The U.S. Army\u2019s Second Brigade of the Third Infantry Division was part of the force that invaded Iraq in March of 2003.\xa0 It raced out of Kuwait in Abrams tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles across open terrain, fighting a battle for which they'd trained. Mechanized infantry combined with the tank sledgehammer brushed aside any resistance losing more vehicles to maintenance than enemy action.\xa0\xa0Things and the plan changed when the Second Brigade made it to Baghdad.\xa0 Instead of encircling the city of seven million people and trying to clear it block by block with dismounted infantry, the decision was made to make a rapier armored thrust into Baghdad, seize the centers of power, and cause Saddam Hussein\u2019s regime to collapse from within.\xa0 That is what the Second Brigade did and what is chronicled in David Zucchino\u2019s \u201cThunder Run: The Armored Strike to Capture Baghdad.\u201d