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Thousands of pounds of Iraqi ammunition discovered

USMC News

Story Identification Number: 200341491615
Story by Cpl. Shawn C. Rhodes

AL KUT, Iraq (Apr. 13, 2003) -- Outside the bustling Iraqi town of Al Kut lies enough ammunition and explosive ordnance to level the city a few times over. Left behind when Iraqi forces retreated north, the ammunition bunkers outside the town were explored for the first time by American forces Apr. 13.

The bunkers sit on a barren piece of desert unlike the nearby town?s Tigris River-provided vegetation. A group of Marines from Task Force Tarawa entered the deserted compound in the morning, to find the bunkers jutting from the ground, some with turret-like towers.

?Our goal here today is to get a look at all the ammunition here, and see exactly what we are dealing with,? said Col. James W. Smoots, the chief of staff for Task Force Tarawa.

The Marines expected to find a lot of explosives and ammunition, but ended up finding more than they could know what to do with, said Smoots.

The ammunition and explosives ranged from small-arms rounds, used in the AK-47 rifle, to thousand pound bombs. In some bunkers the ordnance was found neatly stacked, while in others it was strewn on the floor.

?The most immediate threat from any of these weapons we found today would be the SA-7 missiles,? said Smoots. ?They are heat seeking, and can be used to hit our aircraft and helicopters.?

The chief of staff decided it would be best to destroy the missiles, rather than let them fall in the hands of locals or paramilitary groups still loyal to Saddam Hussein. An explosive ordnance disposal team was on hand to handle just such a mission.

?We?re using composition-4 plastic explosive to blow the missiles. It can be shaped to fit into things, and is great for this mission,? said Gunnery Sgt. Luke A. Moore, an explosive ordnance disposal technician. The Springfield, Ill., native continued by saying ?we?re going to lay some projectile missiles on top of the SA-7s, put the C-4 in them, and then set the fuse.?

The projection missiles were French-made. Most of the ammunition and ordnance found was made in Russia, but there were also items made in America, sold to Iraq for use in the Iran-Iraq war.

Once the charges were placed inside the missiles, the times fuse was set and the EOD technicians ran to the waiting vehicles, which then moved a safe distance away from the explosion. Four minutes later, a loud boom echoed across the compound, and a large cloud of smoke shot into the sky.

Smoots said there was a potential for chemical weapons to be on the premises of the ammunition dump, but the biological and chemical specialists with the group found no sign of them being used.

The mission appeared to be at an end until the colonel gathered the EOD team together and drove back in to the ammunition dump, to look for and possibly destroy more weapons of mass destruction.