Grandpa’s War – Part 26 – Iraq

One of the most bizarre pieces of the cease fire was when we pitched camp. The sun went down and on the horizon were hundreds of glittering orange lights. It looked like a city at night. But unless we’d forgotten how to read a map there were no cities that size nearby. The nearest that might fit the bill was Basara and it was in the wrong direction.

It took a little while for us to realize the truth. The news had said Saddam had his Merry Men blow up the wells in Kuwait. This of course set them all on fire. What we were seeing were the well fires. The black smog that hung over the area in the day confirmed that.

We would be in Iraq for several weeks. To a degree, life became routine again. One of the immediate things that had to be taken care of were the huge numbers of POWs. Barb wire fences had been erected, and we used the HUMVEEs as guard towers.

The night winds were cold, and so we gave the POWs shovels to dig pits they slept in. Everything was spread pretty thin for them. We were able to get them food and water courtesy of the Air Force. The airfield we were at had been bombed. The engineers filled in the craters, and C-130s started bringing in food and water.

But the first few supply drops were just that. Drops. A C-130 would come in low, the back hatch open. Huge crates would be kicked out the back.

I wasn’t there to witness this, but the guys that were said it was an exercise in hilarity.

The water was in plastic bottles, not at all unlike the one’s you’d see at the Loaf n’ Jug. These are rather fragile and aren’t meant to be kicked out of the end of a C-130. When they landed, there was a huge splash. Almost like a wave. Almost half the water that got delivered that way was destroyed.

One of the things we did was to supervise the transfer the POWs out of Iraq and to Saudi Arabia. The Saudi’s would handle returning them to Iraq. I heard that an offer was made to each of them if they wanted to stay, they could.

I don’t know if any of them took the Saudis up on it.

Despite the cease fire, there was still some rather bizarre stuff going on.

One of the bizarre things, I wasn’t present for. It happened near the POW camp and while some of our company was guarding them. They heard a vehicle coming in and over this small rise comes an Iraq BMP. Whoever was driving was driving like a man possessed. They raced past the POW camp and before our people could even react, it was gone.

They said the POWs really started cheering when it raced past.

I don’t know what happened to the men driving the thing (I never heard of one being intercepted). But if they ever caught them, I hope they gave them a medal.

One day, our Platoon Daddy asked me to go with him. We went out to this one unit where they’d detained two Arab men. The story was that they’d shown up in a little white and orange Toyota pickup. They identified themselves as Saudi Intelligence officers. They wanted gasoline for the truck.

Thinking this was slightly bizarre, that unit arrested them.

SFC G and I took them to an actual Saudi outfit and turned them over to them. I don’t have a clue who or what they really were. It was odd and just one more incident to file under “What the heck.”

The other issue was that we weren’t exactly finished with fighting Saddam. More specifically, we supported–while not appearing to support–a grassroots revolt.

There were a number of so called “Freedom Fighters” in the area. A band of them showed up needing food, water, medical attention, and a place to rest for a bit.

The picture above shows Sgt. Richard Jordan talking to the leader of this group of men. The man claimed to be related to Saddam and that Saddam had tried to have him killed. That explained why he was with the rebels.

We’d emptied this particular POW camp. Someone explained to them that as long as they stacked their arms, they were welcome to stay the night. We fed them, gave them water, and the medics looked after their injured. In the morning we gave them more food and water. We turned their weapons back over to them and sent them on their way.

I’ve often wondered what happened to these men.

One of the real issues we faced was that we were still being spread thin. We still needed to keep the area secure. The airfield we were sitting just outside of had bunkers full of ammo. We had to keep an eye on them.

And I never went to check them out, but I also heard that there were a couple of fighters in the hangers.

Our female MPs weren’t supposed to be watching the POWs. But with us being spread thin, we had few choices but look the other way a little.

One of our MPs was SP4 Hahn. Thirty plus years later, I don’t recall her first name. She was a very pretty girl, and we wondered how we’d hide the fact she was a woman.

“Leave that to me,” she said.

She tucked her hair up under her helmet and put on a flak jacket.

It worked. She looked more like Ron Howard’s little brother than a girl.

I have to hand it to the ladies. They pitched in and helped when we needed help the most.

All photographs Copyright – Richard L. Muniz