From TransFormaTion To CombaT The First stryker brigade at War

Tall Afar, Iraq
The Stryker Brigade’s area of operations remained active while TF
arrow pursued its mission along the stretch of Highway 1 connecting
scanIa and anaconda. Between 11 April and 1 June, it conducted cordon
and knock operations in Mosul that resulted in the arrests of hundreds of
suspected insurgents and the capture of tons of weapons and ammunition.
In response, the enemy launched a series of indirect-fire attacks during
April that targeted American bases ringing the city and in May began
to detonate improvised mines and roadside bombs in growing numbers
against U.S. convoys. A total of eleven Strykers took hits from these
devices, but damage was light. The vehicles generally suffered a flat
tire or two, and at most a few crew members received minor wounds.
The remainder of the brigade suffered some two dozen additional battle
losses from a variety of causes.
The evolving tactics of the insurgents in Mosul elicited the Stryker
Brigade’s adoption of new countermeasures. For example, the employment
of increasingly sophisticated improvised explosives by the enemy
prompted Lt. Col. Dennis M. Thompson’s 296th Brigade Support Battalion
to resort to new tactics and to adopt new equipment to carry out
its mission. The unit acquired armor kits for critical vehicles and fabricated
steel plates for others. It also experimented with varying mixes
of weapons to determine the best defensive armament for a convoy;
provided headsets to its gunners to allow them to hear commands from
inside their vehicles; and supplied at-risk personnel with riot-style face
shields for extra protection from flying metal fragments. In addition to
beefing up its own vehicles, the 296th furnished the same service to other
units within the brigade.
TF arrow left anaconda for its new home at FOB Fulda near Tall
Afar airfield, soon renamed FOB sykes, on 17 June. Once there, arrow
returned the companies from the 2d Battalion, 3d Infantry, and the
1st Battalion, 23d Infantry, to their commands while receiving its own
Companies A and C in return. Its new mission centered on the city of
Tall Afar, a way station between Syria and Mosul for weapons smugglers
and a hub of insurgent activity. Since January 2004 the sole coalition
presence within the city, Captain Beaty’s Company C, 5th Battalion,
20th Infantry, had been subjected to almost daily attacks that resulted in
one U.S. soldier killed and twenty-nine wounded. Shortly before the 5th
Battalion, 20th Infantry’s return, Colonel Rounds decided that Beaty’s
unit would relocate to a new base on the outskirts of the city and reduce
the number of its patrols until additional forces were available.
48