Baghdad: The Crossroads

[1IDVET]

June 2003
By Dennis Steele

About three hours before dawn on April 7, the Bradley fighting vehicles, Abrams tanks and other armored vehicles of Task Force 3rd Battalion, 15th Infantry (TF 3-15), which was part of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team (BCT), 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), lined up on a scarred stretch of a four-lane highway a few miles south of Baghdad.

An up-armored Humvee belonging to 3-15 Infantry?s Scout Platoon headed the column. As the rest of the vehicles left the attack position that the task force had occupied the previous afternoon, it eased onto the shoulder to wait, parking beside a twisted ribbon of guardrail that had been ripped by an explosion in the recent fighting. Capt. Trey Lawrence, the platoon leader, SSgt. Jason Giles, the Scout Platoon Green Section sergeant, and PFC Tucker Sanna, the driver, sat inside the Humvee. PFC Cody Ruiz stood in the hatch manning the .50-caliber machine gun.

Suddenly, PFC Ruiz ducked his head inside the Humvee and said, "Sergeant, no kidding, if I get hit today, will you put my wedding ring back on my finger?" (At the outset of the invasion into Iraq, Capt. Lawrence ordered his soldiers to remove all rings, including wedding bands, to prevent injuries.)

"Yes, I will," SSgt. Giles replied without hesitation. Talk tapered off inside the Humvee after that. The mood grew somber. PFC Ruiz?s simple request underlined the fact that had remained unstated until that point: that everyone in the column would be putting his life on the line within the next few minutes. The battle for Baghdad was at hand.

TF 3-15 was composed of its headquarters elements, Companies A and B of the 3-15 Infantry, Company B, 4th Battalion, 64th Armor, and Company A, 10th Engineer Battalion, and it was headed into the heart of Baghdad to seize and defend three key objectives: Moe, Larry and Curly -- yes, named for the Three Stooges -- which ultimately would make it possible for the 2nd BCT to take the southwestern slice of the capital and be the first U.S. force to hold ground in Baghdad.

The 3rd Infantry Division?s 1st BCT and a task force from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force had made "thunder runs" into Baghdad during the previous 72 hours to destroy as many enemy forces as possible, stir up the hornet?s nest inside the city and then withdraw, proving that U.S. forces surrounding Baghdad could attack anywhere inside the city with impunity.

Saddam?s propagandists, however, alleged that Iraqi forces had caused the American attackers to flee on the two previous occasions -- assertions that were as true as the Iraqi Information Minister?s spin a few days earlier that U.S. forces had been defeated a hundred miles outside Baghdad. Nevertheless, the lies just plain ticked off every soldier, from private to general. Higher levels of command decided that the third thunder run would stay if the main line of communication could be held open.

On April 7, the mission of the 2nd BCT?s other two task forces (TF 4-64 Armor and TF 1-64 Armor) was to attack the sprawling government section of the city on the west bank of the Tigris River, also the location of several major presidential palaces and most of the high-ranking Baath Party member?s official mansions -- essentially, Baghdad?s version of the Forbidden City.

TF 3-15?s job was to secure the avenue of attack and main line of communication from the south along Highway 8, by holding three key intersections -- Objectives Moe, Larry and Curly. The most southern, Curly, was considered the least defended and dangerous of the three, so it was given to TF 3-15 headquarters elements augmented by one mechanized platoon from Company B, 3-15 Infantry. Company B, 4-64 Armor was given Objective Larry, and Company A, 3-15 Infantry was given Objective Moe. (The remainder of Company B, 3-15 Infantry, had the initial mission to secure the 2nd BCT?s rear that day, but another of its platoons would reinforce Objective Curly when the outcome teetered in the balance.)

Lt. Col. Stephen Twitty, the TF 3-15 commander, in a radio call to all elements as they lined up on the highway said, "They know we?re coming. We?ve been probing, clearing mines, and we just shot MLRS (multiple-launch rocket system) rockets. They definitely know we?re coming." They did. Throughout that day, TF 3-15 would be engaged in some of the most intense close-combat fighting of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The scouts riding in Green Section 1?s Humvee were headed for Curly and a seven-hour firefight, joining around 80 other soldiers to fight a surreal battle under and around a large cloverleaf highway exchange. The Mortar Platoon was also on Curly, and launched 260 120-mm mortar rounds during the battle, often firing its mortar tubes in one direction and engaging in direct fire in the other with its 50-caliber machine guns. They were completely surrounded by an enemy force that numbered 200 to 300 that had to be rooted out of trench systems carved into rubble and blasted from surrounding buildings while the small American force was pounded by rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and artillery. A similar number of enemy troops surrounded each of the other objectives. They all turned out to be Syrians that Saddam Hussein had convinced, and paid, to come to fight the Americans.

The section of Highway 8 leading to Moe, Larry and Curly came to be known as "RPG alley" as small convoys carrying back the wounded and larger convoys bringing supplies of fuel and ammunition were pummeled by RPG fire. Two soldiers from TF 3-15 (SFC John Marshall, the Scout Platoon sergeant, and SSgt. Robert Stevers, a maintenance team chief) died on that road, hit by RPGs as they manned crew-served weapons in the open hatches of vehicles. Thirty other soldiers were wounded at the three TF 3-15 objectives. Recommendations for 28 Bronze Star Medals with "V" Devices and five Silver Star Medals went forward from the TF 3-15 commander for action that day.

The photographs printed here show the firefight at Curly, one of three isolated battles that were key to the fall of Baghdad and Saddam Hussein?s regime, where American soldiers were put to the test and prevailed.

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