Battle
The Battle of Norfolk, in a sense a continuation of the fighting that began with the Battle of 73 Easting the day before, began at 12:30 am on 27 February. The two attacking brigades of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division, including the 3rd Brigade of the 2nd Armored Division, were positioned along the 75 Easting, 2,000 meters east of 73 Easting. The Brigades clashed with the Iraqi Tawakalna Division of the Republican Guard, including the 37th Brigade of the 12th Iraqi Tank Division.
With air support from the 1/1 Attack Helicopter Battalion and fire support from 4/3 FA Battalion preventing Iraqi artillery from interfering, the U.S. 1st Infantry Division conducted a passage of the 2nd ACR's lines. In the following three hours the U.S. 1st Infantry Division methodically crossed the ten kilometers of Objective Norfolk, destroying Iraqi tanks, trucks, and infantry through thick fog. The 3rd Brigade of the 2nd Armored Division destroyed 60 Iraqi tanks and 35 AFV along the IPSA pipeline. In the thick of the fog of war, U.S. units became mixed with Iraqi units dispersed throughout the desert. This confusion led to the largest number of friendly fire incidents throughout the war.
By dawn, the U.S. 1st Infantry Division controlled Objective Norfolk and the Tawakalna Mechanized Infantry Division had ceased to exist as a fighting force. American casualties were six soldiers killed (all but one by friendly fire) and 30 wounded.
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Famous quotes containing the word battle:
“There is nothing more poetic and terrible than the skyscrapers’ battle with the heavens that cover them. Snow, rain, and mist highlight, drench, or conceal the vast towers, but those towers, hostile to mystery and blind to any sort of play, shear off the rain’s tresses and shine their three thousand swords through the soft swan of the fog.”
—Federico García Lorca (1898–1936)
“I’m out of repair
but you are tall in your battle dress
and I must arrange for your journey.
I was always a virgin,
old and pitted.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.”
—Bible: Hebrew Ecclesiastes 9:11.