First Person singular

摘要

I was in a Challenger command tank as we crossed the minefields into Iraq at about 15h00 on February 25, 1991. Although we were the 7th Armored Brigade, the famous Desert Rats of WW II North Africa, the desert was probably the last place I had expected to find myself confronting an enemy. And I hadn't expected to be moving forward ―in a tank, no less. Before 1990, the British Army was designed, trained, and deployed to fight against the Warsaw Pact for the defense of Western Europe. Almost everything that we did with our training, especially those of us who were placed in Western Germany, was practice for GDP, the General Defense Plan. Our exercises, whether they be command-post exercises or field exercises with troops, basically were all rehearsals for how we would pull back from the inter-German border to the next defensive line as the Warsaw Pact rolled in and attacked us. Ourbrigades were thus designed, as was our equipment, for just such a battle in Europe.