Compass Points - Desert Warriors
Decades of honorable service.
March 23, 2024
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The Marine Corps' desert warriors have never received the honor and acclaim they deserve.
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Kuwait was invaded by the Iraqi Army on August 2, 1990. Five days later, US forces were ordered into the region and Operation Desert Shield / Desert Storm began. Marines were among the first ground forces to arrive and, with supplies and equipment from maritime prepositioning ships and fly-in echelons, the Marines were able to expand rapidly. When US and coalition forces moved to free Kuwait early in 1991, many civilian experts predicted a long and bloody struggle. But because the Marines and all the US forces and coalition partners were so well equipped and well trained, the conflict was over in 43 days.
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Conflict and operations in the Middle East simmered for a decade until the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City on September 11, 2001. On that day, the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit was at port in Darwin, Australia, enjoying a well-deserved liberty. The Marines were ordered back onboard, and they set sail immediately for war.
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Amazingly, on the way to Afghanistan, the Marines of the 15th MEU demonstrated the power and flexibility of the Marine crisis response force by stopping to conduct an emergency humanitarian mission in East-Timor and then made another brief stop to help the Air Force by securing an airfield in Pakistan. Continuing on, the Marines were among the first US forces inside Afghanistan. The 15th MEU was tasked with securing Camp Rhino, a small airfield just south of Kandahar, Afghanistan,
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In Iraq, Marine forces did some of the fiercest fighting in Operation Iraqi Freedom.
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Operation Iraqi Freedom
. . . The I Marine Expeditionary Force, along with the U.S. Army's 3rd Infantry Division, led the 2003 invasion of Iraq. The Marines left Iraq in the summer of 2003. They returned, however, at the beginning of 2004. They were given responsibility for the Al Anbar Province, which is the region west of Bagdad consisting of extreme desert terrain. During this occupation, the Marines lead an assault on the city of Fallujah in April, known as Operation Vigilant Resolve.
The operation was initiated by the killing of four private contractors in Fallujah and five soldiers in Habbaniya in March 2004. During April and May, Marines carried out ground and air operations in an attempt to root out insurgents. A cessation in the fighting occurred during the summer and fall of 2004. In November, the fighting continued under Operation Phantom Fury, with some of the most intense urban fighting since the Battle of Huế City during Vietnam. This operation continued until 23 December 2004. The human cost of both of these operations was 122 Americans killed and nearly 700 wounded. Following 2004, the Marine experienced fierce fighting in the Iraqi cities of Ramadi, Al-Qa'im, and Hīt.
Marines participated in the Anbar Awakening and 2007 surge, which reduced the degree of violence in Iraq. Between 2007 and 2010, Marines served in various operations; however, their primary mission was to train Iraqis to serve as a domestic security force. The official end of the Marine Corps presence in Al Anbar Province came 23 January 2010. At that time, they handed over responsibility for the region to the U.S. Army. Marines would return to Iraq, however, in the summer of 2014. This return was in response to growing violence in the country. Their mission was to quell the violence while continuing to train Iraqi troops. . .
-- National Museum of the Marine Corps
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Since Iraq invaded Kuwait back in 1990, Marines have conducted operations for more than three decades in the deserts of the Middle East.
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For now, Marine operations in Afghanistan ended at the Abby Gate at the airport in Kabul. While the 15th MEU was among the first Marines into Afghanistan, another Marine MEU, this time the 24th MEU, was called upon to help the last US forces withdraw from Afghanistan through Kabul International airport. Marine Sgt Tyler Vargas-Andrews in March of 2023 described to the House Foreign Affairs Committee what he saw at the 2021 suicide bomb attack at Abbey Gate.
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People were suffering from extreme malnutrition, dehydration, heat casualties, and infants were dying. Afghans [who] were brutalized and tortured by the Taliban flocked to us, pleading for help. Some Afghans turned away from HKIA [Hamid Karzai International Airport] tried to kill themselves on the razor wire in front of us that we used as a deterrent. They thought this was merciful compared to the Taliban torture that they faced.
-- Sgt Tyler Vargas-Andrews, USMC
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In all, 13 U.S. troops died in the Abby Gate bombing, all Marines -- except for one Navy corpsman and one Army staff sergeant. The Abbey Gate bombing ranks as one of the highest losses of U.S. military forces in a single incident in the Afghanistan War. It was a tragic ending to the years of honorable service by Marines in Afghanistan.
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The Marine Corps' desert warriors have never received the honor and acclaim they deserve.
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Sgt Tyler Vargas-Andrews and all the Marines who have served with honor over the last several decades in and around the Middle East, including Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan, deserve unending recognition and respect from a grateful Nation.
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In the years to come, new challenges will arise. Even now, Iran proxy forces Hamas, Houthi, and Hezbollah are once again a threat to US interests in the Middle East. The 26th MEU in the last few days finally turned for home after extended duty in the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea, and the Eastern Mediterranean. No doubt, there are more challenges ahead for the Marine Corps in the Middle East.
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For more than three decades, the Marine Corps' desert warriors were thrown into one impossible situation after another and yet they met every challenge with professionalism and extraordinary service. They won many victories and they also shared loss, sacrifice, and hardship. Through it all, they served with honor.
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Marine operations in the Middle East are a worthy addition to the honor roll of Marine operations since 1775. The duty of all Marines today including those currently on active duty and those once on active duty is to help build the Marine Corps of the future. To build the Marine Corps of the future will take the wisdom gleaned from Marine operations from the Battle of Princeton in 1777 all the way to the 26th MEU in the Eastern Mediterranean in 2024. To build the Marine Corps of the future will require wisdom gleaned from every era, every contingency, crisis, emergency, skirmish, rescue, and fight.
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The best way to glean the wisdom of Marines who have gone before is to talk together, exchange ideas, and then discuss, design, and create the enhanced Marine Corps of the future. But while we can read and study the actions of Marines from the Revolutionary War to World War I, we cannot sit together with them and share experiences. That is why it is vital that Marines alive today from every decade, with experiences in every part of the world, join together, discuss together, solve together, and create together.
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Compass Points salutes the extraordinary service and sacrifice of the Marine Corps' desert warriors who served from 1990 to 2024. -- many of these Marines are still serving on active duty today. It is these desert warriors who deserve more recognition and acclaim for their service. Now, as the next challenges loom, it is these Marines who will shoulder so much of the burden of creating the enhanced and upgraded, combined arms, crisis response force of the future. With the wisdom of Marine operations from the past, enhanced by the lessons of current combat operations around the globe, the Marine Corps will be, as it always has been, strong today and stronger tomorrow.
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Marines - 04/24/2021
30 years later: the enduring lessons for success from Operation Desert Storm
By Lance Cpl. Alison Dostie
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Marine Times - 09/13/2021
War in Afghanistan ended much as it began - with U.S. Marines defending a runway
By Philip Athey
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Task and Purpose - 03/09/2023
Wounded Abbey Gate Marine delivers powerful testimony to Congress
‘I opened my eyes to Marines dead or unconscious lying around me.’
By Jeff Schogol
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/marine-wounded-abbey-gate-afghanistan-withdrawal/
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National Museum of the Marine Corps
Operation Iraqi Freedom – 2003 to 2011
https://www.usmcmuseum.com/uploads/6/0/3/6/60364049/oif_iraq.pdf
Loved watching the retirement ceremony of one of our desert warriors recently, LtGen George Smith. He was most recently the Commander of I Marine Expeditionary Force...the largest warfighting formation in the Marine Corps.
He began his remarks by asking the audience to participate in an old trick in case he became too emotional during his remarks.
The trick, he said, is that he would prime them with a word or phrase to shout out when he begins to tear up or lose his bearing. The word or phrase must be something he viscerally hates, something he is so passionate about that the mention of it would bring him back to reality and counter his tendency to get weepy and nostalgic.
For example, other recently retired generals he referenced had asked the audience, during their remarks, to shout out their old college nemesis, or the evil golf club that gave them the most grief and frustration on the course. "Old Blue!" Or: "4 Iron!"
In this tradition, he asked the audience that day to keep him centered and appropriately angry by shouting two words. Two words he hated more than anything.
FORCE DESIGN!!!!
The Corps lost one of its active duty moral compasses when Lieutenant General Smith threw in the towel and retired. He knew FD2030 was garbage in and garbage out. He was willing to pay a career ending price for calling it out. No doubt the emotion naturally in a speech reflecting decades of dedicated service might be hard enough, but leaving the active duty side of the Corps he loved and leaving it to “managers” intent on destroying it must have really caused the emotional thermostat to rise. It has become apparent over the last many months that FD2030 with all the clear flaws in the nuts and bolts failure of it, the larger issue is the attack and make no mistake it is an attack, preplanned fires included, on the very Ethos, of our Corps. It’s a frontal assault on who and what we are and believe in. So when a true warrior leaves and basically leaves because he was either told to, or simply knew his stand would not stand; it would be impossible not to be emotional, and ergo the use of the words “Force Design” no doubt refocused his emotional self on the anger in his mind. Hopefully General Smith will lend his voice to the matter at hand in the coming days and weeks and months as the fight goes on. We few we happy few….