Thought I'd start a thread marking the start of the air campaign in the Gulf War to liberate Kuwait. First I heard about it was from a little old lady I was delivering the mail to. As she came to the front door she simply said, " It's started". Were any of you there back in 1991? BBC ON THIS DAY | 17 | 1991: 'Mother of all Battles' begins
Well my Brother, was out there with 62 ORD COY RAOC, and when the air campaign started I was in bed, but my Dad got me up to watch the coverage on tv must of been about 7am or there abouts
I was out with my family. When we came home around 10 or 11 pm we put the TV on and it was on the news. I remember the next day at work my Kuwaiti punters were rather happy !
My boss rang me a 6.00 am and asked me to go in early to work, he picked me up and as we got to the office one of the guys came down the corrider and said they have taken off. I said all or just selective he said he did not know so it was onto the net to find out what was going on.
20 years - time just goes doesnt it i was on standby to go, didnt get to the first one but managed to get out for the rematch
Was it really 20 years ago today - Mr Blair he told the RAF to play - So let me introduce you to - the one and only GWB and Uncle Sams Lonely Hearts Club Bombs But seriously I enlisted in 1965 twenty years after WWII - suddenly feeling old
I remember staying up through the night as the news broke that Israel had been hit by scuds and thinking to myself "s--t, now this could get VERY nasty if they retaliate". There was a programme on last night on one of the Discovery channels called "The Gulf War-The Soldiers Tale" and it brought it all back.........
Oh yes! and do we remember? ( Look, this is not about age! it's about experience) I recall very clearly the High Command passing the message that it was not acceptable for us to go to/fro work in uniform any longer!! (Please note; the IRA wasn't very prominent over here.) My unit commander judged it appropriate and sufficient for him to put a greatcoat on top. So there he arrived, every day, in his grand Dark Blue Coat, really dashing - like Dracula or Matrix - with his uniform legs and boots showing clearly below. Those where the times when we were still young and innocent. (Sigh)
the night the battle began - soldier magazine http://www.soldiermagazine.co.uk/flashback/pages/586.pdf
er...no, that would be John Major back in 1991. I remember seeing some photographs of graffitti on some of the white coastal walls in Kuwait that a Kuwaiti took and showed me in the UK. US and UK flags sprayed on walls with Thank you Mr Bush and Thank you Mrs Thatcher. They never knew John Major was the new Prime Minister.
I didn't know them back then, but my future mother-in-law was looking at a magizine & saw a photo of some Yanks sat on a bomb ready to go on a plane. On said bomb was written , 'This is from Ken Sharlow' or words to that effect. Ken & family had been their next door neighbour when he was posted to UK in the 80s. He showed me the magazine page when we visited them in 1995 in NY State. He also gave me some bomb clips he said had come off a plane that had bombed the Iraqis.
First RAF losses 17 January 1991..... 27 Squadron Tornado GR1 ZA392 Wing Commander Timothy Nigel Charles Elsdon 39 Pilot OC 27 Squadron + Flight Lieutenant Robert Maxwell Collier 42 Navigator +
We were operating on an eye of someone who had been in an automobile wreck. We turned on the radio to listen to what was going on. We went home at 11pm that night and watched CNN until on over in the morning.
I remember CNN televising a Navy Seal team exiting the water on a zodiac at night. The Seals were a little surprised by the encounter with CNN...thought it could have been the enemy. But, no...it was just Headline News.
This vivid photograph popped up on one of my news feeds--thought some of you might like to see it. It's labeled U.S. marines drive through burning oilfields in Kuwait, 1991 , but there's no telling whether that's accurate.
