Pre-Action Report, SIMFICS exercise SANDY BOOTS, Kuwait Theatre of Operations, 1 February 1991.

Dear Rupert

How's things back at HQ?

Had a chukka with Uncle Sam's Marines next door yesterday. Marvellous show by the lads, even the Staffords did well for infantry.

Started off over a bet that 'flexible defence' can withstand 'The Marine Way'. Decided to settle the argument using laser training aids. The Queen's Dragoon Guards deployed two troops of Scimitars and a Striker Anti-Tank troop, a platoon of Staffords in Warriors, and had some on-call assistance from the heavies of the 39th. The leathernecks seemed to have rustled up some infantry in large mobile barns they call AAV-7s, a few M60's with some add-on Israeli armour and a recce platoon in LAVs which aren't much smaller than an AAV-7. Give me a Scimitar any day. However, the cheats seem to have enlisted the USS Iowa off the coast which came as a nasty surprise to the artillery.

We wound up being deployed in a series of low sand-dunes and small villages 2 miles north of ZINC along highway BAMBER, with the Marines advancing south-west. Camouflage was excellent and we saw no evidence that the Marines had detected our positions in advance of the exercise.

Initial contact was made by the 39th's advanced artillery observer who detected some vehicular movement to the south-east and called a fire programme down. A cloud of pyrotechnic smoke went up after the MLRS 'bomblet' strike so we knew we'd got some of the blighters - turned out it was an AAVP-7 full of leathernecks who weren't too happy at being forced back to the casualty tent so early in the scrap. One of the USN Shore Patrol had to hit one.

This is when the 39th were radioed that they'd been detected by the Iowa and they were being engaged by 16 inch ordnance. This caused some consternation at the missile position and after much running around (where they missed a rendezvous with their reload trucks) it was judged that they'd lost one MLRS and couldn't come back on line for 40 minutes.

Next contact was in the same area when a Striker launched a Swingfire missile that set off another AAVP-7 strobe light and smoke, leading to more leathernecks in the casualty tent and more thwacking by umpires and Shore Patrol to maintain order. So far, two mobile barns down for an MLRS. Further to the northwest, we detected some movement near the village, but since the artillery were still driving aimlessly around 15 km to our rear we couldn't engage.

The Strikers launched another missile at a fleeting target that turned out to be a turret-down TOW launcher on a LAV but hit the base of the rise about 200m away. The sooner the MOD gets around to deploying that new ACLOS Swingfire development the better - the stuff we have now was developed in the '60s...

It turned out the two AAVP-7's were part of a Marine company attacking the other village to the southeast. We'd deployed the Staffords in this village and the two forces ran into each other. A heavy firefight ensued (and the occassional kicking too I am informed - it would seem our infantry are quite capable of starting a fight as the Marines) where the leading Marine elements were cut down. Return fire from their pinned foot and some M60's kept our men down and depleted two sections, one of which was the platoon CO. That'll teach him to keep his head down. The LAW 80 heavy anti-tank rockets worked a treat and knocked out several M60's and surviving AAVP-7's, in conjunction with some Warrior Rarden fire, stopping the attack dead. We lost a Warrior to a Marine Dragon round after the first hit had failed to detonate against that new Chobham armour, but with 6 men 'down' the Staffords platoon held out throughout the engagement. Good show!

Over the rest of the battlefield the Marines resorted to their feet and advanced slowly through the rises and ridges around BAMBER. The Queen's Scimitar troop deployed near that area snapped off a few shots and retired - 30mm of aluminium armour wouldn't have stood up to the Marine disposable anti-tank weapons. There was a tussle with the Queen's Striker deployed in that sector and the Marine LAV recce platoon where the LAVs themselves came off worst. We didn't see any armour but it turned out they were hiding in the sand dunes out of sight - the Swingfire missle may be 1960's technology but it was forcing the Marines to keep their heads (or should I say turrets) down. We need to whizz up some ideas how to frighten the Iraqis with them.

The 39th came back on line but the Marines jammed their comms so we didn't see them again. Eventually the battery packs in the infantry SIMFICS ran down and we called off the exercise. Certainly the Queen's defence slowed the Marine attack considerably and I can confidently say that, should the 7th Armoured Battlegroup get attacked in the flank by Iraqi forces in the next couple of weeks we'll be well placed to hold their attack until the Challengers arrive.

Toodle-pip
Yours
Humph

PS Regards to Cynthia and the boys