Today is October 23, the anniversary of the Beirut barracks bombing, and I've been thinking about a group of Marines who were at sea that same morning, headed toward Lebanon. Within 48 hours they were landing on a different island entirely. Sunday marks 43 years since Operation Urgent Fury, and the 22d Marine Amphibious Unit's part in it is one of my favorite examples of what "ready" really means.
A change of course
The 22d MAU was built around Battalion Landing Team 2/8, Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 261 and MAU Service Support Group 22. They embarked at Morehead City, North Carolina, on October 17, 1983, aboard five Navy amphibious ships, USS Guam, Trenton, Fort Snelling, Manitowoc and Barnstable County, bound for a peacekeeping rotation in Beirut. According to the Marine Corps Association's Leatherneck, the ships were ordered to change course late on October 20, and at 10 p.m. on the 22nd the MAU was told to make for Grenada. The reason was concern for the safety of roughly 600 American medical students and other foreigners on the island after a violent coup there.
The plan gave them about a day to get ready. The Marines would take Pearls Airport and the nearby town of Grenville on the island's northeast coast, with H-hour set for 5 a.m. on October 25.
Plans change, Marines adapt
The original idea was a dawn landing by helicopter and amphibious tractor at the same time. Then the surf report came in: Navy SEALs scouting the beaches said amphibious tractors "might land with great difficulty and other landing craft not at all." So the plan changed. Two rifle companies would go in by helicopter instead.
Shortly before sunrise, CH-46 Sea Knights escorted by AH-1 Cobras put Company E down near Pearls. Antiaircraft guns in the hills fired on a follow-on wave and were quickly silenced by the Cobras. Company E held the airport by about 7:30 a.m., and Company F secured Grenville by about 6:30 a.m. Locals pointed the Marines to weapons caches and helped them spot soldiers who had swapped their uniforms for civilian clothes.
The day wasn't free. Marine Cobras sent south to support Army Rangers near Point Salines took heavy fire, and two were shot down. Three Marine aviators were killed. One received the Navy Cross and two received the Silver Star, all posthumously. A CH-46 crew flew into that fire to pull out a wounded pilot.
Turning the whole MAU around overnight
What gets me is what happened next. Company G, still aboard ship, got a new mission that evening: land at Grand Mal Bay on the west coast and relieve a SEAL team pinned down at the governor-general's residence in St. George's. Amphibious vehicles came ashore in the dark and had a beachhead by 7 p.m. Tanks and heavy gear followed through the night. Helicopters moved Company F around the island before dawn. By the next morning the Marines had reached the residence, relieved the SEALs, and taken Fort Frederick without a fight. The battalion even sent its artillery battery ashore as a provisional infantry company when it needed more riflemen.
On November 1 they did it again, landing on the nearby island of Carriacou by air and sea. It was taken without a shot fired. The Marine Corps History Division's account lays out the whole sequence, and the Joint Chiefs' official history notes that the operation, along with Beirut that same month, added momentum to reforms in how the services fight together.
Why it sticks with me
I spent my enlistment, 2014 to 2018, as an Airborne and Air Delivery Specialist. A lot of that job is planning for a drop that may not happen the way you drew it up. Weather changes. A drop zone moves. The 22d MAU's week in Grenada is the best example I know of what we were trained to do: write the plan, expect it to break, and keep moving anyway. They left North Carolina for one mission, changed course for another, and did it while hearing the news from Beirut about Marines they knew.
If you served with someone from 2/8 or HMM-261, this weekend is a good excuse to send that text.
Semper Fi.
Sources: Marine Corps History and Museums Division, U.S. Marines in Grenada, 1983 (PDF) · Leatherneck (Marine Corps Association): Grenada, 1983, Operation Urgent Fury · Joint History Office, Operation Urgent Fury (PDF)
