while with General Keane, who was also observing the drop, we headed back to the Fort Bragg PA office to await an opportunity to join up with 1st Brigade.
While we slept on surprisingly comfortable cots in the PA office that night, the rain came down and turned the exercise area into a quagmire of red clay mud. However, it did not stop Petraeus and his men from getting down to the business of taking their first objectives. Having landed near his planned impact point at the bottom (southern end) of Normandy DZ, he assembled what troopers he could, and moved into the tree line to establish the 1st Brigade TOC. Despite only 60 percent of 1st Brigade’s troopers having jumped before the exercise controllers had closed down the DZ, LGOPs were formed and all of the primary objectives were taken before dawn. By the time the rain stopped and the troopers that had been unable to jump had been delivered to the DZ, it was noon. It was also time for us to finally join up with 1st Brigade, now that Major Wiggins had been able to get a set of GPS coordinates for the TOC.
Driving south through the Normandy DZ, we watched C-130s dropping loads of food, water, fuel, and other vital supplies for the brigade. Almost as soon as the pallets hit the ground, troopers from the forward support battalion were crawling over them, and loading the pallets onto PLS trucks and other vehicles for delivery to cache sites and distribution points. Less than twelve hours after the drop in the fog, the brigade was fully on-line and taking the battle to the brigade from the 10th Mountain Division (the “Red” or OPFOR force). As we found the Brigade TOC in a grove of trees, Colonel Petraeus and Sergeant Major Myers greeted us and offered us a lunch of MREs and coffee. Handing us off to Sergeant Major Myers, Colonel Petraeus headed off to take advantage of an intelligence windfall that had arrived while we were eating. Petraeus is a big believer in patrolling and winning the counterintelligence battle against an opponent, and his efforts had just paid off. One of his patrols had overrun the command post of an OPFOR unit, capturing the entire command element with all of its valuable planning documents. So now Petraeus had the plans for the next twenty-four hours of operations by the Red force, and he was moving to take advantage of the opportunity. While he went to work, the sergeant major took us on a tour of the DZ perimeter, which was growing by leaps and bounds.
The sergeant major took his personal security seriously, because enemy patrols had already made probing attacks against the TOC the previous night. So while we rode in his Hummer, several others mounting machine guns and TOW launchers convoyed with us so that we would not look like something that needed killing by the troopers of the 10th Mountain. All around the Normandy DZ, OH-58Ds were buzzing just over the trees searching for targets, and transport helicopters were moving units and supplies where they were going to be needed. Clearly, an attack was planned for sometime soon, and we were going to see how 1st Brigade did business. As the sun was setting, we arrived back at the TOC. Another meal of MREs was given to us, and the plan for the evening was explained.
Armed with the captured documents, signals intercept information, and scouting reports from the Red force, Petraeus had planned a breakout to the south through a critical road junction near a small DZ known as Campbell’s Crossroads. This was the main defense line of the enemy brigade, and if it was broken through, that would effectively finish their ability to defend against 1st Brigade. The problem was that the crossroads was located between a pair of artillery live-fire impact zones, which would not be used for maneuver that evening when the attack was scheduled. This created a funnel-shaped path that the troopers of the brigade would have to attack down. Petraeus was betting that the data his patrols had collected was accurate, and that he could concentrate enough firepower to kill the heavy enemy forces concentrated at the junction. Just to make sure that he did, General Crocker had assigned him the RRC from the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), which had been delivered that afternoon. Along with a company of M551 Sheridans (they still were in service at this time), Devil-6 was planning a hot time for the 10th Mountain troops later that evening.
Petraeus also hit upon an idea to decoy further enemy forces away from his attacking units. As related earlier, the Red force had already found the 1st Brigade TOC, and had attacked it with a small force of infantry and an attached infantry platoon. Hoping that they would do it again in greater strength, he had the HHC dig deep fighting positions and lay a heavy tangle of barrier wire to stop the expected assault. He then shifted primary control of the brigade’s operations to a force of a half-dozen HMMWVs configured as a mobile TOC, and moved them to the top of a deserted hill. From there, he would control the fight from the front seat of a Hummer with a couple of radios and a plastic-covered 1:50,000 scale map from DMA. It would be little different from how Ruben Tucker had done it during Market Garden over a half century ago.
Around 10:00 PM, the two attacking battalions headed to the line of departure with their supporting armor, and the brigade’s force of artillery and attack helicopters began a heavy simulated bombardment of the Red force positions around the Campbell DZ crossroads. Now we would just have to wait and see what happened.
Friday, May 17th, 1996
By midnight, it was clear that 1st Brigade had made excellent progress towards their objective of taking the crossroads. The artillery strikes had been scored highly effective against the enemy positions, and now the brigade’s force of OH-58D Kiowa Warriors was working over what was left of the enemy armor and guns with simulated Hellfire missiles. This still left a battalion-sized blocking force in front of the crossroads, and this would require some deft maneuvering to defeat. The narrow passage between the two impact zones made for very little maneuvering room, though the darkness helped shield the brigade’s lead infantry elements as they moved south. At the same time, the Red forces staged a heavy attack on the Brigade TOC, just as Petraeus had planned for. You could see the smile on the face of Devil-6 as he heard his HHC staff fight for their simulated lives, and win a tough fight against the intruding Red force infantry. The rest of the fight would take hours to finish, since the brigade’s infantry was legging it to their objectives. As a heavy fog closed over the hilltop TOC, we laid our ponchos down and tried to grab a few hours of sleep until dawn.
By the time the sun began the burn away the fog, we were up and checking the status of the fight. Colonel Petraeus and his staff were tired but happy. The lead units had taken the crossroads, after some heavy fighting and the armor and follow-on two battalions were fanning out from the bottom of the funnel-shaped exit towards the southern boundary road, the final stop line for the brigade. Before sundown on this Friday, they would achieve their goals, completely victorious against the tough opposition of the 10th Mountain’s brigade.
Things had not been so easy for the Brits over in the western part of the exercise area, though. Their Gurkha OPFOR opponents had proven extremely tough, and had even driven them off of part of the Holland DZ at one point! It would take the 5th Paras until the end of the exercise on Saturday afternoon to achieve all of their objectives, though they would eventually succeed.
When the “ENDEX Time” signal was issued the next day, Royal Dragon was being judged an unqualified success by the USACOM exercise directors. The Blue forces had been faced with bad weather and a number of difficult “real world” challenges, which they had overcome. All involved, including the OPFOR units, had gotten a great week of time in the field, with over four days of simulated combat time. Best of all, the 82nd had gotten to practice their trade on a massive scale, proving the continued viability of division-sized drops in the 1990s. It was both fun and informative to watch, and a great way to learn the trade of the airborne.
Colonel Petraeus and his troopers would need the practice, because they would shortly be headed into the eighteen-week cycle that is the core of the brigade lifestyle in the 82nd. We’ll explore this more in the next chapter. For now, though, I hope that our little narrative of Royal Dragon has taught you a bit about how the airborne does their deadly and vital job.
Division Ready Brigade: Eighteen Weeks in the Cycle
