Greeneville Native

Describes Details

Of Street Fighting,

Soldiers' Valor

By MAJ. MIKE HUMPHREYS

3rd BCT PAO, 4th Inf. Div., MND-B

Maj. Mike Humphreys is a Greene County native serving with the U.S. Army in Iraq. He wrote the following article about his brigade's efforts to increase security in the Sadr City section of Baghad, Iraq's capital.

BAGHDAD -- In the annals of America's wars there are great battles that stand out as a turning point.

Places like Lexington, Gettysburg, Marne, Normandy and the Chosin Reservoir were merely dots on a map before they gained a place in history as testaments to American military might against determined foes.

In Iraq, the Battle for Sadr City may be recorded by history as the final gate to irreversible momentum that leads to a secure and democratic Iraq.

"A major turning point in the Iraq war was taking Sadr City," said Col. John Hort, commander, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division.

Sadr City was a battle in the truest form. After a protracted period of intermittent attacks by militant Shia extremists against Multi-National Division - Baghdad and its partners in the Iraqi Army and the Government of Iraq (GoI), Sadr City erupted March 25 in a stream of rocket fire aimed at the International Zone and the GoI.

Special Groups Criminals, in violation of the Muqtada al Sadr-imposed cease fire, took advantage of violence in Basra to launch attacks against the GoI, the International Security Force (ISF) and innocent Iraqi civilians.

"The primary threat was the 107mm rocket," said Hort. "We had to secure the southern portion of Sadr City and deny the Special Groups ability to continue targeting the international zone."

With assistance from additional maneuver companies and adjacent brigades, the U.S. Army's Striker Brigade moved quickly to shore up weakened or abandoned Iraqi army checkpoints overwhelmed by well-equipped and well-organized Special Groups fighters.

Alongside their reinforced Iraqi army partners, the brigade sealed off Sadr City to prevent the violence from spreading to the peaceful and progressive areas of the Adhamiyah district of Baghdad.

"We had to protect our success. We couldn't allow Special Groups to dismantle what our soldiers and the Iraqi Army worked so hard to build," said Maj. John Gossart, executive officer for the 3rd BCT, 4th Inf. Div.

In the early days of the battle, tales of heroism were being written as American soldiers fought side by side with the Iraqi army to fight back the Special Groups criminal assault.

1st Lt. Galen Peterson, of Colorado Springs, Colo., and Staff Sgt. Jason Key, of St. Louis, were part of a group of four soldiers with the 1st Combined Arms Battalion, 68th Armor Regiment, who braved direct fire and rocket-propelled grenades to come to the aide of an Iraqi army checkpoint in danger of being overrun by an estimated 100 Special Groups fighters.

The mere sight of the U.S. soldiers emboldened the Iraqi Army, who moments before had been taking cover from SG criminal firepower.

Peterson maneuvered his soldiers under enemy precision fire and established suppressive fire while Key employed an anti-tank weapon against an enemy position.

Within hours of the first attacks, the tide was turning all over in Sadr City. The Striker Brigade had effectively isolated the violence in what amounted to a giant cordon of Sadr City.

Next, soldiers had to gain control of the Thawra 1 and Thawra 2 neighborhoods in south Sadr City to deny the enemy an ability to strike with as many as 12 rocket attacks per day.

The Striker Brigade launched an offensive not seen since Operation Iraqi Freedom I.

M1 tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles from 1st Combined Arms Battalion, 68th Armor Regiment, and the 8-wheeled Stryker vehicles rolled in to secure the once permissible neighborhoods and eliminate primary points of origin for the 107mm rockets.

Intense fighting ensued in the densely populated area, where the enemy held up in homes and businesses abandoned by Iraqis fleeing the fighting.

Partnered with the IA and relying heavily on aerial reconnaissance platforms and attached air weapons teams, the 4th Infantry Division was able to regain those neighborhoods and shut down the rocket launch sites.

A Street Fight

"It was a street to street fight to clear and hold the neighborhoods," said Gossart, a native of Washington D.C.

Gossart said the enemy combatants were determined to remain in control of their rocket launch sites and the Jamilla Market, the largest market in northern Baghdad and a principal source of income for the criminal elements, who extorted from businesses and civilians to fund their campaign of violence.

To isolate these Iranian-backed criminals, Hort made the decision to employ a successful tactic used by his brigade in Adhamiyah and elsewhere in Baghdad: the Striker Brigade would build a wall.

Day and night, soldiers of the Striker Brigade fought their way up and down the three-mile stretch of the Jamilla/Al Quds road that separates Thawra 1 and Thawra 2 in the south from the rest of Sadr City.

Through a hail of sniper fire, rocket-propelled-grenade attacks and minefields of explosively-formed penetrators, American soldiers erected barrier after barrier of concrete now known as the Gold Wall.

Joining the fight just in time, and armored division added fresh reinforcements to the battle in May, taking responsibility for Thawra 2 and their section of the Gold Wall.

Hort said the four-week operation to build the wall needed the resources of a whole brigade and another Engineer Brigade.

'Fought The Whole Way'

"It was literally a three-mile sprint, and our guys fought the whole way," Gossart said.

Hort credited aerial intelligence, reconnaissance and surveillance platforms and the soldiers who controlled them from the 3rd Special Troops Battalion, for his view of the battlefield and the ability to walk air-weapons teams in for the kill.

He said engineers provided the expertise and operated the equipment to place the barriers on the ground, and logisticians normally charged with resupplying the brigade fought their way in and out of Sadr City, delivering and stockpiling barriers right on the line, a task usually not associated with the job.

"Our Soldiers were right there with tracers flying over head, Hellfires flying over head and main tank rounds going off," said Lt. Col. Robert Hatcher, from Montgomery, Ala., commander of the 64th Brigade Support Battalion, 3rd BCT, 4th Inf. Div.

Wall Is Completed

When completed, the Gold Wall consisted of more than 4,000 concrete barriers, 10 to 12 feet high, and the effect was immediate. Hort said the enemy was essentially defeated, and the Iraqi army's confidence was restored.

By the end of May, with reconstruction efforts already under way, the Iraqi army moved north of the Gold Wall, moving deep into Sadr City almost completely unopposed.

Today, Sadr City remains peaceful. The Striker Brigade has overseen more than $53 million in U.S. and Iraqi money on infrastructure and essential services improvements such as sewer, water, power, schools, parks and roads.

Additionally, the brigade has paid out more than $3 million in micro-grants to aide small business and more than $1.2 million in claims against Coalition Forces.

"We want to bring back normalcy to the area - return essential services, help develop the economy, markets and empower the local government," Gossart said.

As the executers of this historic battle, the Striker Brigade led an unprecedented fight of more than 600 direct-fire engagements; the soldiers expended more than 12,000 25mm rounds and more than 800 120mm tank rounds, to kill or capture more than 1,000 Special Groups criminals.

"Our Soldiers can be proud of what they've done here," Hort said, of the Striker Brigade. "One day, they'll be able to say to their grandchildren: 'I remember Sadr City.' "