Big7
The Oracle
Should have went on to Baghdad and got that on out of the way.
Many lives could have been saved.
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20th anniversary - of Iraq 2.0 that is!
- Thread starter oldfella1962
- Start date
Many lives could have been saved.
oldfella1962
Senior Member
Capturing Baghdad (and capturing Saddam) during the first Iraq war could have saved civilian lives by never having a need for Iraq 2.0 in 2003.
We were already "in the neighborhood" and it's not like Saddam wouldn't stay in power since he's - ya know - a dictator and that's what dictators do since they have no term limits. Granted our leadership couldn't see into the future in 1991 but I'm sure a lot of experts - and regular folks - were not surprised when Saddam didn't change his tune and we ended up spending a gazillion dollars and thousands of US lives (and countless Iraqi civilians) in 2003 and about a decade beyond.
I'm not the first person to notice this, but war in general is very violent, wasteful and inefficient all throughout the history of homo sapiens, no matter how you slice it.
TurkeyJay
Senior Member
I was there. 2005 USMC. I agree with everything you say.Capturing Baghdad (and capturing Saddam) during the first Iraq war could have saved civilian lives by never having a need for Iraq 2.0 in 2003.
We were already "in the neighborhood" and it's not like Saddam wouldn't stay in power since he's - ya know - a dictator and that's what dictators do since they have no term limits. Granted our leadership couldn't see into the future in 1991 but I'm sure a lot of experts - and regular folks - were not surprised when Saddam didn't change his tune and we ended up spending a gazillion dollars and thousands of US lives (and countless Iraqi civilians) in 2003 and about a decade beyond.
I'm not the first person to notice this, but war in general is very violent, wasteful and inefficient all throughout the history of homo sapiens, no matter how you slice it.
Shane Dockery
Senior Member
I was there, just on the western border in Jordan. Quite a night!Time flies! 20 years ago I was in Kuwait about 15 miles from the Iraqi border, when Bush said "Let's roll!" and roll we did.
I was the oldest guy in my company, one of the oldest in my entire battalion. So yeah, now I feel really, really old. Twenty more years older!
Was it worth it?I never thought about it - that's above my paygrade. So what great & deep "life lessons" did I glean from my time in the sandbox? In a nutshell:
1) The "theory" of how the Army is supposed to do things and the "reality" of how things are actually done are two different things entirely.
2) The world is not binary. Life is not a western movie or TV show, where the good guys wear white hats, and the bad guys wear black hats.
We all wear grey hats because there are no absolute "good guys" and "bad guys".
3) The military is a business, full stop. Yes it's a dangerous business, but I've done way more dangerous things for much less money.
4) Everybody is corrupt and a criminal to one degree or another. Try not to get greedy and you with any luck, you won't get caught.
5) "Bullet proof" and "bullet resistant" are not the same thing.
6) Don't hate or judge anybody. We are all riding this rocky planet around the sun and will end up six feet under before we know it.
Big Foot
Senior Member
Sir, thank you period!
oldfella1962
Senior Member
2005 was rough for all branches! By then the bad actors had regrouped and reorganized and adapted. They were far more lethal. IED's alone were devastating coalition forces. When I was there IED's were just being developed. They were dropping grenades off highway overpasses in early 2003. But before we left, we had a briefing from some other unit about the new kid on the block, the IED.
And remote detonation? That is some scary stuff right there.I know Marines were involved in both Fallujah battles - if you deployed shortly after these, I'm sure these battles were fresh in a lot of Marines' memories!
oldfella1962
Senior Member
Jordan? I didn't know we had troops there. If you were Air Force, maybe you guys were the ones who bombed the Iraqi airfield at Al-Asad.
It could have been the Australians. * Several strategically placed bombs in a staggered pattern down the length of the runway so the Iraqi jets couldn't get going fast enough in a straight line to take off. That's smart bombing right there.The jets could never take off and were abandoned while the Iraqi AF got out of Dodge via "shoe leather express"
. Not being able to get in the air probably saved the pilots' lives - they would have been shot down anyway.So Air Force engineers filled the bomb craters with a quickness! The runway was good-to-go for everybody to use in a couple of days.
* A lot of folks don't realize that the Australians initially engaged the Iraqi military and drove them out of their air force bases so the US military could take them over in relative security.
Shane Dockery
Senior Member
Yep, AC130 gunships were in air and causing some havoc those first couple of days. I worked on the MC130H's and we were dropping special forces guys off at that airport.Jordan? I didn't know we had troops there. If you were Air Force, maybe you guys were the ones who bombed the Iraqi airfield at Al-Asad.
The jets could never take off and were abandoned while the Iraqi AF got out of Dodge via "shoe leather express"
So Air Force engineers filled the bomb craters with a quickness! The runway was good-to-go for everybody to use in a couple of days.
* A lot of folks don't realize that the Australians initially engaged the Iraqi military and drove them out of their air force bases so the US military could take them over in relative security.
oldfella1962
Senior Member
Wow that's pretty interesting! At my level (an E-6 squad leader) I had no idea of the much bigger picture simultaneously unfolding. I literally got more big picture information from watching the news than I did from my leadership.
All I know is when my unit got to Al-Asad (via vehicle convoy) the runway at the airfield we were going to establish had several bomb craters about ten feet deep and forty feet across.
Oh and Iraqi military jets (a lot of French & Russian made jets) were still sitting there fueled up and ready to go. Oh and a lot of buildings were blown up. Somebody put a precision bomb into the admin/office section (ground level connected to the tower) of the air traffic control tower (the tallest in Iraq at over 100 feet tall - visibility for many miles) was pulverized but the actual tower was still standing. The elevator was destroyed, so we had to carry all our heavy ATC equipment up a very narrow staircase which was not exactly fun.
Amazing how fate plays out. I was in the first Gulf War, came back, did another Op then retired. Years later, I was part of a team that was requested to setup procedures for commercial passenger charters at Ala Saad. I ended up flying the first passenger charter into the base picking up troops headed back state side. After retiring I never thought I’d see Iraq again.
oldfella1962
Senior Member
I thought everything commercial flying in & out of Iraq went through Ali Al Salem Airfield in Kuwait? Maybe they changed that after I was there in 2003. When our unit finished our deployment we convoyed to a base near Camp Arifjan in Kuwait. Then we went to Ali Al Salem airfield in Kuwait City to actually fly out because commercial airlines were not allowed in Iraq because it was a combat zone.
Al Asad was in Iraq quite a distance west of Baghdad (west of Fallujah even).
Were you at Al Salem in Kuwait by chance? Not nitpicking, a lot of those Arabic names sound similar (to me anyway).
I know exactly where I was at. The whole idea was keep the troops off the road to Kuwait. It took over a year to work out all the details, we did it and operated regularly out of there. Solid white plane looked like a freighter. All volunteer commercial crews. The Deputy CINC of CENTAF met us on that first arrival. Stuck his head in the cockpit and said, “Glad you guys are here, don’t worry there’s 5,500 Marines between you and the bad guys.”
Germany-Iraq-Germany, refueled and swapped crews in Germany then on to the U.S.
oldfella1962
Senior Member
Oh I see - great idea! Yeah, with only a few roads going to Kuwait the bad guys can use IED's and so forth like nobody's business.
Troops would be sitting ducks! Like I mentioned, I left Iraq in 2003 when convoy ambushes were just becoming widespread.No doubt it wasn't too long before the bad actors had us patterned and realized they would have many opportunities to kill troops in that situation.
What year did your technique begin? Whover thought of it should have been promoted immediately!
I’d have to look to be sure, either 06 or 08.
oldfella1962
Senior Member
Not a safe time to be there.
That's around the time that a lot of guys I know who had their "close calls" had the stuffing scared out of them. One guy at work who was at Balad/Anaconda had just exited a porta-potty at the Air Force hangar waiting for a flight to another part of Iraq when a mortar round hit near the hangar and smoked the porta-potty. Yes, he got a lot of joking about "dude, when you drop one so nasty you blow up the toilet, you really blow up the toilet! Another guy was refueling a generator or something when a mortar round hit next to the actual tactical radar set (near the generator) put holes in it/damaged it severely but he was barely scratched. Worst bad luck by far (somebody not in my circle of associates) at Balad was a guy who was brushing his teeth in the morning at a semi-hardened plywood/tent/sandbagged hooch and walked a few steps outside the hooch to spit out his water, and took a direct hit from a mortar round. Your day can only go downhill from there when you start out dead.
I don’t think I got the military thing quite right. I worked some out of uniform while on active duty. When I retired I started flying to places nobody wanted to go. I finally got old enough to stop all that foolishness. 
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