Personal Narrative: Red/Orange Hat Operations

After the engagement of the Jaish Al-Mahdi fighters, the insurgents had conducted deception operations in order to discredit these units by removing the weapons used by these fighters. (Dauber 2009, pg. 1-2) More condemning was media releases by the insurgents of these fighters being put into a position that was reminiscent of the fighters appearing to have fallen during prayer not during battle against the SF units. Where this had also created large problems, was that the media releases had left the forces having to defend their actions in order to ensure that the civilian population as well as the host nation forces, didn’t lose support or have loss of

It was 115 degrees; the platoon was walking through the middle of the desert each of them with 40 pounds of gear on and an M16A2 rifle. It was summer time in the country of Afghanistan and the temperature was rising. At this point I asked myself what the hell I am doing here and why did I join the United States Army? Right when I was thinking that I felt a tug on my leg and there stood a young boy about 7 years old with only one arm, “Candy,Candy” he asked. Upon speaking with the local villagers we found out that his arm was taken from an improvised explosive device (IED) planted

In September 2009, I checked into my first command, eager to learn and ready to work. Unfortunately, my command was a shore command, meaning the command did not deploy people. Fortunately, my department arranged for my temporary attachment to a command that did deploy, a maritime security squadron whose mission was to protect US and Coalition warships as they transited in and out of port in Jebel Ali, United Arab Emirates. I was deployed from April to November of 2010, living in Dubai and working at Jebel Ali. During that seven months, This deployment was the steepest learning curve I had experienced in my life to that point. I learned about waterborne tactics, Iran’s Naval power, and extremist groups operating in the Arabian Gulf. This was especially relevant when an al-Qaeda aligned group, Abdullah Azzam Brigades, attacked an oil tanker transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Our unit was responsible for making initial reports on the damaged tanker when it limped into port.

Air support had planned to bombard enemy positions for 55 minutes; however, miscommunication between Texas 14 and higher led to a short bombardment and a total of six bombs being dropped. TF HAMMER was unsuccessful in entering the valley due to a heavy amount of small arms fire and mortar attacks. The lack of air support triggered by bad communication frustrated Afghan and Special Forces alike and led to Afghan trucks being hit heavily by pre-registered mortar fire on known choke points by Taliban and al Qaeda fighters. Unity of command is crucial in conducting a successful military operation: communication flows smoothly through a unified command, but unfortunately for a non-unified command, the reverse effect holds true.

terrorists during a simple refueling operation; the commander on board did nothing to incite the

Almost immediately into this operation, a house outside Yaka Chine (cool waterfall) is spotted with Insurgent activity. Kearney is notified and requests permission to destroy it with cannon fire from a Spectre gunship. Kearney speaks to some elders the next day in the rubble of what remains of that house in the aftermath of the airstrike. Another matter of using firepower this intense with such a wide kill radius is that bullets and bombs cannot differentiate the good guys from the bad…or were the five corpses good? Anyway, the site has now turned into a scene of diplomacy and compensation. A strong point to be made here is what unfolds in this effective diplomatic conversation from Kearney and Battalion Commander LTC Ostlund to the locals. In TRADOC Pamphlet 525-3-1 The U.S. Army Operating Concept, this operational mindset is outlined in section c. of 3-3 Develop situational understanding through

In September of 1993, the Clinton administration made a grave mistake. General Colin Montgomery, who led the elite soldiers, requested for heightened military reinforcements. The administration denied the requests since the administration did not want to make the US look like they were increasing forces when their main goal at that time was to lessen them. On October 3rd to the 4th, Operation Gothic Serpent took place. The operation was a seventeen hour-long mission that resulted in eighteen soldiers killed with eighty four others injured. (“Ambush”). During this mission, Somali fighters that were loyal to Aidid shot down two helicopters with rocket-propelled grenades. Once the helicopters crashed, mobs of Aidid’s men hacked and dragged the fallen soldiers through the streets of Somalia “as trophies” (Kuzmarov).

SNC’s five paragraph order was delivered meek tone which lacked authority and command presence; SNC appeared aloof and distant throughout the brief. SNC’s Situation paragraph included fabricated information contrary to what the evaluator briefed; these omissions caused the squad to not understand the mission. SNC briefed specific, relevant tasks but failed to brief any coordinating instructions beyond “attack begins immediately after this order.” SNC briefed Admin and Logistics as “unchanged since the last order.” SNC’s brief was punctuated with filler words. SNC departed towards the objective without the ammo cans required to complete the mission. During movement to the objective, dispersion was poor; at most times 5 candidates were

You have to consider for a moment the serious nature of this action. When we deploy, we rely on the person to our left and right. The profession of arms is one that requires all to do their part. Combat, by nature, is a physical, difficult, and demanding task. A person’s very life may depend on the actions of those around him or her. Ask any Soldier pulled from the vehicle hit by an improvised explosive device if that is true or not. You must have personnel on whom you can rely. The actions and directions from the brigade forced us to accept people who may be

I tried to cover my red softball uniform with a pink velour jacket. The red uniform was visible under the jacket. However, my teammates were not trying to cover their uniforms and the black numbers on their jerseys seemed to sparkle under the sun. I was wearing my jacket with jeans because I did not want my parents going to my softball games. I did not want them at the games as I was tired of being yelled at for every mistake. I walked up to my Dad’s green pickup, and got into the truck.

At Coalition airfields and on board Coalition warships all across the Gulf region, the first hours after midnight 17 January were marked by activity with a new sense of urgency. The initial attack packages marshalled south of the Iraqi and Jordanian early warning and ground control intercept (GCI) coverage. By employing modern stealth capabilities the coalition forces intended on targeting a specific Iraqi radar dish, which would, unless destroyed, alert Iraqi air defence of the impending assault. The entire coalition attack armada moved north, comprising of hundreds of aircraft from many different nations and services, proceeded into hostile airspace at 2:10 am, Baghdad time . Eight US Army AH-64 Apache helicopters led by two US Air ForceMH-53 Pave Low helicopters destroyed Iraqi radar sites near the Iraqi-Saudi Arabian border which could have warned Iraq of an impending attack, hence providing the coalition forces with an initial advantage. Shortly after the operation was authorised and the initial assaults on airfields in Western Iraq begun. These airfields were targeted on the basis that they were the quintessential first response of the Iraqi army and by effectively destroying them the coalition forces hoped to obtain the advantage with air superiority. Coupled with the assault on these specific airfields, a large US led squadron began to bomb the Iraqi city of Baghdad , which was to act as a diversion, which resulted in the small Iraqi air forces currently deployed to return to Baghdad in an effort to counter the coalition bombing campaign. These attacks were met with little resistance, which can be attributed to the successful planning and delivery of Phase. 1 can be attributed to the coalition forces ability to effectively survey

On the night of May 17 a few minutes past 8:00 P.M. the Tactical Action Officer, Lieutenant Basil Moncrief, “received a report from an airborne warning and control system (AWACS) airplane-essentially a flying radar station-that an Iraqi F-1 Mirage fighter had departed Shaibah Military Airport in southern Iraq and was ‘feet wet’ over the Gulf, flying southward toward the Stark’s position” (Symonds, 269). No alarms were set off by the report of this air craft because of the high level of air traffic due to the war. The ship detected the Iraqi air craft on radar when it was two hundred miles out. Once the jet reached 70 miles out from the ship, the Petty Officer in charge of monitoring the radar asked Moncrief if he should send out a warning message but Moncrief said no, and to wait. When the Iraqi jet reached fifty miles out from the frigate, “Moncrief alerted Brindel (the captain), who directed Moncrief to send out a message on the international air distress frequency demanding identification” (Symonds, 269). Seconds after the warning was sent out, the pilot of the jet launched an Exocet AM39 air-to-surface missile. Shortly after a second missile was fired.

Now that I’m older, I have started to loathe driving. Don’t ask me why, but after thirty years or so of being behind a wheel while commuting to work, I don’t think that I can handle doing it anymore. Thus, I traded in my car and got a scooter to bomb around town in. I no longer have to commute to work (I now work from home) so having something small and fast is perfect for my chosen lifestyle.

I woke up to a merciless beeping coming from dark corner. I quickly dressed in my Uniform, a black-short-sleeved shirt, black, baggy cargo pants, and combat boots. From our joint bathroom I could see the light on and glimpses of Echo’s Caramel hair glimmering in the light. After the first 5 minutes of the beeping Echo yelled, “GET UP LILITH! YOU’RE GONNA BE LATE TO BREAKFAST!” She was rewarded with some murmuring coming from Lilith as she pulled the pillow over her head. When it became clear that she hadn’t gotten up Echo exited the bathroom in an identical uniform except she had a camo colored weapons belt which had sheaths with katar daggers. Her hair was done up and an elegant braided bun.

I was not very old, I turned 5 during May and I got a small bike without training wheels for Christmas, I was so excited I took it outside immediately and tried to ride it. Of course when you're a little kid you're eager to learn so, I hopped on without having any clue what I was doing, I got enough speed to go a few inches then ran into a fence then started crying.