Next week is the 4 year anniversary of the Battle of An-Nasiriyah.

The post below is a shortened version of thousands upon thousands of hours of research, which culminated in one of my all-time favorite historical non-fictions: Marines in the Garden of Eden by Richard S. Lowry.

Together, Richard and I gathered a collection of the choice copy, photos, and quotes from his research, and condensed them into this blog post…. a post dedicated the Marines of Task Force Tarawa, the combat they saw, and the brothers they lost.

All the photos (sans the Euphrates bridge shot) were taken by Marines, during the fight.

Prior to OIF, An-Nasiriyah served as a major hub of the Iraqi Army, home to three full Iraqi divisions, with a strategic location on the Euphrates River. Coalition forces were going to have to take An-Nasiriyah eventually, however after one particular Army supply convoy carrying one particular soldier named Jessica Lynch was ambushed north of the Coalition advance, the Marines decided to move in early.

Saving the remaining members of the lost convoy fell to Lt Col Rick Grabowski, who moved into An-Nasiriyah with two objectives. Secure the bridges, and save the surviving members of the 507th’s convoy.

Lowry on the latter of the two objectives:

Running low on ammunition and with five wounded, the ten stranded soldiers had already resigned themselves to the fact that they would not survive the day. They all resolved that they would go down fighting. They had been lying in the trench for nearly an hour waiting for the Iraqis to close in on their position. Suddenly, Staff Sergeant Tarik Jackson, the most seriously wounded, cocked his head, “Listen!” he exclaimed. “Do you hear that? It sounds like our tanks!” [1]

Someone peeked up out of the trench and saw Captain Thompson’s tanks approaching. Team Tank rolled up and straddled the trench at the “Garbage Dump,” just south of the railroad overpass. Thompson’s tankers began picking targets and methodically destroying the enemy with main gun rounds. Hawk called for Cobra support and the helicopters swooped in and attacked the enemy from above.

After spending forty-five minutes of sheer hell, believing that they were going to die that day and not knowing that any American forces were nearby, the sound of M1 tanks and Cobra Helicopters immediately rallied the despondent soldiers. They would survive. The Marines had saved the day.

Unfortunately for the Marines, the battle was just beginning.

While elements of Tarawa were rescuing the convoy, Col Grabowski was securing the bridgeheads:

Shielein’s CAAT section and Gunny Howard’s Team Mech tanks crested the Euphrates River Bridge first. From his position farther back in the column, Grabowski watched as the tanks and HMMWVs disappeared from view. He thought out loud, “there’s no turning back now, we’re committed!” [1]

As soon as Shielein’s CAAT vehicles moved to the dusty streets on the north side of the bridge, all hell broke loose. Schielein’s field of view was filled with Iraqis running in all directions. He saw muzzle flashes for one-hundred eighty degrees in front of him. Bullets cracked all around his vehicle. Schielein immediately ordered, “There will be no TOW shots.” [2] In a confined urban environment the TOWs can be more dangerous to the Marines than the enemy. Back wash from its rocket can melt the skin off a person in the blink of an eye. So the Marines in the TOW vehicles reached for their SAWs.

Schielein’s CAAT section came screaming down off the bridge with guns blazing. They were firing every SAW, every .50-caliber, and every MK19 they had. Drivers and loaders were firing their personal M-16s. Schielein’s Marines threw everything they had at the enemy. The MK19 grenadiers hurled grenades as fast as they could, leveling everything in sight.

At the base of the bridge, Schielein jumped from his Humvee into the middle of the street and began to lay down M-16 fire. As the rest of his section moved across the bridge, Schielein noticed an Iraqi Technical in the corner of his eye. The Iraqi gunner in the back of the pickup was swinging his heavy 12.7 mm machine gun in Schielein’s direction. Gunny Howard’s Lucille2 [3] came clanking up and stopped between the Iraqi and Schielein. Howard’s turret was moving before the large tank ground to a stop. The turret completed its traverse and, BOOM! Schielein was knocked back from the concussion, ears ringing, and stars twirling in his eyes.

“Holy Crap!”[4] Schielein shouted in surprise. Howard’s main gun had taken out the Iraqi Technical, saving his life.

The fight intensified:

C201 ground forward again, turning and maneuvering to work its way around the two buses. All of Charlie Company began to move again. Finally, Schaefer could see the Canal Bridge in the distance. Two soldiers were on the bridge. He immediately dispatched the guards and raced across the Saddam Canal.

The Iraqis were surprised by this very different response. Earlier, the soldiers of the 507th Maintenance Company were nothing more than targets as they raced through Ambush Alley. They had wildly returned fire with a few M-16s and a single SAW. Now, the Marines were inflicting heavy casualties. Curtis Campbell had been terrified when he saw Iraqi soldiers and vehicles blocking his path. Castleberry and Schaefer couldn’t shoot fast enough. The Iraqis learned quickly that a mechanized Marine Infantry Battalion was a much different creature than an Army Maintenance Company. They had ambushed a lamb and now they were fighting a lion.

Tarawa was heavily outnumbered and taking equally heavy casualties. Fortunately for the Marines on the ground, there were Marines in the air:

Eric Garcia received the call for assistance and within minutes he launched from Queensland. Gunny Hetterscheidt heard the radio crackle with the call for help, “We got an urgent cas-evac mission. You will be going into a hot zone.” [1] Garcia flew north until he found RCT-2’s command post set up along the side of the road. He brought his two Phrogs in and landed but kept his birds rotating. Garcia jumped out of the helicopter and went in search of an escort.

Hetterscheidt and Lewis began going through the motions that they had practiced so many times in training. First they checked the bird. Then they checked their .50 caliber machine guns and staged their ammo. Docs Gloria and Kirkland nervously watched Hetterscheidt and Lewis prepare for war.
After what seemed like an eternity, Hetterscheidt saw Garcia returning to the aircraft. “OK. It’s game time now,” [2] Hetterscheidt thought. Then he turned to Lewis and shouted into his helmet, “Here we go! If anything happens to me, I want you to find my kids and you tell them what happened and let them know I love them.”

Fire around the LZ was fierce, but the Marine air crews didn’t seem to notice.

“Kool-Aid, we have your tracks in sight.”

“Kool-Aid copies, be advised there are multiple sets of large power-lines on the East side of the road-by the trees…break…and we are still taking fire from multiple positions on the west side of the road.”

“Copy, understand that the LZ is secure?”

“Parole Two Five, negative, the area is as secure as we can make it right now, but we are still taking fire from the west.”

Garcia acknowledged with a simple, “Roger,” and continued his approach, heading for the billowing purple smoke.

Garcia, determined to run evac for the growing casualties, landed his bird in the middle of the red-hot LZ:

Marines on the ground, and in the air, rushed to provide security for Garcia’s helicopter. SSgt. Cantu could not believe his eyes. Even after Garcia’s move into the alley, he believed that the Iraqis would soon zero in on the helicopter. Parole-Two-Five was still not safe. Cantu’s men instinctively pushed forward to cover Garcia’s helicopter. They all quickly directed their fire at the buildings and alleyways around Garcia’s aircraft. Lieutenant Letendre moved his CAAT section to further protect the landing zone.

Finally, Matthew Juska was brought to Garcia’s helicopter. One of Cantu’s Marines ran up the ramp to the crew chief, “It’s hot! It’s a hot LZ!” [1] He shouted above all the noise, telling Gunny Hetterscheidt what he already knew.

“Hurry up!” Hetterscheidt ordered, as the Marines were having a hard time getting Juska’s large frame into a litter in the aircraft.

“No, we’re done! Put him on the ramp! We’re getting out of here!” [2] the crew chief shouted. The Marines obeyed and gently laid Juska on the deck of the helicopter, then stepped back from the aircraft. Before the plane had left the ground, Gloria and Kirkland were attending to Juska. He was in bad shape, bleeding from the ears and several cuts on his head. Blood was everywhere. Gloria quickly established an IV and pushed some morphine and antibiotics. Then Gloria tried to stop the bleeding from Juska’s head.

Hetterscheidt closed the ramp. Garcia gunned the engine to full power and picked up right over buildings filled with Iraqi fighters. He pulled to the right, crossed back over Ambush Alley and got out of the city as quickly as possible. Within thirty seconds, Parole-Two-Five was safely back over desert sand, heading toward a field hospital. Gloria continued to check Juska repeating his mantra, “Head to toe. Head to toe. Head to toe.” [3] Gloria did not want to miss anything.

Captain Brooks watched Garcia lift his gray Sea Knight helicopter into the blue afternoon sky. After seeing Juska’s crushed helmet and severe head injury, Brooks was certain that he would soon be dead. But Corporal Matthew Juska would survive, only because of the efforts of many Marines on the ground and the selfless actions of Garcia, Schroeder, Hetterscheidt, Lewis, Kirkland and Gloria on Parole-Two-Five.

Garcia was later awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his bravery.

Really, this only scratches the surface of the battle. By the time An-Nasiriyah had been secured, 33 Sailors and Marines had died on the field of honor. It was Iraqi Freedom’s single bloodiest operation, largely overlooked by a press corps who either wanted to cover the Jessica Lynch capture, or use the battle to scream headlines like “What Will It Take to Win?”

To read the rest of this incredible story, you can purchase Marines in the Garden of Eden at Amazon.com.

Special thanks to author Richard S. Lowry for the photos and quotes.

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