Initial Reports
This incident occurred[28]during an artillery raid, the first ground action of Operation Desert Storm on the night of Jan. 20-21, 1991. A field radio operator on the artillery raid initiated the investigation of this incident with a call in 1995 to the DOD Persian Gulf illnesses1-800 hotline set up at that time. Investigators also conducted a follow-up interview with this individual. He reported that M8 alarms went off beginning at 2:00-3:00 a.m.. Troops went to MOPP Level 4. He stated that M256 tests were positive for nerve agent two or three times. The unit decided that the alarms and M256 kits must have been malfunctioning due to High-Mobility, Multi-purpose, Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV) exhaust or something from the "chicken farm" (a nearby abandoned Bedouin camp). After performing selective unmasking procedures, the unit unmasked.[29] Another source document—an attachment to the 1/12 Command Chronology—reported incoming artillery fire at 11:44 p.m., "Gas attack, burning fuel fumes" at 1:33 a.m., and "All clear; [M]256 [kit] negative" at 2:00 a.m..[30] A third source, the Command Chronology for the 11th Marines, briefly noted the raid, but said nothing about incoming artillery or a "gas" attack. It stated, "Battery F, 2/12, from 1/12, conducted an artillery raid at 0315C [3:15 a.m. local]. ... They fired 84 rounds ... on suspected targets. No battle damage assessment available…"[31] Because of the disparity in reporting, the investigation of this incident centered on clarifying the sequence, as well as the nature, of events. See Figure 17.
Figure 17. Location of Incident D
Additional Evidence
Various witnesses recalled the details of this incident differently. The raid involved the F Battery, 2/12, a 1/12 forward command post (CP), intelligence and security elements, and a mobile unmanned aerial vehicle downlink receiving station.[32] The firing battery and some of the security elements were positioned well forward of the CP area. An Egyptian tank platoon and some Marine infantry provided security for the battery.[33] An operations officer estimated the CP location at five miles south of the Kuwait border. The 1/12 CP was behind and to the side of the gun line, which he estimated was 500-800 meters (up to half a mile) away. Subsequently, he deferred to the F Battery, 2/12, CO on this distance (almost four miles).[34] Logs and personal journals agreed that incoming artillery fire struck the general area of the 1/12 elements at 11:44 p.m.,[35,36] although a witness located near the CP recalled the time as 2:00-3:00 a.m. and estimated the impacts at 1,500 m to the front.[37] One of the operations officers in the CP estimated the number of incoming rounds at six. He thought impacts were about 2,000 to 2,500 meters to the front. This range also appeared in an incoming fire report filed at 11:44 p.m..[38] A field radio operator was not sure the raid party was the target,[39] a view shared by the CO of the 1/12, who commanded the raid. The CO referred to contemporaneous notes when interviewed. He said that the raid party did not operate a counter-battery ("fire finder") radar that could have tipped off the Iraqi forces. He recalled that the Saudi Arabian King Abdul Azziz Brigade maneuvered tanks, headlights on, to the left flank of the CP (he sent an officer to request they stop this during the raid). He thought the noise and lights of the Saudi unit might have drawn the Iraqi fire. The CO remembered that the sound of the incoming fire was like artillery shells, not artillery rockets.[40] The raid’s intelligence officer was sitting in his vehicle near the CP and recalls the incoming fire as perhaps half a kilometer away. He saw the flash but could not remember how many rounds detonated. He recalled he could not open the vehicle door and jumped through the window to take cover.[41]
Figure 18 diagrams the approximate positions of various raid elements based on testimony of the F Battery CO and a 1/12 operations officer in the forward CP.[42,43] Both officers reviewed drafts of this diagram and concurred that it portrayed what they remember (except that the operations officer did not recall Egyptian tanks on the raid).
Figure 18. Positioning of the 1/12 for First Artillery Raid
The CO of the firing (F) battery recalled that when the incoming fire hit "around midnight," it impacted about 1,500 meters behind his rear security element and 3,000 meters behind the center of the gun line. He recalled four or fewer rounds (shells) of tube artillery fire, which were probably 122 mm rounds rather than 155 mm rounds. This identification was based on the distinctive sound when passing overhead. Artillerymen often serve as forward observers or spotters and have experience with this phenomenon.[44]
According to intelligence and subsequent UN investigations after the war, there was no evidence that Iraqi 122 mm tube artillery had chemical rounds. Iraqi ground forces were only capable of delivering nerve and blister agents via 155 mm artillery and 122 mm rockets. Iraq could deliver CS riot control agent with 120 mm mortar rounds, but these would not sound like artillery or rockets. Both nerve and mustard agents could be delivered in aerial bombs,[45] but close aerial surveillance and Coalition air supremacy prevented aerial delivery during the Gulf War.
Most witnesses recalled the wind during the raid as out of the north, from the direction of the border.[46] One witness believed the winds were calm and mentioned dense fog,[47] and another thought there may have been a "slight breeze."[48] The Air Force weather database for the war indicates the winds in the general area at the time were from the northeast at 5-10 knots (6-12 miles per hour).[49] Assuming a northerly wind of six miles per hour--and assuming the rounds landed about 2,500 meters northwest of the CP-- any smoke or chemical agent from the rounds would have passed abreast of the CP and to the west about nine minutes later.
A journal and a witness recorded a chemical alert by the CP at 1:33 a.m., an hour and 49 minutes after the incoming fire.[50] The 1/12 Command Chronology has an entry for 1:33 a.m. that reads, "Gas attack, burning fuel fumes." Another entry for 2:00 a.m. states, "All clear, [M]256 kit negative."[51] However, the same source that recalled the detonations at 2:00-3:00 a.m. also believed the time separating the explosions and the alert was about 15-20 minutes.[52]
An intelligence officer along on the raid said he initiated the alert after smelling what he described in an initial interview as "sulfur." In a follow-on interview, he recalled sensing CS, a riot control agent used in NBC training; he said it both smelled and felt (irritated) like CS. He recalled no incoming artillery fire near the time of the smell. A communications officer present with him smelled the strong odor of sulfur. They masked and passed the alarm in the area of the CP.[53]
The senior operations officer recalls standing near the back of a HMMWV when all of the sudden he could not breathe. He recalled a choking sensation (a "bitter bite") that did not taste like CS or smell like rotten eggs. He called CS "kids play" compared to the sensation he experienced. He said he gagged and coughed, but the symptoms slowly subsided after he masked. He recalled that, "we could not get anything to pop positive on the M256 kits. The results were negative." When the unit unmasked, the irritant was gone. On return to base, a corpsman checked his pupils and throat and treated him for sore throat. His throat remained sore for up to a week.[54]
The 1/12 CO, who also commanded the raid, emphatically stated that he smelled sulfur (rotten eggs) but definitely not CS, expressing confidence he could tell the difference.[55] The operations officer manning the radios in the CP recalled that at the time he got the alert, the intelligence officer said he had smelled CS and experienced CS-like symptoms.[56] The NBC officer of the 11th Marines, who did not accompany the raid, remembers that the incident definitely involved CS and was reported as such up the chain of command.[57] The communications officer directed a driver and a communications technician to conduct M256 tests. He remembered that the first test was positive for nerve agent. He was almost certain that a second test about 80 feet away was negative. He recalled they performed selective unmasking "by the book" and the "all clear" was sounded. The smell had disappeared by the time they unmasked.[58] The operations officer who experienced a choking sensation also detected nothing after unmasking (although throat irritation from the exposure lasted several days).
Several witnesses believed no M8 Chemical Agent Alarms accompanied the raid forces.[59] However, one Marine witness believed he recalled several instances when M8 chemical monitors alarmed during the raid. This same Marine was one of those who conducted M256 kit tests. He recalls two or three positive M256 tests during a time when M8 alarms were repeatedly going off and being reset. He noted that someone decided the positive was due to vehicle exhaust or something from the "chicken farm" (deserted Bedouin camp).[60] Based on disparate recollections of outcomes and the opinion of the communications officer, it is possible that more than one survey team ran M256 tests in the vicinity of the CP.
According to an authoritative source, the M256 detection kits would not produce a positive indication for chemical warfare agents in the presence of CS.[61] The kits could, however, produce false positive readings for CWA in the presence of smoke, petroleum products, and other battlefield contaminants. (See the Glossary entry on M256).
The battery commander on the raid, located forward and west of the CP, recalled that the CP notified him by radio that somebody had smelled something back at the CP. He did not order the battery to mask, and he was not aware of anyone with symptoms. He did not find out that the CP had gone to MOPP Level 4 until after the raid the next day.[62]
The CO of the 1/12 indicated that days after the raid, he recalled hearing that coalition aircraft had bombed an enemy site, and the sulfur smell resulted from this attack.[63] A check of a classified database covering coalition air strikes placed the closest attack (time and distance) some tens of miles from the raid positions and more than six hours before the unusual smell incident. This air attack used large bombs against an area target.[64] Considering the wind data cited above and the geometry of the locations, the center of any airborne residue from this attack would have passed more than 10 miles west of the CP position. This would have happened between about 10:00 p.m. and 1:00 a.m.. The later time (assuming six mile per hour winds) is half an hour before the smell was noted at 1:33 a.m.. The exact nature of the air targets in the target area is unknown, but raids against area targets do not focus on fixed facilities. (If hit, fixed facilities would be more likely to emit smells and gases than bombed areas.)
Finally, investigators found that the raid participants were given a target in Kuwait, fired 84 rounds at 3:15 a.m., and rapidly departed the area.[65] Figure 19 summarizes the timing of the incident.
Figure 19. Timeline for Incident D
Assessment
The investigation could not definitively determine the cause of reported positive M256 detections, the nature of the substance(s) smelled, or the source. However, on balance, the likelihood that chemical warfare or riot control agent was present in the CP area is "Unlikely."
To come to this conclusion, two key questions had to be answered:
- Did Iraqi troops fire any chemical warfare agent or riot control shells at the 1/12 elements on the raid; and
- If they did, what are the chances the 1/12 elements were in the contaminated area?
If the CO of the raid battery correctly estimated the caliber of the incoming rounds as 122 mm artillery, the rounds did not contain chemical agents because the only tube artillery Iraq used to deliver agent (blister) was 155 mm. Several witnesses recalled positive M256 readings for nerve agent. Available information indicates Iraq did not have nerve agent shells for tube artillery. The possibility that Iraqi troops fired CS rounds into the area of the raid party is also unlikely since Iraq used 120 mm mortar rounds—not artillery—to deliver CS. Finally, the time separation between the incoming artillery fire and the first notice of an unusual smell suggests that the two events were unrelated.
Several witnesses that were near the CP clearly experienced something strong. The lack of agreement on the nature of the smell prevents an unequivocal conclusion about what it was. Hydrogen sulfide (H2S) smells like rotten eggs—the smell identified by the 1/12 CO who discounted the possibility of CS. No known lethal or riot control agent smells like rotten eggs.[66] The intelligence officer believed strongly that he smelled and "felt" CS, which has a pungent, peppery smell. The communications officer in the same area at the time recalls smelling sulfur. The operations officer behind the HMMWV reported choking sensation that caused a sore throat, but he was sure the cause was not CS. Despite getting a "whiff" of something strong, none of the witnesses reported experiencing the enduring and serious symptoms one could expect from this kind of exposure to lethal chemical warfare agents.
The 11th Marines report indicated that CS was involved in the incident, but those on the scene thought vehicle exhaust or something from the abandoned camp was the cause. The commanding officer of the 1/12 "heard" the source of the smell was a Coalition air strike, but the nearest attack was over six hours earlier and a considerable distance away. This seems too long and too far to sustain the concentration that the "strong" smell suggests, even if the CP had been directly downwind.
Witnesses' recollections about M256 test results also varied, perhaps because more than one survey team conducted tests. One of the testers recalled multiple positive detections. The Marine who directed him to do the test remembered only one positive detection. Others recalled no positives at all. If the strong-smelling substance was CS, M256 kits would not have produced positive readings.
The majority of evidence from witnesses suggests the raid elements did not have M8 chemical agent alarms available, despite testimony from one Marine to the contrary.
The weather and the location of the raid forces make it unlikely that any agent Iraq might have fired in the 11:44 PM artillery salvo would have been detected by members of the raid. However, winds vary somewhat in speed and direction, and none of the witnesses claimed absolute certainty about speed and direction. Consequently—although it is unlikely—the presence of some kind of agent at the CP could not be entirely ruled out.
In short, the assessment of "Unlikely" rests on there being no evidence of a delivery means, the absence of serious casualties from CWA, reports of key witnesses of an H2S smell that is not associated with any known CWA or riot control agent, and the belief of some present that the cause was an environmental contaminant.