92                                     U.S. MARJNES IN THE PERSIAN GULF, 199O~I99l


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Men of Company G, 2d Battalion, 7ih Marines, prepare to clear irenchlines and bunkers al the
southern perimeter of Al Jaber Air Field on 26 February 1991.

    At 0553, just at first light, Company B of the 4th Tank Battalion, a Reserve
unit from   Yakima, Washington,      attached to the 8th Marines,        2d Marine
Division, detected a column of T72 tanks.    The Iraqi armor force was moving
south just inside the 1st Marine Division's sector.  There was no time for the
company's commander, Captain Ralph F. Parkison, to buck the information up
the chain of command.  After reconfirming what he saw in his thermal sights,
he ordered his company of MiAl tanks to engage.          The battalion that the
company was supporting immediately joined in with combined arms.            After a
brief and intense anti-armor engagement, 34 out of 35 enemy tanks were out of
action."
    At 0835, a 1st Marine Division forward air controller spotted tanks that he
tentatively identified as T72s about 5,000 meters east of C3eneral Myatt's
command post and directed AH-i Sea Cobras to attack them. About 50 minutes
later,  1st Marine Division reported   "enemy tanks and troops flushed from
Burqan area.  Much confusion."4'     Myatt and his staff were convinced that the
burning oil fields were much too inhospitable to support Iraqi operations and the
direction of the attack came as a surprise. By 1008, the command group itself
was in the thick of a melee, and its security force knocked out several vehicles.
The 11th Marines massed their fires against the attackers from their positions on
either side of the second-barrier. Due to the obscuring smoke, the engagements
occurred at relatively short ranges. In one instance a few hours later, a M198


    Company B left its older M6OAi tanks at its home armory in Yakima. After 23 days of
trainin~ on MiAl tanks at Twentynine Palms, California, the unit flew to Jubayl to draw the 13
new MiAls they took into combat.