February 12, 1991

Dear Family and Friends:

Here is the 1st update letter, concerning Daron Stenvold's status in, as they call it, "The Theater of Operations in the Persian Gulf." Please bear with me, as your reading this, because I've taken most of this information in bits and pieces and that's pretty much how I've composed it!

Daron is currently stationed in the Port city of Jubail, Saudi Arabia. It sits directly on the waters of the Persian Gulf and is approximately 100 miles south of the Kuwait boarder. He is in a Motor Transport unit that has responsibilities of moving supplies, ammunition and troops, in and around the front line. They have also had several convoy's to other cities, such as Mecca Juda, Elkabrit and Dahkran(?Dammam?). At the time of his first phone call, they hadn't received any U.S. Military vehicles yet, so they were using local, civilian commercial trucks. Because of this, Military personnel were not allowed to drive these civilian vehicles, so he was riding shotgun for a Philippine National. His camp is stationed about 1 mile from a setup of Patriot Missile batteries. You may have heard on the News about battle ships, like the "Wisconsin", that have been firing those huge 16-inch guns that can fire 1,900 pound shells! Well, he said that they can hear and FEEL those Navy guns firing, 24 hours a day, and remember, those ships are up to 100 miles off of the coast! It boggles the imagination to actually experience that kind of fire power, even from that far away! I sure would hate to be in Kuwait, taking the wrath of those ships, head on!! So far, they have been driving about 20 to 40 semi's per day to the front line and back. Also, they only drive the trucks, they don't actually load or unload them. This means that they only spend an absolute minimum time at the front.

So far, he feels that he has luxury accommodations, compared to how some of the other GI's are living. Mail arrives every day, at least 1 to 2 full semi loads of letters are dropped off every time mail comes in! Speaking of mail, there is an addition to his mailing address that we need to give you. Please add the words "B Company" to the second line:

Stenvold, Daron J. Cpl. 502-70-2774

6th MTBN - B Company

I MEF

FPO San Francisco, CA 96608-9501

I mentioned in the last letter that they had formed into groups of 4 Marines. Now, they've formed into new groups of 18 people. Even though they are stationed in Jubail, be aware that they are constantly on the move. So, if you here news reports that Jubail had been hit by S.C.U.D.'s, chances are very good that Daron will not be in the area.

To take a step back, before actually arriving in Saudi Arabia, Daron flew in a converted (painted over) TWA 747. His flight took him from California to New York, then onto Rome and then finally to Saudi. They had about an hour layover in New York. He was able to walk around the terminal and take some pictures there. They were not allowed to leave the plane in Rome. While on their final stretch into Saudi, Daron was walking around the front area of the 747 and the cockpit door was open, so he decided to take a closer look. At about the same time, the pilot was coming out of the cockpit area and noticed Daron trying to get a closer look. So then, the pilot says, "Would you like to watch my seat while I take a Nature break!?" So there's Daron, flying a 747 at 40,000 feet over the sands of a desert in total darkness! HeeHee It took the pilot about 5 minutes to return. There were five pilots in the cockpit area. Before the pilot had to "regain control" of his aircraft (HeeHeeHee) he asked Daron if he'd like his headlights on - he did - and Daron said he flipped those babies on and it was incredible - he said the beam of light must have shown for at least a mile or two, straight ahead! He's never seen anything like it. While flying over Saudi Arabia at night, Daron said it's remarkable, there are lights everywhere! The entire desert is all squared off with rows upon rows of lights. It's the weirdest thing, every road is lit up, even though there is no population around those roads. His plane finally landed at 1:05 a.m., on 1-19-91. At the end of this letter, I have included a word-for-word letter that Daron wrote me, that describes more details on his arrival. So, I'll wait until then to type more on this.

The food is the absolute worst tasting @#&%! he's ever tasted! But, all of their water is bottled water that is shipped from the states! There are no garbage cans in Saudi! Arab's dump ALL of their garbage into the sand and out of their windows when driving! Also, all of their raw sewage is dumped directly into Persian Gulf! So, in other words, they have been told not to even touch the water, because they will probably get some sort of disease! Saudi has the ugliest cats! They are big and skinny, very scary looking and mean! They back away from humans, when approached. Daron compares them to toxic waste dump animals! There is no real milk in the desert. It comes in "Hi-C" like boxes that you stick straws in the top! Yuk!

So far, here are the dates and times that I've talked to Daron:

1-24-91 at 1:00 p.m. for 1.5 hrs.

1-27-91 at 3:20 p.m. for .5 hrs.

2-02-91 at 6:00 a.m. for .5 hrs.

2-09-91 at 6:30 a.m. for 1.5 hrs.

It looks like I'll be paying about $1.60 per minute for these hummers! Eeeek! Oh well, you can't put a price on hearing his voice, knowing that he is safe!

He reported that on the night of 1-26-91, they were called into 4 code reds (i.e. SCUD attacks) were they jump into "Mod 4's". That is, they jump out of bed, grab all of their equipment, put on their chemical suits and gas masks, and jump into a bunker\fox hole. Gee, that's how I'd like to be woken out of bed!! Because of the threat of chemical attacks, everyone over there has been required to take a number of different drugs. He has told me about one: Pyridostigmine Bromideusp, 30 mg. every 7 hrs. Here's the dumb thing about this. They were not supposed to take those until AFTER a chemical attack. But they were told to start taking them immediately! Some jerk gave them the wrong information!! So then the side effects hit. For about four days, his throat was swollen nearly shut every morning! For other guys, their arms were numb and they couldn't feel them! Needless to say, Daron said screw it, and stopped taking them. Then they found out a few days after that, that they weren't supposed to be taking them! So, if there are any doctors out there, we'd like to find out more about this drug! All we need is for this thing to turn out like that "Agent Orange" did in Vietnam. Who knows if they are using are guys as guinea pigs for experimental drugs!

Here is some information that I got from a call from Daron on February 2, 1991. It was phone call #3:

It's Saturday afternoon there. He's still in Port Jubail, SA. The actual town name is just "Jubail", SA and that is where the locals live, but "Port Jubail" has been assigned the name of the place where all of the military personnel live. He volunteered, out of sheer boredome, for a one week guard duty assignment, then he found out two days later that those assignments were changed to become thirty day duties. He's not happy about that. His shift runs from 10:00 a.m. til 2:00 p.m., and he sleeps from 10:00 p.m. til 5:30 a.m. He says his days are now starting to get very long and boring finally. Part of his unit was assigned convoy duty to the Red Sea and back, to pick up military trucks and supplies and bring them back. He really wanted to do this, but he was already assigned guard duty. He also said that he wants to get back into driving to the front line and back, carrying supplies and ammunition. This sounds kind of bad to us when we here this, but you can imagine the sense of comradery these guys feel when they here about fighting on the front line, and these people in the rear feel so helpless that they can't be there to help them out. Everyone wants to be there to back everyone else up. He spends his free time playing football and playing cards, so far he has plenty of time for mail. He has already gotten about 6 pieces of mail. He called from a place where they have military stores setup where you can buy alot of things that you could buy stateside, like yesterday, he bought a Walkman cassette player. They have alot of phones setup, but he had to wait 1.5 hrs to get to use this one. He was also washing clothes while he was at this area.

On the home front: About a week before the fighting actually started in Saudi, three friends and I made a pact that, if the fighting actually started, we would all get flat-tops in support of Daron! Well, everyone else, but me, chickened out! So now, I'm basically completely bald on top!!! My hair was originally 2 inches below the collar, so it's quite a change! Actually, I like it! I never have to worry about my hair getting messed up when it's windy out! HeeHee Daron had mentioned that he would like some T-shirts made for his unit. He would like them to say: "My Unit was saved by P.M.S." And on the back of the shirt, the P.M.S. stands for Patriot Missile Systems. Kinda cute huh?! So I went to a print shop and I'll be sending those off to him shortly. Note: His unit was attacked by S.C.U.D's the first week they were there. The first one landed about a mile from them, in the desert, and the other was intercepted by a Patriot, pretty much over their heads! He said it was very scary, because you could actually see the damn things and it almost seemed supernatural because you know that that thing is going to kill something, and you could actually see if before it explodes!

I was watching CNN the other day and saw a segment that showed how you could send letters to Saudi Arabia over the computer! And because we have a computer at home, that would be perfect! So I went out and bought it. The software for your computer that enables you to do this is called Prodigy. How it works, is you type your letter while running the Prodigy software, press the "Send" key and that's it! Then, almost immediately, your letter is received electronically in Saudi, a printout of it is made and then it's just a matter of routing that piece of mail to the right person. Kind of like an inter-office piece of mail! They said it takes only 3 to 5 days for it to be delivered! Currently, mail is taking anywhere from 10 to 15 days. So besides calling, this is the fastest way to get him information!

Here is some information that I got from a call from Daron on February 9, 1991. It was phone call #4:

Like we said earlier, the food is horrible! But, breakfast is the only fairly good meal. They have real eggs, french toast, and pancakes. For lunch, they have Spam(not quite) bread & beans. For dinner, they have steak(nasty, not from cows!). There is a Saudi version of a McDonald's across the street from where they are camped. It has real french fries which taste just like the real thing back here! They also have a variety of Pop, like Team, Sprite & Pepsi.

Here is the specifications of his weapon: It's an M-16 A2; it has 5.56 caliber bullets; it weighs 6lbs without ammo and 8lbs with a 30-round clip; he carries 6 magazines(clips) with him at all times; he also has a 120 round Bandolier belt. That is basically a belt that has spots for you to plug in individual bullets.

His current guard duty hours are from 6 to 10 in the morning and from 6 to 10 in the evening. There are only 2 guys from his unit that are on this particular guard detail, him and a buddy named Tom Huesman. They basically stand guard against terrorist attacks on the base. There have been only 2 nights in which they have been put on Delta Alert(that is the highest terrorist alert). The first time, a white car came through the gates un-announced and another time, a green car looked suspicious. They both turned out to be O.K., though.

The current rotation for going to the front lines is this: you spend 30 days on the front line, then you get 2 weeks of liberty. The only place where they can really spend this "vacation", so to speak, is aboard the ships that are docked the in harbor. Jubail is a major docking station for all of the allied battleships. Most of the duties that they have are to move supplies, ammunition and people around on the front line. Currently, they wear white (tan) camis during the day, but switch to the familiar green ones at night. The white ones glow too much at night! Also, it's just the opposite of what you might think, the white ones are much hotter that the green ones, so it's kind of backwards for the fact that they have to wear the hot ones during the day, and the cold ones at night!?!?!? This morning it was only 56 degrees. Daytime temps reach into the 90's.

They've just setup 100 phones near Daron's camp. The satellite dish is as big as a house. Last night, while on guard duty, he watched as his whole unit got shipped to the front. Daron and Huseman were left behind because of guard duty. They took 2 semi's, chock full of hand grenades and small arms weapons with them. Over the last two days, Daron has seen over 80 semi loads full of ammo, being moved to the front lines. So, as you've been hearing in the News, they are DEFINITELY gearing up for a ground war! There are no T.V.'s over there, so everyone listens to the Armed Forces Radio Network. They basically simulcast live broadcasts of CNN. The U.S. has been dropping leaflets (that basically say surrender) along the border of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. I've told Daron to grab some of those babies and save them!

People call the Saudi civilians "Nationals". That is because there are so many different groups of Arabs that speak different dialects of Arabic, that it's just easier to group them all into one name. The local Arabs are absolutely scared to death of the Saudi Police! The closest thing that Daron can compare them to is that they are like the Nazi SS men or Mafia hit men. Apparently, they kill people at will and for no reason! I'd tell you some stories about them, that Daron has heard from some Nationals, but they are way too graphic for this type of letter! Basically, the Nationals tell the American GI's that there is only one thing that is worse than death in Saudi, and that is to get pulled over by the Saudi Police!!

Another weird thing about Saudi Arabia: there are NO garbage cans! All trash is simply thrown right out the windows of the vehicles! Daron said you wouldn't believe the roadsides out there! The current mood of the approximate 2,000 guys at the Jubail Military camp, is that everyone feels bad that they can't be at the front lines, helping out their guys! So far, only five guys have freaked out about getting shelled at night or getting killed.

There is a Medevac Helicopter pad, a hospital and an airstrip right next to there tents. Despite what you hear on the News about the LOW number of Allied casualties, Daron says he see's several body bags coming off of the Medevac helicopters every single night, seven days a week! Not a pleasant sight, knowing that he may know some of those people.

While driving on convoys throughout Saudi, they stop at many truck stops along the way. There is this one in particular that is Daron's favorite. You can buy a 1/2 Chicken for $3.00, and it's damn good tasting real Chicken! He says that the front line troops have better food, which is understandable. The Saudi's pay for all of the food that the Allies eat. I believe that that is their contribution to the costs of War.

Our troops have plenty of time to shop in Saudi supermarkets. Daron says the best way to buy stuff is with Arab dollars. They exchange American money for Arab money, then they buy things with the Arab money, not the American dollars. Here's why: He had to pay $10 American dollars for a small ream of paper, where as if he had had Arab money, he would have only had to pay $3.00! Apparently, the Arab's cherish an American dollar bill as if it were gold!

The military trucks that they drive have 50 mm machine guns mounted to top of cabs! While riding shotgun during a recent convoy, Daron was forced to "Lock & Load" his M-16 on a National who freaked out while driving their truck! He wouldn't drive any further for fear of being hit by bomb. So basically, Daron popped a shell into the chamber of his gun, pointed it at the National, and told him to drive or else.

Saudi Motors is the local company that supplies all of the vehicles that they've been driving. You may have heard on the News about that one main road in Saudi that people have termed "Hell Highway" or "Death Road". Well, everything you see or hear about that is true and even more so! It's a two lane road that stretches about 550 miles near the Iraq - Saudi border. Apparently, for Saudi's, it is a matter of losing their pride, if they lose a race on this road. So, whenever you see two trucks racing side by side on this road, you have to drive onto the shoulder to miss them, because a Saudi would rather die than to lose a race!!! They simply will not give up the road! Man, what a country!

He says the sheep and lambs of the region are incredibly ugly! They look as if they've been under nuclear experimentation or something! The camels are extremely friendly. Whenever they see cars and trucks coming down road, they walk into road to greet them. Consequently, alot of them end up getting run over. Pictures of females, of any sort, are strictly forbidden by Saudi Law. If a National get caught with girlie pictures, they lose a body part on the spot! Another example of the Saudi Police I described earlier. It's extremely windy there! A gun will jam with only a few specks of sand in chamber!

Daron told me about a group of military guys that had stopped on the side of a road to get some pictures of some camels that were there. Well, a camel ended up spitting on one of them, so this guy turns to his huge "tank-killing" machine gun and blew the camel into a million pieces! Well, some Saudi's saw this happen and the guy was arrested! He ended up with and $18,000 fine for the life of that camel and several of it's future generations! I guess they like their camels!!

Daron now has two types of cassettes that he can listen to over there. The regular cassettes that fit into boom boxes and also those Micro-cassettes. Those super tiny little cassettes. He says that it would be great if people can send him tapes, in addition to letters! I think that it would be great if he could hear everyone's voices! Also, don't listen to News reports that say you can't send certain stuff! You can send them anything you want! Also, everyone that he knows of in his unit, is getting mail.

Daron says that he will pick up the rank of Sergeant by the time he returns. I plan on having a week long party when he returns, so if anyone wants to make it down here to welcome him home, there will be plenty of celebrating for everyone!

If you would like to send mail to people who are not getting mail, here's the address:

Any Soldier

Operation Desert Storm

APO New York 09848-0006

As far as writing letters to Daron, alot of you, along with myself, are struggling with not knowing what to write or what to say, without sounding silly or something. Just write about daily activities, like, I wrote him about when I went shopping the other day, a semi just about rear-ended me, I had to park a mile away from the door, and had to wait 45 minutes in line!!! Or write about things that happen to other people that you know. Or write about your childrens activities at school. I'll also be sending him postcards that have lots of snow in the pictures, so he can get a sense of what he's missing! HeeHee.

Welp, I guess that's about it for now. Remember, Daron can listen to cassette tapes, so tape one off some night, when your just sitting around watching T.V. or something. That'll be really good for him to hear your voices!

Jason D. Stenvold

13900 Chestnut Dr. #222

Eden Prairie, MN 55344

(612) 937-5691

Marine Brother!

P.S. Drop Daron a short note at least once a week!!!

I thought that I would include a letter that Daron wrote me on 1/21/91. I've copied it word for word so that you can get a sense the real Daron talking!

"It is 0700 Monday morning. I've been up since 0100. I went to bed around 1700 last night. Since yesterday morning, there are 28 of us who have been just waiting to leave on a truck and supply run. It is 15-17 hrs. one way to pickup some Military trucks and supplies, then we go back and drop the supplies off at the front line, which sounds like it is Kuwait right now. Then we bring the trucks back here. Right now, we are right on the shoreline of the Persian Gulf, at the Port of Jubail. It is about 90 miles south of Kuwait."

"Our plane arrived around 0100 on Saturday, at and air strip about 30 miles north of here. After we were unloaded and got our gear, we just waited out in the sand, away from the lights of the airport, until about 0530 when we finally got a bus to bring us here. We had to wait awhile because they thought a S.C.U.D. Missile had hit this base, but they later found out there was a sonic boom from a jet, then a coincidental fire in a building. After we got here they told us that this is a receiving area to check us in, then we are going towards the front line and we are going to be the supply link to the front. We got these Anthrax shots in the arm - boy did they suck! It still hurts. Sunday morning I had the worst cold and I could barely move my arm. They also gave us pills to take every 12 hours. This is to make us 80% immune to a known biological attack from the Iraqis. We finally got to bed around 2330 Saturday night then we got up at 0500 Sunday morning. We filled sand bags all Sunday morning then we got Sunday afternoon to be on stand-by for our run, so I washed my desert camies then I was asleep by 1700."

"It is a great set-up here. We are in tents with cots, 18 of us to a tent. We have showers: a tent with hoses hanging from the ceiling with sink sprayers on the end. Above the tent is this huge black bowl that they put water in and that is your water and water pressure. The water is ice cold. They also have a chow hall setup. The food is REALLY bad though, the milk is warm, but it is better than the stateside MRE's that we eat (Dry food in a bag)! Last night, the rest of our people from California showed up. They flew in on a C-5. I guess we came 1st class."

"Well, I guess that is about all I can think of to scribble for now, it sounds like we should be leaving on our convoy around 0800 this morning. I guess I feel well rested and I want to get out and see more of Saudi, so here we go. I guess we are driving through areas where Americans are not allowed to go, so it could be interesting. Oh yeah, the Saudis, they are weird, across the street there are some Hiessians or something like that, that are trying to get us out of here and they have snipers that are expected to start shooting at us soon. there are also British troops down the road."

"It's Wednesday now, yesterday was a real exciting day. In the morning we took a bus to Dahkran(?Dammam?) to pick up 40 semi's to bring back here. While we were there a S.C.U.D. landed and pieces from it hit at a gas station across the street from where I was standing, waiting for the other trucks to form a convoy. We had put on our Gas Masks when the alarm sounded, but the warhead did not have any chemicals in it, so we were able to remove our Masks. When we got back here we were attacked by S.C.U.D's again, this was wild, we saw the S.C.U.D's coming. Two of them overshot us and landed harmlessly in the desert. The other one was destroyed by a Patriot Missile. We were called to Mop Level 4 ( the level where we put on our full chemical suits), but were immediately given the all-clear, because none of them hit us."

"Last night I had a duty of bringing a load of ammo to the front line. That was a charge. I drove and my A-driver ran the 50 caliber machine gun mounted on top of the truck. We had to go right to the border of Iraq. Mortar rounds were blowing all over us. What a scare. All you can do is just drive and hope you do not get hit. Last night on CNN, they had said that the Port of Jubail had been hit by the S.C.U.D.'s, when they actually missed us. So, if you ever here things like that again, now that you know where I am, remember, I may have been somewhere else, or it may have been a bad report."

"Oh yeah, before I close, I just realized I never said anything about where I am living. For now we are sleeping in tents on a tar lot, 16 of us in a tent. We have cots to sleep on. I already wrote about the showers. Our meals come from a chow hall(tent) and tents are setup to eat in. It is an entire area setup of tents (like a M*A*S*H setup). We are right next to the shore of the Persian Gulf, which helps keep it cool. No matter where we are, we carry our gas mask and rifles, in fact, we have to sleep with our rifles(My rifles name is "Tey", pronounced "T", that's short for Toni). Whenever we leave our tent area(tent city), which is about a one block area, then we wear our flack jackets, 782 gear( ammo, water, bayonet, first aid kit, helmet) or Alice pack with a Mop suit in it and a few other miscellaneous things that we would need if we had to be out in the field for a couple of days. Over at the Motor pool, there is a Van that the Saudis sell stuff from. Pop and little goodies like that. I guess that's about it."

And that was the end of Daron's letter.