The 11th Marine Regiment, a reinforced artillery regiment that supported the 1st Marine Division, entered Kuwait from the south and moved to the vicinity of Kuwait City during the 100-hour Operation Desert Storm ground campaign (February 24-28, 1991). Tailored for the ground war by the addition of other artillery units, the regiment fought with five battalions. Elements of the 11th Marines deployed throughout the 1st Marine Division sector. Figure 2 summarizes the Operation Desert Storm scheme of maneuver and role of the 1st Marine Division.

Figure 2.  1st Marine Division scheme of maneuver

In Gulf War unit chronologies and operational logs, the 11th Marines recorded many chemical warfare agent alerts before, during, and after the Coalition ground offensive. The 11th Marines’ elements initiated some of these alerts while others began elsewhere and were passed by radio to 11th Marine units. During our investigation, veterans reported to us a few additional potential chemical warfare incidents that did not involve alerts.

This investigation addressed two questions: was chemical warfare agent present in the immediate vicinity of 11th Marines units during possible chemical warfare incidents; and why did the 11th Marines record so many chemical warfare agent incidents?

After studying the written documentation and interviewing witnesses, we cataloged 17 possible chemical warfare incidents associated with the 11th Marine Regiment. In most of these incidents some of the 11th Marines donned additional chemical protective clothing. For two incidents, documentation contained scant detail and witnesses could recall little. Insufficient evidence led us to assess the possibility of chemical warfare agent presence as indeterminate. For 13 incidents, we collected substantial information and assessed that chemical warfare agent presence was unlikely in each case. We assessed the other two incidents as definitely not involving chemical warfare agent presence. In all incidents, no one reported chemical warfare agent casualties.

Positive chemical warfare agent tests triggered some incidents. All of the detection devices available to Marine units could produce false positive indications in the presence of substances other than chemical warfare agents. For much of the ground campaign in Kuwait, burning oil wells exposed the 1st Marine Division to high concentrations of smoke and raw petroleum. In retrospect, we believe such pollution affected detection equipment and caused many of the chemical warfare agent incidents the 11th Marines recorded during the ground offensive.

The Marine units initiating alerts frequently failed to identify themselves and their locations, which probably caused more 1st Marine Division units than necessary to increase protective posture and don chemical protective clothing as a precaution. As the ground campaign progressed, some 11th Marines unit commanders reacted to repeated false alerts by limiting their units’ responses when alerts originated elsewhere. This could have increased those units’ risk of exposure to chemical warfare agents if such agents had been present. However, wearing a protective mask and suit degrades combat performance in many ways, and the commanders, at the time, thought the risk acceptable.

Table 1 summarizes each of the 17 incidents, to which we assigned letter identifiers, and our assessments.

We published an interim report on this investigation on November 5, 1998. We have revised the report based on additional information, comments received from veterans, a revised methodology, and recommendations by the Presidential Special Oversight Board.

We identified several factors that may help explain why the 11th Marines recorded and participated in so many incidents:

• 11th Marines’ elements had extensive communications capabilities and liaison teams with each other and with supported infantry units because of artillery fire support coordination requirements. Parts of the 11th Marines became aware of, and passed on, many alerts. Operational logs and journals throughout the 1st Marine Division reflected these warnings, often indicating they were received from 11th Marines’ elements.
• The 11th Marines and others did not always demonstrate adequate discipline and completeness in passing alerts by radio. We believe this resulted in more alerts and more widely dispersed responses than necessary.
• Artillery units moved in leapfrog fashion so some stationary artillery batteries could always respond to requests for artillery fire. While infantry units advanced almost continuously, artillery units spent more time in stationary locations. Therefore, artillery units’ Marines had more time to observe their surroundings and conduct chemical warfare agent tests. Because they often could not maneuver to avoid chemical threats, they might have been more inclined to upgrade protective posture in the face of ambiguous threats and could do so more easily.

Table 1. Incident assessment summary

• For much of the ground campaign, 11th Marines elements and the units they supported were immersed in the extraordinarily heavy contamination from the sabotaged oil wells, operating in heavy black smoke and raw petroleum deposits. The smoke turned day into night. To some degree, this contamination affected all available chemical warfare agent test equipment, possibly producing false positive readings for a chemical warfare agent when none was actually present. The detection equipment was not designed to work in the presence of such petroleum contamination and was often ineffective. Many detector operators did not fully understand their equipment’s propensity to false alarm in heavy pollution.

In disseminating chemical warfare alerts, the 11th Marines worked to preserve the 1st Marine Division’s safety and operational capability. The Marines faced what they had every reason to believe was a serious chemical warfare threat. They believed in their NBC detection capability and overall acted rationally under the stress of combat, at times in unique environmental conditions. Our post-war assessments of the chemical threat, training, procedures, detection equipment shortcomings, and lessons learned are not criticisms of these Marines’ professionalism.

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