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 are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
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Posted on 01/26/2003 12:01:57 AM PST by SAMWolf
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are acknowledged, affirmed and commemorated.
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On March 13, 1979, the New Joint Endeavor for Welfare, Education, and Liberation (New Jewel) movement ousted Sir Eric Gairy, Grenada's first prime minister, in a nearly bloodless coup and established a people's revolutionary government (PRG), headed by Maurice Bishop, who became prime minister. His Marxist-Leninist Government established close ties with Cuba, the Soviet Union, and other communist-bloc countries. In October 1983, a power struggle within the government resulted in the arrest and subsequent murder of Bishop and several members of his cabinet by elements of the people's revolutionary army.  To secure objectives in Grenada and to facilitate operations, the island was operationally split in half. The Marines covered the northern half of the island while Army rangers covered the south. The invasion in the south focused on an unfinished runway at Point Salines. A Navy SEAL team which was to have provided intelligence on the airfield at Salines was unable to get ashore. At 0534 the first Rangers began dropping at Salines, and less than two hours elapsed from the first drop until the last unit was on the ground, shortly after seven in the morning. After the rangers had secured the runway, 800 more troops would land, freeing the rangers to press northward where they were to secure the safety of American medical students and bring under control the capital of St. Georges. At the end of the first day in Grenada, the Rangers had secured the airfield and True Blue Campus at a cost of five dead and six wounded. Once the Rangers had secured the runway, elements of the 82nd Airborne Division landed, and late in the evening of the 26th the 82d Division's 3d Brigade began to deploy across the island. In the north, 400 Marines would land and rescue the small airport at Pearls. Preceding the operations in the north and south, Navy seal teams were airdropped near St. Georges to secure the safety of the Grenadian Governor General who was being held under house arrest by opposing forces in the governor’s mansion and to capture the government radio station at St. Georges. The 22d Marine Amphibious Unit was diverted to Grenada while en route to Lebanon. The Marine amphibious unit conducted landings as part of Operation Urgent Fury at Grenada on 25 October and at Carriacou on 1 November. By 3 November, the Marine amphibious unit was reembarked aboard its amphibious shipping and had resumed its passage to Lebanon.  In total, an invasion force of 1,900 U.S. troops, reaching a high of about 5,000 in five days, and 300 troops from the assisting neighboring islands encountered about 1,200 Grenadians, 780 Cubans, 49 Soviets, 24 North Koreans, 16 East Germans, 14 Bulgarians, and 3 or 4 Libyans. Within three days all main objectives were accomplished. Five hundred ninety-nine (599) Americans and 80 foreign nationals were evacuated, and U.S. forces were successful in the eventual reestablishment of a representative form of government in Grenada. That is not to say, however, that the invasion went without challenge. The first challenge was the lack of good intelligence data. For example, at Point Salines operations bogged down because resistance was much greater than expected. In attempting to rescue the Governor General, American forces were stymied by larger Cuban and Grenadian forces than anticipated. By listening to Cuban radio broadcasts, it seemed that the resistance was being directed from a place called Fort Frederick. As it turned out, but not previously known, Fort Frederick was the nerve center for the Cuban and Grenadian forces and once it was destroyed resistance simply melted away.  The invasion force lacked precise data on the location of the American medical students they were to rescue. One account noted that attack planners did not realize that the American medical students were spread out over three locations. The final challenge to invading forces was the lack of a fully integrated, interoperable communications system. Unlike the fighting elements which were organized to conduct operations independent of one another, communications systems were not allowed such freedom. Communications was to have been the glue that would tie together the operation of the four independent United States military service elements. Unfortunately, communications support failed in meeting certain aspects of that mission. It cannot be said that communications capability itself was abundant. Several participants cite shortages of communications.  Shortages were not the only communications problems found during the invasion of Grenada; interoperability was another. For example, uncoordinated use of radio frequencies prevented radio communications between Marines in the north and Army Rangers in the south. As such, interservice communication was prevented, except through offshore relay stations, and kept Marine commanders unaware for too long that Rangers were pinned down without adequate armor. In a second incident, it was reported that one member of the invasion force placed a long distance, commercial telephone call to Fort Bragg, N.C. to obtain C-130 gunship support for his unit which was under fire. His message was relayed via satellite and the gunship responded. Several factors have been cited as the cause of the communications problems which were confronted in Grenada. Among them were insufficient planning for the operation, lack of training, inadequate procedures, maldeployment of communications security keying material for the different radio networks, and lack of preparation through exercise realism. One of the more noted intelligence shortcomings of the operation was the lack of up to date topographical information (maps) on Grenada. When adequate maps were found, they apparently had to be flown to the Grenada task force rather than being sent by electrical transmission.  No journalists were on the island of Grenada to provide live reporting on the invasion, nor had any been taken along with the invading force. Vice Admiral Joseph Metcalf, in charge of the operation, had originally planned to exclude the media completely from the operation until he was convinced that they could do no harm. As word of the imminent invasion spread, hundreds of journalists moved into the area but were blocked from proceeding to Grenada. Indeed, there were no first-hand reports from Grenada until 2½ days after the operation began. The media, citing the American people's right to know, and frustrated at their inability to provide the current reporting that they would have liked, protested loudly about the military's gross oversight in failure to permit journalists to accompany the operation. An advisory council, named by the governor general, administered the country until general elections were held in December 1984. The New National Party (NNP), led by Herbert Blaize, won 14 out of 15 seats in free and fair elections and formed a democratic government. Grenada's constitution had been suspended in 1979 by the PRG, but it was restored after the 1984 elections.
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Just today, I was browsing the site for my son's unit, the Nightstalkers, and remember seeing a link to one of their operations, "Operation Fury."
To add to the hostory, you might want to check out the 160th history of this operation.
Dear Mama_Bear,
I was enjoying the Super bowl probably as y'all are right now until my husband received this email garbage a few minutes ago. To give you a little background information, my husband is an administrator (maintains email database, provides message board and guest book, etc.) of a website that is dedicated to a certain Brigade that he served with in Vietnam.
Sender of the email is targeting a lot of the members listed in the email database. Needless to say, I cannot stand by and do nothing. Since I respect FReepers like you and a lot of others on this thread, I've decided that this is the best place to come for advice.
Other than sending him/her/it a 'fitting' email-- which I shall shortly do-- what else can I do? Any ideas or advice? I know and have verified the sender's email address, but not sure if I can post it on FR.
Thank you in advance, Mama_Bear.
(Below is its Spam email word for word that I copy/pasted with permission.)
"I don't know what Jane Fonda did in Vietnam during her visit to see the P.O.W.S. in the camps, but I suspect that some of these anti-Jane anecdotes are fabricated. I do know that Jane Fonda is a Hero for nobly opposing this U.S. War of Imperialist aggression against the Vietnamese people, and that her actions helped to shorten the War, therefore saving thousands of American and Vietnamese lives in the long run.
The real traitors were the rich pigs on Wall Street and in Washington who sent tens of thousands of poor American kids to die in rice paddies so they could rip off the people of the Third World. The Vietnamese bravely fought for years against the Japanese, the French and then the Americans in a noble fight for National Independence and Ho Chi Minh was the George Washington of that Country.
The United States has invaded more countries than any other Country in history. Our government has invaded virtually every Latin American country at least once. In fact, our government is, even now, planning to invade and commit genocide on the people of Iraq, even though that country never did anything against us. We need more Jane Fonda's and less Republican rednecks. Jane, where are you? America needs you."
((end of garbage))
Well? (I want this person to taste what it's like to receive full strength FReeper wrath in return!)
Any veterans have any choice words for Chong to pass on to this creep?
WASHINGTON (Free Republic Network)--Defense Department spokesman Earnest Fury announced today a balanced approach to future Grenada-like operations.
"In lessons learned, Grenada taught us to conserve the lives of our people while expending those of the enemy 'like water'. Hence the new approach will be to airdrop diplomats. We have on one-hour standby a squadron of F-117 Stealth fighters equipped with the P-113 Peanut Pod, a capsule containing a former president and Nobel Peace Prize winner, a document of surrender and a Bic pen."
Spokesman Fury was somewhat cryptic as to details.
"I can neither confirm nor deny that the capsule contains a thermobaric device in lieu of any parachute."
An AC-130 gunship accompanies the squadron, dropping other public figures (e.g., Ramsey Clark, Jane Fonda), with flares in their mouths to direct suppressing fires.
"Human shields will be used but they'll be shrink-wrapped on pallets so we can be shoving them down cargo ramps from 20,000 feet--we're not losing any more people in these pest exterminations," added Fury.
So much for the Raiders.
Go Bucs, go!
That is what is so infuriating and dispicable about these people. They enjoy the freedoms of America while trashing and attacking her as the most evil country on earth. I don't care if it is politically incorrect or not......if a person doesn't respect what this country stands for they should get the hell out! They are free to leave whenever they want. No one is forcing them to live in this evil, hateful place.
There, I feel somewhat better. :-)
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