It reads like a novel; it sounds like a film script ... As an American naval lieutenant explores the Jordan.

It's not the Alcan Highway; it's not the New York Thruway ... But in Saudi Arabia the impact may be the same.

In the heat of the day they rode, and in the cool of night... And across the fiery sands and through the driving rain.

Of siege and victory, and a horse running toward the sea... The memories of a man who was there to see it all begin.

Off the barge at Ras Tanura came the truck and the traps ... And headed north to Shedgum and the waiting GOSP.

In massive ruins at the end of a green and fertile plain ... Mighty Baalbek, cornerstone of the Roman Empire.