THE DECADE IN REVIEW: Swayze Inspired Troops, Saved America
12/31/09—WASHINGTON, D.C. Senior Defense Department officials agree that the turning point in the War on Terror came in December of 2003, with the capture of Saddam Hussein in “Operation Red Dawn.” The arrest and trial of the former dictator helped sap the morale of Iraqi guerillas. But as important as Hussein’s arrest was in Iraq’s transition to democracy, the real key was the name, which came from a 1984 Patrick Swayze film about young Americans fighting a guerilla war against Soviet invaders.
“It was sort of a joke at first,” said Undersecretary of Operational Nomenclature Stephen O’Connell. “We saw one of the posters in the elevator for the monthly viewing of “Red Dawn” in Secretary Rumsfeld’s rumpus room, and thought, hey, it’s as good a name as any.”
“A month later, when we were tipped off on the sighting of Mullah Omar in Kandahar, we joked that the name might have been a good luck charm, so we decided to call that one ‘Operation Steel Dawn.’ And after that mission’s success, it just sort of took on a life of its own,” O’Connell said.
Al Qaeda leader Abu Yasir was captured in "Operation Road House" in November of 2004. The intelligence gained from his interrogation led troops to bin Laden lieutenant Abu Muzaham in "Operation Point Break" in January 2005. Muzaham, in turn, gave the military the information it needed for "Operation Dirty Dancing", which led to Osama bin Laden’s arrest in the mountains of Aghanistan that March.
Bin Laden’s capture accompanied a profound change in the Bush administration’s political fortunes. When news of the mission’s success hit the airwaves, Vice President Cheney was on Capitol Hill, answering questions under subpoena about his role in the ’04 Halliburton Scandal. Congressional Democrats had even called for Cheney’s resignation. But those calls quickly ended when President Bush marched into the Senate, and, with a cry of “Nobody puts Baby in a corner!”, carried Cheney on his soldiers to a triumphant joint press conference.
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