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launched an overland attack to their objective up in this area, Al Farnan Airfield,
and we were held up a little b~t by the weather, but by 8:00 o'clock in the morning,
the 101st Airborne air assault launched an air assault deep into enerny territory to
establish a forward operating base in this location right here.  Let me talk about
each one of those :noves.

      First of all,  the Saudis over here on the east coast did a terrific job.  They
went up against the very, very tough barrier systems; they breached the barrier very,
very effectively; they moved out aggressively: and continued their attacks up the
coast

      I can't say enough about the two Marine divisions.  If I used words like
brilliant, it woUld really be an under-description of the absolutely superb job that
they did in breaching the so-called i~enetrable barrier.   It was a cl~ssic,
absolutely classic railitary breaching of a very, very tough minefield,  barbed wire,
fire trenches type barrier.   They went through the first barrier like it was water.
They went across into the second barrier line, even though they were under artillery
fire at the time -- they continued to open up that breach.  Then they brought both
divisions streaming through that breach.  Absolutely superb operation,   a textbook,
and ~ think it will be studied for rnany, many years to come as the way to do it.

      I would also like to say that the French did an absolutely superb job of moving
out rapidly to take their objective out here,  and they were very, very successful, as
was the 101st.   Again, we still had the special forces located in this area

)

       What we found was, as soon as we breached these obstacles here and started
brin3ing pressure, we started getting a large number of surrenders. I think I talked
to so~~e of you about that this evening when I briefed you on the evening of the 24th.
We finally got a large number of surrenders.  We also ~ound that these forces right
here1  were getting a large number of surrenders and were Tneeting with a great deal of
success

     We were worried about the weather.   The weather was 9oing to get pretty bad the
next day, and we were worried about launching this air assault.  We also started to
have a huge number of atrocities of really the most unspea~able type committed in
downtown Icuwait City, to include reports that the desalinization plant had been
destroyed.  When we heard that, we were quite concerned about what raight be going on.
Based upon tbat, and the situation as it was developing, we made the decision thaL
rather that\ wait the following morning to launc?~ the rernainder of these forces, that
we would go ahead and launch these forces that afternoon

(Chart)

           This was the situation you saw the afternoon of the 2~th.   The ~arines contin-
     ued to make great progress going through the breach in this area,  and were moving
     rapidly north.   The.Saudi task force on the east coast was also moving rapidly to the
     north and ~aking very, very good progress.  We leunched another Egyptian/Arab force
     in this location, and another Saudi force in this location -- again,  to penetrate the
     barrier.  But once again, to make the enemy continue to think that we were doing
     exactry what he wanted us to do, and that's make a headloriS assault into a very, very
     tough barrier system -- a very, very tough mission for these folks here.   ~ut at the
)    sa~ ti~, ~hat we did is continued to attack with the Frencb;    we launched an attack
     on the part of the entire ~th Corps where the 1st Infantry Division went through,
     breached an obstacle and minefield barrier here, established quite a large breach
     through which we passed the 1st British Arrnored Division.  At the same time, we

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