ANTHOLOGY AND ANNOTATED B~HOGRAPHY                                           93


Molly Moore, a reporter for The Washington Post, travelled with Lieutenant
General Boomer's command group during the ground campaign.            In the first
article, she recounts the Marines' preparations for their offensive, particularly
the intelligence gathering effort.  The second article describes Task Force Troy,
part of a comprehensive deception plan that also included the amphibious forces
off the coast of Kuwait.   The third article shows what it was like to be a part
of the I MEF headquarters from the start of the ground war to its end one
hundred hours later.

Porous Minefields, Dispirited Troops
and a Dog named Pow

by Molly Moore

The Washington Post, 17 March 1991


   Beginning the day after christmas, small U.S. reconnaissance teams sitting
in observation towers along the Kuwait border watched as hapless camels and
dogs were blown to pieces making their way through Iraqi minefields.        The
observers soon realized that the Iraqis never returned to the fields to replace the
exploded mines.
   The Marine recon teams also learned that the Iraqis had carefully marked
paths through the killing fields with coils of concertina wire.  "Once we found
that, the only thing missing was the neon sign saying, `Start here,"' said a U.S.
military officer.
   The porous minefields were just one example of an Iraqi military threat that
never lived up to its advance billing.    When the ground war finally came the
Iraqis proved to be a smaller force--and a far weaker one--than U.S. com-
manders had initially expected.
   The recon teams in the towers also began luring more and more Iraqi
front-line troops across the border to surrender and learned that the Iraqi will to
fight was far weaker than anyone had anticipated.
   Sometime the Americans slipped notes urging surrender under the collar of
a black-and-white mutt dubbed "Pow" which begged for scraps on both sides of
the border.  One day, Marines tied a nude magazine pinup to Pow's collar and
sent him across the line.  That night, they said, four Iraqi soldiers crossed the
border and turned themselves in to the Americans.


Copyrigbt 1991 The Washinawn Post. Rcprinted with Permission