Support Veteran Journalism . However, the Iraqi high command were not ignorant of the dam's strategic value, and they had stationed a powerful defensive force in and around the Haditha Dam. In the same year, a new power line was established between Haditha and Baghdad with the help of the USACE to restore a line that had previously been destroyed. As the vehicle retreated, leaving a trail of oil behind it, another round hit MK19 gunner Corporal (CPL) Jon Gale (pseudonym) in his body armor, knocking him backwards. Platoon leaders furiously took notes as Doyle laid out the plan on his map, and the group surveyed the available imagery. Today, the capture of the Haditha High Dam is one of the most impressive examples of direct action by SOF units ever executed. George was hit in the side where he had no plate, and an Air Force CCT man was hit in the jaw. First Lieutenant Graham White, B Company, 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, interview by Lieutenant Colonel Robert W. Jones, Jr., 23 October 2003, Fort Benning, GA, tape recording, USASOC History Office Classified Files, Fort Bragg, NC. One round struck Alans left foot, and then penetrated the trucks oil filter. There were two prisoners being held there at Serpent so Chief and Tony decided to go have a close-up gander at their adversary. U.S. Army photo. W hen militants in Iraq made their . Platoon sergeant SFC James Lauder (pseudonym) led a squad to the south side of the road to clear buildings. With 1st Squad leader SSG Jesse Ragan in the lead, three vehicles and twenty-seven Rangers maneuvered down the steep embankment into Objective Cobalt. John Gale (pseudonym) said, I was facing forward when I felt this blow to my lower left back. The dams capture also prevented any further use of the facility as a river crossing by foreign terrorists, while ensuring its availability to coalition forces. They secured the antiaircraft artillery academy to the south, and cleared out the cache of munitions. Chief flew an escort mission that night for his own teammate Ranger Tony Ely, who was tasked to fly his MH-6 scout helo to the dam to deliver a surveillance drone and operator to the Rangers so they could get long eyes downrange. The MH-6 also acted as bait to draw enemy fire so the two attack birds could pounce. Based on their Afghanistan experience, the Rangers knew that a guy with a weapon did not actually indicate combatant status; everyone carried weapons, both militia and civilians. What to know. The road blocks came under sporadic mortar and rocket fire, resulting in the AH-6 helicopters flying multiple gun runs to silence the Iraqi mortar and rocket positions. Stopping short because the position was still under attack, the Rangers left their vehicle behind a three-foot concrete wall and traveled the final hundred meters on foot. Energized by the encounter, the Rangers separated the dam workers into cells, photographed each man, and temporarily restrained them. OBJ Lynx, Haditha. During the day, 1LT White had pushed his squads east, out past the dam buildings. The Rangers rapidly reduced the distance between vehicles, and raced toward the objective at sixty kilometers per hour. Unable to access the area from the top of the dam, CPT Taylor directed his men to reverse course and head back through 1st Platoons blocking position. On April 5, no artillery was fired at the Rangers, and they began expand their perimeter from their original blocking positions. All Rights Reserved. B Squadron came and relieved us. We loaded him and the Air Force man into one of the DAPs and it flew them off. The Battle of Haditha Dam: Mowing Iraqis down like bowling pins. SPC Watson fired several hundred .50 caliber rounds into the vehicle, stopping it cold. Battle Of Haditha - Official Trailer of DVD 10,341 views Mar 15, 2015 13 Dislike Share Save 1915oz 11.8K subscribers Battle for Haditha - US Marines Iraq War movie DVD available from. A Battle for Haditha Dam Episode aired Jan 24, 2016 YOUR RATING Rate Drama Iraq 2003: A group of U.S. Army Rangers fights to take control of Haditha Dam when they realize they are outnumbered. Twenty-nine tanks and three trucks also fell to the Ranger-directed airstrikes, along with 300 to 400 enemy killed by the time that they were relieved. Endurance: B Company Under Fire An Iraqi man exited the vehicle and pointed to his seemingly pregnant wife still in the car, shouting to the American commandos for water and medical assistance. Destruction of the dam would have significantly affected the functioning of the country's electrical grid and could cause major flooding downstream from the dam. The locals had finally had enough and began coming forward to the Marines with information about the location of key members of AQI. Having made enemy contact, the Rangers were on alert and ready for further conflict. Combat stress trauma is hardly a new phenomenon. Russ was a very energetic man of immense courage and always sporting a positive attitude. The rest of 3rd/C continued to take heavy Iraqi fire from a pair of buildings, which would continue to be a problem for the next three days. The three Iraqis were similarly dealt with. Battle of Haditha Dam: Former Delta operator and Ranger Sergeant Major saves the day by George E. Hand IV Mar 13, 2020 Share This: You can read the previous part here. Despite their gains, tragedy would continue to befall the battalion, including the loss of their operations officer, who was key to the Three Bs plan in a helicopter accident. As one of them said later, I remember just starting to fold up, and fall in on myself. Cowed by beheadings, rapes, murder and general intimidation, the locals of the area remained rarely emerged from hiding. Two hours later, the building was clear. Before the invasion, US planners feared that Saddam might intentionally destroy the dam and flood the area in order to protect Baghdad's northwestern flank from Coalition forces. CSM Alfred Birch and SFC Duncan decided that they could not leave the wounded men to die. Strikes within 200 meters of a friendly position are considered danger close. Ten Iraqi mortar tubes, along with dozens of machine guns and RPG launchers, opened up on the Rangers, sending them running for cover. The Rangers anticipated that the dam would be very well defended, with at least a platoon on Objective Lynx, and a mechanized company to the south, near Hadithah village. CPT Doyle outlined the plan: 2nd Platoon would lead the main effort, seizing a foothold on the dam and clearing the inside of the dam complex; 1st Platoon would be the supporting effort, seizing the dominating high ground to the west of the dam; and between the B Company platoons, 3rd Platoon, C Company, would clear Objective Cobalt, an area south of the dam structure comprising power station buildings and a transformer yard. The Battle of Haditha Dam took place in 2003. The numbers in that fight were calculated out to be 1:22. The 2nd Squad Rangers repositioned their vehicles on the north side of the road and responded to the enemy fire with MK19 grenade launchers and heavy weapons of their own. This corridor proved critical to al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) throughout the war. Best of all, reinforcements, initially in the form of a pair of M1A1 Abrams tanks, finally began to arrive. s01e03 - A Battle for Haditha Dam Transcript detail There is no going back to the person that I was before Haditha Dam. The Premier Online Military History Magazine. Critics Consensus. Once everybody was refueled and positioned, the convoy of seventeen vehicles and 140 Rangers penetrated the moonless night. Enraged by this loss, his young Marine buddies carry out a brutal retaliation. On 2 April, Delta was engaged by half a dozen armed technicals from the same . Battalion leadership, seeing how members of AQI would slip into the Triad from the desert, then disperse to nearby safe areas, devised a plan that was quickly dubbed Three Bs it stood for berm, BAT and badge. However, it took the Rangers many hours to clear the dam complex due to its huge size and the hundreds of rooms it contained. I thought about the Ranger creed and all the other guys on the dam, and slowly started getting back in the fight. Chief Greg Coker coordinated a Blackhawk helicopter to retrieve the bodies of the three deceased Rangers. Jesse Ragan, 3rd/C moved down a steep access road into the objective area. When it was over, Duncan and battalion command sergeant major Alfred Birch rescued three of the wounded Iraqis who had fallen down a steep hill while under fire. Its hardly surprising that the 75th Rangers were awarded the Valorous Unit Award, along with five Purple Hearts, four Silver and 26 Bronze Stars, and 71 Army Commendation Medals for the Haditha Dam action. An investigation of the massacre of 24 men, women and children in Haditha, Iraq allegedly shot by 4 U.S. Marines in retaliation for the death of a U.S. Marine killed by a roadside bomb. Doctors returned to hospitals. Smith aimed and registered the first enemy kill of the operation. Back at the FARP Chief refueled and reloaded immediately, ready to spring from Serpent to re-engage with any froggy Arabs. A hidden battery of Iraqi 155 mm howitzers also pounded the beleaguered Rangers for hours, prompting brief memories of the artillery barrages of World War I. . In fact, the Thirds time in Haditha would prove to be the single deadliest deployment for a Marine battalion since that of the October, 1983 Beirut barracks bombing that killed 220. Sign up for notifications from Insider! Captain Brad Thompson, C Company, 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, interview by Dr. Charles H. Briscoe, 23 October 2003, Fort Benning, GA, tape recording, USASOC History Office Classified Files, Fort Bragg, NC. During their deployment, 3/3 maintained a strong outside the wire presence throughout the Haditha Triad, making great strides in the counterinsurgency campaign in the areabut at a cost; the battalion lost 15 of their members. On 1 April, C squadron, Delta Force and 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment conducted a night-time ground assault into the target on foot and in armored vehicles against the Haditha Dam complex. The invasion of Iraq in March 2003 was marked by a. The Battle of Haditha Dam: The beer is on us! At least, that was the plan.1. The Delta team's reconnaissance of the dam indicated that a larger force would be needed to seize and hold it, so a request was made and approved for a second Delta squadron from Fort Bragg to be dispatched with a further Ranger battalion, along with M1A1 Abrams main battle tanks from C Company, 2nd Battalion 70th Armored Regiment. Early on the night of April 1, the Rangers and Delta Force operators stormed the dam. Finally, the Rangers demonstrated the value that a flexible, cohesive, and highly trained assault force can bring to the modern battlefield. It would begin on Sept. 24, 2006the day that 3/3 officially handed control of the area of operation over to its sister battalion, the Second Battalion of the Third Marine Regiment (2/3, pronounced two-three). The medics removed Feldbuschs blood-covered helmet and suctioned his airway, hoping to avoid a tracheotomy. A Battle For Haditha Dam Buy TV-14 CC The Warfighters 164M subscribers Subscribe 37 The Warfighters S1 E3 Iraq 2003: A group of U.S. Army Rangers fights to seize control of Haditha Dam a. He got hit and we circled wagons and handed the Iraqis their asses with support from the air. According to the Coalition Provisional Authority, the inauguration of this turbine on 3 June 2004 signified the first time since 1990 that the power station operated at full capacity. 2007, Drama/War, 1h 33m. This is the concluding Part 3 of Hold Until Relieved: The Haditha Dam Seizure. Since the 2003 invasion, various U.S. Marine units had been stationed at the dam, as well as a small detachment of soldiers from Azerbaijan. Chief came to be friends with the Fire Support Officer (FSO) of Company A, Captain Russ Rippetoe, in the time they spent working together to bring effective fire support to the Rangers. One of the most important, and enduring, victories of 3/3's time in the Haditha Triad was tracking down a former Iraqi army colonel from the region named Farouk and returning him to his home city of Haditha. The days seemed to pass very quickly. 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Our medic worked on George but there was just nothing he could do. 3rd Platoon spent the morning consolidating enemy prisoners and improving its own fighting positions.15, In the afternoon, CPT Doyle issued an order to CPT Thompson to clear the eastern half of the dam complex. Constantly on coalition planners' minds were the "scorched earth" tactics employed by Saddam Hussein during Operation Desert Storm in 1991. Early in that war, his forces had flooded the Persian Gulf with crude oil to destroy fishing grounds and . A combination of mortar and 152 millimeter artillery shells rained down on the concrete surface near the Ranger positions. Yet in the current fighting in Iraq, the major dams on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers are seen not just as strategic targets but as powerful weapons of war. 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According to the Marines of 3/3 and 2/3 who followed the news of the area for years after these deployments, ISIS never took the Haditha Triad area. By April 6, 2003, reinforcements, including a brace of Abrams main battle tanks, began to arrive. When the hawk landed at the FARP, Objective Serpent, Chief and another Ranger unloaded the bodies of the three men and then wept for the loss. Yet one of the greatest Americanand Iraqivictories in the long conflict occurred in the little-reported Haditha Triad region of western Iraqs Al Anbar Province. He was a good man, a damned-good man and well all miss him forever. The HIMARS rocket system saw its first combat deployment at the dam, firing counter-battery missions. Anticipating two buildings, Lauder and his men soon discovered twelve more buildings not depicted on maps. Two nights later we headed east toward Tikrit traveling longer than we should have into dawn, passing a Bedouine camp in the process. The bullet-riddled and oil-leaking vehicle finally died just short of 1st Platoons position. Haditha Dam was codenamed "Objective Lynx," while an old airfield nearby was codenamed "Objective Serpent.". By April 6, despite an occasional 155 mm artillery round lobbed into their positions, the Rangers had expanded their perimeter several thousand yards downstream. In order for U.S. forces to use Objective Serpent for fixed-wing transport. The plan called for quick action, and Doyle projected the operation to last less than twenty-four hours.2, Believing they only had two hours to prepare, platoon leaders and squad leaders further defined their units missions and disseminated the plan for coordination. Iraq's Republican Guard was an elite force that reported directly to Saddam, while the Fedayeen was a paramilitary force outside the regular military. The dam after the battle. Unbeknownst to the Marines, AQI had filled the girls bag with hand grenades and had instructed her to press a detonator button when she passed close to the Marines. The arrival of a tank element on 6 April, and help from local clerics, ensured Ranger control of the dam and surrounding area. The Battle of Haditha Dam took place in 2003. The turning point came after a series of atrocities committed by AQI insurgents fighters used local children as unwitting suicide bombers. The Rangers followed the same procedure as in the western building, breaking and blowing down doors, and collecting all items of potential intelligence value. The terrain grew more treacherous as they neared the dam, with barren desert giving way to scrub-covered hills and dry wadis (gravel streambeds). Battle for Haditha. Praesidus brings homage to the military watch tradition. Instead of sustained firefights, locals, including children, could walk the streets in brightly colored clothes. The next battalion to occupy the region, the First Battalion of the Third Marine Regiment, didnt suffer a single loss of life. A Battle for Haditha Dam: With David Hartzell, Jonathan Wong. The movie follows the story of the Marines of Kilo Company, an Iraqi family, and the insurgents who plant the roadside bomb. As American and coalition forces focused on Baghdad and the nearby cities of Fallujah and Ramadi, AQI would retreat to the relative safety of the Triad to rest, train, regroup and plan new attacks. They kept up the fight, however, on all fronts. The Rangers located the guards, rendered first aid, and carried them up to the top of the dam, all while still under attack from the south. An investigation of the massacre of 24 men, women and children in Haditha, Iraq allegedly shot by 4 U.S. Marines in retaliation for the death of a U.S. Marine killed by a roadside bomb. By late on the evening of April 2, a number of Doyles Rangers were showing signs of the disorder, as shells fell steadily around their positions. We had already hit Objective Serpent and were up at Lynx calling for fire at Haditha dam until Greg Ironhead Birch showed up with a whole battalion of Rangers he really knows how to show up to a fight proper. Stay up to date with what you want to know. Mar 23. Barrett products are used by civilians, sport shooters, law enforcement agencies, the United States military, and more than 75 State Department-approved countries around the world. We really gauged the passing of time by the consumption of our ammunition.. His efforts would prove crucial in the following months, when al Qaeda would launch an all-out, last-ditch effort to keep control of the Haditha Triad. The raid prevented a potential humanitarian and environmental disaster along the Euphrates River, and mitigated the risk to coalition forces rapidly advancing toward Baghdad. The Rangers quickly repelled the initial assault, but, as the morning passed, indirect fire increased. The Iraqis, however, kept trying to get back to the dam. See more stories on Insider's business page. We sent a hundred guys, and they had like a battalion, so we were outnumbered. Learn how and when to remove this template message, "The Haditha Dam Seizure - The Target - Defense Media Network", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Battle_of_Haditha_Dam&oldid=1107643320, Articles needing additional references from August 2017, All articles needing additional references, Pages using military navigation subgroups without wide style, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 31 August 2022, at 02:47. The Many Faces of Napoleon Bonaparte -- What did the French Emperor Actually Look Like? The convoy lost its aerial escort when a ground vehicles broken gearbox delayed progress to the point where the Little Birds had to divert for fuel.3. George jumped on a machine gun mounted on the back of one of the Gauers and traded automatic fire with the truck. The same thing happened to 5th Green Berets and some British Special Boat Service pipe hitters on the first night of the war; both were hit and both retreated. In true Ranger fashion, the section methodically cleared the building by kicking down doors, blowing off locks, and placing items with potential intelligence value into the hallways. Knowing that the Night Stalkers had stayed long beyond the protection of darkness, he released them with gratitude. 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Weather, including sandstorms, began reducing visibility and interfering with the Night Stalkers' flying, but on the third day, an MH-47 Chinook helicopter braved enemy fire and resupplied the Rangers, who were approaching 72 hours under fire on what was planned as a 24-hour operation. You want to know business page man and well all miss him.! Its first combat deployment at the Dam buildings fold up, and the insurgents who plant the roadside.... Early in that war, his young Marine buddies carry out a brutal retaliation, was. The HIMARS rocket system saw its first combat deployment at the Rangers were on alert and for. Darkness, he released them with gratitude children as unwitting suicide bombers than we should have dawn... Until Relieved: the beer is on us two attack birds could pounce convoy of seventeen and. To al Qaeda in Iraq ( AQI ) throughout the war two nights later we headed toward... Short of 1st Platoons position Air Force man into one of the DAPs and it flew off. 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