American lives, I can say that the embed process allowed me a deep understanding of the war from beginning to end. I did not consider it a compromise to not report something the moment I knew it. And it was because of COL Andersonâs trust that I came to know that complicated mission plans were often turned upside down.
Almost daily, the 101st received changes in battle plans, and planners became deeply frustrated. 101st MAJ Mike Hamlet, who led mission planning, told me, âI have never seen anything like this in war planning.â
As an example, one day, the 2nd Brigade was tasked to take Saddam International Airport. Another day it was a target code-named BEARSâthe road leading out of Baghdad to Saddamâs hometown of Tikrit. In the end, the Strike Brigade was never tasked to take those targets. The 3rd Infantry Division moved faster than anyone imagined and mission plans went up in smoke.
Final Dinner
âEasy Company,â the famous company of soldiers from World War II profiled in movies and TV programs like Band of Brothers, was part of the 101st.
Soldiers from Easy Company told me that when waiting for paratrooper missions in England, they never knew when they would be sent to fightâexcept for one signal: the night before combat, they were given a special meal. That meant they would go to war the very next day. There were so many canceled missions after these meals that they seemed a mixed blessing.
In a dining tent set up for hundreds, at Camp New York, we lined up for our special meal. Steak and lobster were served to soldiers who now knew they were being deployed to Iraq.
Soldiers from other bases got wind of the menu, and decided they deserved a good dinner, too, so as a result, the lines were so long I never actually tasted the steak. But the lobster tail was the last good meal I would eat for weeks. In the dining hall, soldiers were wearing their chemical (MOPP) suits; the call to move out early the next day had come. There are many stories of the tricky intricate planning in wartime; now I know it goes right down to the last lobster tail served up with melted butter in a tent in the middle of the Kuwaiti desert!
Road to Iraq
The 101st has a saying about how quickly it can deploy: faster, deeper, further. Light infantry, rapid-deployment airborne units can move much faster than heavy, mechanized divisions that need monstrous amounts of supplies to keep them going. We didnât cross the border first, but when the Strike Brigade moved, it was fast. Traveling only in humvees, we crossed the border into Iraq. Being in the back of a cramped humvee with a cameraman was about as comfortable as being squeezed into a tin can.
Excluding a few fuel stops and eating Army food on the hoods of our vehicles, we drove north toward Baghdad for a straight thirty hours. It was exhausting and nerve wracking. The danger and fear were that Iraqi forces would launch a preemptive assault on our convoy of several hundred vehicles. Humvees are not bulletproof. They are âsoftâ vehicles and offer little protection, so much of the time we drove at night. No lights. All the while, the drivers were wearing night vision goggles and trying not to fall asleep or run into the vehicle in front.
It is difficult to describe the massive amount of U.S. military supplies moving north. For example, we were told the 3rd ID was literally running out of gas. Huge tankers, convoys of thirty and more, raced up the highway to refuel tanks waiting to assault Baghdad.
One tanker overturned in front of us, when a convoy was told there was intelligence that an Iraqi attack might occur on their roadside base, and they moved out too quickly.
On the road, we saw dizzying amounts of burned-out Iraqi vehicles. And, while it received little media attention at the time, we also saw burned-out U.S. M1A1 Abrams tanks. Soldiers were shocked because no U.S. tanks had been destroyed by Iraqi forces in the last Gulf War, yet
Almost daily, the 101st received changes in battle plans, and planners became deeply frustrated. 101st MAJ Mike Hamlet, who led mission planning, told me, âI have never seen anything like this in war planning.â
As an example, one day, the 2nd Brigade was tasked to take Saddam International Airport. Another day it was a target code-named BEARSâthe road leading out of Baghdad to Saddamâs hometown of Tikrit. In the end, the Strike Brigade was never tasked to take those targets. The 3rd Infantry Division moved faster than anyone imagined and mission plans went up in smoke.
Final Dinner
âEasy Company,â the famous company of soldiers from World War II profiled in movies and TV programs like Band of Brothers, was part of the 101st.
Soldiers from Easy Company told me that when waiting for paratrooper missions in England, they never knew when they would be sent to fightâexcept for one signal: the night before combat, they were given a special meal. That meant they would go to war the very next day. There were so many canceled missions after these meals that they seemed a mixed blessing.
In a dining tent set up for hundreds, at Camp New York, we lined up for our special meal. Steak and lobster were served to soldiers who now knew they were being deployed to Iraq.
Soldiers from other bases got wind of the menu, and decided they deserved a good dinner, too, so as a result, the lines were so long I never actually tasted the steak. But the lobster tail was the last good meal I would eat for weeks. In the dining hall, soldiers were wearing their chemical (MOPP) suits; the call to move out early the next day had come. There are many stories of the tricky intricate planning in wartime; now I know it goes right down to the last lobster tail served up with melted butter in a tent in the middle of the Kuwaiti desert!
Road to Iraq
The 101st has a saying about how quickly it can deploy: faster, deeper, further. Light infantry, rapid-deployment airborne units can move much faster than heavy, mechanized divisions that need monstrous amounts of supplies to keep them going. We didnât cross the border first, but when the Strike Brigade moved, it was fast. Traveling only in humvees, we crossed the border into Iraq. Being in the back of a cramped humvee with a cameraman was about as comfortable as being squeezed into a tin can.
Excluding a few fuel stops and eating Army food on the hoods of our vehicles, we drove north toward Baghdad for a straight thirty hours. It was exhausting and nerve wracking. The danger and fear were that Iraqi forces would launch a preemptive assault on our convoy of several hundred vehicles. Humvees are not bulletproof. They are âsoftâ vehicles and offer little protection, so much of the time we drove at night. No lights. All the while, the drivers were wearing night vision goggles and trying not to fall asleep or run into the vehicle in front.
It is difficult to describe the massive amount of U.S. military supplies moving north. For example, we were told the 3rd ID was literally running out of gas. Huge tankers, convoys of thirty and more, raced up the highway to refuel tanks waiting to assault Baghdad.
One tanker overturned in front of us, when a convoy was told there was intelligence that an Iraqi attack might occur on their roadside base, and they moved out too quickly.
On the road, we saw dizzying amounts of burned-out Iraqi vehicles. And, while it received little media attention at the time, we also saw burned-out U.S. M1A1 Abrams tanks. Soldiers were shocked because no U.S. tanks had been destroyed by Iraqi forces in the last Gulf War, yet
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