Later in the battle, an Abrams tank carrying the commander of B Company, 3rd Battalion, 66th Armor was destroyed by another Abrams shortly after it was hit, but not damaged, by a grenade. Three Bradley fighting vehicles with B Company, Task Force 1-41, were struck by friendly tank fire shortly after the battle began. ″Every effort was made by commanders to maintain control during what was very obvious, to those who were there, to be a very dangerous and potentially disastrous evening,″ Weisman wrote in his report. The reasons behind the incident, as described in the officers’ statements, reflect the dangers of a high-speed, nighttime ground assault using high-tech weaponry. The soldiers had gone for as long as 36 hours without sleep, according to the investigation reports. The 3rd Brigade had raced more than 60 miles into Iraq when the big battle began. ″Our equipment is so lethal that there is no room for mistakes.″įatigue may have contributed to the problem that day. ″We knew that control (of friendly tank fire) was going to be a problem,″ he said. In a telephone interview Monday, Weisman defended his troops’ actions, saying that although mistakes may have been made, the brigade fought brilliantly and without the aid of a fool-proof system of distinguishing between friend and foe. Weisman’s brigade of 4,400 soldiers lost only six men in the ground war - all in the friendly fire incident of Feb. Weisman, commander of the 3rd Brigade, whose three armored battalions fought what he called the most demanding and difficult battle any soldier would ever encounter. ″It was confusing, it was dark, it was scary,″ said Col. Rather than wait to be fired upon, the gunners pulled the trigger, the reports said. In some cases, gunners who saw these flashes disastrously concluded they were bursts of cannon fire from Iraqi tanks. When these grenades hit M1-A1 Abrams tanks, the flashes could be detected from distances of more than 2 miles by the thermal sights of other Abrams tank gunners, who were unsure where the Iraqi forces were positioned, the documents said. The Army said none managed to pierce U.S. The shoulder-fired, rocket-propelled grenade was a mainstay of the Republican Guard infantrymen who popped up from trenches, ditches and bunkers to fire from every direction at passing American tanks and other armored vehicles.
He said confusion over the Iraqi rocket-propelled grenade fire was the likely reason. tanks and three Bradleys fighting alongside his unit. Brown, commander of the unit’s 2nd Battalion said in a sworn statement to investigators.īrown acknowledged that tanks from his battalion may have been responsible for the destruction of two U.S.
″It was a hard-fought battle the Iraqis presented a 360 degree threat, and our soldiers gave a splendid account of themselves,″ Lt. The chaotic battle raged almost uninterrupted for five hours.
#IRAQ WAR TANK BATTLES FULL#
The records show that on that overcast beginning of the final full day of the 100-hour ground war, the 3rd Brigade of the ″Hell on Wheels″ 2nd Armored was pushing eastward through southern Iraq, clashing repeatedly with elements of a Republican Guard armored division. The Army earlier acknowledged it lost a total of 21 soldiers to friendly fire in the course of the 100-hour ground war, but it had not previously disclosed such details of how the mistakes were made. The records were released to The Associated Press in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. Ights, the gunners mistook the grenade flashes as hostile cannon bursts from the tanks themselves, and then fired at them, the documents said. Viewing the distant action through thermal - heat detecting. The Army said the major - though apparently not sole - source of the confusion was the image presented M1-AI gunners when rocket-propelled grenades fired by Iraqi infantrymen exploded harmlessly off the thick skins of other American tanks. soldiers were killed, 25 were wounded, and five M1-A1 tanks and five Bradley fight vehicles were destroyed by fire from their own forces during a running battle against units of Iraq’s Republican Guard on that pitch-black morning of Feb.
instance of ″friendly fire″ in the Persian Gulf War was caused mostly by American tank forces mistaking a fairly harmless grenade assault for enemy tank fire, according to Army records.
0 kommentar(er)
