36 Years Ago Today...

[peteg59]

...we lost 220 Marines in Beirut Lebanon...RIP Marines...

On October 23, 1983, 220 Marines were killed at a Marine compound in Beirut, Lebanon. This attack has been deemed the deadliest attack against US Marines since the battle of Iwo Jima during WWII. On the morning of the 23rd, a truck carrying 2000 pounds of explosives drove onto the Marine base and crashed into the barracks. The origins of the attack was traced back to Hezbollah--a militant and political group that was established in 1982 in Lebanon. As the truck entered the compound, no one questioned it's presence, it wasn't until it suddenly veered off course--plowing into a wire barrier and between two guard posts. By that time, however, it was too late to do anything to prevent the coming attack. The entire building was destroyed, flattening the structure and all of those that were trapped within; in total there were 241 US military personnel--220 Marines, 18 Navy sailors, and 3 Army soldiers--were killed, with 100 more injured. For an event rarely talked about in today's world, it signaled the beginning of a new norm of warfare that the United States would be facing.​

 

[ol' school]

Thanks for the share Pete. May they all RIP...

 

[Gideon]

Thank you Pete, may they all RIP.

 

[Sully]

Salute..........

 

[FuzzyWuzHe]

I was one of the sailors that was off the coast when that happened ... about 20 of us volunteered to go dig for survivors and bodies ... not a pretty sight ... had nightmares for months.

RIP Marines ... Prayers for their families.

36 Years ... dang I'm getting old.

 

[peteg59]

I was one of the sailors that was off the coast when that happened ... about 20 of us volunteered to go dig for survivors and bodies ... not a pretty sight ... had nightmares for months.

RIP Marines ... Prayers for their families.

36 Years ... dang I'm getting old.

Was in the Med too.

Ship I was on at the time, (Capodanno FF1093), provided NGFS off shore of Lebanon for the Missouri so they could grab a couple weeks of liberty.

The Mighty MO did most of the heavy lifting but with all of the ships in the Eastern Med at the time, combined, we shelled the city and buildings in the port area of Beirut into a ghost town afterwards.

Not much said in the media about the retaliation at the time, but that was before 24/7 news and the interwebs.

 

[FuzzyWuzHe]

You could always tell when the Might Mo was angry ... they fired right over us ... you could hear the shells fly over ... very impressive. You couldn't see the MO, but, you could hear the shells.

I was on the USS Virginia, we were off the coast of Beirut about a mile or two providing gun fire support for over a year ... with a couple of days off here and there for liberty, I never got to leave the ship because it was the only times we got to shut down the engine rooms for maintenance.

We sat in the same spot, just spinning shafts so they didn't warp every 2-3 minutes for like a month. You could throw a cigarette butt over the side, go on watch ... and it would still be there when you got off watch ... not really ... but you could watch it for a long time ... it was amazing that you could get used to the 5" 54 going off at all hours day and night. There was an ammo loading tube in my berthing compartment that brought shells from the ammo storage below us to the gun above us ... we always knew when they were shooting ... LOL

We mainly provided over the horizon radar support ... It was the closest I was to combat when we dug the marines out, body armor, kevlar helmets and gloves ... really not good duty. We got shot at a few times by snippers ... fortunately hey weren't very good.

The ship had a 26' boat with explosive come at it (we exploded that with the 50 cals) ... lots of other minor things. We used to go sit in the dark on the main deck and watch the tracers flying around on land. I can't imagine getting used to 24/7 combat .. my hats off to those that were in country in any combat actions.

I was there to shut up Khadaffi (-5sp), (USS Enterprise), got to go through the Suez canal on that one, we were in the Indian Ocean and they wanted another carrier in the Med. Also was in Persian Gulf One (USS Arkansas).

I also "got to go" on several DEA/Coast Guard Drug Ops off Panama (USS Arkansas, was on the Arkansas for 8 years), We actually got to sink a drug "mother ship" on one of those. The drug dealers tried to scuttle it, but our rescue and assistance team boarded it with the Coast Guard and prevented it from sinking. The DEA and Coast Guard guys that were riding with us (they had law enforcement authority and we had over the horizon radars and guns) found 2.8 billion in cocane and 750 million in Weed (Street Value) on board. They captured the crew of 9 and the DEA guys brought them onboard and got them to turn on the Cartels, then they were helo'd off and turned over to Interpol, who had several warrants on them.

The whole op was secret for two years, guess they were acting on the intel the DEA got. We got letters saying we could now discuss it ... LOL. Although the drug ship didn't sink, it was sitting very low in the water and the DEA, Coast Guard and our Captain requested permission to sink it as a "hazard to navigation". We got permission and backed off about a mile or two and took target practice at it ... only took like three shots to sink it (smallish freighter). All the drugs except small amounts kept as evidence were sunk too ... Lots of high fish that day.