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Major Craig Huddleston, Battalion XO I’m glad the Iraqis didn’t defend. In any case, as it became apparent to all the Marine forces that this ¤rst offensive was going to be a piece of cake, the mission started changing; we had a boundary change between us and our adjacent unit, which was Task Force Poppa Bear. One of their ¤rst objectives they ignored and gave to us, which was very large . . . we called it a worker’s camp. We took off on that same day with India Company, myself, some heavy guns, some TOWs—and away we went to clear this huge built-up area. It had been abandoned, but it turns out it had been an Iraqi division headquarters. What we found in there is of historical signi¤cance, and I don’t know if it’s ever been developed—we found a copy of the order which called for the destruction of the Al Wafrah oil ¤elds. In addition, it had the task organization of the destruction teams and their names. We had a Kuwaiti liaison with us, who translated it for us. We sent it up to the chain of command. It clearly listed the four-man teams that were to destroy each well. And of course, that’s what happened. The Al Wafrah oil ¤eld was totally wrecked. I hope that the Kuwaitis have the order and that they have sifted through all the POWs and have the people responsible. We spent a quiet night up there. We got organized in the town. Regimental headquarters moved up behind us, both of the other battalions are to our rear. They’re standing down somewhat. The threat is not so great as we thought it was going to be. About nine o’clock the next morning, a passing 21 / Prisoners Huey reported to us that a tank battalion and an infantry brigade were moving in our direction. It was about ten kilometers away from us. There was no time for the rest of the battalion to join up with us or for us to join up with the rest of the battalion. We decided that if the enemy was attacking, our best bet was to remain in the town and to stay down. I went forward with a ri®e squad, some psyops people, a TOW squad, and a heavy machine gun squad to do reconnaissance and also to see if these folks were maybe trying to surrender, because we had an indication they might be. The helicopter pilot said, “They don’t look like they’re trying to¤ght.” We came up and hit the second defensive belt, and there they were—a tank battalion and about two thousand infantry moving at us. By this time we organized four Cobras and four A10s, Air Force aircraft; they were circling overhead. The lead Cobra went up and put a laser spot on the lead tank to get a range. As soon as that laser went out, they all stopped, they all got out of their tanks, and fell into battalion formation, waved white®ags, and surrendered, as did about two thousand infantrymen. They have to come through the mine¤elds to get to us. The ¤rst group comes through, a little delegation of ¤ve tankers, and they said, “We just want to quit. We want to surrender, how do we do that?” We said, “Come on. We’ll take you.” Captain Joe Fack, FAC The XO, an arty FO, and myself and the TOW vehicles were the whole task force. I had ¤ve Cobras, two A10s, a Huey, and all the close air support that I could get. The Cobras were in back of us. There was one Cobra leading us up. We were right below him just in case he had to shoot something. Corporal David Bush, S3 Driver They just wanted to surrender. They were throwing their stuff off, running towards us, throwing their weapons down. Then their own troops started shooting at them. So they wanted to surrender. They got sixty or seventy right there. The Iraqis just gave up. Sergeant Major Bo Pippin, Battalion Sergeant Major Of course I was surprised to see all of this. I think in the ¤rst radio call, they said, “We got sixty-¤ve enemies.” Then the guy on the radio came back and said, “Make that one hundred.” The third call that came back, he Prisoners 197 [52.14.22.250] Project MUSE (2024-04-25...

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