The captain has challenged his platoon to eat a one-gallon drum of chocolate pudding in six minutes or less–a daunting task, even for grunts who have conditioned their stomachs for days with runny scoops of “ice cream eggs,” as they refer to breakfast. On the pudding front, Arnett is failing miserably, the desert sun sealing the leftovers in a slimy brown skin. Arnett looks disgusted as he nurses a belly full of chocolate. “Out here,” he says, “you do anything to keep yourself amused.”
Commanders refer to Arnett’s unit, the Army’s Third Infantry Division, as the invasion’s “blunt trauma force,” a collection of M1A1 Abrams tanks, howitzers and Bradley Fighting Vehicles that could quickly propel American riflemen into the country within days. Massed in the Kuwaiti desert, the Third Infantry is ready to surge north as soon as President Bush gives the order. “Things could happen very fast,” Lt. Col. Ernest “Rock” Marcone, Arnett’s battalion commander, tells his men. “Once things get going, it’s going to be cats and dogs, hair-on-fire crazy.”
The men realize that the craziness is almost certainly imminent. While they haven’t been given their orders just yet, they too are tracking the tense diplomatic countdown to war and waiting for President George W. Bush’s Monday address to the nation. They know they could be seeing action very soon. But for now, at least, the soldiers of the Third Infantry are locked in a battle against monotony.
Nature has provided little entertainment here. Troops have taken to calling their mission “Operation Enduring Boredom.” “It’s Groundhog Day here,” says Capt. Kelvin Brown, of Bartow, Ga., referring to the movie in which Bill Murray lives the same day over and over. “Every day is Groundhog Day.”
In the bleak sandbox that makes up most of northern Kuwait, all amusement is imported. Outside the mess tent, Marcone has erected a satellite dish in the sand. It gets 95 channels, but it is almost always tuned to Fox News. Last night even Marcone–who usually spends his days poring over grid maps and satellite images–is kicking back on what may be his last few days of quiet. He’s got his feet up on a box of bottled water, watching “Battleground,” an old black-and-white World War II movie starring Ricardo Montalban.
What’s not imported is invented on the spot. Arnett’s guys play their own version of trivial pursuit in the mornings, with soldiers asking questions over the Humvee’s radio. Other grunts capture a three-foot lizard, put her on a leash and name her “Helga.” Other wildlife is less welcome. “Kangaroo rats,” which get their name because they can jump, can be seen wandering amid the tents at night, looking for their own ration of pudding.
Rats are only one of the curses nature has cast on the Kuwaiti desert. About once a week violent sandstorms seem to blow through the billets, toppling tents and scratching eyeballs. Some soldiers wear gauze patches over tender eyes. Sgt. Jennifer Wheatley, 26, of Belleville, Mich., stands squinting with her head cocked and her back to the wind, the rains of sand crusting her lashes and eyebrows. “I’ve had my fair share of this,” she says. “I’m ready to switch over to the softer side.”
When the wind slows and the sun comes out, soldiers practice their drills to keep busy. Civil affairs personnel hold classes on how to search prisoners and civilians. The instructors are meticulous, teaching grunts basic Arabic (“Halt!” “Hands up!”), and things like how to pat down a Muslim woman. But sometimes the subtlety is lost on the grunts. “Let me go!” says one as he twists away, playing the recalcitrant Iraqi. His buddy wrestles him to the sand. “I told you f—er, we would have took care of you,” he says. “Now look at you!”
Back at Marcone’s headquarters, his senior officers have gathered for the nightly 8 p.m. meeting. The night’s highlight: The unit’s Air Force liaison has obtained some stunning satellite footage of their planned invasion route, which they project from a laptop onto one of the tent’s white walls. Marcone and his commanders finish watching the footage and raise the lights. The intelligence officer, who keeps track of the weather, has forecast a major sandstorm. A faint breeze starts to blow through the tent, growing stronger as the meeting goes on. The canvas walls start to flap and flutter. It becomes hard to hear Marcone. The fluorescent light above the commanders’ heads starts to shake, and fine swirls of dust begin to kick up along the tent’s floor. Marcone adjourns the meeting and steps out of tent. Sand falls from the sky like snowflakes, the beginnings of a desert storm to come.
