Ambush Alley: The Most Extraordinary Battle of the Iraq War

US: Presidio Press, 2007. Very Good. March 23, 2003: U.S. Marines from the Task Force Tarawa are caught up in on e of the most unexpected battles of the Iraq War. What started off as a rou tine maneuver to secure two key bridges in the town of Nasiriyah in souther n Iraq degenerated into a nightmarish twenty-four-hour urban clash in which eighteen young Marines lost their lives and more than thirty-five others w ere wounded. It was the single heaviest loss suffered by the U.S. military during the initial combat phase of the war. On that fateful day, Marines came across the burned-out remains of a U.S. A rmy convoy that had been ambushed by Saddam Hussein's forces outside Nasiri yah. In an attempt to rescue the missing soldiers and seize the bridges bef ore the Iraqis could destroy them, the Marines decided to advance their att ack on the city by twenty-four hours. What happened next is a gripping and gruesome tale of military blunders, tragedy, and heroism. Huge M1 tanks leading the attack were rendered ineffective when they became mired in an open sewer. Then a company of Marines took a wrong turn and en ded up on a deadly stretch of road where their armored personal carriers we re hit by devastating rocket-propelled grenade fire. USAF planes called in for fire support play their own part in the unfolding cataclysm when they a ccidentally strafed the vehicles. The attempt to rescue the dead and dying stranded in "ambush alley" only drew more Marines into the slaughter. This was not a battle of modern technology, but a brutal close-quarter urban knife fight that tested the Marines' resolve and training to the limit. At the heart of the drama were the fifty or so youn.