Author(s): Mike Rossiter

Current Affairs

March 2003: while the terrible 'shock and awe' was going on in Baghdad, Royal Navy Marines from HMS Ark Royal and HMS Ocean were given the job of 'kicking the door down'. At zero hour on March 19 members of 40 Commando, steaming a few miles off the Iraqi coastline, boarded helicopters, their faces blackened and their throats dry at the thought of what lay ahead. They were to be the first troops on the ground in Iraq and were tasked with forcing an entry into the country, to storm the Al Faw peninsula, secure the crucial oil terminals and open a gateway for ground troops in the advance on the city of Basra. It was the first British amphibious landing since the recovery of the Falkland Islands. Within minutes of landing contact was made with the enemy and the darkness was split by gun flashes and explosions.40 Commando won a swift and early victory taking over 200 soldiers prisoner. But now it was essential that the British Marines were reinforced against an Iraqi counteroffensive. Plans to fly in 42 Commando by the US Marine Corps were abandoned when a huge sandstorm brought down a helicopter. There was to be no reinforcements for 40 Commando that night.