution. This is where the 4.2-inch mortars came back into play. Eagle Troop mortars repeated the deadly tactic of mixing ground-burst white phosphorous (“Willie Pete”) rounds with air-burst high explosive to decimate anything living that our main guns could not effectively engage. As soon as the “Willie Pete” rounds burst among the trenches and shattered armor, Iraqi troops would jump out to escape the acid-like white phosphorous while high-explosive rounds filled the air around them with shrapnel. Seconds after the mortar attack started, machine guns and 25-mm chain guns opened up, completing the slaughter.

After a short while, an occasional spray of bullets peppered the desert floor beneath our tank or a larger-caliber round would hiss by, but by and large the enemy’s fire slackened to the point where I could no longer suppress my hunger.

I absolutely had to eat. It was about 1715 hours when I lifted myself out of the hatch, keeping one eye on the enemy to the front while moving to the rear deck, where I could stand and get at the bustle rack on the back side of the turret. To my great relief, despite the small-arms and RPG hits on the tank, the ammo can that contained the ingredients for my peanut butter and jelly sandwich was intact. I quickly opened the can and put together a sandwich oozing with peanut butter and jelly. Standing on the back deck of the tank, behind the turret bustle rack, I sank my teeth into one of the most delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I have ever eaten.

When I finished wolfing down the sandwich, I climbed back inside the turret. Sergeant Jones had been keeping watch to the front and told me that he had “acquired” another armored vehicle in a defensive position.

With the laser range finder, Sergeant Jones determined that the target was about 1,500 meters away.

After a short discussion, Abercrombie loaded a HEAT round, and Jones sent a roaring ball of fire into the target. The fiery splash signaled that we had hit something substantial, but we were never quite sure just what it was.

Four thousand meters to my left, Lt. Keith Garwick reported to Sartiano that BMPs and tanks were concentrated to the left of his scout platoon at a range of perhaps 3,500 meters and moving in his direction. Since these Iraqi elements were really in the 3rd Armored Division’s zone of attack, Sartiano’s principal concern was that Garwick establish positive identification of the enemy before engaging. However, when Mecca confirmed with Ierardi that 3rd Armored Division’s cavalry squadron was still at least an hour or more behind us, Garwick got permission to engage.

By 1705 hours, Ghost Troop was fighting a serious battle on the squadron’s northern flank.

From where eighteen-year-old Pvt. 1st Class Jason E. Kick sat in the driver’s seat of Ghost 14, a Bradley fighting vehicle in Garwick’s scout platoon, the whole action looked like chaos. Speaking into the tape recorder he brought along, Kick repeated, “This is chaos here, this is total chaos.”²

Listening to Garwick’s fire commands, Kick noted, “Red 1 [Garwick], he’s the platoon leader. You can hear it in his voice, he’s all shook up.”³

Kick was right, but lieutenants and captains are paid to create order out of chaos at the platoon and company levels, where chaos is the soldier’s constant companion in war.

As this was his first significant engagement with an enemy who shot back, Garwick was surely shaken. But like the officers in Eagle Troop, Garwick controlled his emotions and suppressed the nagging fear of death that makes cowards of otherwise brave men. He asked Sartiano for immediate tank and artillery support.

Thanks to the combat observation lasing team (COLT)—an M981 fire-support vehicle—operating with Garwick’s scout platoon, Garwick knew that the range to the Iraqi formation was about 3,600 meters. Deskevich and Mecca worked with Garwick and 2nd Lt. Greg Franks, the COLT leader, to get the artillery started.

When asked for artillery support, however, Cpt. Jack Millar, the Cougar Squadron fire-support officer, said no, on the grounds that the target area was in 3rd Armored Division’s future zone of attack. The fire direction officer (FDO) of 6-41 FA knew that 3rd Armored Division was still hours behind us, heard Millar on the fire-support net, sensed the urgency of the situation, and overruled Millar.

The FDO had tactical control of the guns, even if eight of the twelve guns were in Sam White’s battery, and could do as he wished with them. Seconds later, the guns roared, and rounds were on the way. The FDO’s instincts for the battle were superb.

While Garwick reported to Sartiano, Sergeant Garcia in Ghost 12, another Bradley fighting vehicle in Garwick’s platoon, launched the first of eight TOW missiles into what Garcia described as a platoon of Iraqi tanks three thousand meters or more to his front. The tanks were backing out of their defensive positions before moving to attack Ghost Troop’s positions along the 73 Easting when the rest of Garwick’s scouts joined in and engaged them.⁴

Grasping that Garwick’s situation had changed dramatically, Sartiano and Mecca moved north to join Garwick’s scout platoon, “scrambling” the troop as he drove across the desert and sending Kilgore’s four tanks 1,800 meters north to positions right behind Garwick’s platoon. “Scrambling” reorganized Garwick’s scout platoon and Kilgore’s tank platoon into scout-tank teams, as they had practiced in January. Ghost Troop called these “viper teams” (1st and 2nd platoons) and “dragon teams” (3rd and 4th platoons).

Staff Sergeant Lundquist from 2nd Platoon picked up a scout section of four Bradleys from Garwick’s 1st Platoon scouts, and Sergeant First Class Lawrence, Garwick’s platoon sergeant, added two tanks to his four Bradleys. Once integrated with fifty or sixty meters between vehicles, the force of six Bradleys and four tanks began systematically engaging the stationary Iraqi armor.

As soon as Kilgore’s tanks showed up, the tank gunners “lazed” the mix of eleven BMPs with perhaps nine tanks. The laser range finder returned a range of three thousand meters. Sartiano also placed Kinsley’s four tanks in reserve behind and to the left of Haines’ scouts.

Without waiting for the artillery to fall on the Iraqi troops, Kilgore’s tanks went immediately into action, firing four sabot rounds into the mix of Iraqi armor. Garwick in Ghost 11 and Sergeant Robbins in 15 didn’t wait either. They launched two more TOW missiles.

The veins on the Bradley gunners’ hands turned blue as they tightly gripped the fire controls, guiding the warheads through the dim light into the Iraqi tanks.

Seconds later, the artillery rained down on the Iraqi armor and stopped them dead in their tracks just as the warheads on the TOW missiles detonated against the sides of two BMPs. In what would be a pattern for the rest of the night, whenever Iraqi troops came under artillery or mortar fire, they just halted.

This was the first time the scouts had seen DPICM in action, and they were amazed at the effect the bomblets were having on the Iraqi armor. Imagine a thousand exploding baseballs crashing into a metal box in which you are sitting, and you have some idea of what the scouts saw and what the Iraqi troops must have experienced.

After fifteen tense minutes, the tank and Bradley gunners finally relaxed, watching columns of flame and smoke rise up in their sights where the Iraqi tanks had deployed on line. When Garwick’s scouts and Kilgore’s tankers saw no evidence of further movement, no sign of life, they began cheering inside their turrets.

Hearing Mecca report destroyed enemy tanks and BMPs to “Cougar 32” (Ierardi), I decided to dismount from my tank and see what was happening inside Cougar Forward, where I knew the communications were much better. While the tank main guns and TOW missile launchers sporadically engaged enemy armor and troops to our front and right flank, I walked back to Staff Sergeant Burns’ Bradley, where John Hillen was struggling to explain events over the radio to Regiment.

As I dismounted, I found McMaster waiting for me behind my tank. He was ecstatic.

Immediately, I slapped my hand into McMaster’s and said, “Congratulations, Captain. Brilliant performance, you did exactly what you were supposed to do. Well done.”

McMaster responded: “Wasn’t it great? We smashed right through them!”

When he shook my hand, it was obvious McMaster was relieved to hear me tell him that he done the right thing. And he was justifiably delighted with the performance of his soldiers. The months of preparation, of demanding gunnery training in Germany, of endless and exhausting maneuvers in the Arabian Desert, and McMaster’s own brand of inventive and aggressive leadership had paid off handsomely.

McMaster asked me what I thought was happening at Regiment and quickly followed up with the $64,000 question: “Where is Colonel Holder?”

I said, “H. R., I don’t know.”

McMaster kept repeating over and over, “Sir, he should be here. He should see this, don’t you think so?”

Of course, McMaster was quite right, but I did not expect to see the regimental commander. Holder had to contend with the corps commander. I assumed Holder would continue to try to orchestrate operations from his command post, several kilometers to the right and rear of our position on the 73 Easting.

“H. R., I don’t think Regiment has the slightest idea of what the hell we just did. But that won’t matter when they find out.”

“What do you mean?” asked McMaster.

“Remember what Wellington said after the battle of Waterloo?” I asked.

McMaster knew that Wellington had said a lot, so he simply nodded, not really knowing what I might quote.

I continued, “Defeat is an orphan, but victory has many fathers. H. R., you can bet there will be a lot of paternity suits on the street when this motherf—er is over.”

McMaster laughed until our discussion was interrupted by a sudden outburst of tank fire from the line behind us. McMaster said he better get back to the troop. I agreed. We shook hands and parted.

When I arrived at the rear of Cougar Forward, I found that Burns had dropped the rear ramp and that the entire crew, including T. K. Wightman, Burns, and Holloway, was waiting for me. The incessant racket of tank and artillery fire did not stop them from enjoying the fresh night air.

Hillen was comfortably reclining with his legs outside of the vehicle and the rest of him inside. I could not hear the radio clearly, but I could see that John was engaged in a heated conversation with Dragoon Base. John’s face was somewhat contorted as he raised his voice to make his point again and again.

“Dragoon Base, this is Cougar Forward. We are located from right to left along the 73 Easting vicinity Papa Uniform—we are at 100 percent combat power. We are in a strong position, over.”

After the first half-hour of dealing with Regiment’s apparent indifference to anything Hillen or Ierardi reported while bouncing all over the battlefield, Hillen turned to Wightman and said, “Why am I even bothering? We could be fighting giant squid on the moon for all the good it’s doing to tell them anything.”

Wightman nodded his head but kept silent.

Hillen continued to repeat the message that we had arrived without any losses along the 73 Easting after destroying an undetermined number of enemy tanks, BMPs, and infantry, finally telling Dragoon Base, “Stand by.”

Because I could not quite hear the content of the discussion, the whole thing puzzled me, so I asked him what the hell was happening.

Eventually, John put down the hand mike, looked at me, and said: “Regiment wants us to fall back to the 69 Easting, at least behind the 70 Easting.”

Hillen pointed out that Dragoon Base was never interested in understanding or appreciating what happened—no matter how Ierardi or he portrayed it. Like Franks, Holder and the regimental staff were blindly wedded to the January battle plan, and beyond Regiment’s insistence that we drop back to a now irrelevant limit of advance, they never offered anything—counsel, fire support, orders, supplies, maneuvering of the rest of the regiment, whatever.

In the end, John said in a voice filled with disappointment, “Regiment’s only response is to retreat.”

All at once, every ounce of frustration and disgust I had felt for months with the chain of command’s ardent opposition to a rapid, decisive attack erupted from the depths of my soul.

In nearly six months of service in Saudi Arabia and Iraq, I was genuinely angry only twice. The first time occurred during training in January. The second time happened at about 1715 hours on 26 February 1991.

I could not believe it. Fall back? Incredible, I thought. After this battle, and they tell us to fall back? I was enraged.

“Goddamn it, John. I will be goddamned if I will fall back in front of this incompetent scum. Nobody with my name has ever fallen back in front of anybody, never! Not in front of Arabs, Chinese, Afghans, Germans, Japs, or anything else, and I will be damned if I will now. What the hell is wrong with them? This is outrageous. What the hell is wrong with them? Why not attack instead? My God, what is wrong with them?”

Realizing that I was raging at John, who was now straightening himself up as if he were soon to be shot, I stopped and regained my composure.

“John,” I said, “call Dragoon Base and ask them to pass the following message directly to Dragoon 6: Tell Dragoon 6 that Cougar 3 says we are in a strong position; there is no reason to fall back. Strongly recommend we stay where we are.”

Hillen sent the message. As the gunfire was picking up, I went back to my tank to try to contact Regiment myself. As I walked back to the tank, Hillen turned to Burns and said, “That man can get mad as hell faster than anyone I have ever seen. But why the hell is he yelling at me? Christ, I’m not the one holding up the train.”

Burns and Holloway burst out laughing. Burns said, “He’s not mad at you, Lieutenant. He’s just blowing off four months of frustration with the chain of command in one night. I wouldn’t worry about it. When Holder hears the message, he’ll let Macgregor stay here.”

Overhearing the traffic between Dragoon Base and Cougar Forward, Steve Robinette walked over to the map and checked the coordinates that Hillen provided. He asked, Why not? Robinette saw no reason why Cougar Squadron should fall back. He picked up the mike and said, “Cougar Forward, Dragoon 5, tell Cougar 3 he can remain in position along the 73 Easting, over.”

This news came at about 1730 hours. Robinette’s call was a welcome relief to Hillen, who was tired of arguing the point.

Wiping the sweat off his brow, Hillen breathed a huge sigh, saying simply, “Dragoon 5, Cougar Forward, many thanks, roger, out!”

16, YOU’RE SKYLINED!

On the left flank where Garwick’s scouts and Kilgore’s tanks had just cheered the destruction of the Iraqi armor, three shells, presumably from more Iraqi tanks, struck the desert floor in front of the two Bradleys on Garwick’s right just as permission came to Hillen for Cougar Squadron to remain along the 73 Easting.

Garwick’s scouts reacted by reloading TOW missiles and 25-mm ammunition in anticipation of another round of action.

Noticing that one of the Bradleys, 16, which was Staff Sergeant Chaffee’s track, was sitting on top of the spur that ran parallel with the 73 Easting, several people urged Chaffee to pull back, but he did not respond. For some strange reason, Chaffee and Sergeant Moller, his gunner, actually moved farther forward, probably to get a clearer shot at the enemy.

Upset with what was happening, Kilgore came on the radio, yelling the administrative call sign so there would be no doubt to whom he was speaking: “Sixteen, you’re skylined, back down, over!”

Staff Sergeant Chaffee may not have heard the warning, because he was busy trying to clear his jammed 7.62 machine gun coaxial with and to the right of his 25-mm gun in the cramped Bradley turret. However, when he saw several Iraqi infantrymen running in his direction, Chaffee immediately stopped what he was doing and asked, “Moller, you got enemy troops to the front!”

Sergeant Moller could not pick them up in his sights, so he popped out of his hatch to take a look.

A split second later, an explosion shook the Bradley with the force of a sledgehammer, driving the twenty-six-ton Bradley backward for a meter. A few seconds later, a second round struck the Bradley, showering the front of the vehicle with sparks and hot metal.

Without a gun shield in front of him on top of his turret, Sergeant Moller was killed instantly.

Patrick Bledsoe, the driver of 16, looked behind him and yelled to see if anyone was alive. When he heard nothing, he jumped out of the driver’s compartment and ran to the rear of the Bradley next to him. He pounded on the door. When the rear door didn’t open, he went forward to the driver’s hatch and pounded on it until it opened. Bledsoe pointed to 16, which was now smoking and said, “We just got hit. I think Sergeant Moller’s dead.”⁵

Watching the drama unfold from the commander’s hatch of the COLT, Sergeant Foltz, a powerful man over six feet tall who cut a hulklike figure, got out of his track and ran toward 16 to pull out any survivors.

Kilgore provided covering fire while Foltz tried to get the survivors out of the Bradley hull before the TOW missiles inside blew up. When he could not open the rear door, Foltz jumped up on top of the vehicle and tried to open the cargo hatch. It was jammed shut.

The force of the striking round had actually jammed the cargo hatch shut, turning the damaged Bradley into a potential coffin for the survivors inside. Undeterred by the bullets whistling by his head, Foltz now picked up a tanker’s bar (a solid steel rod about sixty or seventy inches long used to lift the tank’s heavy track blocks) and began, in Deskevich’s words, “beating the living hell out of the cargo hatch until it opened.”

With the hatch open, Foltz reached inside, pulling out Chaffee and the observer in the back. Bradley 15 picked up the survivors, Spec. Terry Lorson and Staff Sergeant Chaffee, and sped them to the rear. Foltz would later receive the Silver Star for his heroic and unselfish actions under enemy fire. Chaffee and Lorson recovered from their wounds.

Dazed by the incident, Garwick announced on the troop net that Moller was dead. The net instantly went silent. Fortunately, Mecca once again dropped down to the platoon net. He broke the silence on the 1st Platoon scout net to get the report and get Garwick to repeat it without compromising security—this was a pain in the ass for Mecca. Hearing Mecca’s voice on the radio, Garwick recovered quickly, telling his scouts, “Keep fighting. Don’t lose focus. Keep fighting, out.”

Garwick’s fight coincided with continuing action in front of Eagle Troop. Iraqi armor in section and platoon size formations seemed to crash every fifteen or twenty minutes into Eagle Troop’s flank. Hamilton’s tanks fired repeatedly into a half-dozen Iraqi armored vehicles, which seemed to disintegrate under the impact of the tank fire. When artilleryman Lt. Danny Davis, the Eagle fire-support team leader, identified an Iraqi T72 tank from his vehicle maneuvering to Eagle Troop’s front, Hamilton shot it to pieces with one sabot round before McMaster could find the tank and fire. Knowing the salvo had come from Hamilton, he called Hamilton and said, “White 1, that was spectacular.”

Hamilton, yelling into the mike under his CVC helmet, replied “Roger. That is what we call the Hammy-Slammy, over.”

To some, Hamilton’s comment might seem out of place. But Hamilton’s response was not bravado. His tank commanders were brimming with the confidence that superior training and leadership instill, and the big Canadian was having the time of his life.

As these actions wore on, they began to assume the character of a repetitious litany. It was hard to tell if these events really represented counterattacks or just retreating Iraqi forces struggling to get out of Kuwait.

Since we were roughly two miles farther east of the 70 Easting grid line, the 2nd Cavalry’s established limit of advance, I assumed many of the Iraqi units were probably driving across the 2nd Cavalry Regiment’s front without being engaged until, to their misfortune, they stumbled into Eagle Troop’s killing machine on Cougar Squadron’s right flank.

Not all of the Iraqi troops that collided with the right flank died, however. Staff Sergeant Foy, DeStefano’s platoon sergeant, recognized that with the advantage of thermal sights his tanks could afford to exercise some restraint until it was clear that the Iraqi troops to their flank and front were attacking.

Most of the time, the Iraqi troops opened fire when they saw American armor, but thanks to Staff Sergeant Foy’s cool head, Iraqi soldiers who wanted to surrender were allowed to do so. Because of Foy, two or three times in the course of the battle Iraqi troops walked into our lines as prisoners of war, where Eagle Troop’s medics treated and evacuated the seriously wounded.

As Eagle Troop’s most experienced medic, Sergeant George Piwetz was charged with the responsibility of evaluating and treating the most seriously wounded Iraqi troops. Piwetz, a tough but compassionate soldier, could see from the haggard looks on their faces that most of the Iraqi soldiers were relieved that their war was over. Of course, there were some exceptions. In one case, a wounded Iraqi soldier lying on a stretcher tried to stab Sergeant Piwetz with some loose hypodermic needles.

Piwetz unhesitatingly knocked the Iraqi unconscious with a right uppercut, telling the now unconscious Iraqi he was a “dumb ass.” Afterward, Piwetz continued treating his now cooperative Iraqi patient.

Sometime between 1720 and 1730, a disturbing message came over the Cougar Squadron command net. “Cougar 3, Sergeant Moller is dead.”

The caller did not identify himself, and to this day none of us knows who sent the message, but whoever did, it was the wrong thing to say on a command net during a battle. First of all, we report by-name casualties on administrative-logistical radio nets. We do not use names on command nets, especially during fighting.

Personalizing battlefield losses is dangerous in war. Announcing the names of friends killed by the enemy always inflames the passions of soldiers already excited by combat. Soldiers quickly talk of revenge. Emotions run out of control. This condition must be avoided at all costs lest we lose men through uncontrolled actions. My response must have seemed heartless and cold to those listening, but I had to stop all further transmission of this kind:

“This is Cougar 3. Do not report our casualties on this net. Cougar 3 Out!”

Within seconds, Mecca reported over the logistics net that the Bradley designated as 16 had been destroyed with one killed and two wounded. Sartiano then broke in and added: “Continuing mission, Ghost 6 out.”

“Continuing the mission,” was the right statement for Sartiano to make. Indeed, what else could Sartiano say? In any case, I was reassured. No matter what happened, we had fought our way up to the 73 Easting, and we were not going to leave.