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U.S. Army, the XO was ill at ease having
    Lieutenant Matthews on the staff. At five foot seven, Amanda Matthews had a figure that looked good even in her baggy BDUs. Her short blond hair framed a face that could only be described as stunning. The XO
    thought how terribly out of place she seemed. In a few minutes they would be talking about war, a real war that was going on as they sat there. A war that they were preparing to join. One tour in the closing days of Vietnam had shown the XO what war could do to people, mentally as well as physically. In his mind, he could not picture Lieutenant Matthews in battle. At home, yes.
    Modeling on Madison Avenue, yes. Crawling along a ditch, under fire, in some Godforsaken country, no. Lieutenant Matthews looked up at that moment and met his eyes. The XO felt himself blush, then turned away to continue his check of who was still missing.
    Lieutenant Matthews paused for a moment and continued to stare at the XO.
    She knew what was going on in his mind: Is she good enough to do the job?
    How well will she hold up when the shit really hits the fan? .. .
    Nothing changed. Every time she came into a unit, from 20 her first day at West Point to her assignments at Fort Hood, she had had to fight the same attitude. At least in the past she had not been the first or the only female officer in the unit. This assignment, however, was different. Since coming down to the brigade, she had been treated with the respect due an officer but not the confidence or trust that was accorded to the other junior staff officers. She had been warned by friends of hers on the staff of the 25th Armored Division that the brigade commander and the S-2 had fought tool and nail against her assignment. They had even stated that it was better to leave the position open rather than put a female in a tactical headquarters that would operate as far forward as the brigade would. In the end, the division commander had told the brigade commander to shut up and accept her. This he did, but reluctantly and with barely concealed hostility.
    She had been warned it was not going to be easy. She felt, however, as if she were starting with two strikes against her.
    Feeling rage slowly building, Lieutenant Matthews turned her thoughts away from her plight and to the notes she had for the briefing. She knew she was ready, having spent most of the previous night at corps G-2 reviewing every bit of information coming in on Soviet activities and Iranian reactions.
    She had rummaged through the files, dragging out every old intelligence report and study on the area that she could find. Her preparation even included a trip to the post library, where she had pulled everything she could find on Iran, from National Geographic articles to area study books.
    Maps of Iran were at a premium that day on Fort Hood. Everyone wanted one.
    That’s where having friends in the right place paid off. The 2nd Brigade was probably the only brigade in the corps that had a full range of maps not only of Iran but of the Gulf states and the southern
    USSR .
    With the XO’s announcement “Gentlemen, the brigade commander,” the briefing began. After being introduced by the XO, Lieutenant Matthews began her briefing with an overview of the topography and demographics of Iran. “Iran lies on a large plateau bordered in the south by the Persian Gulf, in the north by the Caspian Sea and the Soviet Union, in the west by Turkey and Iraq, and in the east by Afghanistan and Pakistan.
    Major terrain features are the Zagros Mountains that start in the northwest and run southwest, parallel with the Iraqi border, to the Persian Gulf. The second major mountain range, the Elburz Mountains, also starts in the northwest but runs almost due east, where it ends just short of Afghanistan.
    In the center of the country, between the two mountain ranges, are two large deserts, the Dasht-e-Kavir, or Great Salt Desert, in the north and the
    Dasht-e-Lut to the south. Dasht is a word