Read Online War Stories by Oliver North - Free Book Online

wives and children, who were eagerly awaiting their arrival in southern California. Then came their new orders: turn around and head north, back up the Persian Gulf, and prepare for war.
    For the next four months, the crew of the Abraham Lincoln served without leave, carrying out their orders. They had already launched almost six hundred combat sorties in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and nearly a thousand more in support of Operation Southern Watch, enforcing the no-fly zones over Iraq. Then they handled 1,558 combat sorties supporting the Marines, soldiers, and special operations teams of Operation Iraqi Freedom. And they did it all—more than three thousand sorties—without casualties. When their mission was completed, they had been deployed for 290 consecutive days and had traveled more than 100,000 miles—the equivalent of circling the globe four times.
    None of this mattered to the president’s ardent critics, who also chose to ignore the extraordinary compliment President Bush had paid to the crew of “Honest Abe.” By landing on a moving aircraft carrier at sea—an extraordinarily difficult feat—the commander in chief was offering the crew of the Abraham Lincoln the ultimate accolade. He put his life in the hands of a Navy pilot and the crew of the carrier—never doubting that they would bring him in safely.

    All of this was a rude awakening to those of us who had just returned from the harsh realities of Iraq. There, brave men and women were serving in harm’s way, in great personal danger. Even when there was little danger, the requirements of duty and the conditions under which they served were difficult at best and downright horrible at worst.
    But being back home, hearing the commander in chief of the Armed Forces of the United States being described as a “deskboundpresident who assumes the garb of a warrior for the purposes of a speech,” and accused of “flamboyant showmanship” and “self-congratulatory gestures” by a U.S. senator, made many of the troops ask “What am I doing here?”
    Before the story waned, Congressman Henry Waxman, citing “clear political overtones,” was calling for a congressional investigation of the president’s flight. But most of the sailors and Marines aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln wondered about the political motivations of the president’s detractors. Meanwhile, others in Congress began calling for a “regime change” at the White House.
    Among the troops who communicated with me in the weeks right after I returned home, the strident partisanship of the attacks on President Bush was topic number one. What we didn’t know then was that this was just the opening volley. It was about to get a whole lot worse.
    Â Â Â  AFTER ACTION REPORT
    Â Â Â Â Â Â  Washington, DC
    Â Â Â Â Â Â  Friday, 12 May 2003
    Â Â Â Â Â Â  0900 Hours Local
    After the vicious assault on the president, it should probably have been expected that those who were embedded with the troops—and who reported good things about them—would be the next targets. It seems that almost all of us who lived with the troops came away favorably impressed.
    I’ve spent much of my life in the military and have concluded, based on how these warriors performed under combat, that the soldiers, sailors, airmen, Guardsmen, and Marines serving in Iraq are without parallel. There has never been a brighter, better-trained, better-equipped group of people under arms than those whoresponded to our country’s call in this war. No military force in history has ever gone so far, so fast, with so few casualties as this group of young Americans.
    I said that repeatedly during my time with the troops and I know no other way to put it. It seemed fairly self-evident to nearly every embedded correspondent, and certainly was to me—and I don’t pretend to be