Our Story: Delta Company 6th/6th Infantry, 1st Armored Division

I am looking for members of Delta company, 6th/6th Infantry of the 1st Armored Division and deployed to Operation Desert Storm in 1990-1991.

Dco, 6th/6th Infantry, 1st AD

My name is PFC Scott Lee, I was the driver for Sergeant Dan Tickle and our gunner was Sergeant Otis Banks. If you were a member of Delta Company 6th battalion, 6th Infantry of the 1st Armored Division and deployed to The First Gulf War I would like to get in contact with you.

I am setting up an oral history project to tell our story. We played a pivotal part in the largest tank battle in the history of war and I'd like to share our story.

Please leave a message in the comment section or contact me directly by email at rmngen@gmail.com.

Combat Vet Remembers More of the War: Jumbled Memories

This takes part after my formation took enemy artillery, where one of our BFV's lost their track and I disobeyed a direct order from both my TC and my CO. I saved our guys lives that day, but we took a multitude more in return. The story picks up from here.

We had boxed the enemy tanks in, after my unit withdrew from the line of engagement the tanks were brought up and began firing into the hemmed in enemy tanks and support vehicles. Our A-10 Warthogs were strafing them into the dust as we lobbed round after round of sabot metal punching spears, erupting into forced infernos where molten metal and steaming entrails form a fiery vaporizing spray. Erupting upwards hundreds of feet or so; turrets flipping end over end and fire blazing everywhere. I can hear the whole battalion over my headphones reporting the grim realities, friendly fire report comes in.

Now we are terrified somewhere in our minds that the pull of the trigger is killing my own; we must compact our overseer part whom questions so much and rely more on training than ever before. Thus cementing the thing blocking us today; the primitive mind becomes stuck as our way of engaging everything and everyone, where the capacity of engaging in mayhem lies. Some of us have tried to wrest away from the passion of vengeance and the kiss of ruination, to no avail as her talons dig deeper and we resist but the seduction of darkness and damnation lies hidden in all the shadows.

Ah, the smell of death at high noon as we sift through the hollowed detritus of war.

The Desert Storm Myth

When I first had to prove my combat experience and therefore my stressors, to finally receive my benefits, I had to research what the hell my unit did so I could piece my memory together with the After Action Reports. Upon my research I came across a website run by a Desert Storm Vet and found this account of my unit's three campaigns, of the 1st Armored Division, Delta Company, 6th Battalion, 6th Infantry, I was on point for the 3rd Brigade and we took the brunt of combat.

It was not a Desert Storm, it was a storm in Hell.

The 7th Corps under Lieutenant General Frederick M. Franks, Jr. was composed of the 1st British Armored Division, the 1st US Armored Division, the 3rd Armored Division, the 1st Infantry Division, and the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment.

...On the US 7th Corps' right flank, the British 1st Armored Division continued to maul the Iraqi 7th Corps.3 In the center, the 2nd US Armored Cavalry Regiment led the 3rd US Armored Division and 1st Infantry Division towards the Iraqi Republican Guards. On the 7th Corps' left flank, the 1st Armored Division captured the large Iraqi supply installation at Al-Busayya (that stored food, water, medicine, fuel, repair parts, clothing, etc.) and then turned east, almost on line with the 3rd US Armored Division.

...The three armored mechanized divisions included the Tawakalna Division, which fought against the entire US 7th Corps as described in this article; the Medina Armored Division, which battled the 1st US Armored Division on the afternoon of 27 February 1991 west of the Al-Ruqta oil field; and the Hammurabi Armored Division, which fought against the 24th US Mechanized Division at Al-Tawr al-Hammar, on 2 March 1991, after the cease-fire.

...The Tawakalna Mechanized Division of the RGFC was positioned about 25 miles west of the Kuwait border, located exactly in the center of the US 7th Corps' sector; The Tawakalna was probably the best division in the Iraqi Army. It had fought with distinction during the war with Iran and was one of the lead divisions in Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in August 1990 (4). Its two mechanized brigades and one armored brigade were equipped with the most advanced equipment available in the Iraqi Army, including 220 T-72 tanks and 278 infantry fighting vehicles. On 25 February it had moved into a blocking position west of the Iraq Petroleum Saudi Arabia (IPSA) pipeline about 80 miles from Kuwait city. In spite of the air campaign, most of this division was in position and ready to fight when the US 7th Corps arrived on 26 February 1991 (5).

...With the destruction of the Tawakalna Division, Franks was able to focus the combat power of the 7th Corps towards the other heavy divisions of the Republican Guard Forces Command. Although part of the Medina Division would stand and fight against the 1st US Armored Division, the Iraqi high command ordered the Hammurabi Division to start moving north, across the Euphrates River and away from the American attack in the west. The Tawakalna Division's defense gave the remainder of the Iraqi Army in Kuwait the time it needed to evacuate most of its mechanized forces to Basra.

...When the confusing mêlée was over, the 1st Division tanks discovered that they had destroyed five of their own M1 tanks and four Bradleys. Six brigade soldiers perished in these attacks and thirty others were wounded.

...While most of the Tawakalna Division commander's attention was focused to his division's front, its right flank was about to be attacked by a fourth American unit, the 1st Armored Division. Major General Ron Griffith's primary military target had been the Medina Division about thirty kilometers father east (54), but one battalion of the Tawakalna's 29th Mechanized Brigade occupied positions in Griffith's 1st Armored Division's zone of operations (55). That Iraqi battalion lay directly in the path of Colonel Dan Zanini's (one of Griffith's three maneuver brigades) 3rd Brigade, 1st Armored Division (my unit baby, in the path of the Tawakalna Division!!!!!!!!!!!!!, we actually received credit for fighting all three Republican Guard divisions, 56).

My Story Will Shatter the Jarhead Myth of the 'Bloodless War' of Desert Storm

Image via Wikipedia

It has been almost 20 years and I have finally healed enough and wish to share my war experience. My story will shatter the Jarhead myth of the 'Bloodless War' of Desert Storm.

I am a Combat PTSD Veteran of the First Gulf War, I saw hectares of blood stained sands strung as the death clock clicked, chimed and claimed 45,000 lives. I lay witness, on point for the 3rd brigade of the 1stAD and beheld the 20,000 lives my unit snuffed in three bloody campaigns that lasted 100 hours. I drove for 172 hours straight without sleeping, yes that's 7 days, on drugs they force me to take.

I wish to dispel the myth of my war and make a movie about it. It was the biggest over land tank battle in the history of war and our enemy had no chance of winning, yet they met our glare as our bullets and bombs fell their own. I took no pleasure in directing hellfire knowing full well people would die.

I Was The Driver, On Point For The Division, So I Saw It All

I was writing about the "troop organism" and the squad mentality in my last paper. This line of inquiry took me back to a time when I felt totality, never since have I been more alive and whole. A complete sense of unity, an omnipresence with my squad so whole within my surroundings, including the enemy snuffed, especially those souls. I carry them today; the weight of such suffering that I now hold within. I have a sense of responsibility to those lives we took, I hold such guilt that at times it overwhelms me to the point of incapacitation.

My surviving has had such an impact on my life that many times I find myself not being worthy of having survived, and I know that this thought is not rational, but at times I cannot shake it. Many times in my life I thought of killing myself because of the crushing guilt, all due to my survival and inability to put behind me these thoughts of incompleteness.

Thinking back now, I feel that the absence of the completeness I felt back in 1991 coupled with the guilt of surviving have combined to form a disorganized attachment to the soldiers that were killed. In losing my attachment to the troop-organism, I unconsciously reformed that attachment on the one thing that I could take home with me, my guilt. In losing my squad-selves and my subsequent identifying with the enemy soldiers, I unwittingly formed a festoon of guilt and hung it upon my soul.

I know that they were the enemy, it was kill or be killed...But my God, when we were shooting and hitting them I saw their tanks and vehicles blowing up in grand fashion, it seemed so beautiful. I remember the sight was so awe inspiring, the turrets flipping end over end, fire spraying upwards to a hundred feet. I could feel in the back of my mind, my humanity, trying to tell me that there were people in those tanks. My mind tried to tell that I could actually see the bodies felling over and over, within the upwelling of fire...no, no that cannot be...I was too far from them to actually see. So I told myself.

The reality set in when we saw the charred remains of the vehicles and realizing that no one could have lived through that. I remember trying not to think of my vehicle getting hit like that. The guilt began to creep up on me when we saw the pitiful encampments of the regular soldiers; we saw their food stocks...rice and rotting tomatoes...nothing more, and little of that. We joked of how we were glad to be on our side, again I felt the little bit of guilt niggling at me to witness and take in what we saw.

Today, I carry the guilt of thousands of soldiers who lost their lives to the meat grinder of the US Army by way of the M1A1 Abrams Main Battle tank sabot rounds, of the Apache helicopter hellfire missiles, the 30mm A10 Warthog Gatling guns, multiple launch rocket systems and the 105 mm howitzer to name a few.

To find out how bravely the Iraqi Republican Guard units fought against an over whelming foe, follow this link (then click on "correcting myths").

I still chase that sense of totality...I was the driver, on point for the division, so I saw it all.

On Point

Over at A Soldiers Perspective (ASP), CJ had recommended a post for one of Paulette's Ramblings. She writes about greeting the soldiers coming home as they get off the airplane. This is of utmost importance for our soldiers morale and memories of stepping onto that tarmac and feeling welcomed home.

Paulette gives soldiers pennies with an angel punched out in the middle. She tells them to bring it back home, when she really means for the angel to bring them back. A token of remembrance of things back home which brings a sense of calm and serenity. When I came home there was no fanfare or gentle angels, such as Paulette, to welcome me home. I was actually let down quite a bit over that, but my situation was different in that I came home by myself due to my sons birth. So I had contradictory emotions associated with my journey home.

I was stationed in Germany and came home before the rest of my company. My youngest son, who will be 18 in February, was born right before we left the demarcation zone (DMZ) to go into combat. I received a Red Cross telegraph out in the middle of the desert, hand delivered. I could have went home then...WOW... I had never even thought about that until now. In 18 years this never crossed my mind. I could not have left before, I knew that my experience driving a Bradly Fighting Vehicle (BFV) was in need, I was responsible for 9 lives, 6 squad members, Track Commander (TC), my squad leader who was the Gunner and of course mine.

My TC, squad leader and I hated each other, we argued and nearly came to blows several times. This went on the whole time we were in Garrison (on the military base). But, when we went into the field, we kicked ass. In war games we were usually some of the last to be knocked out of commission. So, when we went to war, none of us wanted anyone else to to be in any positions within our squad. We trusted and respected each other and knew that everyone on us had each others back.

This trust in your squad members is paramount in the successful survivalship in combat situations. We were one organism, complete and whole. Numerous contingencies have to be considered before the squad has a green light for combat readiness, comprehension and functioning. I knew without a doubt that when the time came, everyone of my immediate leaders and squad would be ready for whatever we faced. So, all I had to concentrate on was my job.

My job as a driver was of course to maintain the BFV, which was more than a full time job. I had over 150 checks and maintenance tasks that I had to perform three time a day. When we were on the move I had to watch for unexploded ordinance and keep an eye on. Then there was the actual driving, my vehicle was on point for the 1st AD, 1st brigade. I had to keep an eye two other divisions one to two miles away.

OH YEAH, did I mention that I had drove for 172 hours straight? Yeah, I drove for 172 hours without sleep, unless if you call the 5 to 10 minutes that I fell asleep at the wheel and lost the other divisions at night. It took us two hours to find them again. My TC told me the only way he wanted our reserve driver to drive was if I was killed, I took it as a compliment. The first 72 hours was extremely hard to stay awake. The 100 hours of sustained combat, now that was extremely easy to stay awake for that. After combat, I slept for two days and only woke up after sleeping 24 hours to go urinate and then went back to sleep for another 24.

Causes of Gulf War Syndrome

On November 17, 2008, after 17 years, Gulf War Syndrome Really Does Exist. These guys have been through a rough time of acceptance with the Gulf War Syndrome. Which by the way have you heard that after 17 years the government finally has admitted that the Gulf War Syndrome exists? But what about the 23% of Gulf War Veterans getting Multiple Sclerosis (MS)? My girlfriends nephew, is getting out of the Army due to PTSD and MS. How many of our modern day veterans will receive a crippling and debilitating diagnosis?

Even though this has only become a reality for the government, this reality has been a denied one for my Gulf War I brothers and I for 17 years. Finally, we have been told that the physical pain, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), Severe Headaches, Joint Pain, Muscle Pain, Nerve Damage, Neurological Damage, Auto-Immune Deficiencies, Unusual Fevers & Night Sweats, Sleep Disturbances, Gastrointestinal signs or symptoms, Confusion, Memory Loss, Blood In Stools & Urine, Fybromyligia, Epstein Barr Syndrome, Micoplasma Fermentans Incognitis Infections, Chemical Sensitivities--(These are just the symptoms that I have--YES there is more).

Here you will find the "probable causes" of GWS,

• Pyridostigmine Bromide (PB) - I was forced to take this experimental drug - it has been reported that this was an optional participation experiment - bullshit, my squad leader watched me three times a day when I took this drug of death, I had to open my mouth and lift my tongue after ingestion as he inspected
  
• Pesticides - yes I slathered this shit on (the old Vietnam pesticide worked the best, yes it had DEET in it) the fucking flies where thick you could look up at the top of the tent and see black patches of flies as big as 6 feet in diameter.
• Oil Well Fires - uh check, it was night for a week before I was shipped out to go home
  
• Psychological Stressors - if you call watching over 20,000 enemy soldiers dying that did not stand a chance to our superior weaponry and technology then yes I, may, could have possibly, received some psychological damage
• Depleted Uranium - Well the report does say that this one here was not a contributing factor, I say bullshit - up until the first Gulf War the government has had strict handling procedures in the storage of depleted uranium (think of the storage facilities that every state in the US does not want Nuclear Waste stored in their backyard - YES, HELLO Depleted Uranium is that exact same Nuclear Waste - except now the US has a place to 'safely' put this waste), I was talking about storage handling - the factory that makes DP rounds for the military have the employees dress in radiation suits all day during manufacturing, then when we get them in the field, sitting right on top of the rounds, YES on top, it somehow is 'OK' to handle them without any safety precautions (except point your weapon down range of course), the government is more worried about LEAD then this toxic metal, LEAD is bad - DU is good - how long were we feed that Lead did not fry our kids brains when they ate that paint?
  

An excerpt from the Gulf War Illness and the Health of Gulf War Veterans report quoting Special Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Gulf War illnesses, LTG Dale Vesser, [he] remarked that although Saddam Hussein didn’t use nuclear, biological, or chemical agents against coalition forces during the war, 'it never dawned on us … that we may have done it to ourselves' (emphasis added) (Gulf War Illness and the Health of Gulf War Veterans: Scientific Findings and Recommendations, p. 128).

I think that even though this war was so short, that the experience of killing literally thousands upon thousands of people in 100 hours cannot be imagined and has had a profound effect on the Gulf War I veterans which has been overlooked. The movie Jarhead does a disservice to the experience that I had. My experience, 100 hours of sustained combat and carnage, watching many thousands of people die, and I contributed to many sons losing their fathers. A crippling guilt that I still face today.

Anyway, my point is that we, Gulf War I veterans have been through quite a bit of shit from the government and would be an asset to the guys coming home now. The reason that I have been extending my hand to those that need help and recognition of the walking wounded and the fight against the stigma of asking for help.

Decades of denial, starting from the Vietnam War, that our military service has had a lasting impact, mentally and medically on our lives--Agent Orange and PTSD with our Vietnam Vets, Gulf War Syndrome with Gulf War I vets and now a psychological band-aid for our modern vets.

When will our nation learn that we cannot keep ignoring our veterans, that to do so, we do to our nations peril?

Are You Saying That you Killed People in Cold Blood?

I had posted an article Dissociative Spectrum on A Soldier's Perspective.

This response was registered first,

Are you saying that you killed people in cold blood? 

in response to my,

The Iraqi soldiers we killed that were trying to surrender.

The responder also asks,

Why?

and then the next comment:

Yes RG (Roman General, me also), what is the full story?

The full story:

On or around February 13, 1991 one day before my second son was born and four days away from my eldest sons second birthday.

We were getting close to moving out, Christmas had come and gone. I was able to call home during that time. By this time I was ready to go, it was February and I had been listening to Baghdad being bombed for about four months straight. Everyday, all day boom boom boom off in the distance, I can still hear them. All I could think about was how many people our bombs were killing, so when we got the call to go I was ready. We mounted up into my Bradley Fighting Vehicle and headed into Iraq.

Our assignment was to cut the Iraqi Republican Guard off from retreating back into Iraq. We set out on convoy toward the front line with me driving on point. A report comes over my headphones that a couple of Iraqi tanks with their turrets turned backward, Geneva Convention for surrender, approached some Marine armored vehicles. When they were in range they turned and fired on them, killing three of our troops. I was shaking all over, mad as hell and could not wait to get some payback.

I was getting myself psyched up going into driving straight for 24 hours. Later after 48 hours of continuous driving I saw silhouettes appearing on the left flank on the horizon during the night and reported it to my track commander. My TC and I hated each other, but respected one another and would have no other.

Having received the reports the night before we were weary of enemy activity. One of our Bradley's fired 3 warning shots, with permission of higher up as the ground war had not officially started yet. They kept coming and we were given permission to fire upon the enemy.

Later in the next day we received an account of the engagement. A brigade of foot soldiers had been trying to surrender and we killed them.

VFW-Veterans for Welfare?

I was reading an article on the website VA Watchdog dot org, where it's founder Larry Scott slams an unknown supposedly "active duty military officer with multiple Iraq deployments and continuing active duty career." The anonymous author of the posting goes on to trash our veterans who have service-connected disabilities. Insisting that veteran benefits are a drain on our country and budget while ignoring the costs of the wars.

Here is my response to a fortunate person who should thank God that they do not know the meaning of being disabled and all that entails;

I feel compelled to say some really negative and harsh words to the person writing this post. But, I will not because I believe that is exactly what he or she wants. I am a Army veteran of the Gulf War, I was a driver of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle. My unit fought the Iraqi Republican Guard in three campaigns and my vehicle was point for the brigade. I drove for 172 hours straight, engaged in 100 hours of sustained combat and witnessed literally thousands of enemy combatants die in that short span of time.

Since being honorably discharged from the service of my country I have struggled with PTSD, depression, substance use disorder, homelessness, social and health issues. It took me 7 tries and 15 years to go through the VA bureaucracy to get the help that I needed. Nothing has been given to me that I have not fought for with my life, either in the Gulf War, with the VA or in the streets of despair. I gave freely of my time and service, the same was not done for me.