War Stories (16 page)

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, French President Jacques Chirac, and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder are now claiming that an invasion of Iraq will sabotage any future UN efforts at disarmament, and that there is “no justification for war, and no reason to end the weapons inspections.” In Paris and New York, French diplomats have announced that President Bush's ultimatum was “contrary to the will of the United Nations Security Council.”

French foreign minister Dominique de Villepin urged the UN, “Let us triple the number of inspectors. Let us open more regional offices [in Iraq] … set up a specialized body to keep under surveillance the sites that have already been inspected.” Chirac, unalterably opposed to a U.S.-led coalition removing Saddam from power, sought to protect French commercial interests in Baghdad by pleading “We want Iraq to disarm, but we believe this disarmament must happen peacefully.”

One Marine watching these developments on our little satellite transceiver threw up his hands and said, “These guys need a reality check. When was the last time an aggressive dictator like Saddam Hussein ‘peacefully' disarmed? Iraq doesn't play by Swiss diplomatic rules and the path to peace doesn't meander through the United Nations.”

Here in the desert, France and Chirac are despised as much as Iraq and Saddam. Never one to miss the opportunity to prove that accountability is always the enemy of empty promises, Chirac also suggested that Iraq should be given a minimum of four or five more months to come clean. But then he clarified his position, lest it be taken too seriously: “There is no deadline,” he added. “Only the inspectors themselves can say when such a deadline is set and how.”

Chirac finally admitted that his goal was to oppose “American plans for dominance.” Others with a more cynical view of the situation have said that Chirac's remarks about “American dominance” are nothing but a smoke screen for French venality since they have much to hide.

Everyone here knows that the French helped Iraq build its nuclear reactor—the Osarik facility that Israel destroyed in 1981. But there is also widespread belief here in Kuwait that the French are afraid that when U.S. forces get to Baghdad, intelligence officers and FBI agents will find evidence of French arms sales and involvement in providing the Iraqis with the means of producing chemical and biological weapons and delivery systems—nearly all of which Paris provided to the Iraqis on credit. If Saddam goes down, the French won't get paid.

The Marines, who are taught history in boot camp, know that in spite of heavy Marine losses at Belleau Wood in World War I, the French shot at and killed U.S. troops during the landings in North Africa in 1942. All this has prompted a lively exchange of jokes about France and criticism that “the UN is dancing to the tune of a French horn.”

Though the news here is thin, we've learned, as the deadline nears in just a few hours, that Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak now believes that Iraq has brought the entire Gulf region to the edge of war. And we've heard that France and Germany want yet another opportunity to bring their objections formally before the UN Security Council. Antiwar protesters are being given prominent coverage,
even on FOX, which is now the only news source that we're getting. Meanwhile, this morning seventeen Iraqi soldiers couldn't wait—they surrendered to American forces on the Kuwaiti border to Iraq.

   
DORA COMMAND COMPLEX

      
Downtown Baghdad

      
Thursday, 20 March 2003

      
0530 Hours Local

The war is now on. It began with a cruise missile attack followed by an air strike about an hour and a half after the expiration of President Bush's deadline for Saddam Hussein and his sons to leave Iraq. The target: an Iraqi command, control, and communications center in downtown Baghdad.

We had originally been told that there would be no action until tomorrow—just in case someone in Saddam's inner circle was planning to take him out and save us the trouble. According to one of my old Navy SEAL pals, the decision to launch tonight's strike was made in Washington after someone claimed to know that Saddam Hussein, several of his top military aides, and at least one of his sons had been seen entering the Dora command-and-control complex to spend the night.

The SEALs, Delta Force operators, and CIA paramilitary officers—some of them pulled out of Afghanistan—have been in and out of Iraq for months now trying to make contact with dissidents. According to those I talked to, they were generally unsuccessful, because Saddam's internal security apparatus, the
Amn Al Khass
, headed by his son Qusay, had all but eliminated internal opposition except among the Kurds in the far north.

Until now, the only indigenous intelligence sources available anywhere near Baghdad have been individuals loyal to Ahmad Chalabi,
head of the Iraqi National Congress. And since Chalabi is a pariah at the State Department and the CIA, my SEAL and Delta contacts regarded it unlikely that the CIA would have been able to provide the Pentagon with the intelligence of Saddam's location for this first strike.

In the days leading up to the start of hostilities, Chalabi had arrived in the Kurdish mountain bastion of As Sulaymaniyah, Iraq, via Iran. From there, with protection provided by his own followers and a small handful of armed “civilians” on contract to the Pentagon, Chalabi has been granting interviews, making broadcasts into Baghdad, and generally planning to become Iraq's next leader. In my many meetings with him, he often told me that he intended to become the first democratically elected president of Iraq. If he does, it will be in spite of our State Department and CIA, not because of them.

The special operators who
would
talk about it believe that Chalabi, or one of his people, was the source of the Dora targeting information and that it was passed not to the CIA but directly to the Pentagon. When it got there, the CIA couldn't confirm or deny the information, but President Bush gave the go-ahead for the strike, since the command center was a legitimate military target.

In Qatar, U.S. Central Command quickly set aside plans to start the war twenty-four hours later and came up with a “double tap” plan, using a first wave of sea-launched Tomahawk cruise missiles, followed by USAF F-117A Nighthawk stealth aircraft armed with two-thousand-pound bunker buster EGBU-27 guided bombs steered to the precise location by GPS technology.

The Tomahawks launched by the USS
Milius
, USS
Donald Cook
, USS
Bunker Hill
, USS
Cowpens
, USS
Montpelier
, and USS
Cheyenne
hit first, knocking down aboveground structures. Then, the bunker buster bombs with delayed fuses designed to penetrate reinforced concrete rained down on the target.

Al Jazeera, the Arabic-language satellite television network that has been so supportive of Osama bin Laden, was on the air almost immediately showing ambulances and first aid workers removing dead and injured, and accusing the United States of killing innocent Iraqi civilians.

In the HMM-268 ready room, squadron pilots took time from laminating their flight charts and maps of Al Faw Peninsula to watch. They were staring at the Al Jazeera coverage when President Bush came on the air to address the nation.

   
THE WHITE HOUSE

      
Washington, DC

      
Wednesday, 19 March 2003

      
2215 Hours Local

For the second time in as many days, Marines of all ranks are watching their commander in chief address their countrymen about war. They surround our tiny TV monitor and stare intently at the screen. But unlike the last time, they are no longer silent. When President Bush says that the “opening stages of what will be a broad and concerted campaign” to liberate Iraq has begun, someone in the group says, emphatically, “Finally!”

Shortly after the president concludes his remarks, the Iraqis issue a brief statement that “the enemies of God committed the stupidity of aggression against our homeland and our people,” and call upon the Saddam
fedayeen
paramilitary volunteers to defend Iraq. Their commander, Uday Hussein, urges them to be ready to die as martyrs in destroying the American and British “invaders.”

   
TAA GIBRALTAR