Forged in Desert Storm

March 19, 2008
By Bill Sontag
Feature Writer

“The guys that I took over there all came back with me. We trained very hard, and we were very good at what we did.” Ben Ruston Jr., facility manager, Amistad National Recreation Area, went into the Middle East with a team of 15 soldiers, and his gratification is rooted in getting the job done well with nobody killed.

Twenty-six career commendations notwithstanding, Ruston is proud, but not immodest about his 23-year career with the United States Army, the last chapter of which was written under combat conditions in the Middle East. 1st Sgt. Ruston served in both Desert Shield and Desert Storm, meaning he not only helped protect Saudi Arabia and U.S. interests there from the depredations of Iraqi aggression, but participated in the invasion of Iraq that ended the regime of President Saddam Hussein.

“I’m an airborne combat engineer,” Ruston, 52, affirmed, as a cursory explanation of his role in the war-torn deserts half a world away. His duties there centered on skills in building or repairing infrastructure that ensured troops, materials, and vehicles could surmount obstacles standing in the way of prosecution of the Gulf War, but it was Ruston’s nearly legendary leadership qualities that were more highly prized by those around him.

In 1989, even before Ruston was deployed to the Middle East, Command Sgt. Maj. Harold Lane rated his performance in an Equal Opportunity leadership assignment. Lane called on descriptive phrases, such as “Absolute dedication to his mission”; “Not a ‘yes’ man”; “The best and most effective EO NCO I have known in 25 years of service”; and “Military bearing and appearance are outstanding.” Similar accolades followed Ruston for the remainder of his distinguished Army career.

In Iraq, Ruston earned a bronze star, Army Commendation Medals and the Meritorious Service Medal. Characteristically, he downplays all of them, but still they hang on his office wall, reminders on his bad days that there have been worse, and was then commended for his performance. Ruston will always doubtlessly exude “military bearing,” a gruff politeness, physical fitness, strength of character, a passionate work ethic and zero tolerance for dishonesty, traits he grew up with, plus another of his own: Independence.

His dad had a noncommissioned officer’s career that exceeded his son’s by only a year, but with a couple of important differences. Ben Ruston Sr. was in the Air Force. “And he liked flying planes a lot better than jumping out of them. He was a lot smarter than I am,” Ruston said with a trace of a grin. His dad’s career began in the old U.S. Army Air Corps, 11th Airborne Division, three years before the USAF was carved out as a separate armed service. Ruston Sr. served—both jump—qualified and glider—qualified—with U.S. occupational forces in Japan at the end of World War II.

He left the Army in 1949, and only a few months later joined the U.S. Air Force. On Dec. 29, 1955, he and Paula Dean Lindsey Ruston brought Ben Junior into the world at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. Ben Ruston Sr. served with distinction in the 310th Air Commando Squadron in Vietnam.

The Ruston couple met while serving as training instructors (TIs) at Lackland Air Force Base. “But back then, when a WAF [Women in the Air Force] got married, she had to get out of the service,” Ruston said, adding, “But I was really in the service from the day I was born. I was in ROTC in high school in Fort Worth. Then I was the only 16-year-old senior in high school to get a four-year scholarship.

“Which I tossed out the window on my 17th birthday, and went and joined the Army. Five of my friends had already been killed in Vietnam, all of them former ROTC cadets,” Ruston said. He and his scholarship had already been accepted at Trinity University, San Antonio. Thinking back to tossing his scholarship papers to the wind, Ruston reflected, “It wasn’t a smart thing to do, but I just decided to join the world. And not be under my mother’s and father’s care anymore.” A moment of melancholy passed, and Ruston denied any regrets.

Only five years after enlistment, Ruston’s company commander, Capt. Timothy Clapp, D Company, 1st Engineer Battalion, 1st Infantry Division, Neu Ulm, Germany could hardly find enough words to prophecy a future for Staff Sgt. Ruston. “SSG Ruston is the most outstanding NCO I have encountered in my career … superior intelligence, dedication, initiative … sincere and tireless devotion … integrity and moral standards beyond reproach.” Clapp’s recommendations were unusual: “Promote to E-7 immediately. Assign as a platoon sergeant or battalion operations sergeant. Send to any military or civilian schooling to further his career. Recommend Reserve Officer Commission.”

Clapp also mentioned Ruston’s facility with the German language as an asset. German? “I hated living in barracks over there. I wanted to be in the community—living on the economy — so I got permission to live off post. I loved skydiving and reading, so I taught myself to read, write and speak German,” Ruston explained.

In 1990, before deployment to Desert Shield, Ruston was assigned to Central America. On TDY in Honduras, he and his peers conducted “Host Nation Civil Action” projects and small unit training. With the Honduran military, Ruston helped train that country’s troops in small unit tactics, basic marksmanship, and airborne assaults in each of five 90-to-120-day blocks.

More than a decade before President George W. Bush launched Operation Desert Shield to help defend the Saudis from an attack by Saddam Hussein, President Jimmy Carter commented in his Jan. 23, 1980 State of the Union speech, essentially creating U.S. policy in the Middle East.

“Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force,” said Carter, giving Bush part of the justification he needed to commit troops, munitions and materielle to the roiling Middle East conflicts.

On Aug. 7, 1990, the U.S. moved into Saudi Arabia. Ruston explained that Desert Shield was a stop-gap measure to halt the advance on Iraqi forces into Saudi territory, something of a line-in-the-sand notice to Hussein. Ruston arrived in Saudi Arabia, Oct. 4, 1990. “It involved a lot of special operations and clandestine operations,” Ruston said. Hussein was testing U.S. resolve. “Kuwait was already taken. They were hip-to-hip in Iraqis over there,” Ruston said.

“One example was an Iraqi feint with the equivalent of an air mobile battalion into Saudi Arabia, and they got completely overwhelmed. It was a helicopter air assault to attack a Saudi air base, and they had just two objectives. First, to make a small, tactical victory just to make it into Saudi Arabia, creating havoc on the King Fahad airfield, and then to have an unbelievable political and propaganda victory,” Ruston said. The effort was repulsed, failing completely.

Ruston’s engineering skills and powers of observation in previous assignments proved useful in enhancement of a major supply route along Saudi Arabia’s northern border with Jordan and Kuwait. Tapline Road runs the length of that border, in a northwest to southeast direction, and American troops needed aircraft access to it near King Khalid Military City. Ruston queried his commander of the 20th Airborne Engineer Brigade, Col. Robert Flowers, why the road could not be used as runway. “Some E-7 Air Force genius went out and tried to dig his heel into the 15-inch asphalt, paced off the distance between a parallel four-foot-diameter oil pipeline and the road, and said, ‘Yeah, this’ll work,’” Ruston chuckled.

Vehicle traffic on the busy corridor seemed problematic until Ruston recalled road design on the German autobahn with removable barriers and pull-offs as rest stops. He suggested building a graded berm over the pipeline, a parallel road on the opposite side of the pipeline to re-route road traffic, and repeating the construction more than a mile down Tapline Road to complete a detour around what would become a 6,000-foot runway for ingress and egress by C-130 “Hercules” cargo and transport ships.

At the midpoint of the new “runway,” Ruston and the other combat engineers built a cargo apron off to the side. “We used marl [lime-rich mudstone] and sweet crude [oil] to bind it all together. And we had the whole job ready for use in 12 hours. The C-130s began landing on it the next morning.”

When Desert Storm commenced to re-take Kuwait and put an end to the Iraq regime of Saddam Hussein, Ruston went in as NCOIC (Non-Commissioned Officer-in-Charge) of an assault command post for the 20th Airborne Engineer Brigade. According to Ruston, his unit was accompanied by the 6th French Light Infantry Division, a successor of the historic French Foreign Legion. He also served as operations sergeant major for the brigades.

“So I was always on top of battle plans for the 18th Airborne Corps. But I did day-to-day coordination with the French Light to be sure we weren’t shooting at each other, and that we were focused on shooting Iraqis. We hurt the bad guys, and took prisoners when we could,” said Ruston. A unit on the move had few opportunities to process captured Iraqi soldiers, he explained.

“We once took 53 prisoners at one time, and just took them to Main Supply Route ‘Texas,’ pointed them south to go to other units that could handle them,” Ruston said. The captured men gave little resistance, and did as they were told. “They were real hungry, real thirsty, and just wanted cigarettes and for us to stop shooting at them.”

Col. Flowers developed a policy of “assured mobility” to be certain that supplies and troops could negotiate the harsh terrain of Iraq with its sharp, nearly volcanic-textured rock and coarse escarpments. “We ran ‘kill-dozers,’ road graders across the desert so the rubber-tired Hemmet vehicles carrying fuel, ammunition, rations and water could negotiate, then spread light crude from water trucks to keep the dust down,” Ruston said.

The vehicle trains traveled in arroyo-style depressions called ‘wadis’ and had to climb out of them to stay on trajectory to destinations, and the graders were used to blow down escarpment walls to provide a negotiable grade. The engineers then spread chemical lights on the paths across the desert, broken to reveal infra-red light seen only by special goggles for night navigation.

Today, Ruston scribbles intricate maps with unit designations, timeframes and orders of battle, demonstrating a still-vivid recollection of the plans and complicated actions as the battle for Iraq commenced. Desert Storm began on Jan. 17, 1991, with an enormous air assault of as many as 1,000 sorties (individual flights) daily. “My basic job in Iraq was to provide command, control, and communications for the 20th Airborne Engineering Brigade and its subordinate units,” Ruston said. “But the job of combat engineers is to be prepared to fight their way into a combat zone, do their engineer work, and, if necessary, fight their way out.”

After six months and five days, Ruston was pulled out and allowed to return home on March 3, 1991. He had made it to “Objective Brown,” about 225 miles into Iraq from the Kuwait border, or about 100 miles south of Baghdad. “The reason we were successful in Iraq is because you use your unrelenting force to get the job done, and the end result of that will usually be less collateral damage than if you hold back.”

Ironically, what Ruston sees as a pathetic “holding back” of available forces demoralized him, contributing to his decision to leave the armed forces. The 1993 Battle of Mogadishu, Somalia, Africa, became a tragic debacle during which 18 Americans were killed in a vain attempt to use an assault force of Black Hawk helicopters, Delta Force Army Rangers, and Navy Seals to capture top members of a murderous clan headed by warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid. For Ruston, the calamity was personal.

“I lost a lot of friends when they sent the Rangers into Mogadishu, and I know for a fact that there were assets that could have played a role in saving many, if not most of those guys. There were three AC-130 gunships that were available, but the Clinton administration didn’t want to commit them, afraid of ‘collateral damage,’” snapped Ruston, still seething with anger.

“That Secretary of Defense, [Les] Aspin under Clinton, would not give the release to use the 130s or Task Force 160 helicopters. This was just one of several tragedies that President Clinton precipitated while he was in office, and that failure at Mogadishu is what emboldened the Al Qaeda terrorists, giving them a massive dose of steroids,” Ruston said.

Ruston retired from Army duties, mustered out at Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, March 1995.

His other reason for coming home to Devine, Texas, was simpler, but no less compelling. “My dad was seriously ill with chronic heart disease, and I wanted to spend some time with him,” said Ruston.

Later, he took his engineering skills, leadership experience and professional approach to management to Castroville, becoming public works director for two-and-a-half years, then went to work for the Immigration and Naturalization Service as an inspector at the McAllen Port-of-Entry, 1998-1999.

In May, 1999, Ruston applied for and got a job on the Building and Utilities Crew of Amistad National Recreation Area, and three years later rose to the facilities manager’s position he now discharges with the same zest and meticulous attention to detail that have characterized Ruston’s many careers.

Ruston is a member of the Masonic Lodge, and is a Third Degree Master Mason and a 32nd Degree Scottish Rite Mason. He spends his weeks in Del Rio, and weekends back in Devine with his mother. 