40th Anniversary Operation EAGLE CLAW 🇺🇸

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Originally Posted by chuckman

Great book.

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WOW,I left DMAFB in June of 79 ! 355 Civil Engineering Squadron. I'll look for the book myself.

From the Army's official history of the Grenada action, which is (somewhat surprisingly) only 40 pages:


"Perhaps the most serious military lapse in the early planning efforts centered on intelligence: the failure to identify more than one campus at the medical school and to discover that a large number of Americans lived off campus. Again, excessive compartmentalization for security reasons and compressed planning appear to have severely hampered not only the flow of information within intelligence circles, but also the collection of additional, readily available information from open sources.

Next to the intelligence failure, Atlantic Command’s inability to coordinate planning by all the disparate ground force elements involved in the operation was the most striking flaw. The compressed planning time was only part of the explanation. The failure to design an adequate concept of a joint operation at an early stage indicated that the joint headquarters in question, Atlantic Command, was neither trained nor manned to mount a complicated ground force operation in the time allotted, whatever the size. Atlantic Command was geared to transport massive reinforcements and supplies safely to Europe in the event of a Soviet attack, but in October 1983 it was unprepared for the complexities of its joint task force responsibilities."

"Excessive compartmentalization" was a theme which was also common to the Holloway Report on the failure of Eagle Claw. OPSEC is critical, so I would think that any decision would tend to lean on the "more security" side. Maybe there's a happy medium somewhere?

https://history.army.mil/html/books/...rgent_fury.pdf

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Originally Posted by Slater

From the Army's official history of the Grenada action, which is (somewhat surprisingly) only 40 pages:


"Perhaps the most serious military lapse in the early planning efforts centered on intelligence: the failure to identify more than one campus at the medical school and to discover that a large number of Americans lived off campus. Again, excessive compartmentalization for security reasons and compressed planning appear to have severely hampered not only the flow of information within intelligence circles, but also the collection of additional, readily available information from open sources.

Next to the intelligence failure, Atlantic Command’s inability to coordinate planning by all the disparate ground force elements involved in the operation was the most striking flaw. The compressed planning time was only part of the explanation. The failure to design an adequate concept of a joint operation at an early stage indicated that the joint headquarters in question, Atlantic Command, was neither trained nor manned to mount a complicated ground force operation in the time allotted, whatever the size. Atlantic Command was geared to transport massive reinforcements and supplies safely to Europe in the event of a Soviet attack, but in October 1983 it was unprepared for the complexities of its joint task force responsibilities."

"Excessive compartmentalization" was a theme which was also common to the Holloway Report on the failure of Eagle Claw. OPSEC is critical, so I would think that any decision would tend to lean on the "more security" side. Maybe there's a happy medium somewhere?

https://history.army.mil/html/books/...rgent_fury.pdf

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It was a great mission concept for the Marines, but everyone wanted their piece of the pie and at the time we did not have the rapid-deployment joint capability packages we have since developed. That it went off as well as it did is nothing less than a miracle.

For many units, it seemed to be a last minute, jump-through-your-ass affair upon notification.

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Originally Posted by Slater

For many units, it seemed to be a last minute, jump-through-your-ass affair upon notification.

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That's because it was no?

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Originally Posted by WillBrink

That's because it was no?

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True that.

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Originally Posted by Slater

For many units, it seemed to be a last minute, jump-through-your-ass affair upon notification.

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The 22 MAU had worked up for Beirut and was given the mission last-minute as an add-on. They went to Beirut in early November, straight from the Caribbean. But the MAGTF concept worked extremely well.

Edited to add, I went to a lecture in college (87? Maybe 88) given by one of the S3s who had planned the Marines' ops for Grenada.

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Originally Posted by chuckman

The 22 MAU had worked up for Beirut and was given the mission last-minute as an add-on. They went to Beirut in early November, straight from the Caribbean. But the MAGTF concept worked extremely well.

Edited to add, I went to a lecture in college (87? Maybe 88) given by one of the S3s who had planned the Marines' ops for Grenada.

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The tragedy in Beirut took place only two days prior to Urgent Fury, so Lebanon was where all eyes were focused. I had a guy in my platoon in Panama who had been in the 82nd when that all happened. They got the warning order to go and everyone thought it was to Beirut. When they got to lockdown and got the briefing as to where they were really going it was like "Where the fvck is Grenada?"

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Originally Posted by ABNAK

The tragedy in Beirut took place only two days prior to Urgent Fury, so Lebanon was where all eyes were focused. I had a guy in my platoon in Panama who had been in the 82nd when that all happened. They got the warning order to go and everyone thought it was to Beirut. When they got to lockdown and got the briefing as to where they were really going it was like "Where the fvck is Grenada?"

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That's right. The Marines were out for blood. They were ready to nuke (metaphorically speaking) Grenada and get on to Lebanon.

My dad had been retired from the Marines just a few years in 83, so we knew some Marines who did not come back from Beirut.

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Originally Posted by Slater

For many units, it seemed to be a last minute, jump-through-your-ass affair upon notification.

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This is an understatement. We were called up at the last minute at Fort Campbell, and a lot of the pilots were off duty and off base. Those of us available were told where we were flying to Pope AAF but no other details. They handed out .38 Smith & Wesson revolvers, but they didn't have enough to go around. I volunteered my S&W Model 66 from home and was approved by the Colonel. We gassed up and flew to the Ashville, NC airport and topped off the tank, then on to Fort Bragg where the fuel off load and breakdown of the aircraft started happening prior to loading on the transport planes. Normally two pilots in the choppers but since all hadn't been located, some of the choppers flew there with just one.

The pilots back at Fort Campbell were found, and cars were rented for them to make the drive to Fort Bragg. We got to spend time in a hanger and listen to Pentagon Intel folks describe the mission, and they reported that the news media found out the Independence Carrier group was en-route to the Caribbean so any OPSEC was lost.

One memorable thing that still sticks with me was a Black Air-Force load master interacted with me and said the heat in the plane I was going to Barbados in was broken- no heat in the back. He asked me if I had a warm jacket. I told him I only had my flight suit. He disappeared for a few minutes then returned with an Air Force heavy duty cold weather lined jacket. He was going to write my name in the collar but my name was too long so he only put LT and C for my last name. I still have that jacket.