Beirut was dozing in the midday sun, its odd little civil war out to lunch, when the unbelievable word raced across the city: "There's a fleet off the airport!" Curious crowds gathered on the sandy knobs along Lebanon's shore line; bikini-clad lasses turned over on the beach to peer out across the blue-green sea. Silhouetted against the sun that danced hazily on the choppy waters were three transports and two LSTs, flanked by two destroyers that moved in 500 yards from shore. In the classic pattern that precedes an amphibious assault, the beetlelike small craft that carry men to the beach were already circling their mother ships.
"They're coming in!" shouted the crowds on shore, still uncertain at that historic moment whether "they" were British or Americans. At 3:04 p.m. on a Tuesday, a small scout craft from LST 1164 churned past a welcoming party of three Arab youngsters, ground ashore. The mouth of the landing craft flew open, disgorging U.S. Marines in battle gear.
Marines in Wonderland. On "Red Beach" at Khalde, five miles south of Beirut, began one of the strangest of all Marine operations since the first leathernecks landed in the Bahamas back in 1776. As planes of the U.S. Sixth Fleet whizzed overhead, amphibious tracked vehicles mounting twin-turreted machine guns, their armored sides tightly buttoned, the drivers steering by periscope, lurched from the sea like hippopotamuses. Tension written on their young faces, sweat dripping from their brows in the 90° heat, marines in full 90-lb. battle pack, lugging an awesome array of Tommy guns, Garands, bazookas, mortars, machine guns and grenades, pounded waist-deep into the surf, regrouped at water's edge and pushed up the hill toward Beirut International Airport. Above the roar of the boat engines came the first historic growl of a Marine sergeant: "Come on, you bastards, get going up that beach!" A red-mustached sergeant waved his men on, shouted: "They're supposed to have mortars, and you're all bunched up. You don't want to live long."
The "they" to whom the sergeant referred were the pro-Nasser rebels who had been resisting for 60 days the legally elected pro-Western government of President Camille Chamoun. The marines—and their commanders—had no way of knowing when their operation began, whether U.S. forces would be opposed or not. All the normal precautions had to be taken, but Alice arriving in Wonderland could hardly have found the situation more confusing. The marines were met not by rebel fire but by ice-cream vendors selling Eskimo pies, and the renowned traders of Lebanon pushing soda pop at 50¢ a bottle, triple the morning price.
"Watch out for the kids swimming in the water," a U.S. naval officer warned his landing-craft coxswain. "How do you tell a rebel from a good guy?" asked a Marine corporal.