Getting the Job Done

D-day for Desert Storm was 16 January 1991, the day the air campaign began. The 3d Marine Aircraft Wing, with about one-quarter of all U.S. fixed-wing aircraft in the theater, had a full role to play. Initially, the targeting was strategic: gaining air superiority (which almost immediately became air supremacy), destroying Saddam Hussein’s command-and-control mechanisms, disrupting communications and transportation systems, going after the Iraqi strategic reserve (the vaunted Republican Guard) and, as a political imperative, seeking out the Scud missile-launching sites.

One air campaign conducted within the overall air war was to shape the Kuwaiti theater of operations (KTO)— through both the interdiction of the KTO and the destruction or neutralization of the Iraqi forces within it. As G-day, when the ground campaign was to begin, approached, the air offensive shifted from the Republican Guard strategic reserve divisions in southern Iraq to the armored divisions in tactical reserve in central Kuwait, and culminated with intensified strikes against Iraqi forward positions. General H. Norman Schwarzkopf U.S. Army, the theater commander, would later estimate that Iraqi frontline divisions were reduced by 50% or more and the second line was attrited to something between 50- 75%.

The air campaign also masked the forward movement of the allied ground forces, to their attack positions. The advance of the ground combat element of the I Marine Expeditionary Force (I MEF) was further screened by Task Force Shepherd, built around the 1st Light Armored Infantry Battalion. The 1st Marine Division moved forward and slightly to the west. On their immediate right flank, between the main road leading north and the Persian Gulf, was the Joint Forces Command East, comprised of five Saudi, Kuwaiti, Omani, and United Arab Emirate mechanized brigades.

To complete I MEF’s zone of action, the 2d Marine Division passed to the rear, then moved up on the left flank of the 1st Marine Division. To their left was the Joint Forces Command North, an Egyptian-Syrian force. 

Farther west, the U.S. Army’s heavy VII Corps, recently arrived from Germany and joined by the United Kingdom’s 1st Armoured Division, moved into position. On VII Corps’s left flank was the U.S. XVIII Airborne Corps. Even farther west was the desert-wise French 6th Light Armored Division.

In the Persian Gulf, there were well-publicized amphibious rehearsals by the 4th and 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigades and the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

G-day was 24 February—but even before that the Marines had drawn first blood on 29 January, at a place called AI Khafji, a near-deserted coastal town close to the Kuwaiti border. Saddam Hussein had sent a mechanized column down the road to test the allies’ defenses. Farther west, but still in front of the Marines, two other columns appeared. The beginnings of the battle were confused, but when the dust and smoke had cleared 17 prisoners of war had been captured and the destruction of 22 tanks could be claimed.

At 0100, 24 February, the 16-inch guns of the battleships Wisconsin (BB-64) and Missouri (BB-63) began thundering against the Kuwaiti coast, as though to signal the beginning of an amphibious assault. Three hours later, the allied forces would begin advancing in two giant columns, separated by more than 200 kilometers. (The Kuwait theater of operations has been compared in size to the state of South Carolina.)

The first major ground move of the land campaign began at 0400 on the morning of 24 February, when the 1st Marine Division jumped off, punching its way with unexpected ease through the two belts of field fortifications that had appeared so formidable. The 2d Marine Division, with the 1st Brigade, 2d Armored Division (Tiger Brigade) attached, crossed its own line of departure at 0530, and met with equal success in breaching the Iraqi line.

By day’s end, the 1st Marine Division had taken Al Jaber airfield and the Al Burqan oilfield, claiming 21 enemy tanks destroyed and more than 4,000 prisoners. The 2d Marine Division had engaged an Iraqi armored column coming out of Kuwait City and defeated it, taking 5,000 prisoners.

On the far left flank, in the XVIII Airborne Corps’s zone of action, the French 6th Light Armored Division, reinforced by a brigade of the U.S. 101st Airborne Division, jumped off at 0430. (Sixty miles into Iraq it destroyed the Iraqi 45th Division, and the following day it took Salam airfield.) To the east of the French, another brigade of the 101st Airborne, lifted by 460 helicopters, moved 113 kilometers into Iraq to establish “Cobra,” a forward operating base.

With Iraqis surrendering by the thousands. General Schwarzkopf advanced the invasion’s clock by 24 hours. In the center, the Joint Forces Command North moved forward, led by the Egyptian 3rd Mechanized Division.

In the XVIII Corps zone of action, the 101st Airborne moved out from Cobra to cut the roads leading north from Kuwait along the Tigris and Euphrates valleys. The 24th Mechanized Division raced north to link up with 101st; the next day, 25 February, the 24th Mech swung east to attack the northernmost Republican Guard divisions.

On the afternoon of 24 February, VII Corps started forward west of the Wadi al Batin—the geological fault that runs between Iraq and Kuwait—led off by U.S. 1st Infantry Division and followed a day later by the British 1st Armoured Division. Continuing the massive envelopment, the 1st Cavalry, 1st and 3rd Armored Divisions, and 1st Armored Cavalry Regiment crossed the Iraqi border and swung to the northeast to continue the smashing of the Republican Guard.

On G+1, 25 February, the 1st Marine Division continued to clear Al Jaber airfield, destroying 80 more tanks and taking an additional 2,000 prisoners. The 2d Marine Division attacked north through As Abdallya with similar success. At sea, the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade conducted an amphibious demonstration in the vicinity of As Shuaybah with naval gunfire support from the Missouri, and the 5th MEB began to fly in its ground combat element, Regimental Landing Team 5, to act as I MEF’s reserve.

On G+2, 26 February, the 1st Marine Division took Kuwait International Airport, destroying 250 T-55/T-62 tanks and more than 70 T-72 tanks in the process. The 2d Marine Division took the city of A1 Jahra and moved on to take Mutla Ridge, cutting off the highways that lead in from the north and west to Kuwait City. The 5th Marine regiment, as I MEF reserve, moved up to A1 Jaber to help with prisoner control. Afloat, the 4th MEB made an amphibious demonstration against Bubiyan and Faylaka islands, which controlled the seaward approaches to Kuwait City.

On G+3, 27 February, the 1st Marine Division completed the taking of Kuwait International Airport in the early morning, and prepared for the passage of its lines by Joint Forces Command East, which was to have the honor of entering Kuwait City. Out in front, a platoon from the 2d Force Reconnaissance Company reached the U.S. embassy and found it apparently untouched, with the Stars and Stripes still flying. The 2d Marine Division stayed in the vicinity of A1 Jahra, forming the bottom half of the box that caught the retreating Iraqi main force, along what became known as the “Highway of Death.”

It was a nightmarish battle—fought against a pall of black smoke from the burning Kuwaiti oil fields—but it was all over in 100 hours. The cease-fire declared by President George Bush went into effect at 0500, 28 February. In the four-day battle, almost the entire Iraqi Army in the Kuwaiti theater of operations (originally thought to be 500,000 strong, but more realistically about 300,000) had been encircled—a modern-day Cannae. Early estimates were 4,000 tanks destroyed and 42 divisions either destroyed or rendered ineffective. The Vietnam War anathema of “body count” was avoided and no immediate estimate of enemy personnel casualties was forthcoming. Coalition killed-in-action were reported as 88 Americans; 41 Egyptians, Saudis, and Kuwaitis; 16 British; and 2 French.

When the shooting stopped on 28 February, I MEF had a personnel strength of 92,990, making Desert Storm by far the largest Marine Corps operation in history. A total of 24 Marine infantry battalions and 40 Marine squadrons— 19 fixed-wing and 21 helicopter—had been committed. Marine losses in the ground action were 5 killed and 48 wounded. Marine aircraft losses for the campaign were six fixed-wing aircraft and three helicopters.

The 1st Force Service Support Group had moved thousands of tons of cargo and millions of gallons of water and fuel to keep the battle going. Southbound logistics traffic concentrated on the evacuation of Iraqi prisoners.

As their share of the war, the Marines could claim 1,040 enemy tanks, 608 armored personnel carriers, and 432 artillery pieces destroyed or captured, and at least 20,000 prisoners taken. It was also learned that the amphibious demonstrations successfully held in place some six divisions—50,000 Iraqis—along the coast of Kuwait, prepared for the amphibious assault that never came.