San Diego Union Tribune September 25, 2002
Marines go to Kuwait for war game
One thousand Camp Pendleton Marines began a scheduled monthlong war game yesterday in the Kuwaiti desert while debate intensified over a possible war with Iraq's Saddam Hussein.
The training near Iraq's southern border is routine and one of several U.S. exercises in the area, military officials said. The annual war game includes troops from Camp Pendleton's 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit and Kuwaiti forces who will practice amphibious, ground and air operations, he added.
The Marines, who arrived aboard the San Diego-based amphibious ships Denver and Mount Vernon, are about half of the 2,200 Marines assigned to the 11th MEU. Most of the unit's infantry and aircraft remain aboard the Belleau Wood, which is cruising in the Gulf of Aden, off Yemen, according to news reports.
Last month, the MEU trained in Jordan for several weeks.
Such exercises have been common for nearly a decade, giving U.S. forces desert experience and bolstering military ties with gulf allies.
The operation in Kuwait, named Eager Mace, doesn't signal an immediate invasion of Iraq, said defense analyst John Pike.
"It's difficult to imagine they'll just go out and stay" in the desert, said Pike, who heads Washington-based GlobalSecurity.org.
Yet, he admitted the exercise is useful as a "dry-run rehearsal" for other Marine units that might come if there's a war.
The exercise will be conducted at Kuwait's Udairi Range, a 200-square-mile desert training area about 45 miles northwest of Kuwait City.
The flat desert, combined with few environmental restrictions, make Udairi a prime practice area for tanks, armored personnel carriers, artillery and aerial bombing. It's been the key U.S. training ground since the Persian Gulf War.
Capt. David Romley, a Camp Pendleton public affairs officer who participated in Eager Mace in 2000, called the experience invaluable.
"You get a sense for the expansiveness of the desert," he said. "You have to learn how to navigate using very minimal terrain features."
Unlike having the foothills of Pendleton as reference points, "Out there, you're using a small knoll," he said.
During the previous exercise in May, 2001, the Marines sent the entire 11th MEU onto Kuwait's shores.
Temperatures reached 126 degrees last year as Kuwait's shamal desert winds kicked up sandstorms that tested Marine helicopter pilots' abilities to fly.
"It teaches you how to operate under extreme weather," Romley said. "It makes you realize how much you're going to sweat when you put on your gas mask . . . it really adds a lot of detail to our war-fighting (training.)"
© Copyright 2002 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
