NORTHERN KUWAIT DESERT, 26 January 2003 — The US military was maintaining strict secrecy yesterday around exercises taking place here within five km of the Iraqi border and over a 30-km range.
It was the 11th day of exercises over the past two weeks that will culminate in night-time live-fire today, the eve of a vital report to the United Nations in New York on Iraqi compliance with weapons inspections.
Such exercises are normally held twice a year, but the US brigade here, fresh from Kosovo, has not been in a position to undertake the war games in the past three years.
Bradley fighting vehicles led the attack across the desert with Abrams tanks held in supporting positions but shelling the mock enemy up to two and three kilometers ahead of advancing troops.
Engineers then moved forward and shot tubes packed with C4 explosives through the minefield which detonated and cleared a path for incoming troops.
Capt. Jorge Melendez said “this gives us a decent appreciation for our forces; it’s unbelievable.”
Melendez declined to comment on Iraq except to say: “Maybe we’ll go to Iraq and maybe we won’t. We’ll keep training to be ready.”
But he did not seem worried despite the growing war rhetoric from the United States and increasing tension in Baghdad.
“I feel ready and confident in our forces and it doesn’t matter if it involves Iraq or anywhere else. The more you train the more lethal the unit gets,” the captain said. Amid preparations for a possible invasion of Iraq, the joint armored and infantry live-fire exercise involved 700 soldiers supported by 200 combat vehicles attacking a series of mock targets in exercises similar to Operation Desert Storm, when a US-led international coalition swept Iraqi forces out of this Gulf emirate 12 years ago.
Capt. Mike Schauss of the 1st Battalion 30th Infantry from Fort Benning, Georgia, said this was the first joint exercise for his battalion since 2000.
“This is our doctrine and how you fight whether you are in European woods or here. This is how you do business,” he said.
The operation was described as two-dimensional because the third dimension, air power, was not involved. One lieutenant colonel said it was the same procedure employed during the liberation of Kuwait in 1991, which ousted the forces of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Schauss said he had no knowledge of any plans for Iraq. “But we’re not ignoring the political situation, and that’s adding to the intensity here, to the training. Everybody is focused and doing their job to the best of their ability,” he said. (AFP)
