It's 1:30 a.m., February 12, 1991. Twenty-five thousand feet below the
A10 Warthog lies the Iraqi desert, chilled to a temperature of 25° F. The
A10 rolls out from its lofty perch, silently dropping to an attack altitude
of less than 250 feet off the desert floor. The pilot flicks on the infrared
gunsite and arms the awesome 30mm gauttling gun. He mutters to himself,
"Yep, there they are, lined up like a shopping mall parking lot."
Six months prior to this encounter, Saddam Hussein parks 1,500 heavy tanks
on the border between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Hussein has crushed the tiny
oil-producing country of Kuwait and now appears ready to invade the
oil-producing giant with which it shares a common border.
Alarmed by ominous signs of another invasion by the Iraqi strongman, the
United States responds by deploying its elite 32nd Airborne Division to
Saudi Arabia. Saddam Hussein continues to threaten the Allies with "the
mother Of all wars" as he steadfastly builds and reinforces his huge military
machine along the Saudi border.
By mid October it is discovered that Iraq has been burying these heavy tanks
in the sand, leaving only the gun turrets sticking out. It is Saddam's
intention to use these tanks, spread out along the Saudi border, as a line
of artillery. By camouflaging the guns and turrets sticking above the
ground, Iraq effectively made these units invisible from the air and any
ground surveillance units.
November 1990, America shifts its Keyhole-satellite into position over the
Iraqi desert. The 55-feet-long, 12-ton spy satellite takes pictures of the
cold desert floor during the twilight hours. "Big Bird," as the ground crews
call it, has infrared scanners capable of detecting a temperature difference
of only 1/2 degree from its lofty perch of 155 miles.
Originally designed to detect underground missile silos (a silo's
temperature is slightly warmer than the surrounding earth), it was placed into position to take pictures of the buried tanks. The tanks would heat up during the
hot daylight hours and continue to hold heat long after the rest of the
desert cooled during the night. The buried tanks showed up on the satellite photo like neon signs. The exact location of each tank was then plotted on a
target map and given to American and British pilots who systematically eliminated them.
However, Big Bird photographed more than buried tanks. To everyone's
amazement, a thin red line (heated areas show up as red on infrared photos)
coming from the ancient site of Rameses in the Land of Goshen (Egypt),
ran eastward, skirting the East Side of the Red Sea. "So God led the
people around the desert road toward the Red Sea" (Exodus 13:18).
The line went first to Succoth, lying just northeast of Rameses. It was
Here the children of Israel, as they left Egypt, first stopped and
Collected the bones of Joseph (Exodus 13:19, 20). The line then extended
onward to Etham, and then over the high plateau of the Sinai Peninsula,
finally dropping down onto what is today called The Gulf of Aquaba, the easternmost finger of the Red Sea.
One need only look at map of this area to realize that the children of
Israel were now trapped. In front of them was the Red Sea Coming from behind them to the northwest was Pharaoh's army. They had been led by God Himself into what appeared to be a trap.
But, the thin red line emerged from the east side of the Red Sea and
continued onward, eventually ending up in present day Saudi Arabia at the
foot of a 3,465 foot mountain known as "Jabal al Lawz" (Mountain of God)-the
real Mount Sinai!
The satellite photo team stared incredulously at the photo! A red line, as
if drawn by God's own finger, traced the exact route of the exodus. When the
Gulf war finally ended, archeologists went back into the region to discover
how it was possible for a 3,500-year-old trail to exist well enough to show
up on satellite photos.
They found that a million plus people, with all their livestock, pulverized
the desert sand into a fine, flour-like powder. During the desert nights,
the humidity rises to levels of near 100%, thus wetting the powdery sand,
making a concrete-like substance. Through the years, this highway was buried
by shifting sands, protecting the trail from the elements. During the day
it would heat up like the tanks, and being more dense than the surrounding
sand, continue holding the heat longer into the cold nights! A coincidence?
Not even!
Remember what God told Moses to say to Pharaoh 3,500 years ago, "But
Indeed for this purpose I have raised you up, that I may show My power in
you, and that My name may be declared in all the earth"
(Exodus 9:16 NKJ).