Blood Brothers
In mid February 1991, allied aircraft were taking their toll on Iraqi targets.
Saddam Hussein’s army was being systematically destroyed and enemy soldiers
were giving themselves up by the thousands. I was a young Marine attached to
the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and had been placed on guard duty on the
Port of Al Jubayl.
Located approximately fifty miles South East of the Kuwaiti border, it was the
staging point for more than seventy percent of all equipment and personnel coming
into the country. Upon arrival at the port we were informed that our new home was
on Hussein’s top ten list for SCUD missile attacks. Strategic command positioned a
U.S. Army Patriot Missile Battery on the port to protect our camp and the Navy
Hospital located next door. Of the eighty-eight SCUD’s launched at the port, only
one would make it through the Patriot defense system. This lone missile landed on the
dock but did not detonate, no chemical weapons were detected.
Life on the port was somewhat difficult, but nothing compared to living conditions
during previous wars. We slept on cots inside tents that had wooden floors and always
had dry clothing and plenty of food and water. Many Marines had not received orders
as of yet, so they spent their days and nights thinking about what they would do when
they took the battlefield. Of the many questions running through their minds, the only
one that mattered was, would they kill, or be killed? Marines are taught to win in battle
no matter what the cost, being combat virgins, many wondered if they packed the gear.
Some of us would soon find out.