Boomer: As I reflect back on it perhaps I sensed that, knowing Marines and our aggressive style, that they might have felt that this was something that we would do to further our own particular agenda, as a Marine Corps. And I just wanted to assure General Schwarzkopf that we were not going to do this. That I was not going to do this, I would be no part of it.

Look we're talking about young Marines, and them being hurt or not being hurt, and my responsibility to them as their commander. The rest of this, was just crap that you cannot be influenced by. The only thing that you can be influenced by is your own men and women, and how you're going to accomplish your mission. The rest of it, is garbage.

Q: In the end you chose basically a frontal attack, why?

Boomer: I chose a frontal attack because there wasn't any other way to do it. And if you walked the terrain as we had walked it, prior to us, going into Kuwait, you understood that there really wasn't another way. Now, early on, I had suggested to General Schwarzkopf there is the possibility, that we could attack, up north and perhaps try to get to Basra, and that would really divert the Iraqis attention for a whole host of reasons.

Q: Amphibuously or, ...

Boomer: Amphibuously. And we explored that option, I mean we explored, dozens of options, and the Gulf is not a a particularly good place to conduct an amphibious assault, I mean that's simply a fact. The water is very shallowin many places, particularly as you get up towards the northern end. But I felt that that was a real option that I would have liked to have have explored a little more, I couldn't interest General Schwarzkopf in that option, for reasons that I'm not sure about, he did express some concern about Iran, and the fact that we would be bumping up very close to the Iranian border if we were doing this. Technically it would have been hard to pull off, but I felt that we could have done it. Particularly with our new air cushion vehicles which enable you to get over that shallow kinds of stuff. But I think in the end, he perhaps felt that it was a little too risky. So once you began to eliminate those options, either because people didn't want them explored any further, or because, you explored them and and determined that they weren't viable. You really came down toa frontal attack. But the most important thing is that it needs to be executed well. And you need to move fast, and you need to incorporate a lot of deception into your attack. All of which we did.

Q: Can you recall what happened on the Blue Ridge, that meeting, can you just tell that story?

Boomer: We had a meeting on the Blue Ridge that was very important because it was called to address this issue of the amphibious assault. Now remember I said earlier, that I had told General Schwarzkopf that I would never recommend an amphibious assault simply for the sake of doing one. But for a long period of time, I believed that we really needed one, because we knew there were two maybe three Iraqi divisions on the coast. We felt that logistically, we would need a port in order to get material into us, especially if the fight drug out. So, we had been planning, all along to conduct an amphibious assault in conjunction with an attack up through the center of Kuwait. Always concerned about it, worried about it, and as it turned out General Powell was worried about it too. And he mentioned and I believed that this was at the second meeting that we held with General Powell and Secretary Cheney, but at that meeting General Powell said something about casualties and the amphibious assault, and, we needed to be careful and take a look at it, and he really wasn't sure that it was the right thing to do. And I appreciated those concerns, we had the same concerns. I think it it triggered er General Schwarzkopf to take a little closer look at it.

Q: And so he turns up...

Boomer: So he called a meeting on the Blue Ridge and of course the Navy was the key piece here. The Marines aboard the Navy ships worked for Admiral Stan Arthur, a great great commander, they didn't belong to me, but of course once they got ashore, they would have linked up with my forces ashore, and they would have become part of my command. But the amphibious assault would have been an integral part of my plan had we conducted it. So we met aboard the Blue Ridge, and the Navy began to brief General Schwarzkopf and me...... and during that briefing it became evident to us, that it was going to take them weeks to clear the mine fields. Weeks. I was beginning to sense that General Schwarzkopf was under some pressure to get this attack launched, and we were reaching a point in terms of training, and, in terms of morale, in terms of keeping for this attack where, I didn't want it to go on forever, either.

So, number one, it's going to take us weeks to clear these mines, I couldn't believe it. Number two, there's going to be a lot of collateral damage. Where they thought that they would attack, and where we had, agreed upon would be good for both of us, was in an area in which we would have had to have destroyed, you know, maybe a half mile of beach front and apartments and houses, and we had been very careful about collateral damage to Kuwait City, throughout. And then finally the question of casualties. And, I don't put that last. That was certainly the most important issue from a Marine perspective, we could have gotten across the beach, where from relatively light casualties, but, we would have had casualties.

So, after hearing that, and what now seems, to me to be a dramatic moment, General Schwarzkopf turned around and looked at me and he said,' Walt can you, accomplish your mission, without the amphibious assault?' And I thought gulp. Decision time folks. And I said yes we can, but you have got to continue, with a deception that will cause the Iraqis to believe that we're going to conduct an amphibious assault, because, I'm at the point now, where I believe I can accomplish my mission, without it, but I do not need these two or three divisions turning and attacking me from the flank, so they've got to be held down.

So that was the decision, and that was how it was made, to not conduct that assault. There have been a lot of myths that have developed about this, I mean in in one book, I was even accused of throwing a fit because we weren't going to be allowed to conduct this assault, and I've already said that that was never my aim in the beginning. It took place just as I described it.

Q: This was a big decision?

Boomer: It was a big decision. A big decision. And, you know we wrestled with it for a couple of days, or I did, and and wondered if it was the right decision, but I didn't dwell on it, because I was trusting my own instincts in this regard, and I felt they were pretty good.

Q: The attack on Khafji. Do you recall the moment when you heard that the Iraqis had launched an attack?

Boomer: It's usually not as dramatic, as 'the Iraqi's are attacking.' But it soon became evident that they were. And we were not overly concerned, about this attack. The build up had occurred to the point where we were confident that, should they come down into Saudi Arabia, contrary to our earlier fears about them coming down, we were almost at that point, saying, let them come. I mean we will destroy them. So there was no huge concern about this, not panic.

But interestingly enough for the Marines, there was another piece of the Khafji attack which was much more important than the attack on Khafji itself, because the Iraqis attempted to come down, farther to the west, towards where we were were building our logistics base, and I had taken a considerable risk and had begun to build this logistics base, in a very vulnerable place, without a lot of infantry protection. It was a risk that I felt, was acceptable, and that was my greatest concern. This attack to the west, not the attack of Khafji coming down ....

Q: What were you thinking. What were you saying?

Boomer: Well, I was thinking, ou let it hang out here, Walt, and now perhaps your worst fear is is being realised. That being said we were going to be able to respond to that, I mean it wasn't a stupid risk, but nevertheless I didn't want anybody hurt as a result of my having put them out there, sort of at the end of the string, without a lot of protection. We had done that incidentally because we we needed to accomplish that build up in a hurry, and there just wasn't any other way to do it, but the distance was such that, I didn't think I had any other choice. But a very very important, little battle took place out there. And it never has received, very much coverage, because the war was focused on Khafji which I didn't care very much about. From a tactical perspective.

We had put out a reconnaissance screen ahead of this logistics base, right up along the border, and we had them in what we call light armored vehicles, these vehicles are designedto provide you intelligence, they have some weapons mounted on them, butthey're not designed to fight tanks. Never were, never will be and in our training we had always said, you have a reconnaissance mission, don't don't take on tanks, or we miss something, and that is the fact, that we've got Marines in these light armored vehicles, and they took them on. With missiles, and with their guns, and with aviation. And they turned this attack back and in essence routed the Iraqis. Ran them off the battlefield.

Q: What did the battle at Khafji tell you about the Iraqis?

Boomer: As I began to piece it together after, it told me three things-- One, you need to be able to move, shoot, communicate at the same time, if you're going to conduct a successful attack, I learned that they could move, but that they couldn't co-ordinate it very well. It it became evident to us, after, the battle that it had not been extremely well co-ordinated, and that there had been a lot of confusion on their part. So I learned that about them. Second I learned that they are the gang that can't shoot straight. They couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. If you held it still for them. That was good news. And that was because they didn't train. Probably still don't. And third, which was perhaps the most important thing, we learned, was, that, in a fight with the Iraqis, if you bloody their nose, during round one, they do not want to come out for round two. So in that regard Khafji was very very important to us. It demonstrated some things that we were beginning to feel, but we had not been able to, quantify, solidify in our own minds and it was really at Khafji for the first time, I began to feel more and more confident. About accomplishing my mission, without getting a lot of Marines killed.

Q: What was the decisive factor in repulsing this attack?

Boomer: The attack was repulsed primarily by some very brave, helicopter pilots, who took on the Iraqi tanks and armored vehicles, to the north of Khafji. Destroyed them. It was repulsed by some good artillery shooting, on the part of the U.S. Marines. And that enabled the Saudis to accomplish something that was really important psychologically to them and that is to obtain a victory. So let's call it sort of a joint effort, that paid off for the Saudis, and we were delighted to see that. But, of course on the line that victory was our support and we knew exactly what we were doing. John Admire had absolute control of that. He was managing it well, quite frankly I didn't focus on it too much, except to talk to John, and get an update.

Q: And can I ask you a straight question? There the Saudis on your right flank--How concerned were you at that time that they were a weak link in the chain? Were they?

Boomer: I developed a real good relationship with the Saudis, and have great respect for them. But for reasons that I have a difficult time understanding, they don't like to train as hard at this business of warfare as you need to do in order to be successful. We train 24 hours a day, seven days a week, from the time we hit the Saudi soil, until the time we attacked, almost. That's just what we do, because we recognise this is a complex business and you can't do it without training. They don't have the same vitality about the profession of arms as we do. We recognise this as a weakness, and worked around it, with them. As individuals, they're very courageous, yeah. But you've got to as a fighting force, you have to make accommodations for this, lack of of training and understanding of warfare, at any level above the company.

Q: The reconnaissance team said the most terrifying thing they experienced was the Saudi counter attack....

Boomer: Coordination with the Saudis was always difficult, but I think we should have expected it to be difficult. There's a language barrier, there's a knowledge gap there in terms of how you go about this business of fighting, tremendous cultural differences. So it was something that we were always concerned about-- how do you coordinate? How do you ensure that we don't shoot each other, and when you look back on it, we were pretty darn successful because I do not recall, an intermural fire fight friendly against friendly, with the Saudis. Even though I know at times, some of our guys were absolutely terrified, that this could break out. And there might have been one or two incidences of it, but it was relatively minor.

Q: As the commander of the Marines there, was the air war doing what you wanted it to do?

Boomer: The air war was truly well executed by General Chuck Horner, but there were times when I felt that there was an emphasis on Baghdad, rather than an emphasis on the Iraqi troops, that were in front of me, and that I was going to have to fight my way through in order to get to Kuwait City. So there was this constant dialogue about how should our air assets be utilised.

Q: What do you mean by 'constant dialogue?'

Boomer: Majors fighting majors and lieutenant colonels fighting lieutenant colonels, on where these planes were going to go and where they were going to drop their bombs. And that's what you would expect. When it got to my level and to Chuck's we were able to work it out and talk about it, because I told you earlier that, one of the first things, General Horner said to me, was we just want to win this war. Not worry about whose airplanes, are doing what or, I don't want your airplanes. So we worked our way through this, Now, you know that the Air Force believes that they know everything that there is to know about planes, and bombs. Well they don't quite frankly, and what they don't know about is the effect of their bombs on the ground. We know about that because we're down there, sometimes in and amongst those bombs. But it's very hard to get them to listen to you. But for the most part, they did.

But I think what occurred was just what you would expect to occur. I'm focused on this piece in front of me, that's where I want every asset focused, if I could have gotten every single Air Force plane and of course they all couldn't have gotten into that space, and focused them on, the enemy in front of me, I would have said great, Chuck I love this, bring me more. So he should have believed that I was going to be on his case about more airplanes, and I was. That being said, there were times when I didn't feel we got enough, that they were sent places where they accomplished less than they would have accomplished if they had been out in front of me.

Q: Could the Air Force on its own have ejected the Iraqis from Kuwait?

Boomer: I don't think the Air Force on its own could have ejected the Iraqis from Kuwait-- what would you have done--would you have levelled all of Kuwait City in order to cause the Iraqis to leave? I don't think so. And they had dropped a lot of bombs, as well as Air Force planes on that ground in front of me. And we attacked, they were still there. We ran them out. When they finally saw that they were going to be attacked on the ground, they did one of two things, give up, fight, or run like hell, to try to get back to Iraq.