Generals Hear Firsthand Tales From the Front

Two Army generals, their dark stars etched into their helmets, came down to the tank line Sunday to listen to tales of the battle for Baghdad.

They heard about Capt. Jason Conroy and his men from Cobra Company, who shot their way to Saddam Hussein’s reviewing stand Monday, then put a tank round through a statue of the deposed ruler on a horse and set the dictator’s head on the top of a tank whose barrel carried the message “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue.”

They heard about Capt. Steve Barry’s Cyclone Company, which fought off several suicide attackers who sped at them firing AK-47s as Iraqi troops opened up from roadside bunkers.

And they heard about Capt. Phil Wolford, who described how his Assassin Company fought its way out of a counterattack by Iraqi troops ferried across the Tigris River in buses, taxis and private cars.

Lt. Gen. David McKiernan, commander of all ground forces in the region, and Maj. Gen. Buford Blount, commander of the Army’s 3rd Infantry Division, heard a lot of stories in the downtown zone controlled by the division’s 2nd Brigade.

But they didn’t hear everything.

Wolford, for instance, neglected to mention that an AK-47 round ricocheted off a spent machine-gun cartridge and knocked him senseless for a few seconds, and that he revived himself in time to pick up an M-4 automatic and fire at Iraqi infantrymen from the top of his tank.

The generals did not hear the tale of Sgt. Luther Robinson, a medic who discovered an abandoned Iraqi armored personnel carrier loaded with weapons, figured out how to crank it and, “braving potential friendly fire from his comrades,” drove the clumsy vehicle up the steps of an Iraqi soldiers memorial for all to see.

Nor did the generals hear the carping that comes so effortlessly from all troops weary of war -- the dreary food, the lack of bottled water, the mail that never arrives, the foot maladies, the miserable monotony punctuated by moments of sheer terror, and the utter lack of satisfying contact with the outside world.

It wasn’t that kind of day.

Instead, it was a day for the generals to listen to episodes of battle, somewhat abridged, to shake a few hands and to tell the men what a fine job they had done in pounding their way from the Kuwait border to downtown Baghdad in just three weeks.

“A lot of heroic stories out here, sir,” Col. David Perkins, commander of the 2nd Brigade, which took Baghdad last week, told McKiernan.

The brigade is now in charge of securing a central area that includes six bridges, part of the Tigris riverfront and a presidential palace complex.

Spc. Eric Martin, a tank driver, stood next to his vehicle in the blistering sun and described for the generals how a round had torn through the vision block, a narrow window fitted with mirrors that allows soldiers inside to see out. He sounded like a man surprised to be alive.

McKiernan asked how he had reacted.

“I got scared a bit when that round went through the vision block, sir,” Martin replied. “But it didn’t get through, so everything turned out OK.”

The general turned and asked Staff Sgt. Charles Wooten, the tank’s gunner, how many rounds from a medium machine gun he had fired during Monday’s pivotal battle.

Wooten thought for a moment and said, “A lot, sir.”

The generals studied scorch marks, dents and jagged holes pounded into the Abrams tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles by Iraqi fire. Perkins praised the toughness of the vehicles, saying “the survivability of these is unbelievable.”

It was left to Sgt. 1st Class Jonathan Lustig to provide the generals with the most vivid description of last week’s urban fighting.

“We tried to bring in as much violence and firepower as possible, sir,” he said. “We laid down a pretty good wall of fire, and it definitely kept people’s heads down.”

The generals asked Lustig what he would have done differently. He answered briskly, saying he would have had his men get more urban assault training. “And I’d train them more to, instead of looking far into the distance, to train their eyes right on the side of the road. That’s where they came at us from -- real close by.”

The generals nodded and thanked the men, then sped away in an armored vehicle.

They made a quick tour of major intersections and the palace, ending up at the soaring reviewing stand where Hussein had made several memorable TV appearances over the years.

Rows of American tanks and Bradleys were lined up on the parade ground where Iraqi troops had so recently passed by for Hussein’s review. Some of the men remarked that they still could not quite believe they had finally arrived at this place, and with such swiftness and urgency.

“This is the division that penetrated 250 miles and was the first in Baghdad,” McKiernan said to a tight circle of men who surrounded him in the dying light of day. “It’s not exactly how we planned to do it, but you learned to exploit success and that’s why you’re standing right here today.”

Their fellow soldiers were proud of them, he told them, and so were their families and the nation itself.

Then he answered the question on everyone’s mind.

“It’s not over yet; we still have work to do,” the general said. He paused and added, “I know you want to get home soon.”

The men erupted: “Hoo-ah, sir!”

The general grinned and raised his hand for quiet.

“We can’t get complacent,” he said, and indeed he and Blount wore helmets and flak vests, and had gas-mask cases strapped to their legs.

“There are a lot of bad guys still out there.”