Live From Baghdad

When I departed San Diego on 3 March on the USS Nimitz, I planned to see Iraq from the cockpit of an S-3B, not from the cab of an Army Humvee. Before our departure, we found out we would acquire the S-3B Surveillance System Upgrade, or SSU, a one-of-a-kind, carrier-based intelligence gathering asset. The SSU had the capability to stream real-time video from a WESCAM camera and its synthetic aperture radar to the ship or to a unique, mobile ground station.

Once in the Persian Gulf, one mission for the Combined Forces Maritime Component Commander and one mission for the Combined Forces Air Component Commander were flown each day. CFMCC missions average 3.5 hours and covered the Persian Gulf coastal regions, while CFACC missions covered targets spanning the entire area of Iraq and lasted, on average, 6.5 hours.

The SSU quickly gained fame and filled the gaps left by the Predator and Hunter UAVs, but commanders still needed real-time full-motion video from central Iraq. In late May, VS-29 sent Lt. Cmdr. Halsey Keats and Lt. Cmdr. David Slayton on a scouting mission to locate the best place for the SSU ground station. They returned a week later with the obvious answer: Baghdad, with an Army military intelligence division. On 10 June, Commander Keats, Lt. Ken Wasson—known as Shrimpburger—and I traded our flight suits for desert cammies. We left the ship with more than 1,200 pounds of gear and headed for Baghdad.

We arrived at Baghdad International Airport at midnight. We slept on top of the gear because a convoy couldn't be scheduled until the next morning. Around five in the morning, a master sergeant and his crew pulled up with a 2.5-ton truck and said, "Put on your Kevlar, put a clip in your weapon, and welcome to Baghdad!" We found out the Army doesn't serve omelet MREs. In short order, we were bouncing around on our way to Camp Victory.

After a quick nap in our 110-degree tent, we briefed the commanding officer and began setting up our station. The next day we had connectivity with the SSU. We tweaked the equipment over the next three days to achieve max range. The downlink had a range of more than 150 nautical miles from the ship and ground station, allowing link coverage over a majority of southeast and central Iraq. The incoming data could be stored on a removable hard drive on the jet and downloaded postflight, but the capability to downlink video real time allowed commanders and intelligence personnel to help aircrew focus on areas of interest while airborne.

Lieutenant Commander Keats went back to the ship a couple days after our arrival. Soon thereafter, Wasson and I were upgraded from our tent to the porch of Uday Hussein's palace. The bathrooms had ten or twenty sinks and toilets, but we located only two showers in the whole complex. Luckily, the Army had set up a showering tent nearby. We were pretty happy that we had a real toilet and running water a stone's throw away from our racks.

The first night in the palace, Shrimp and I were awakened by two F-16s providing close air support for an attack occurring at the airport, which we could see from the porch. It was an eye-opening moment for us both—witnessing a ground battle from the ground and not 20,000 feet in the air. Needless to say, we prefer the latter.

The Army had set up two air-conditioned trailers for chow and prepared three hot meals a day. Near the chow hall entrance, a sign read "You must have your weapon to eat in the chow hall." The Aussies had a pool they kept in working order, and during one visit, we saw two girls laying out in bikinis with M16s next to them—not something you see every day in San Diego.

I departed 21 June and headed back to the ship, leaving Shrimpburger, the lone Navy man at Camp Victory, to operate the ground station for the rest of the month. The Army took care of him, and he became proficient at driving a Humvee on his many trips to the newly opened Burger King at Baghdad International.

Lt. Peter Weston relieved Shrimpburger at the beginning of July and continued to operate the ground station throughout the remainder of the month. He brought a digital thermometer with him and recorded an average temperature of 125 degrees, with a high of 150.

On 22 August, Wasson and I were tasked to get to Baghdad as fast as possible and retrieve the ground station. The word on the street was that we were pulling out of the Gulf and possibly relieving the USS Carl Vinson off the coast of Korea. We arrived in Baghdad after sixteen hours only to find out that the Nimitz might remain in the Gulf. Since Shrimpburger had already spent a full month there, I knew that I'd draw the short straw to stay and operate the station. Fortunately, the order came to dismantle the equipment and return to the ship—we were finally pulling out.

The experience made us appreciate Navy life. We got four hot meals a day. We always had showers, unless the reactor was stealing our water. And we didn't need to carry a weapon to eat lunch. We were also able to experience the professionalism of the Army, from the newest private to the dusty colonel. Our return to the Nimitz was the first time in our careers that we were glad to shove off and head back to sea.
     — Lt. (j.g.) Brian Schulz