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The maritime conditions of Iraq and the Northern Arabian Gulf,
NAG, can greatly limit the operations of large naval vessels and
warships. Due to this and the U.S. Navy's lack of in-shore patrol
craft, a large part of the Navy's request for Coast Guard assistance
in Operation Iraqi Freedom, OIF, centered on the service's
shallow-draft patrol boats. Cutters of the 110-foot Island Class,
also known as WPBs, would serve as a mainstay of shallow-water
operations. The deployment of the 110-foot patrol boat Adak serves
as a snapshot of WPB operations in OIF. Deployment of the WPBs
overseas would represent the first combat deployment of Coast Guard
patrol boats since the Vietnam War, even though other Coast Guard
assets had served in operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm in
the 1990s.
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U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Adak patrols in the Northern Arabian Gulf.
(Courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard)
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In early February 2003, the Coast Guard's Atlantic Area
Command deployed to the NAG the WPBs Adak, Aquidneck,
Baranof and Wrangell. The 110s arrived in Bahrain at the
beginning of March having ridden aboard the motor vessel
Industrial Challenger for 35 days. On Wednesday, March 5, a
heavy-lift crane off-loaded the WPBs taking only six hours
to set all four in the water. Lt. Sean Mackenzie and his
crew ran Adak through sea trials for two days and on Sunday,
Adak and sister-ship Aquidneck deployed to the NAG followed
by Baranof and Wrangell on March 12.
In the days
leading up to combat operations, Adak focused on maritime
interdiction operations. Coalition vessels had restricted
passage of local watercraft out of the Khawr Abd Allah
Waterway, thinking that these vessels might carry mines or
escaping Iraqi officials. By mid-March, local watercraft had
attempted several breakouts with fleets of dhows and small
boats and, on March 17, a large breakout of 60 Iraqi
watercraft attempted to evade coalition units. With the
vessels scattering in all directions, Adak, Wrangell and
their small boats, aided by other coalition units, managed
to corral all of the Iraqi watercraft and board them. None
of the vessels carried escaping Iraqi leaders or any illegal
cargoes typical of small smuggling vessels. After boarding
teams had thoroughly searched the dhows, Adak and the other
patrol vessels allowed the watercraft to proceed along a
specific route into the NAG.
In the early morning
hours of Thursday, March 20, coalition forces initiated
combat operations with air attacks against key military
targets in Baghdad. In addition, coalition forces had to
secure Iraq's Khor al-Amaya Oil Terminal and Mina al Bakr
Oil Terminal to prevent environmental attack by the Iraqi
regime. That evening, Navy special operations forces
supported by Polish special forces personnel, stormed the
oil facilities. During the operation, Mackenzie and Adak,
along with Baranof, maintained security around the terminals
to prevent reinforcement or escape by Iraqi military forces.
After the special operations forces cleared the terminals of
Iraqi personnel, weapons and explosives, Coast Guard
personnel from Port Security Units 311 and 313 arrived to
secure the facilities.
Next Mackenzie received orders
to patrol the KAA Waterway, so by the early morning hours of
Friday, March 21, Adak had steamed up the KAA to serve as a
guard ship. In fact, of the 146 coalition naval units in the
NAG, Adak served deepest in enemy territory and served as
the “tip of the spear” for coalition naval forces. During
her early morning patrol, Adak and Navy patrol craft Chinook
surprised and stopped two down-bound Iraqi tugboats,
including one towing a barge, and ordered them to anchor. At
first, the vessels seemed harmless since they ordinarily
serviced tankers and other vessels that plied local waters.
But the two patrol vessels continued guarding the tugs and a
special boarding team composed of Australian and American
explosives experts searched the tugs and barge and found
concealed within them a total of 70 contact and acoustic
mines; had they been released, the mines could have sunk or
heavily damaged dozens of coalition naval vessels. The team
secured the tugs and Chinook transported the enemy crews
back to a coalition naval vessel for processing. The captain
of one of the mine-laying tugs admitted that the sight of
Mackenzie's “white patrol boat” had prevented him from
deploying his deadly cargo.
Throughout the day, the
captain and crew of Adak experienced a great deal of
excitement. At 6:00 am, Australian and British frigates
began naval fire support operations in what became known as
“Five-inch Friday.” The warships poured nearly 200 rounds of
4 1/2 and 5-inch shells into the Iraqi defenses while Adak
screened the vessels against unauthorized watercraft. During
this time, Mackenzie and his men felt the buffeting of
explosions of hundreds of bombs and shells lobbed on shore.
British Royal Marines, supported by U.S. Navy and Royal Navy
hovercraft, commenced the amphibious assault on the Al Faw
Peninsula–the largest amphibious operation carried out since
the Korean War.
During the landings, an Iraqi PB-90
patrol boat had been cruising upstream on the KAA Waterway
in a position where it could threaten low-flying coalition
helicopters and provide early warning reports to land-based
Iraqi forces on the Al Faw Peninsula. To engage the PB-90,
the coalition command center vectored in an AC-130 gunship,
which destroyed the enemy vessel. Afterward, a coalition
helicopter spotted three survivors floating down the KAA and
notified Adak of their location. The WPB recovered the
hypothermic Iraqis at 8:30 a.m. and transferred the
prisoners to an Australian naval vessel for processing.
Coalition experts later identified the men as warrant
officers from Iraq's Republican Guard.
After
coalition forces wrapped up the initial phase of combat
operations, naval planners focused on opening the KAA
Waterway to vessel traffic. Wrecks from the Iran-Iraq War
and the first Gulf War still littered the KAA and its
shores, but mines proved a greater concern. Some mines
remained in the waterway from Operation Desert Storm.
Minesweeping operations began on Saturday, March 22, with
Navy Sea Dragon helicopters towing minesweeping sleds along
the waterway. Mackenzie received orders for Adak to join
sister-ship Wrangell, and Navy patrol craft Chinook and
Firebolt to escort Navy and Royal Navy minesweepers up the
KAA. The process proved slow as the minesweepers proceeded
at a rate of only three knots up the 40-mile channel to the
Iraqi port of Umm Qasr. The patrol boats had to stand off
1,000 yards from the minesweeping vessels often stationing
themselves upriver from the minesweepers. On several
occasions, the minesweepers located mines in waters
previously navigated by the WPBs and, on one occasion,
Adak's crew listened as the patrol boat contacted a mine
that came to the surface but failed to detonate.
It
took about a week to complete mine-clearing operations on
the KAA and with Umm Qasr in coalition hands, cargo vessels
could begin steaming into the Iraqi port. Naval combat
operations concluded near the end of March, but Mackenzie
and Adak joined the other WPBs to continue their force
protection role and serve as escorts while Navy salvage
vessels Catawba and Grapple removed obstructions in the
waterway. On March 28, coalition forces sent the first
shipload of humanitarian aid into Umm Qasr on board the
shallow draft Royal Fleet Auxiliary Sir Galahad under the
escort of Adak, Wrangell, a minesweeper and patrol craft
Firebolt. Adak and its crew continued escort duties along
the KAA into early April. On April 11, Adak escorted Iraq's
first commercial shipment on board motor vessel Manar, which
carried 700 tons of Red Crescent Society aid of food, water,
medical supplies and transport vehicles.
On April 12,
Mackenzie received orders to return to base and Adak
redeployed to Bahrain after completing a 35-day non-stop
deployment to the NAG. On April 9, organized resistance had
ceased in Baghdad, followed in mid-April by a cessation of
resistance in most other Iraqi cities. On May 1, President
George Bush announced the end of combat operations in Iraq
and the coalition's offensive operations came to a close.
During OIF, Adak, its sister-ships and their crews
brought many vital capabilities to the theater of
operations. The patrol boats operated for many hours without
maintenance in waters too shallow for most naval vessels and
served as the fleet's workhorses in boarding, escort duty,
force protection and maritime interdiction operations. The
characteristic white hulls of the WPBs also provided a less
antagonizing presence in a highly volatile region. As they
had in previous Coast Guard combat missions, Coast Guard
patrol boats and personnel exceeded all expectations in
shallow-water and in-shore maritime operations.
Shallow-draft Coast Guard units and their personnel have
played an important role in the long blue line and will
maintain a part in future naval operations wherever
hostilities erupt in the world's littoral regions.
By William H. Thiesen, Atlantic Area Historian, USCG
Provided
through
Coast
Guard
Copyright 2016
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