ANTHOLOGY AND ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY                                        189


If It Didn't Have A White Flag, We Shot It

by Molly Moore

The Washington Post, 17 March 1991


   JUBAIL, Saudi Arabia: Lt. William Delaney's first view of war turned his
stomach.  He pulled up to the first Iraqi minefield inside Kuwait at dawn three
Sundays ago just in time to see tanks behind his platoon firing on American
military trucks to his left.  He watched in horror and anger as the vehicles
exploded and burned.
   "That almost made me physically sick," said the 26-year-old tank platoon
leader from Bethesda. "Here we were just starting out, and we were already
killing our own troops.   Friendly vehicles were hit and burning, and that was
the start of the whole thing."
   Although Delaney would later learn no one died in the incident, it verified
his deepest fear as he led the first allied tanks into Kuwait: "I was prepared to
lose some guys very special to me."
   As the tanks spearheading Marine Task Force Ripper rumbled forward,
Delaney's men spotted the first Iraqi tanks.
   "They knew we were coming.       We didn't wait to get closer. We destroyed
them--in all, our company got 15 tanks.   It was unbelievable.   Tanks blew up
with tremendous explosions.     Turrets flipped off.  There would be 15 to 20
more explosions as ammo cooked off.    Everybody in my platoon got a tank kill.
There were dead bodies all over the place."
   As the first day of war progressed, "We just destroyed everything in front
of us," said Delaney.     "If it didn't have a white flag, we shot it--trucks,
vehicles, bunkers.
   "Marines were trying to kill each other to get to these guys        Then the
ground opened up and those guys came out of bunkers--dancing, skipping,
singing with their thumbs up.   All some had was white toilet paper to surrender.
Everytime you saw a POW you were relieved.      It was one less guy we would
kill or would kill us."
   At the end of the first day of combat, troops who had tried to restrain their
jubilation on the radio all day collected around their tanks and "traded our feeble
war stories," according to Delaney.
   As dawn of the second day broke, "Morale was high," Delaney said.       "We
thought the first day we went through the [Iraqi front lines].    Now we were
getting to the good stuff."


Copyright 1991 The Washing~on Post. Rcprintcd with Pcrmission