The Road to Safwan: The 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry in the 1991 ...

The Basra Highway 165
encountered during the entire war. Although the terrain was
normally gently rolling with small hills, heavy mining equipment
had dug huge craters throughout a twenty-square-kilometer
area. In the 1st Brigade zone, this man-made obstacle had
only two trails that would allow the brigade to traverse the area
from east to west. On the far east side of this obstacle waited
more small units of Iraqi armor and dismounted infantry. As in
the past few days, however, the Iraqis demonstrated how
poorly trained they were in defensive operations. They did not
use mines to limit American movement; they did not mass their
tank or artillery fire on the few routes through the sector to destroy
American vehicles caught on the narrow trails; and they
did not use the terrain to mask their vehicles’ silhouettes to protect
them from the long-range fires of American tanks. Instead,
Iraqi armor often moved to the top of a ridge, firing with little
effect and making themselves an easy target for the proficient
American gunners. Iraqi leaders lost another opportunity to
make the coalition pay for their military gains. However, they
still managed to slow down the 1st Infantry Division’s advance
in what 1st Brigade soldiers called the “Valley of the Boogers.” 16
Meanwhile on the division’s northern flank, Wilson’s troopers
continued moving eastward with little opposition. In coordination
with the 2nd Brigade, Burdan had developed a series
of checkpoints for the squadron to use as a path toward Objective
Denver. 17 Somehow, these imaginary milestones, which he
placed well north of the 2nd Brigade’s zone of attack, avoided
most Iraqi defenders and the rough terrain that faced the rest of
the division. Ignorant of the developing situation in the rest of
the division, the squadron was now on the way to the Basra
Highway.
An aeroscout weapons team from D Troop, led by Chief
Warrant Officer 2 Thomas Perkins, reconnoitered the area forward
of the moving ground troops to provide early warning as
they moved across Kuwait. This team located and destroyed
several isolated armored vehicles, but found no serious resistance
in the cavalry’s path. The ground cavalry units passed several
heavily fortified, but unoccupied, defensive positions with
reinforced concrete berms, trenches, and bunkers. With the exception
of individual tanks or small groups of Iraqi armor gen-