Newsday (New York, NY) March 23, 2003
Pilots Battle Their Feelings; Trying to cope with combat
By Thomas Frank
Southern Iraq - Sitting in the pitch-black darkness of his helicopter cockpit, Lt. Jeff Nelson gently squeezed a trigger with his right hand and aimed the laser sight at the target nearly two miles away.
Moments before, Nelson's flying partner, Chief Warrant Officer Mike Medura, had fired a pair of 70 mm rockets with explosive warheads at the squat Iraqi armored personnel carrier sitting near a bridge that U.S. forces were trying to control. The rockets fell short but the blast sent five Iraqi soldiers fleeing from the carrier.
Nelson watched them scamper - tiny images on the infrared screen by his right knee - and as he pulled the trigger with his left hand to release a missile, he was nearly exultant.
"You guys are freakin' history," Nelson barked into his headset.
The 4-foot-long, black Hellfire missile whooshed out from below a helicopter wing, arced upward and rocketed straight for the laser spot Nelson was still pointing at the carrier. Eight seconds later, a shower of metal and light exploded from the ground.
"All right!" Nelson yelled. "That's the --- !"
For seven hours late Friday and early yesterday, teams of Army attack helicopters prowled 100 feet above ground, blowing up Iraqi tanks, personnel carriers and missile launchers - 10 in all. The attack cleared the path for ground troops from the Army's Third Infantry Division to cross the Euphrates River and establish a foothold 180 miles from central Baghdad and 100 miles from the southern Iraqi border they crossed Thursday.
The helicopter strikes certainly will be forgotten in the annals of this war. But many pilots of the Third Infantry Division's aviation brigade will long remember them as their first encounter with combat, destruction and death. It was an initiation of sorts that the brigade commander, Lt. Col. Curtis Potts, hinted at yesterday when he asked a small group of nearly 40 pilots, "Who were the virgins last night that are no longer virgins?"
Nobody can say how many Iraqis were killed. Pilots were told to destroy weapons systems such as tanks. Many pilots do not even know if their strikes killed people. But many assume they did. And that has made some feel a little uneasy.
"I keep thinking to myself, I've actually fired in anger - you've actually shot to kill," said Medura, a 13-year Army veteran who saw his first combat Friday night.
"I've tried to rationalize my career," he added. "The Army has been very good to me, provided for me, and I feel a sense of responsibility to do the job I was trained to do for the Army. It all boils down to, I'm just doing the job I'm supposed to do."
Capt. Jeff Rains, 29, who also faced his first combat Friday and destroyed a personnel carrier, said, "It's not a good feeling to have killed somebody, but the way I can justify it is they were on the route that our forces were going through. It may have indirectly saved American lives."
Even Nelson, the weapons operator with Medura, was not so exuberant yesterday - almost embarrassed to hear what he had said after a videotape of his hit was played.
"It was just me saying, 'You're trying to fight and kill my buddies and you're not about to do that. If you want to kill, we'll do the same back,'" Nelson, 34, said.
After Nelson killed his first enemy, in the Gulf War in 1991, he felt so badly that he questioned whether he was meant to be a soldier. A few hours of soul-searching affirmed Nelson's belief in the Army - that he was "here for other soldiers, family, friends and the United States."
The Apache helicopter helps pilots cope with killing by enabling them to do so at great distances, using controls that Lt. Mike LaBroad, 24, says are "scarily like a video game."
Chief Warrant Officer Jesse Oliver, 25, who faced his first combat Friday, said that by looking at targets through high-powered cameras in the helicopter's nose "you're kind of detached, like what's going on in the system is not real. You're finding targets."
Oliver blew up an Iraqi missile launcher Friday. His reaction, recorded on tape: "Target destroyed."
Airborne Assault: A look at the AH-64A Apache, the Army's primary attack helicopter
Specifications
Crew: 2 (pilot and gunner)
Engines: 2
Blades 4
Length: 58 1/8 feet
Height: 15 1/4 feet
Wing span: 17 1/8 feet
Ammunition: 16 Hellfire missiles
76 aerial rockets
30-mm. automatic gun
Maximum speed: 176 mph
Range: 1,200 miles*
*Internal and external fuel
1: Pilot
2: Gunner
3: Target acquisition system
4: Cannon
5: Hellfire missile rack
6: Rocket pack
What it is:
The AH-64A Apache is a quick reacting helicopter that can fight at close range and low altitude against enemy forces. Its armor shell can withstand hits in key areas from rounds up to 23 millimeters.
What it's used for:
The Apache is designed as a stable, aerial attack helicopter. Capable of carrying 16 Hellfire laser-designated missiles, its primary role is an anti-tank gunner.
Features:
Highlights include a battlefield Target Acquisition Designation Sight and a Pilot Night Vision Sensor, enabling the crew to navigate and conduct precision attacks night or day and in adverse weather conditions.
History:
The first unit of Apaches was deployed in 1986. In 2000, the Army grounded its entire fleet following discovery of tall rotor problems, leading to crashes. By late 2001, the Army seemed to have resolved the problem, although an Israeli Air force Apache later experienced catastrophic tall rotor failure.
Radar-Aided Targeting
Upgrades to the Hellfire Longbow missile include a radar system that can distinguish between enemy weapons systems well beyond visible range.
How it works:
1: Radar sweeps battlefield and prioritizes up t 128 enemy targets.
2: Top 16 targets, based on pre-programmed mission objective, are shown on digital display. Same information is fed to separate computers inside each Hellfire missile.
3: Aircraft selects target and pilot fires. Pilot can override target if warranted.
SOURCE: www.globalsecurity.org
GRAPHIC: Newsday Photo/Thomas Frank - Chief Warrant Officer Mike Medura, left, and Lt. Jeff Nelson. Newsday Chart / Rod Eyer - Airborne Assault: A look at the AH-64A Apache, the Army's primary attack helicopter (see end of text).
Copyright © 2003, Newsday, Inc.
