February 24, 2019
“Times and Days Past I”
By Jim Culp
It was 1991. I had been in the Middle East (the
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) for about a month. I was 25 years old, and in charge
of half a bridge section, which is typically about eight men. This type of Army
squad was part of a platoon that operated a component of a company sized float
bridge system that is transported on specialized 5-ton trucks, and complemented
with boats that are outfitted for assembling the bridge in a river or other
body of water. It was on this day that fateful February that my unit, Company E
of the First Engineer Battalion, was told that we were headed into Iraq to either
bridge a river, or use or truck’s pallets to haul materials. What the next 96
hours would be was some of the most intense and sleepless days and nights of my
life. The Coalition (the USA, British, Saudis, and many others) had pounded Iraq
for weeks with missiles, rockets, and bombs dropped from aircraft. Iraq’s
armies had plundered the peaceful nation of Kuwait, raped and tortured her
citizens, and stolen millions of dollars from her banks. On February 25th,
the area we had left one month earlier (the Port of Dhahran, Saudi Arabia) was
struck by an Iraqi SCUD missile.
When this ground operation started, the Iraqis
finally determined that the coalition was tired of their occupation, and began
the task of leaving Kuwait. 28 U.S. personnel lost their lives that day. On
February 26 and 27th, large portions of their army would be sent to their
deaths on Highway 80 out of Kuwait. That area would subsequently be known in
history as the Highway of Death. The Iraqis were slaughtered by coalition
aircraft, and not allowed to return home.
Back in Southern Iraq, my unit had been ordered to
ground their bridge bays and boats, and haul materials to a large amount of
destinations on the battlefield. This mission included hauling water,
ammunition, explosives, rations, and bodies. At the end of these four days,
Secretary Of Defense Colin Powell ordered the hostilities to end, and the war
was over. It wasn’t over for us. We spent days, weeks, and months cleaning up
the mess. When we headed back into Kuwait, we drove down the Highway of Death.
When we reached the Kuwait city of Al Jahra, we thought the world was on fire.
BBC blasted out the news to the world over our pocket FM radios. At night, you
could see oil wells burning with flames that climbed 15 to 20 stories in the air.
By the time we reached King Khalid Military City,
and headed to our new home in the middle of the Saudi desert… a large area of
operations that would become a redeployment station for our return home. We
were there for three more months, weathering blinding sandstorms and the worst
enemy that you can face…boredom.
We of the First Engineers will never forget that war…and
I think the reason is that it brought out the worst and the best in human
beings that we were associated with. We saw the best of leaders, and some of
the very worst. To all of my comrades that served there with me, thank you
brothers. To the men and women of the coalition that never made it home, Rest
in Peace; the rest of us are coming.
-Jim
