Prepositioned stocks of munitions and equipment in the theater helped
enormously. The Air Force had stocked approximately $1 billion worth
of fuel, munitions, and equipment in the Gulf states and aboard 3 mari-
time prepositioned ships. These stocks represented approximately 3,500
airlift cargo missions for Air Force stocks alone and a total of over
10,000 sorties for all Services. The importance of this prepositioning can
be grasped by noting that the total of all intertheater airlift sorties during
the first phase of the deployment (August to November, 1990) amounted
to just over 6,000 sorties.’

Prepositioned munitions accounted for about half of the tonnage
eventually dropped in the war, but the proportions of specific munitions
varied. The prepositioned stocks represented a mix of conventional
ordnance-Mk-80 series general-purpose bombs, Vietnam-vintage cluster
bombs, and some laser-guided bomb components. However, the muni-
tions ashore did not contain the latest technology weapons for security
and safety reasons.? As a result, many more precision munitions were
brought to the theater than were included in the prepositioned stocks.

Early in the deployment, CENTAF had to rely on whatever munitions
were available in the prepositioned stocks, but matching those munitions
with aircraft was a difficult and time-consuming problem, with some units
having access only to the munitions with which they deployed. CENTAP
established a priority of critical munitions—primarily items for the conduct
of defensive operations—but these priority munitions did not arrive in the
theater for up to six weeks.

On a more positive note, aircraft maintenance achieved excellent
results. One factor leading to this success was the attention given to
securing needed supplies and spare parts described earlier. A second
major factor was the Air Force’s innovative concept for establishing
centralized maintenance support centers. Engines, for example, were
serviced in Europe and on Guam rather than at the individual bases in the
theater, giving better efficiency to the entire process. Establishing such
centers on the theater’s bare bases would have overstrained the base
support structure, Even so, theater maintenance was a major effort, and
one measure of that effort was that approximately 38 percent (17,000) of
all Air Force personnel deployed in the theater were maintenance person-

"For much of this material, airlift would have been inefficient use of the aircraft,
but the material could not have been available as soon in any other way.

13(§) Intvw, AF/LGSP personnel, 2 Apr 1992.

213



term, their destruction would prevent the employment of such weapons in
the Gulf War. Planners believed that the Iragi nuclear weapons program
had not gone beyond research, but they believed Iraq fully capable of
using both chemical weapons and Scuds.” In the long term, the objective
of security and stability in the Persian Gulf required eliminating Iraqi
weapons of mass destruction along with the Scuds that could serve as their
delivery means. Planners knew that the Iraqi ballistic missile force had
mobile Iaunchers, some number of which would escape destruction and
fire their missiles. But although the Black Hole had planned since August
1990 to attack the fixed Scud sites, neither that group nor anyone else had
devised, before the war, a search-and-destroy scheme for dealing with
them. The planners in the Black Hole, like CENTCOM’s leaders, regard-
ed Iraqi ballistic missiles (even with chemical warheads) chiefly as nui-
sance weapons that might cause political difficulties for the alliance (par-
ticularly if Israel were to retaliate against the Iraqis). They viewed the
missiles as posing little tactical or operational threat to the Coalition and
intended to reduce the offensive threat they represented by attacking fixed
Jaunch sites, support bases, production facilities, potential hide sites, and
support facilities for mobile launchers, but not the launchers themselves.”

Military support facilities and naval ports and facilities were natural
target sets. Several other target sets (railroads and bridges, electric power
production, and oil facilities), while undeniably forming a part of a
country’s military power, also served a country’s nonmilitary economic
power and its civilian populace.”' Here, planners attempted to affect the
military support provided by these entities while limiting the damage in
other respects. The Black Hole did not, however, attempt to avoid incon-
venience to the Iraqi population. Rather, they wished to inflict disruption
and a feeling of helplessness on the Iragi public without bringing about
severe suffering—all in the hope of weakening Hussein’s grip. As a result,
planning for attacks on the industrial power of the country had a dual
nature. On the one hand, the objectives were to “cripple production” and

?9(S) Brig, Maj Gen Robert Johnston, CENTCOM Chief of Staff, to Joint Staff and
National Command Authority, “CENTCOM Offensive Campaign, “10 and 11 Oct 1990,
in rep (S) CENTCOM J-5 Plans, Augmentation Cell, Afier Action Report [Vol 1X SAMS],
Tab C, 28 Feb 1991, GWAPS, NA 259.

3(S) Target list (with objectives for each target category, including Scuds), GWAPS,
BH, Other Documents, Folder 8.

"Many of the telecommunications targets would also fall into this category.

43



insensitive to the amount of physical destruction actually inflicted on
German aircraft production.

Paralysis as a Goat

Finally, theorists had long argued that air power could disorganize and
paralyze an enemy's military industries and operations, as Allied bombing
of Germany sought to do in World War Il. In the Gulf War, the Coalition's
strategic-operational goal of the air campaign, particularly during the elabo-
rately planned first two days, was more ambitious: to paralyze Iraqi nation-
al leadership by destroying its telecommunications, strategic air defenses,
and air force. As described in Chapter 3, the Coalition achieved impressive
successes, especially against Iraqi strategic air defense.

Operational Thresholds

The majority of the military systems and operational concepts central
to the Desert Storm air campaign, then, had historical antecedents. Most of
the technologies had seen service in earlier wars." Even the low-
observability (or stealth technology) of the F-117 was not new. The plane
had first taken part in combat during Operation Just Cause in Panama on the
night of 20 December 1989," and stealth technology aimed at eluding radar-
based air defenses had helped to protect the SR-71 for decades."

But even if the technologies and concepts were not new, the ways in
which Coalition air forces applied them often were. Moreover, as Soviet
military theorists had tong observed, quantitative changes in the conduct
of war have a way of becoming qualitative transformations. It is not
surprising, then, that knowledgeable observers, including a number of
officers involved in the planning and conduct of the Desert Storm air
campaign, concluded that they had witnessed something “revolutionary”
in the Gulf War. In this war, air power crossed some operational thresh-
olds that, if not as obvious as the initial use of a new weapon or opera-

"STARS was an important exception.

“Out of the Black,” Lockheed Horizons, May 1992, p 51. This issue of Lockheed
Horizons, subtitled “We Own the Night,” was devoted entirely to the F-117 program.

"Barly F-117 Program Set Pattem for B-2, A-12, A-X; No Prototypes,” Aerospace
Daily, 11 Jun 1992, p 411; also Bill Sweetman, Stealth Aircraft: Secrets of Future
Airpower (Osceola, Wisconsin: Motorbooks International, 1986), pp 14-21.

242



division, moving south to north and from west to east in the theater.
Highest attrition took place in the western frontline divisions; lowest in
the divisions in the northeast corner of the theater.”

A related issue to Iraqi attrition of equipment is their loss of person-
nel during the air war. Central Command produced no estimates of Iraqi
personnel losses during or after the war, nor did the 1991 Department of
Defense Conduct of the Persian Gulf War. Sraq itself has given estimates
on number of Iraqi noncombatants killed but has not addressed its mili-
tary losses. The reports that addressed the number of soldiers in each
unit that were killed, wounded, or had deserted during the air war enable
some estimates of the size of the Iraqi Army in the theater at the begin-
ning of the ground war. Starting from a figure of 336,000, the estimated
personnel manning the Iraqi Army at the beginning of the air war as de-
scribed in Chapter 1, the Iraqi Army saw desertions of 25-30 percent. In
addition, they suffered a smaller number of casualties to the air attacks—
probably less than 10 percent of the force. As a result, the remaining
strength of the Iraqi Army by 24 February numbered approximately
200,000 to 222,000.

The air interdiction, the damage to the communications and supply
systems, along with the equipment attrition during the air war, clearly
affected the Iraqi soldiers beyond the inflicting of casualties during that
period. The Iraqi soldier, by and large, lost his determination to fight.
The Iraqis did not defect or surrender in droves during the air and ground
war because their armor and artillery were being destroyed (in fact,
statements by Iraqi prisoners of war indicate they appreciated the discrim-
ination of the air forces in aiming at the equipment and not them), but
because many were short of food and water. The true effects of these
attacks, in other words, came not from specific targets destroyed but from
the combination of targets attacked and the intensity with which the
attacks took place. ~

The pervasive impression left by the interrogation reports of prisoners
was the sense of futility felt by the Iraqis after weeks of extensive bomb-

ing. When the bombing started, their ground transportation began to

"Lower equipment attrition in the east would coincide with the far lower rate of
employment of precision-munitions by the Marine Corps and Navy aircraft used in that
area.

°**The following paragraphs draw on muliiple prisoner of war reports.

107



Figure 3
Coalition Plan for Ground Attack

As-Samawah
2

2p heey
tes
is doNastiyan IRAN

NEUTRAL

De fo trey as
tomenltcel ies) po

rd Saud mops
(elignment approximate)

SAUDIARABIA

Boundary roprosartaions ara natracessarty mur ttive

Postwar analysis confirmed this number of Iraqi divisions but con-
cluded that the number of troops, armor, and artillery in these units was
overstated. Most divisions deployed understrength, particularly those on
the front lines in the western part of the theater (total undermanning of
120,000)'? Also, Iraqi policy allowed frequent leaves, meaning that a
large number of soldiers, absent when the air campaign began, never
rejoined their units. The Survey authors judge that 20 percent, or 84,000

Such a disposition of divisions would make sense in light of the Iraqi anticipation
of a Coalition attack coming up the coast road or from the area of the Wadi al Batin (into
either the Iraqi TV or TM Corps areas). Note, however, that some units deployed at close
to full strength. As a result, any theater-wide assessments based on manning of frontline
units should be made with caution.



installation in relation to target systems any more than did the operational
planners and commanders. Regarding Iragi ground forces in the Kuwait
theater, Coalition intelligence provided remarkably complete tactical
intelligence on the locations and dispositions of the units there. U.S.
ground forces involved in the one-hundred-hour ground campaign seem
to have encountered no major surprises, especially in the critical breach-
ing operations: “The enemy was exactly where intelligence said he was,
disposed as intelligence described... .“° In retrospect, however, the
greatest gaps in intelligence on targets and target sets seem to have
occurred with things like Scud mobile launchers that were inherently
mobile or elements of the Iraqi nuclear weapons program that could be
moved out from under Coalition bombing and concealed.

From an intelligence standpoint, one of the clear success stories in
the Gulf War was the Coalition’s rapid neutralization of the Iraqi air
defenses and air force. The degree to which Coalition intelligence agen-
cies provided not only the relevant installations and associated order of
battle but furnished the requisite understanding of the Iraqis’ operational
weaknesses was truly extraordinary. As a result, Coalition air forces
could concentrate their initial efforts precisely against the weaknesses and
vulnerabilities of Iraq’s air defenses and air force. By contrast, the
Survey did not discern anywhere near the same sophistication on the part
of Coalition air efforts against the Iraqi field army in the Kuwait theater,
which largely became an exercise in incremental attrition. This asymme-
try seems to have arisen as much from the historical preferences of
Coalition operators as from weaknesses in Coalition intelligence. But it
suggests one area at least in which a closer relationship between opera-
tions and intelligence could bear fruit in the future.

Bomb Damage Assessment

Few assertions about the Gulf War could command as much agree-
ment as the inadequacy of bomb damage assessment (BDA), but the
Survey found no such agreement about the causes of inadequacy.
General Schwarzkopf told Congress that

“Brig Gen John F. Stewart, Jr., “Operation Desert Storm, The Military intelligence
Story: A View from the G-2, 3d U.S. Army,” April 1991, p 9.

138



The Black Hole’s ready access to targeting intelligence from national
intelligence agencies had the unfortunate effect of cutting Central Com-
mand J-2 and CENTAF Intelligence out of the communication loop.
Theater intelligence organizations continued to perform their functions but
found that planners rarely heeded their recommendations because they
could never advance their proposals rapidly enough to get them into the
fast-paced planning cycle. Even if the Black Hole had worked more
cooperatively with theater intelligence, a number of systematic and tech-
nical problems that lay beyond the ability of the theater people to solve
would have prevented a harmonious relationship. The Washington bypass
violated formal channels, but it worked. Operations planners got expert
intelligence more rapidly than otherwise might have been the case.

Targeting

The selection of target systems whose neutralization or destruction
will achieve the desired operational and strategic objectives has seldom,
if ever, been an easy or trivial matter. Uncertainties, gaps, and errors in
intelligence about targets and target systems have been the rule, and the
Gulf War proved no exception. On the one hand, Gen. Colin L. Powell
has argued that the intelligence available to the Coalition “was probably
the best in military history.”"” In light of the array of advanced collection
and reconnaissance platforms available to the Coalition, to say nothing of
the degree to which the Iraqis were blinded by Coalition air power, there
is considerable truth to this generalization. On the other hand, General
Powell has also acknowledged that theater and tactical commanders
expressed frustration after the war “over the lack of coordination and
timeliness in the dissemination of intelligence collected at the national
level.”* Among other things, a significant percentage of the target

"Gen Colin L. Powell, “Report on the Roles, Missions, and Functions of the Armed
Forces of the United States” (Washington, DC: CICS, Feb 1993), p I-13.

bid, p W-13.

133



Library of Congress’ Cataloging-in-Publ ication Data

Gulf War Air Power Survey.

D. .
Gulf War Air Power Survey directed by Elfot A. Cohen.
Includes an unnuabered summary report by Thomas A. Keaney and

Eliot A. Cohan.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Contents: v. 1. Planning and command and contro) ~~ v.
2. Operationsand effects and affectivenass -- v. 3. Logistics and
Support -- v. 4. Weapons, tactics, and tratning and space operations

-- v. 5, A statistical compendium and chronology.

1. Persian Gulf War, 1991--Aerial operations, American. 2. United
States. Air Force--History--Persian Gulf War, 1991. I. Cohen,
Eliot A, II. Gulf War Air Power Survay (Organization : U.S.)

III. United States. Dept. of the Air Force. IV. Title: Gulf War

Air Power Survey. Sumwary report.

DS79.724.UeG85 1993

956.7044 '248--de20 93-30601
cIP

For sale by the U.S. Government Printing Office
Superintendent of Documents, Mail Stop: SSOP, Washington, DC. 20402-9328
ISBN 0-16-041950-6



Table 3
Listing of Selected Munitions Employed in Desert Storm*
17 Jan-28 Feb 1991"

Expended
Munitions ii
Fin, Navy «Marine Total
General-Purpose Bombs
Mk-82 (500 Ib) 59,884 10,941 6,828 T1653
Mk-83 (1,000 Ib) 10,125 8,893 19,081
Mk-84 (2,000 Ib) 10,467 971 751 12,289
Mk-117 (B-52) 43,435 43,435
CBU-52 (fragmentation 17,831 17,331
bomb)
CBU-87 (combined 10,035 10,035
effects munition)

CBU-89/78 (Gator) 1,105 148 61 1,314
Mk-20 (Rockeye) 5,345 6814 15,828 27,987
Laser-Guided Bombs
GBU-12 (laser/Mk-82) 4,086 205 202 4A93
Air-to-Surface Missiles
**AGM-114 Hellfire Army =

+ (AH-64 and AH-1W) 2,876 30 159 3,065
AGM-65 All Models 5,255 41 5,296
(Maverick)
Notes:

*The selected munitions were those most often employed in the Kuwait theater.
Other types of laser-guided bombs and air-to-surface missiles were used in the war,
but not, principally, m the Kuwait theater. Totals given-are those employed on all
targets, however, not just those in the Kuwait theater. See cited tables for a listing
and totals of all weapons expended during the war.

**The Navy and Marine Corps also fired a total of 283 BGM-71 TOW munitions
from helicopters.

“Table derived from GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Tables 188, 189, 190, and
191; also Brfg, HQ DA, ODCOPS, “Aviation Division, Apache in Desert Storm,” nd, en-
closed in a folder, Army Aviation in Desert Shield/Storm (US Army Aviation Center,
FTR, AL: 1992), GWAPS, NA 337. Munitions shown are the principal ones used in the
Kuwait theater (some, but not many, of these weapons types were used elsewhere in Iraq).
Totals are for the war overall, however, not just those expended in the Kuwaiti theater.

103



Targeting in the Kuwait theater during the prosecution of both Phases
THI and IV employed “kill boxes” to orient the attacking aircraft. The
theater was divided on the map into squares (the so-called kill! boxes),
thirty nautical miles on a side, reflecting an already existing Saudi map
overlay system, The squares (subdivided further into four fifteen-by-
fifteen-mile squares) became the operating areas for attacking aircraft.
Sometimes the aircraft flight had a designated target within the kill box;
at other times the aircraft flight was left to find the most appropriate
target within the area.

The Final Plan

A final element of the air campaign came together before the cam-
paign’s initiation. Aircraft from U.S. European Command had been posi-
tioned at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey in hopes that the Turkish govern-
ment would permit air operations from its territory. While not critical to
the success of the campaign, attacks from Turkey would divert Iraqi
attention to the north and perhaps prevent the movement of more forces
into the Kuwait theater. Turkey gave its approval to the U.S. request just
hours before the beginning of the air campaign, and the aircraft based at
Incirlik, known as Joint Task Force Proven Force, added almost one
hundred additional combat aircraft to the air campaign. These aircraft
supplemented the Phase I strikes, hitting air defense, chemical weapons,
military supply, and industrial targets.* Black Hole planners did not
count on the Turkish-based force until the war broke out.

In December 1990, the planning efforts of the strategic air campaign
came together with the planning for subsequent phases, and a combined
operations plan emerged. The specific nature of Phase I of the plan and
when it would begin remained closely held secrets until just before its
initiation, so much so that most non-United States Coalition air forces
could not be included in the opening attacks. The size of the Coalition
air force allowed considerable flexibility in the air assets assigned to the
different segments of the air campaign, and the numbers also permitted
the first three phases to begin almost simultaneously. By 15 January, the
Coalition air forces comprised more than 1,000 fixed-wing attack aircraft

*4(S) CMSgt Jerome E. Schroeder and SMSgt Thomas L. Raab, History of Joint Task
Force Proven Force (Office of History, Hq, USAFE, 1991), pp 50-54.

52



were available for redeployment, since no Soviet threat existed. By January
1991, over half of the aircraft of U.S. Air Forces Europe were in the Gulf
or Turkey ready to support Desert Storm. As a result, fewer reservists were
needed than would have been the case several years earlier for a similar
deployment. Thus, the Air Force elected to call up only about 65 percent
(34,000) of the total number (52,000) authorized by the President, percent-
ages similar to those of the other Services.

Finally, the call-up of Reservists and selection of Air Force personnel
to deploy tended to mask rates of those not able to deploy. Since entire
units were not deployed, commanders could pick from volunteers and select
those most fit for combat duty. The Air Reserve, for instance, reported no
nondeployable personnel. Also, based on Air Force surveys conducted in
September 1990 and February 1991, only 1.7 percent of the military couples
with dependents were deployed, but a far higher percentage of single mem-
ber sponsors (of dependents) deployed-13.3 percent. Women make up 15
percent of the Air Force, but only 7 percent deployed. The most likely
explanation is that Air Force functional specialties that did deploy (crew
members, maintenance, and security police, for instance) had a lower per-
centage of women than overall Air Force percentages. In the early stages
of the deployment, there was some indication that women were not deploy-
ing on the first aircraft, waiting for clearer indications of the Saudi position
on U.S. Service women, but that concem was soon dismissed.

The Intangibles

American air commanders brought to the theater experience and expec-
tations that shaped the war as powerfully as any material piece of equip-
ment. Two wars in particular had shaped their attitudes. One, the Southeast
Asia conflict, seemed to offer cautionary lessons to Gulf War colonels and
higher who had participated in it two decades earlier. The second was a
war with the Soviet Union that never took place but that nearly all members
of the armed forces had trained for assiduously, preparing air forces in
various and generally useful ways for the air campaign against Iraq.

During Desert Shield, U.S. planners and commanders thought a great
deal about their previous warfare experiences, They cautioned one another
about the mass housing of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia, fearing a repeat of
the Beirut bombing of 1983. They refrained from fixating on the removal
of Saddam Hussein as a war objective, bearing in mind the frustrating hunt
for Manuel Noriega in 1989. No experience from their collective past,
however, compared with the lessons from Vietnam. Colonel Warden and
his Checkmate staff in the Pentagon referred to their draft plan for a cam-
paign against the Iraqis as “Instant Thunder’”—a not-so-subtle repudiation of

218



required geodetic coordinates. Due to problems with incompatible imag-
ery dissemination systems in theater, the Black Hole often ended up
trying to pass aimpoints to units with geographically rectified imagery
whose quality was nowhere near equal to the geodetic DMAAC coordi-
nates that could have passed through intelligence channels.” Inevitably,
passing less-precise coordinates introduced further friction into the target-
ing process.

These interconnected problems became particularly acute for certain
units that depended on high-quality, current imagery for mission prepara-
tion. Unfortunately, pilots often flew with outdated pictures of the target
or with no imagery at all. For some units, imagery was not critical. But
since imagery was a standard part of mission preparation materials, all
air crews had come to expect it. It was not good enough to read a
message that described the target and its surroundings; they wanted and
expected to see a picture of it. Although the intelligence community had
successfully provided imagery for target folders for crew study in peace-
time, the demand in wartime for imagery and imagery-derived products
was not met.*

From a campaign planning standpoint, one of the most far-reaching
decisions of the war was the selection of target. categories as contrasted
with individual targets. The Air Staff's Instant Thunder briefing, as pre-
sented to General Schwarzkopf on 17 August 1990, identified ten target
categories for an offensive air campaign against Iraq proper.“ With some
minor modifications the 17 August Instant Thunder target categories were
retained by General Glosson’s special planning group (the Black Hole) and
used throughout Desert Storm. It is possible to argue, based on the overall
success of the air campaign, that the limited intelligence data available to

intvw, Capt O'Connell with Maj Gen Glosson, 3 Feb 1992; Intvw, Capt O'Connell
with Maj Jack Gardner, USAF, CENTCOM Target Intelligence Officer, 5 Aug 1992.

“Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Appendix C, p 338.

“4(1) National leadership facilities, (2) national telecommunications and C3, (3) oil
distribution and storage, (4) electric power, (5) railroads (to which bridges were later
added), (6) nuclear/chemical/biological warfare capabilities, (7) military researchy
production/storage, (8) strategic air defenses, (9) airfields (particularly those containing
interceptors and bombers), and (10) Iraq's ballistic missile capabilities.

136



The final component of the Coalition's efforts to gain and maintain
air superiority consisted of attacks on Iraqi airfields. Over the first five
days, strikes against runway surfaces—particularly those strikes by Royal
Air Force (RAF) Tornados delivering from low altitude the runway-
cratering bomblets and area-denial mines carried by the JP233 system—
were used to limit Iraqi flight activity, Toward the end of the first week
of Desert Storm, the Coalition effort against Iraq's main operating bases
shifted from runway surfaces to hardened aircraft bunkers and shelters.
By then it was clear that Coalition fighters could shoot down virtually
any air-to-air opposition that the Iraqis might choose to put into the air.
At the same time, Iraqi flight activity had trailed off, which meant that
the value of attacks on takeoff surfaces was also declining. As air plan-
ners in both Riyadh and Washington quickly realized, it made little sense
to mount JP233 sorties against runways that the Iraqis were not using."°

The campaign to attack hardened aircraft shelters on Iraqi airfields
with precision-guided munitions began on the night of 22/23 January
1991 with attacks by F-111Fs delivering laser-guided bombs on about
half of the hardened aircraft shelters at Al Asad airbase.'’ The Iraqis then
began flying combat aircraft to sanctuary in Iran."*

Because only two Coalition aircraft, the F-117 and F-111K, carried
hard-target penetrators (the GBU-27 and the GBU-24A/B with the 1-2000
or BLU-109 warhead), and because Iraq had a large number of hardened
shelters (nearly 600) scattered throughout the country, the effort against
aircraft shelters would become a relatively slow campaign of incremental
attrition. Inevitably, this approach gave the Iragis an opportunity to play
shell games both on and off the airfields with their surviving combat
aircraft. By dispersing aircraft into the open on the airfields, they could
preclude Coalition aircraft from getting both a shelter and a combat air-
craft with a single laser-guided bomb. By moving aircraft in the open
regularly-every day or so-they could make it difficult for Coalition plan-

16There was much speculation during and after the war that the four GR-1 Tomados
the RAF lost before the last JP233 attacks on 21 Jan 1991 could be attributed to the
low-level ingress and delivery tactics demanded by the JP233 system. But, in fact, two
of these losses were due to radar SAMs, and only one of the four occurred on a JP233
sortie (Alfred Price, “Tornado in the Desert,” Air Force Magazine, Dec 1992, p 44).

“GWAPS Missions Database, entries for the 48th TFW, mission numbers 2601A,
2602A, 2606A, 2607A, 2611A, 2613A, 2614A, 2623A, and 2627A on ATO Day 6.

'8(8) “Fact Paper: IZAF Aircrafi to Iran,” 11 Feb 1991, GWAPS, CHC-10, p 1.

63





tions of computer and paper records that sometimes did not survive the
war. Organizations: (fighter wings, for example) placed very different
emphases on the accurate recording of some of the most important kinds
of operational data; the mission reports of many attack sorties, for exam-
ple, present inadequate information to determine what an aircraft had
struck and sometimes even where it had dropped its bombs.

The Survey has reduced the uncertainties surrounding many of these
numbers and the events that gave them meaning; it has not eliminated
them. It has attempted to frame and answer important questions about
the employment of air power in this war, bearing in mind that the issues
raised herein have more than a purely historical interest. The Survey
will, no doubt, help scholars seeking to improve our understanding of the
Gulf War. But it had as its most important audience the young men and
women, military and civilian, who will have to consider and create the
instruments of American ait power in the future. The Survey has endeav-
ored to render for them, in as clear a fashion as time and skill permitted,
a comprehensive account of how air power, and above all American air
power, shaped the confrontation with Iraq from 2 August 1990 to the end
of the Gulf War on 28 February 1991. Should the Survey’s reports prove
of use to them, they will have served their purpose.



|
i
|

Hl
|

nel.* All indications were, moreover, that there were not too many
Maintenance personnel in the theater; in fact, there were one-third fewer
than Air Force planners had anticipated would be needed to support the
number of aircraft deployed and provide the kinds of maintenance re-
quired under combat conditions.'*

Maintenance in-commission rates for Air Force aircraft also were
excellent, but whether they were better than in peacetime, as sometimes
claimed, is open to question. Differences between the peacetime and (the
largely ad hoc) Desert Shield-Desert Storm reporting systems make
comparisons inexact. Whatever the comparison, the rates achieved were
superb, considering repairs to battle-damaged aircraft and the harsh desert
environment. Other Services achieved similar in-commission rates with
their flying units, except for isolated problems. The desert environment
appears to have had little persistent effect on reliability, except for the T-
64 and T-700 helicopter engines (used on the CH/MH-53 and MH/SH-60
helicopters, respectively), which experienced sand erosion problems that
brought reliability to only one-tenth of rates anticipated.

Another tangible element of support was communications. Providing
ground and air communications and control throughout the theater of
operations forced Central Command to deploy entire systems. Central
Command immediately deployed satellite communication terminals and
eventually employed over 7,200 terminals and pieces of equipment that
were linked electronically to more than 63 communications, intelligence,
navigation, and weather monitoring satellites.'* In ‘comparison, only
3 terminals existed on land in the theater before 2 August 1990, This
communications explosion typified the increases taking place in several

'4(S) Briefing, AFMEA/MEMS, “Desert Shield vs Europe Force Projection/Support,”
Jan 1991; USAF Wartime Manpower and Personnel Readiness Team Desert Shield/Desert
Storm Electronic Database; USAF Statistical Digest: Fiscal Year 1991 Estimate, pp D-38
and D-48.

'SNo judgements are implied about the “correct” tooth-to-tail ratio. The ratios of
specialties of Air Force personnel would vary considerably depending on numbers of
engineering, sceurity, or other personnel, based on the operating environment, host nation
support, and so forth.

‘©(S/NF) Rpt, United States Space Command Operations Desert Shield and Desert
Storm Assessment, Jan 1992, pp 6, 16, 27, 34; Joint Stafi/J6Z Briefing, “Use of Satellite
Communications Desert Shield/Desert Storm,” undated; Col Alan D. Campen, USAF
(Ret), Gulf War's Silent Warriors Bind U.S. Units Via Space,” Signal, Aug 1991, p 83.
The above sources put the number of communications terminals at between 1,200 and
2,000.

214



AAA
AAR
AB
ABCCC

Abn Corps
AFB
AFHRA
AI

AIF
ALARM
ANG
AOR
ARCENT
ATACMS
ATO
AWACS
BDA

BE or BEN
BVR

BW

C3

CAFMS

CALCM

Glossary

Antiaircraft Anillery
After Action Report
Air Base

Airbome Battlefield Command and
Control Center

Airborne Corps (US)

Air Force Base

Air Force Historical Research Agency
Air Interdiction

Automated Installation-Intelligence File
Air-Launched Anti-Radiation Missile
Air National Guard

Area of Responsibility

U.S. Army Forces, Central Command
Army Tactical Missile System

Air Tasking Order

Airborne Warning and Control System
Bomb Damage Assessment

Basic Encyclopedia Number

Beyond Visual Range

Biological Warfare

Command, Control, and
Communications .

Computer Assisted Force Management
System

Conventional Air-Launched Cruise
Missile

257



Internal Look 30-35, 122, 123, 128,
139

IR (see infrared)

Iran 10, 12, 13, 18, 21, 29, 56, 57,
63, 64, 79, 87, 102, 110, 119, 126,
167, 227, 246

Iran-Iraq War 10, 18, 57, 79, 87, 110,
126, 246

Iraqi air force 17, 18, 53, 56-58, 64,
78, 89, 92, 125, 126, 159, 181, 227,
246-248

Iraqi army 7, 13, 19, 21, 24, 28, 49,
51, 53, 7, 78, 92, 93, 99, 100,
103, 106-108, 110, 112, 114,
116-118, 125-127, 152, 170, 176,
227, 246

Tragi navy 21, 93, 100, 102

Traqi target study 32

Israel 5, 17, 43, 84, 87-89, 120, 166,
186, 247

Maly 181, 199

Ivory Justice 2

IZAF 63

J

5-2 98. 124, 129, 131-133

3-370, 110

J-5 29, 34, 43, 48

Jaguar 199

Jamerson, James L. 166, 192

Japan 181

ICS (see Joint Chiefs of Staff)

ICSE 7

IJDOP 47

JFACC (see Joint Force Air
Component Commander)

IFC 7,10

JFC-E 7, 10

JFC-N 7, 10

Johnston, Robert 43

Joint Chiefs (see Joint Chiefs of
Staff)

Joint Chiefs of Staff 27, 29, 36, 37,
39, 42, 44, 70, 102, 127, 131, 146

Joint Directorate of Planning 47

Joint Force Air Component
Commander 5, 6, 62, 145-148,
151-155, 157-161, 240

Joint Intelligence Center 132

Joint no-fire target list 46

270

Joint Staff 37, 43, 127, 131, 147,
157, 193, 215

Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar
System 19, 110, 114, 178, 183,
192-194, 237, 242, 247

Joint target list 32

Joint Task Force 3, 16, 17, 52, 159,
165, 166, 192, 196

Joint Task Force Middle East 3

JOPES 208, 233, 234

Jordan 77

JSTARS (see Joint Surveillance
Target Attack Radar System)

JTF (see Joint Task Force)

Just Cause 46, 186, 226, 242

K

KA-6s 190

Kari 60, 125

KC-10 4, 187, 190

KC-135 2, 168, 183, 187, 190

Kelly, Thomas W. 70

Khafji 19-21, 23, 93, 99, 100, 105,
109-111, 117, 237, 246

Khalid, Bin Sultan al-Saud 5, 158,
175

Khamis Mushait 173, 175

kill box 52, 103, 105, 156

killer scouts 21

Kimmitt, Robert 45, 46

Kirkuk 243

KTO (see Kuwait theater of
operations)

Kuwait 1, 2, 4-7, 10, 12, 13, 15, 16,
18, 19, 21, 22, 23-25, 27, 28, 30,
33, 35-39, 44, 47-49, 51-53, 55, 56,
60, 64, 66, 67, 70, 78, 92, 93, 97,
98, 100, 102-105, 110, 111, 133,
114, 1§5-117, 122, 126, 127, 134,
138, 139, 141, 143, 150, 152, 154,
167, 170-172, 179, 181, 182, 183,
198, 199, 202, 222, 226-230, 240,
246, 249, 250, 251

Kuwait theater of operations 6, 11,
12, 60, 70, 78, 95-97, 106, 119,
120, 134, 150, 155, 251

Kuwaiti 1, 44, 46, 64, 78, 82, 104,
125, 198

Kuwaiti Air Force 1



What were the Instruments of Air Power?

Removing Iraqi forces from Kuwait required the efforts of many
nations, but the United States provided the bulk of the military resources,
air concepts for their employment, and the command and control structure
to implement those concepts. These truths apply to the air campaign as
well as to all other aspects of the war. On closer study, it becomes
apparent that in some areas the American effort constituted close to one
hundred percent of the whole; in others considerably less. Moreover, the
American armed Services provided different kinds of air power, reflecting
practices, concerns, and equipment characterizing each of the individual
Services. The following pages examine the composition of these forces.
to provide the reader with a better understanding of instruments of air
power and their complexity.

From outside the Middle East, four countries besides the United

’ States (Great Britain, France, Canada, and Italy) sent combat flying units.

Several more (South Korea, New Zealand, and Argentina) provided a
nominal number of transport aircraft (C-130s) and crews and others (the
Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Germany) sent air units to
Turkey as part of the NATO defense of that country against Iraq but not
to participate in Desert Storm. Gulf state air forces were from Saudi
Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates.’ U.S. air
assets were spread among the Air Force, Navy, Army, and Marine Corps,
including Army and Air Force Special Operations Command aircraft,
which flew more than 1,000 fixed- and rotary-wing sorties during Desert
Storm. Coalition air power also included cmise missiles, drones for
teconnaissance and decoys, and satellites for communications, reconnais-
sance, and weather observation. Elements of that air power moved the
forces to the region, reconnoitered the targets areas, controlled the em-
ployment of air forces, defeated the Iraqi air force in the air and on the

"Plus, Japan, S. Korea, Kuwait, and Italy donated (paid the cost of) a total of 200
airlift flights into Saudi Arabia.

181



Coalition attack helicopters saw action both in direct support of the
attacking Coalition ground forces and in conducting independent, deep
attacks behind Iraqi frontline forces, the latter attacks, conducted princi-
pally by helicopter units of the XVIII Corps." In several instances,
i because of low ceilings due to weather, blowing sand, or oil well fires,
~ only helicopters could operate successfully. Several deep operations (50
miles or more) by the AH-64s that accounted for significant destruction
of Iragi equipment took place in the final two days of the war.'” A
limitation for these deep sweeps proved to be the logistics and planning
required to support operations, particularly with the ground forces moving
q so swiftly. As a result, the first such deep raid did not take place until
i late on 26 February, with three more multibattalion attacks taking place
i during the day and evening of February twenty-seventh. The largest raid
on 27 February was conducted by AH-64s on the causeway crossing the
Hawr al Hammar, a key exit route from the theater (to be discussed
ae later); during the raid, the Apaches disabled many vehicles caught in the
congestion waiting to cross the causeway.’

ed in two phases. During the first phase, from the initiation of the offen-
sive to the evening of 25 February, aircraft attacked the reserve heavy
divisions (and the other Republican Guards divisions as well) in order to
destroy their capability to move or maneuver against the Coalition ground
forces. The second phase began after intelligence information indicated
(and airborne aircraft had confirmed) that a general retreat of Iraqi forces
was underway (evening of 25 February). From that time until the cease-

i
i
: E Air interdiction operations during the ground offensive were conduct-
i
i

"6 attack helicopters employed were the Army’s AH-64, Marine Corps AH-1W, the
French Army Gazelle, and the British Army Lynx. The Kuwait Air Force also possessed
Gazelle helicopters, but they were not employed as attack aircraft during Desert Storm.
The Army had AH-1s deployed to the theater, but there is no record of their employment
as attack helicopters.

‘Hg DA, ODCOPS, Aviation Division, “Apache in Desert Storm,” nd (hereafter
referred to as “Apache in Desert Storm”), enclosed in a folder, Army Aviation in Desert
Shield/Desert Storm (U.S. Army Aviation Center, Ft Rucker, AL, 1992), GWAPS, NA
337, p34; (S) Marine Corps Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol IV, p 113.

i 08 4 rmy Aviation, pp 86-108; “Apache in Desert Storm”; 8th Air Support Operations
| { Group After Action Review, Operations Desert Shield/Storm, nd, GWAPS, NA 577.
Lae

. 112



Table 4
Operational-Strategic Summary

Hl: Target Setst ——_Desiresi/Planned Actual Results
| TADS (SAD) Early air superiority 1ADS blinded/ intimidated/
Ly i" .

& + Suppression medi- suppressed
a Airfields (A) um-high air defens- + Low-altitude AAA, IR SAMs
i es throughout Iraq remained
4: * Contain/destroy Iraqi AF bottled up on bases
fi Iraqi AF * 2 air-to-surface Iraqi shooter
ky sorties?
i 375 of 594 HABs destroyed/
i damaged
f © Iraqi AF flees to Iran (starting
a 25 Jan 91)
A Naval (N) Attain sea control All Iraqi naval combatants
sh + Permit naval opera- —_ sunk/neutralized

tions in northern * Other vessels sunk
Persian Gulf Silkworms remained active through-
out war
Leadership (L) Pressure/disrupt govern- | Unknown degree of disruption
& mental functioning + Neither decapitation nor
Telecomms/C3 Isolate Saddam from Saddam's overthrow
«ccc) Telecomms substantially reduced

Traqi people, forces in
KTO

* Links to KTO never completely
cut

* Intemational communications
cut

Electricity (E)
&

Oil (0)

Shut down national grid
* Minimize long-term
damage

Cut flow of fuels/
lubricants to Iraqi forces
* No lasting damage
to oil production

Rapid shutdown of grid
* Down 55% by 17 Jan, 88% by
9 Feb
+ Lights out in Baghdad
Some unintended damage to genera-
tors
Refining capability down 93% (Day
34)
Destroyed about 20% of the fuel/
lubricants at refineries & major
depots
* 43 day war precluded long-term
effects

118



The first argument, that this war confirmed the prophecies of air
power theorists from the inter-world-war period, tends to overlook how
the results envisioned by the earlier theorists differ from those envisioned
by the architects of the Desert Storm air campaign. Air power thinking
between the wars took its character from a revulsion against the experi-
ences of World War 1 and from assumptions about the requirements of
industrialized warfare. During the 1930s, the U.S. Army's Air Corps
Tactical School espoused precision bombardment of “vital targets” in the
“industrial web” of an enemy nation in order to deprive it of the means
of mass production required to prosecute modern war.’ The School’s
theory of strategic bombardment sought disorganization and paralysis of
the enemy nation through selective attacks on critical industrial targets.‘
In these respects, the Tactical School approach differed from the theories
of Douhet, who advocated mounting all-out attacks with high-explosive,
incendiary, and poison-gas bombs on the enemy nation’s population and
industrial centers in order to compel surrender.* Douhet's theories antici-
pated the collapse of an opponent’s society as a result of attacks far more
brutal (deliberately against civilians) than any American commanders or
politicians today would willingly contemplate, But even if one focuses
on the industrial bombing approach of the Tactical School rather than the
theories of Douhet, the short, intense air campaign of the Gulf War had
a different emphasis than did the air power prophecies of the 1920s and
1930s. In contrast to attacking the industrial production that in past wars
had provided the arms and munitions for forces in the field, the Desert
Storm air campaign sought preeminently to disorganize the “central
Nervous system ” of the enemy regime.

3Maj Gen Haywood S. Hansell, Jr., The Air Plan That Defeated Hitler (Atlanta, GA:
Higgins-McArthur/Longino and Ponter, 1972), pp 40-48. The theory of strategic air attack
described by Hansell was implemented in an August 1941 plan designated AWPD-1 (Air
War Plans Division-1) as well as in the plan for the Combined Bomber Offensive against
Nazi Germany. During Desert Shield, Col John Warden pul up a sign outside the Check-
mate spaces in the basement of the Pentagon that read: Air War Plans Division 1941-
1991.

‘Donald Wilson as cited in Hansell, The Air Plan That Defeated Hitler, pp 40-48.
Hansell, Wilson, Kenneth N. Walker, Laurence S. Kuter, and Harold L. George are
generally considered to have been the main architects of the theory of strategic air attack
that came to predominate at the Air Corps Tactical Schoo! by the mid-1930s.

SGiulio Douhet, The Command of the Air, trans. Dino Ferrari (Washington, DC:
Office of Air Force History, 1983 imprint of 1942 translation of 1927 2d ed), pp 58, 187-
195, 281. Mitchell's position fell between those of Douhel and the Air Corps Tactical
School. See William Mitchell, Winged Defense (New York: G.P. Putnam Sons, 1925).

236



Two final observations are warranted on the weather encountered.
First, while unusualty severe for the region, the weather was nonetheless
superior to conditions in those same months in most other parts of the
northern hemisphere. Fiying over Frankfurt in Germany or Hanoi in
Vietnam, for instance, pilots would have experienced low ceilings twice
as frequently as those actually encountered in the Persian Gulf region.
In other words, visual, medium-altitude bombing tactics would have
proven virtually impossible during a typical European winter or Southeast
Asia monsoon, during which cloud ceilings at or below 10,000 feet occur
80 or 90 percent of the time.'° Second, it is not clear that the Coalition
actually encountered unusually poor weather. Planners may have simply
been excessively optimistic because of the poor quality of climatological
data for the region. U.S. forecasters at several locations in the theater
noted disparities between their procedures for recording weather observa-
tions and those of the local meteorologists, particularly in reporting
ceiling and visibility. The U.S. forecasters, while having insufficient time
to make a thorough evaluation, began to doubt that the Persian Gulf data
they had used rested on accurate assessments of the last 14 years."'

The Air Bases

The quality of bases used for Desert Storm varied considerably within
and among countries. Saudi Arabia is the most prominent case in point.
The Saudis had superb air bases, some finished, occupied, and with excess
capacity, and some incomplete—that is, possessing runways and ramps but
little else. The facilities occupied by the Coalition air forces varied from
those at Khamis Mushait, which had ample aircraft shelters and modern
living and working conditions, to those at Al Kharj, a site still under con-
struction. Al Kharj had only runways and taxiways, and the nearest source
of water was twelve miles away. Even with excess capacity, however, the
bases could not handle the size of the air forces deployed there during the
Gulf War, particularly after the second phase of deployments in November
1990, without additional engineering support and temporary construction.

"USAF Environmental Technical Applications Center Study, “Comparison of
Germany, Viet Nam Climatology to Persian Gulf Climatology and Desert Storm—Jan-
Mar,” 19 May 1992, Capt R.P. Amold and TSgt R.C. Bonam.

"Air Weather Service Report 2, p 117-118, 123.

173

357-357 0 - 93-7





by the Coalition to minimize its losses while destroying the Iragi Air
Force on the ground, thereby denying Iraqi’s goal of holding its Air Force
in reserve either for a last stand or for postwar use.

Freedom of Action

The opening hours of the war saw Coalition air forces bomb key
command and control elements of Iraq's strategic air defense system such
as sector and intercept operations centers. Coalition fighters mounted
offensive fighter sweeps over the main Iraqi fighter bases with the intent
of shooting down any Iraqi fighters that became airborne. British Tor-
nados attacked takeoff surfaces at key airfields with JP233 (an airfield-
attack system containing specialized cratering and mining submunition)
in order to limit the numbers of launched Iraqi fighters to quantities the
Coalition fighters could readily handle. And sophisticated attacks involv-
ing drones and HARMs (high-speed antiradiation missiles) were launched
against Baghdad and other areas where Iraq's radar-guided surface-to-air
missiles were concentrated. These efforts were designed to bottle up the
Iraqi Air Force on the ground and eliminate the threat of radar-guided
SAMs at medium and higher altitudes, thereby permitting Coalition
aircraft to operate there with little risk of significant attrition.

The air-to-air portion of this effort, which averaged some 340 sorties
daily over the course of Desert Storm, quickly persuaded the Iraqi Air
Force to stand down. By the 9th day of the war (25 January 1991),
Coalition fighters had downed 16 Iraqi MiG-29s, MiG-25s, and F-1s, and
Traqi flight activity had largely ceased. By the end of Desert Storm,
Coalition air forces had shot down 33 Iraqi fixed-wing aircraft (5
MiG-29s, 8 Mirage F-1s, 2 MiG-25s, 8 MiG-23s, 2 Su-25s, 4 MiG-21s,
3 Su-7/17s,* and 1 IL-76) and 5 helicopters’ while suffering, at most, 1
air-to-air loss on the opening night of the war.'°

Salthough these three kills were officially credited as Su-7/17s, they were more
likely Su-20 or Su-22 variants (Deur, Wall of Eagles: Aerial Engagements and Victories
in Operation Desert Storm, p 41).

°Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 160; Deur, Wall of Eagles, pp 40-41). Deur's
summary also includes the Mi-24 destroyed in the air by a GBU-10 taser-guided bomb
from an F-15E on 14 Feb 1991, for which no “kill credit” was awarded (ibid., pp 14 and
41; and “Tim Bennett’s War,” Air Force Magazine, Jan 1993, p 38).

"Intww, GWAPS with Cmdr Mark Fitzgerald, 15 May 1992. It was thought,

immediately after the war, that no Coalition aircraft had been shot down by Lraqi aircraft.
Postwar reexamination of Coalition losses eventually suggested, however, that the lone

58



Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses (SEAD)

The Coalition successfully shut down the Iraqi air defense system
within days of the war’s beginning. The operational achievement was
impressive, but again, very little was new in principle about this aspect
of the air campaign. Since 1943, American air forces have undertaken
the achievement of air superiority as their first priority. As defenses
(particularly surface-to-air missiles) have grown more sophisticated, the
suppression of enemy air defenses has become an increasingly important
part of that task. The measure-countermeasure struggle of World War
Tl included electronic and physical means of jamming or confusing enemy
radars, and radar-homing missiles have long been part of the arsenals of
the United States and her allies. Direct attacks on enemy ground-based
air defenses (as distinct from airfields) became common in the Vietnam
War, when the advent of radar-guided surface-to-air missiles led to the
creation of dedicated radar-hunter-killer aircraft, the Wild Weasels. In
1972, Linebacker II achieved considerable successes against North Viet-
namese air defenses, albeit at greater cost than in the Gulf. Since then,
virtually all large air operations have featured some SEAD operations.
The Israeli operation in the Beka’a Valley in 1982 combined SEAD and
air-to-air combat to defeat the Syrian Air Force and its ground-based air
defense. Although on a much smaller scale than the Gulf War (the
Beka’a is roughly half the size of one of the thirty-odd killboxes in the
Kuwait theater), it exemplified the sophisticated use of a variety of means
to take down an air defense system. The Gulf War operation departed
from others in its speed, scope, and relative cheapness in terms of casual-
ties. Coalition forces did not conduct SEAD as an isolated effort to
protect a specific mission or area but rather as an integrated attack de-
signed to disable the entire Iraqi national-level air defense system. The
intimate cooperation of aircraft from different Services and nations in this
effort also represented something of a departure from the past and testi-
fied to the benefit of centralized planning under a Joint Force Air Com-
ponent Commander (JFACC).

"War Department, “Command and Employment of Air Power," Field Manual 100-20,
21 Jul 1943, p 1; “Basic Aerospace Doctrine of the United States Air Force,” Air Force
Manual 1-1, Vol 1, Mar 1992, p 10.

240



particularly General Schwarzkopf." Army and Marine commanders,
meanwhile, had restricted the employment of attack helicopters until the
approach of the ground war.

The decision to bomb from medium altitude affected the accuracy of
nonprecision weapons. Before the war, planners anticipated using this
tactic only during daylight. However, after three days of actual combat
and the loss of several aircraft, commanders restricted all bombing mis-
sions to medium altitude. Attacking from altitudes of approximately
10,000 to 15,000 feet (above the reach of antiaircraft artillery and infrared
surface-to-air missiles) increased survivability, but at the expense of
bombing accuracy. Given the conditions of the war and the need to
minimize casualties, the move made sense. However, a consequence of
the altitude restriction was the need for higher weather ceilings in order
to deliver ordnance visually; thus a higher-than-anticipated incidence of
mission changes occurred because of weather. Air Force planners esti-
mated that by 6 February, three weeks into the war, approximately half
of the attack sorties into Iraq had been diverted to other targets or can-
celed because of weather-related problems.'’ The weather not only
impeded accuracy but also hampered accurate bomb damage assessment.

On 18 January, U.S. Air Force aircraft began flying strike missions
from Incirlik in Turkey against targets in northern Iraq as a way of pin-
ning down Iraqi forces in that region. These aircraft were part of Joint
Task Force Proven Force, formed from units in Europe into a composite
wing (fighter, tanker, reconnaissance, and electronic-warfare aircraft).
The task force flew fifty to sixty strikes a day in three waves (two in
daylight, one at night) throughout the war. The strikes from Turkey
concentrated on air defenses and airfields; chemical, biological, and
nuclear facilities; electric power plants and oil refineries; and munitions
storage locations in the north, Late in the war, when the focus of the
other Coalition sorties was on the Kuwait theater, Proven Force aircraft

'%S) Intvw, GWAPS staff with Lt Col David A. Deptula, 21 Dec 1991.
Lt Col Deptula was an original member of the Black Hole planning group and became
Gen Glosson’s principal deputy for planning attacks against strategic targets in Iraq.

"(S) Brig viewgraph, prepared by AF/XOXWF for the Secretary of Defense visit
to Checkmate, 6 Feb 1991, GWAPS, CHC 1-6.



amount, to the theater. Once in the region, tactical airlift moved over
half that amount again within the theater.

Moving units and supplies to the Persian Gulf involved not only
spanning great distances but also adapting to an unusual deployment
concept. For most logistics planning, the Air Force aircraft squadron had
been the basic combat unit that would deploy from operational bases in
the United States to operational bases overseas. Such a concept did not
fit the situation in the Southwest Asian theater, where the entire opera-
tional base itself had to be deployed. Saudi Arabia was by no means
lacking in operational bases for its own use, but neither it nor the other
Gulf states had ever experienced a deployment the size and speed of
Desert Shield. Many units deployed to newly built, bare bases with no
available support structure and about which little was known. Most of
the early deploying units did not even know where they were being sent
until just before or, in some cases, during the deployment itself.”

Since no approved time-phased deployment schedule existed for
Desert Shield, units quickly had to estimate equipment tonnage, passen-
gers, cargo size, and destinations. The resulting errors made projecting
airlift requirements highly problematic. For example, estimated lift
requirements for the first seven deploying units increased 60 percent
between 11 and 13 August and forced the Military Airlift Command to
schedule additional, unforeseen sorties and to delay airlift for follow-on
support units” It was not until 14 August that Central Command pub-
lished the first complete deployment schedule, only to learn that it ex-
ceeded Military Airlift Command’s capability by 200-300 percent. As a
result, deploying fighter squadrons did not receive necessary airlift sup-
port, and from there the problems cascaded. The Joint Operation Plan-
ning and Execution System (JOPES) automated deployment system was
incapable of tracking partial shipments of equipment and, as a result,
quickly lost accountability of more than half of all the shipments rushed
to the Gulf. Moreover, since destinations and associated units were

'GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Table 23.

70n 9 and 10 August 1990, squadrons of F-15Es and F-16s had their destinations
changed while they were in mid-flight. [William T. Y'Blood, The Eagle and the Scorpi-
on; The USAF and the Desert Shield First-Phase Deployment, 7 August - 8 November
1990 (Washington, DC: Center for Air Force History, 1992), pp 51-52; “4th Tactical
Fighter Wing in Southwest Asia,” p 18.]

3(S) RAND, Assessment of Desert Shield Deployment, 10 Oct 1991, pp 57-58.

208



a ilapeson tet

3
a

wer

trucks and other vehicles, or countless objects located within the Scud
launch areas in western and southeast Iraq.

Over eighty percent of the Scud launches during Desert Storm oc-
curred at night. Even an F-15E orbiting near a fleeting target the size of
a MAZ-543 mobile launcher had little chance of identifying and acquiring
the vehicle before it reached a “hide” site. The clearest evidence of this
can be drawn from the forty-two occasions on which Scud launches were
visually observed by orbiting strike aircraft. In only eight of these cases
were aircrews of strike aircraft able to visually acquire the target suffi-
ciently to deliver ordnance.* Even allowing for the long distances at
which a Scud launch could be seen at night, aircraft such as F-15E and
the FLIR-equipped F-16L experienced fundamental sensor limitations that
rendered the probability of finding Iraqi mobile launchers extremely low-
even when the launch point could be localized into a relatively small area
in near real time by either aircrew visual sightings or offboard sensors
providing coordinates.

Some eighty-eight extended-range Scud variants were launched at
Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain during Desert Storm. Thirty-three of
the eighty-eight launches occurred within the first seven days of Desert
Storm. Hence, the number of launches over the remaining thirty-six days
of the war-a total of fifty-five firings-reflects over a threefold lower
average level of activity (1.5 launches per day versus an average of 4.7
launches per day during the first week); it is reasonable to attribute this
reduction in the average number of daily launches to the “Scud hunting”
efforts of Coalition aircraft.

Nevertheless, the maximum number of Scud launches on any single
day—fourteen—does not exceed the total number of mobile launchers known
to have survived the war.® So the observed launch data are very consis-
tent with the possibility that the Iragis started the war with a total mobile-
launcher inventory in the high twenties to mid-thirties. Furthermore, the
period of lowest activity spans the third and fourth weeks of the war, and
Iraq's Scud units seemed to have recovered somewhat during the final two
weeks of the campaign. This pattern can be seen more easily in the

°($) Defense Science Board (DSB), Office of Director of Research and Engineering,
“Lessons Learned during Desert Shield and Desert Storm,” “For comment draft,” May
1992, p 72.

The total number of mobile launchers known to have survived the war is 19.

87


While air power employed during the incursion at Al Khafji was an
unrehearsed response to an unexpected action, the air power supporting
the ground offensive of 24 to 28 February was well planned. The date
for the offensive was known, sorties apportioned, and the procedures
practiced.. Air operations were coordinated and geared to support the
ground offensive with large numbers of aircraft sorties planned for close
air support and to interdiction across the Kuwait theater.

The bulk of the Coalition aircraft not planned for close air support
were tasked to fly interdiction sorties. Commanders intended these
sorties to destroy supplies and prevent Iraqi reserve forces from reinforc-
ing the front lines or to catch retreating troops by striking headquarters,
roads, and bridge networks. Attacks by Coalition aircraft extended
throughout the theater, with Navy (from the Gulf carriers) and Marine
sorties concentrating on eastern Kuwait. Many of the night flyers
(F-111s, F-15Es, A-6s, and the LANTIRN-equipped F-16s)"5 focused on
targets in the northern part of the theater to damage the heavy divisions
further and disrupt road traffic. B-52s flew around the clock: on the first
day, they hit breaching sites and frontline forces; on subsequent days they
struck headquarters and staging areas just south of the Euphrates River
in Iraq.”* The pian intended to put maximum pressure on the Iraqi forces
with every type of strike aircraft at the Coalition's disposal.”

When the ground offensive began at 0400 local time on 24 February,
the system needed all the flexibility it could muster to deal with the
rapidly changing conditions. More than 3,000 sorties flew that day,
mostly in the confined airspace over the battlefield. The generally light
Opposition to the rapid ground advance generated few targets for close air

25two squadrons of F-16s had navigation pods of the low-altitude navigation and
targeting infrared for night (LANTIRN) system.

26S) Master Attack Plans, 24 through 27 Feb 1991, GWAPS, BH 1.

27ithough the F-117s and Tornados only marginally so: F-117s continued to hit
strategic targets in Iraq, and Tornados were employed principally against airfields in Iraq.
The Proven Force F-I6s and F-11 Is, which could not reach the Kuwait theater, continued
to strike targets in northern Iraq.

23



Iragi
| \._ Convays

JSTARS radar display showing vehicle traffic of the Iraqi Army
fleeing Kuwait and on the roads to Basra.
(Photo courtesy of Grumman Corp.)



the United States operating over North Vietnam during the Linebacker II
campaign of 18 to 29 December 1972.'°

Although most of the HARMs were fired during the first week of the
war—200 on the first night-they continued their influence throughout the
war. On the first night of the air war, an elaborately choreographed combi-
nation of stealth aircraft, specialized electronic warfare aircraft, decoys,
crise missiles, and attack aircraft delivered a sudden, paralyzing blow to
the integrated air defense system from which the Iragis never recovered.
The HARM’s role was to take out the Iraqi SAM radars, activated by the
decoys and attack aircraft. As important as the ability of HARM to actually
destroy Iraqi radars was its deterrent effect: after the first day of the war,
Iraqi radar activity declined precipitously because of the unwillingness of
operators to turn on their radars for anything more than brief periods of
time. Iraqi operators would, in fact, turn off their radars if they knew a
HARM-carrying aircraft was in the vicinity. This was a classically indirect
effect of a weapon; a measure of HARM’s physical destruction of enemy
targets tells only part of the story. By the third day of the war, the radar
threat had been so reduced by the Iraqi fear of HARMS that the Coalition
could fly at altitudes of 10,000 feet or higher, where normally radar-guided
SAMs would have posed an unacceptable threat.

The experience of the 35th Tactical Fighter Wing (Provisional), whose F-
4G aircraft were the main employers of HARM, indicates how the dominance
over SAMs came about. The 35th Wing fired 905 HARMs and recorded 254
radars destroyed, for a 28 percent success rate. More significant, however,
was that the radars, if not destroyed, had virtually ceased to operate. The F-
4Gs that accompanied strike packages invariably fired all their missiles during
the first week of the war; later, some of these aircraft returned with all of their
missiles. In the Kuwait theater, the F-4Gs began a patrol, the “Weasel Po-
lice,” so that they no longer accompanied each strike package, but each
element of the F-4Gs could cover thirty to forty attack formations. Later in
the war, the dominance became so complete that tanker aircraft could accom-
pany the F-4Gs further north, allowing them to remain on-station even longer.
During the entire war, only five Coalition aircraft were lost to Iraqi radar-
guided SAMs, and four of those five did not have F-4G support."’

9) inebacker II losses were 25 aircraft out of about 3,200 combat sorties, compared
lo 38 losses out of about 70,000 combat sorties in the Gulf War

"\(S) TSgt Charles L. Starr, History of the 35th Tactical Fighter Wing (Provisional),
Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, 2 August 1990 - 2 August 1991, Volume !
(35th Fighter Wing Special History), pp 148-50, 179-83, 190.

230



While the Black Hole quietly planned the campaign that would be
executed, the rest of the CENTAF staff was left to plan for daily training
missions and refine evolving plans for defending Saudi Arabia should Iraq
invade. As August turned into September and the latter prospect became
less likely, much of Homer’s staff remained isolated from the offensive
planning effort. This caused some bittemess, even after December when the
Black Hole was better integrated into the CENTAF staff and Glosson was
put in charge of all planning under a new deputy chief of staff for opera-
tions, Maj. Gen. John Corder. However, Homer preserved a formal direct
link to Glosson by putting him in command of all CENTAF’s fighter wings.
As a consequence, both Corder and the rest of the TACC could be bypassed
by Glosson, who could talk directly to Homer and Schwarzkopf on the one
hand and to wing commanders on the other.”

The approximately 300 CENTAF personnel formally responsible for
providing intelligence were even more frequently bypassed. Glosson
decided early in Desert Shield that the CENTAF intelligence staff could
not meet his needs fast enough. He and his Black Hole staff developed
their own links to the Washington intelligence community, which often
sent them information days before it made its way through channels to
CENTAF intelligence. Normally, the TACC was the meeting ground
where the CENTAF intelligence staff put its products to work for the
operations staff. Now, the Black Hole had direct access to its own sourc-
es through Checkmate and Rear Admiral McConnell in Washington.’

When Glosson took charge of CENTAF planning in December 1990,
he also took charge of Homer’s principal tool for asserting authority as
JFACC: the Air Tasking Order, or ATO. During Desert Storm, each

7Glosson commanded the 14th Air Division (Provisional); Brig Gen Glenn A.
Proffitt, H, the 15th Air Div (Prov), which included electronic warfare and control
aircraft, Brig Gen Patrick P. Caruana, the 16th Air Diy (Prov), which included B-52
bombers, tankers, and strategic reconnaissance aircraft. Brig Gen Edwin E. Tenoso, the
1610th Airlift Div (Prov).

8See Chapter 4 of this report.

148



identify and resolve Coalition problems and, perhaps more importantly,
it provided a conduit for rapid access to Saudi policymakers." Offensive
planning took place within Central Command: the Black Hole was devel-
oping Phase I, and CENTAF and CENTCOM staffs were developing
plans for preparing the battlefield and supporting the ground attack. A
CENTAF reorganization in December 1990 formally merged the Black
Hole with the other elements of the CENTAF planning staff. At this
time, all phases of the air campaign came together in the Desert Storm
Operations Plan.*

Planners made Phase II, Air Superiority in the Kuwait Theater, a
separate phase only at General Schwarzkopf’s suggestion—most of the air
planners viewed the Iraqi air defense system as a whole, including the
Kuwait theater-and this phase received little special elaboration.
Phase III, Battlefield Preparation, however, called on air power to destroy
ground forces to a degree not heretofore planned for any air force.

From early August 1990, CENTCOM leaders assumed that Iraqi
forces would outnumber those of the Coalition, and that a successful
attack into the Kuwait theater would require an extensive preliminary air
attack. In the words of one of the earliest briefings on this subject,
“... therefore must have heavy air attrition prior to ability to wage suc-
cessful offense.”

As early as 14 August, General Schwarzkopf’s combat analysis group
concluded that for a Coalition offensive to be successful with a single
corps, the air campaign would first have to achieve fifty percent attrition
of enemy ground forces.* General Glosson first discussed the fifty-

45(S) Operations plan, Hq, U.S. Central Command and Joint Forces and Theater of
Operations, Combined OPLAN for Defense of Saudi Arabia, 29 Nov 1990, GWAPS, CHC
18-4; (SNF) USCENTCOM JS Plans, Afier Action Report, pp 5-6, GWAPS, NA 259.

“©The planning organizations were brought together, but the existence and specifics
of Phase I remained a closely held secret unti} just prior to the air campaign’s initiation.
Homer Intvw, 4 Mar 1991.

“7(S) USCENTCOM Brfg, “Preliminary Planning,” 2-6 Aug 1990, GWAPS, NA 117.

“(s) Rpt, Combat Analysis Group, 21 Mar 1991, in Vol Vi of CENTCOM J-5
Plans, After Action Report. The Bush administration's November decision to double the
forces for a two-corps ground offensive did not change the calculations because intelli-
gence reported that Iraq had also deployed more forces 10 the Kuwait theater.

48



Strategic targets throughout Iraq and heavy attacks against Iraqi ground
forces, enemy casualties remained relatively low.

The trend toward “bloodlessness” as a desideratum in the conduct of
war may have gained impetus from the growth in television reporting of
combat operations via satellite. Cable News Network (CNN) reporting
of the initial Coalition attacks on Baghdad while they were in progress
temains one of the most vivid images from the Gulf War. Television
coverage may have influenced political-military decisionmaking during
the Gulf War, although some senior participants in White House decision-
making discount this.” Careful review of the timing of media coverage
of Coalition air attacks against Iraqi forces fleeing northward from Ku-
wait City along Highway 6 at the end of the war, for example, indicates
that most of it appeared after President Bush had announced his decision
to end hostilities on the evening of 27 February 1991 (Washington time).
Transcripts indicated that there was no television coverage of the “High-
way of Death” on the evening news programs from the three broadcast
networks on the evenings of 25, 26, or 27 February. In fact, the only
Public indication preceding Bush’s announcement that the Coalition might
be inflicting “wanton” slaughter on fleeing Iraqi forces consisted of print
coverage such as the “‘Like Fish in a Barrel,’ US Pilots Say” article that
appeared in The Washington Post on the moming of 27 February.”!

On the other hand, General Schwarzkopf reported that late in the after-
noon of 27 February Riyadh time (which would have been early in the
moming of the same day in Washington, D.C.), Gen. Colin Powell called
to say that the two of them needed to discuss a cease-fire because people
in Washington were getting nervous about all of the damage that Central
Command’s forces were inflicting on the Iraqis.” The episode suggests the

See Walter Goodman, “How Bad Is War? It Depends on the TV Pictures,” The
New York Times, 5 Nov 1991, p C18.

2tRichard Randall, “*Like Fish in a Barrel,’ US Pilots Say,” The Washington Post,
27 Feb 1991, p A28. The Randall article, which was based on reporting from aboard the
USS Ranger, provided perhaps the most vivid account of air attacks against retreating
Lraqi ground forces. However, one of The Washington Post's front-page articles on the
war that morning also echoed Randall's reporting from the Ranger. This front-page piece
depicted Coalition air attacks on Iraqi armor and truck columns as “a combat frenzy
variously described as ‘a turkey shoot’ and ‘shooting fish in a barrel.’ (Rick Atkinson
and William Claiborne, “Allies Surround Republican Guard, Say Crippled Iraqis Are Near
Defeat,” The Washington Post, 27 Feb 1991, p Al).

Gen H. Norman Schwarzkopf, with Peter Petre, Jt Doesn’t Take a Hero (New

250


forty-four percent, respectively, of the total traffic). In the theater,
Dhahran in Saudi Arabia served as the main terminus; this base alone
handled half of the arriving traffic-during December 1990, forty cargo
and passenger aircraft arrived every day.‘ The strategic airlift aircraft
carried nearly all the people and more than five percent of the cargo
shipped to the theater (approximately fifteen percent if fuel is excluded
from the total cargo figures).

Aerial refueling tankers, KC-10s and KC-135s [assigned to Strategic
Air Command (SAC)], also took part in the airlift. While employed on
refueling missions to the theater, these aircraft brought both their own and
other units’ personnel and support equipment; in this way, SAC became
relatively self-sufficient in its aircraft deployment.’ The plans called for
20 KC-10s to serve strictly as cargo aircraft, but the need for aerial
refueling sorties placed a particularly heavy demand on the tanker fleet.
Ultimately, SAC supported this exclusive airlift requirement partially and
reluctantly. The KC-10s flew 379 such cargo-only missions from August
1990 through January 1991.6

The entire strategic airlift fleet worked steadily throughout the de-
ployment period, with two peak periods: during the initial response in
August-September 1990 and again in December, after the order for the
second stage of deployments—a surge that lasted through the end of Desert
Storm. The C-5s and C-141s curtailed all other commitments but often
ran short of air crews, particularly in the early days of the crisis before
the activation of crews from the Reserves. Military Airlift Command
(MAC) estimated, in fact, that its crew force would run out of allowable
flying hours by the end of August, when the Reserves were activated.
MAC used the Reserves in peacetime regularly, but such extensive use
of the Reserves was new. Approximately half of MAC’s airlift flight

“Strategic Airlift in Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm, p 36. Data derived
from the Military Air Integrated Reporting System and recorded in rpt, John Lund and
Ruth Berg, Strategic Airlift in Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm: An Assessment
of Operational Efficiency (Santa Monica, CA: Rand WD-5956-AF, 1992).

SBrfg, SAC staff to GWAPS personnel, 10 Feb 1992.

§(S) Military Airlift Command, MAC History 1990 (Scott AFB, IL: Hq MAC/HO,
1991), p 79; (S) SAC History, pp 335-36; GWAPS Statistical Compendim, Table 22.

187



gence sources.** By the time the war started, the Black Hole had become
its own intelligence organization: it had its own intelligence sources, and
it did its own targeting. :

CENTAF, of course, did not operate completely independently of the
theater intelligence structure. The Central Command Joint Intelligence
Center became the senior intelligence organization in the theater, but
CENTAF intelligence exercised considerable latitude in weaponeering and
other targeting duties. Likewise, CENTAF intelligence reported to a
theater battle damage assessment cell on targets attacked in Iraq; the
Naval Component of Central Command (NAVCENT) accomplished
damage assessments of Iraqi naval facilities and vessels; the Marine
Component of Central Command (MARCENT) provided damage assess-
ments of Iraqi ground force targets within the Marine area of operations;
and the Army Component of Central Command (ARCENT) reported the
damage inflicted on the remainder of the Iraqi ground forces. Still, at
least as far as the air war over Iraq was concerned, theater intelligence
organizations played a smaller role than would have been expected.

The ad hoc relationship between Washington and Riyadh intelligence
centers challenged the axiom that intelligence developed in theater is better
and more timely than intelligence developed in the United States. With
the help of the national intelligence agencies in Washington, the steady
stream of requests from the Black Hole met with a corresponding response
that over time turned into a steady dialogue. Many times Washington
intelligence analysts knew the target had been struck before in-theater
analysts did. Furthermore, developing targets for the strategic air cam-
paign often required levels of expertise unavailable in the theater. For
example, a special cell formed under DIA/J-2 in Washington to analyze
the Iraqi telecommunications system could not be duplicated in Riyadh.
This applied to several other target sets requiring technical analysis.

35For an example of the kind of targeting information being provided to the Black
Hole from VAdm McConnell and Checkmate, see Lt Col Deptula’s targeling folders in
GWAPS, CHP, folder 3, In several cases, intelligence reports from CENTAP/IN are
dated several days after similar information had been provided by VAdm McConnell or
Checkmate.

Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 344.

132



war. While Iraq had anticipated an initial period of air attacks, the actual
attacks were longer and more severe than expected, and a Coalition
ground attack still appeared no closer to getting underway. Before the
war, Saddam Hussein had boasted of the Iraqi advantage in a ground war;
he predicted that mounting casualties would split the Coalition and turn
the U.S. public against the war. On 22 January, Iraq set fire to two oil
refineries and an oil field near the Kuwait-Saudi border. A day later, Iraq
opened oi! manifolds in several offshore terminals, allowing crude oil to
pour into the Persian Gulf. Whether Iraq’s intent was to provoke a
ground war or to make an amphibious assault more difficult is not
known, but attacks by two F-111Fs using GBU-15 precision bombs on
the oil manifolds at the Al Ahmadi refinery on 27 January stopped the oi]
flow into the Gulf.

On 29 January, the Iraqi army attempted to prompt a ground war by
launching attacks into Saudi Arabia from several points in southeastern
Kuwait; the most prominent attack was against the Saudi Arabian town
of Al Khafji (see Figure 7). Saddam Hussein ordered the attack to induce
the Coalition into a ground war, heighten the morale of his own forces
by taking the offensive, and take prisoners as a source of intelligence in
order to determine the Coalition’s intentions.’? The result was a defeat
for the Iraqis in several ways. They occupied the abandoned and un-
guarded town of Al Khafji for a day, but Coalition forces quickly evicted
them. Attempts to assemble Iraqi reinforcing columns in Kuwait were
detected by a variety of night reconnaissance systems, including the
newly arrived JSTARS (Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System)
E-8 aircraft, and the columns were routed by air attacks. Having failed
to precipitate a greater ground war, the Iraqis simply took to their defen-
sive emplacements to await their fate.

'Saithough Saddam Hussein's intentions may never be known, this synopsis follows
the widely accepted interpretations of Iraqi action by CENTCOM and Washington intelli-
Bence organizations during and after the war. Enemy prisoner of war reports provide
positive confirmation of this interpretation of events, and no reports dispute it [(S) Msg
Defense Intelligence Agency, dig 151959Z Feb 91, subj: NADA INTSUM 207-91,
GWAPS, CHST 45-33].



campaign depend on unprecedented airpower success in destroying an
army. Air power had an enormous task in Phase III alone-to destroy
approximately 5,000 pieces of dug-in and defended Iraqi equipment. And
these were not the only targets planned for attack in the Kuwait theater.
The U.S. Army, Marine Corps, and other Coalition ground force compo-
nents could all nominate targets such as Iraqi Army command posts,
supply and ammunition depots, communications sites, and troop concen-
‘trations, to name just some of the more prominent ones. In other words,
while the attrition calculations seem to have anticipated that the air plan-
ners would have a free hand in focusing the air attacks on Iraqi equip-
ment, such a notion was counter to the Central Command target nomina-
tion system. Coalition ground units sought equipment attrition of course,
but they sought that attrition along with the destruction of other elements
of the Iraqi Army-all before a ground attack.

If all went as envisioned, planners estimated that the final phase,
Phase IV, ground offensive operations, would commence several weeks
after the launching of Desert Storm. The objectives for this phase were
to liberate Kuwait, cut critical lines of communication into southeast Iraq,
and destroy the Republican Guard in the Kuwait theater. The ground
attack would be “combined with continuous B-52 strikes, TACATR (tacti-
cal air) attacks, and attack helicopter operations.” In anticipation of the
main attack, “The bridges, roads and rail line . . . will be cut to block
withdrawal of RGFC and to form a kill zone north of Kuwait.”

Planners intended to provide close air support (CAS) for ground
forces by using a “Push CAS” system. Flights of aircraft would arrive
at locations within the anticipated target areas continuously, sometimes
as frequently as every seven minutes. Without waiting for a ground
commander to request support, the aircraft sorties were “pushed” to his
location. If the commander had no need for the aircraft, they would orbit
for a short time, then proceed to attack a planned back-up interdiction
target, and another flight of aircraft would arrive to fly in orbit at the
commander's location. Aircraft ‘were to strike ground targets under the
control of the tactical air control party, naval gunfire liaison team, or an
airborne forward air controller.”

5(§) Coalition Combined OPLAN. pp 6-7; (S) USCINCCENT OPLAN Desert
Storm, pp 13-14.

548) Coalition Combined OPLAN, 17 Jan 1991, p C-6-2.

51



The Saudi bases, however, were just part of the story. The United States
operations plan that served as the basis for the original deployment directed
flying units to fourteen air bases in five countries. U.S. aircraft actually
operated out of twenty-three bases, eleven in Saudi Arabia. The remainder
were in the other Gulf states, which lacked the Saudi base infrastructure to
support air operations.

Figure 30
Map of Region Depicting Major Air Bases used by
Coalition Air Forces during Desert Storm

TM Souda Bay, Crate

Fairford, England
Mildenhall, England
Mont de Marson, France
Andravida, Greece
Hallenikon, Greece
Malpensa, italy
Moron, Spain
Zaragoza, Spain

Midway
King Fang | ay
Dnabran Roosevelt

> Diego Garcia

174



180



week-by-week launch totals depicted as solid bars in Figure 19. Relative
to the first week, the weekly launch totals reflect a substantial reduction
of Scud launches through the fourth week. But the solid bars in Figure 19
indicate that some degree of recovery occurred in the fifth week, and the
launches during the last eight days of the war are comparable with the
total numbers of Scuds launched during the second week.

Figure 19
By-Week Launch Totals and
Maximum Salvo Size for Iraqi Scuds

Launches
357 Hi Total Scuds Launched
30+ 5] Maximum Launched in
S 3 Minutes
257

204
154
107

54

Last
1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 8 Days

Week

Source: Christie, Barlow, et al., “Desert Storm Scud
Campaign (U)," IDA P-2661, Apr 1992, SECRET NF.

A somewhat similar story emerges from considering the maximum
salvo size in each week. The striped bars in Figure 19 depict the maxi-
mum salvo size, which has been somewhat arbitrarily defined as the
maximum number of missiles fired within a three-minute period during
a given week. This measure attempts to represent the Iraqis’ potential to
overwhelm Patriot defenses by putting a large number of missiles on
Saudi Arabia or Israel within ninety seconds. The by-week data suggest
that after the low launch rates of the third and fourth weeks, the Iraqi
Scud units recovered enough in the fifth week to launch a salvo size

88



On any day during the war, the Black Hole would be developing the
Master Attack Plan for the air campaign to be waged two days ahead,
while the ATO shop was preparing the order for the next day and the rest
of the TACC monitored the execution of the current ATO. In practice,
of course, this process often appeared chaotic. A myriad of details need-
ed coordination, and the JFACC or senior planners could change taskings
at any time on the basis of hot information-intelligence tips, pilot debrief-
ings, or weather shifts. The flying units (which would usually have the
night of the second day to complete their planning) also had opportunities
to shape the ATO, often through telephone conversations with the Black
Hole early in the process. As a result of these ingredients, the ATO
sometimes went out late or incomplete (particularly early in the air cam-
paign) and was still subject to change in any case.

The JFACC and the CINC

The role of the JFACC in the Gulf War can be clarified by examining
three relationships General Horner developed during the course of Desert
Shield and Desert Storm: with the theater commander, with the other
American components, and with allied forces.

In the early days of Desert Shield, General Horner served as Central
Command's forward commander in the theater—a role that made particular
sense in view of the immediate priority given to flying aircraft into the
theater. By the end of August, General Schwarzkopf had at his disposal
some U.S. ground forces and substantial air power. Iraqi forces had not
moved into Saudi Arabia, and the prospect of their doing so seemed
increasingly unlikely. General Homer began to pay more attention to the
offensive planning responsibility he had assigned General Glosson.

Schwarzkopf now gave Homer a fairly free hand in planning offen-
sive air operations, Standard procedures called for the creation of a Joint
Target Coordination board with representatives from each component to
nominate targets for air attack. The Black Hole took over many of the
functions normally assumed by such a board. This appears to have been
an expedient decision on the part of a command that had very little staff
in peacetime and whose augmented but overworked staffs during the Gulf
crisis were consumed by the task of deploying hundreds of thousands of



Subsequent to the experience at Al Khafji, the Iraq Army attempted
no other attacks. They constructed more berms, dug deeper, dispersed
supplies, changed to the use of smaller convoys in the Kuwait theater,
moved headquarters locations frequently, and increased the use of decoys
in many areas.'"' Perhaps the greatest theater-wide impact of Al Khafji
was its effect on the Iraq Army commanders. Their forces dug in to
survive, but they had realized that counterattack or withdrawal “was
impossible under the gun of the furious Coalition attacks.” The Iraqis
discarded their plans for major operations in the Kuwait theater as a result
of this experience. Al Khafji was a major effort by Iraq to begin a
ground war, the only such attempt Iraq made-hence, the importance of
its failure. Iraq’s only hope was to force an early start to a ground war
of attrition before it was itself exhausted. At Al Khafji, air power had
gained an important victory not fully appreciated at the time.

The lack of determined Iraqi resistance during the ground offensive
made close air support by aircraft a peripheral aspect of this war. All the
frontline Iraqi divisions crumbled quickly, often with no resistance at all,
and as the corps advanced, they reported only light resistance throughout
the theater. With the exception of isolated instances of determined resis-
tance, possibly two in the Marine area of operations and several more in
clashes by Army forces with units of the Republican Guards, rarely was
the opposition not handled easily by Army or Marine ground weapons
alone.'® There were, in other words, few situations of “troops in contact”
to test how well close air fire support by U.S. Marine Corps fixed-wing
aircraft or attack helicopters could be synchronized with ground fire
support systems. As early as the first morning, forward air controllers
turned aircraft back to the Tactical Air Control Center as unnecessary,
and many aircraft returned with their ordnance because they could not be
employed anywhere else. The primary close air support aircraft, A-10s
and AV-8Bs, saw much less action than planned: A-10s reported 316 of
909 sorties (35%) ineffective (that is, they did not drop their bombs), and
AV-8Bs had more total missions canceled or with no drops (143) than

'9'(S) USCINCCENT/32 Msg, Collateral Intelligence Report No. 180, 6 Feb 1991,
GWAPS, CHST 42.

'24 possible exception would be the employment of aircraft (F-16s in one case,
A-10s in another) to assist in the protection and extraction of special forces personnel
operating behind enemy lines.

110



10

Was Desert Storm a Revolution in Warfare?

Many circumstances in the Gulf War overwhelmingly favored the
United States and its Coalition allies. The end of the Cold War meant
that they could concentrate their vast military forces almost exclusively
on the war against Iraq. The terrain and Iraqi force structure favored the
effective application of air power. Underestimating American capabilities
and resolve, Saddam Hussein conceded the initiative and gave the U.S.-
led Coalition the time to marshal and prepare forces for battle.

Notwithstanding these strongly favorable circumstances, the extraordi-
narily lopsided quality of the war in general and of the air campaign in
particular has led a number of observers to conclude that the war’s conduct
and outcome augur a revolution in the conduct of war, a transformation of
warfare itself. The popular arguments for this conclusion have taken two
forms. The first sees the Gulf War as evidence that technology has finally
enabled airmen to fulfill the expectations that air power advocates advanced
in the 1920s and 1930s. Air power proponents such as Giulio Douhet and
Billy Mitchell had described the things that air power could achieve in
theory, but until the Gulf War, air forces lacked the “tools and systems
capable of achieving them” in practice.' The second line of argument
interprets Desert Storm as confirming the decade-old Soviet prediction of an
impending “military-technical revolution” driven by advances in micro-
electronics, automated decision-support systems, telecommunications, satel-
lite and other advanced sensors, lasers, and, especially, nonnuclear munitions
so accurate and lethal that they could wreak levels of military damage
comparable to those attainable with tactical nuclear weapons.”

‘Lt Col David A. Deptula, “Can Bombing Win a War?," NOVA Show #2002, air
date 19 Jan 1993, Journal Graphics transcript, p 6.

Mary C. Fitzgerald, “The Soviet Image of Future War: ‘Through the Prism of the
Gulf War,’” Hudson Institute HI-4145, May 1991, pp 4, 66-67; Intvw with Marshal N.
V. Ogarkov, “The Defense of Socialism: Experience of History and the Present Day,”
Krasnaya Zvesda (Red Star], 9 May 1984, English trans. FBIS, Daily Report: Soviet
Union, 9 May 1984, Vol Il, No 091, Annex No 054, p R 19, Also see Benjamin S.
Lambeth, “Desert Storm and Its Meaning: The View from Moscow,” RAND R-4164-AF
(Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1992) and Mary C. Fitzgerald, “The Soviet Military and the
New ‘Technological Operation’ in the Gulf," Naval War College Review, 44:4 (Aulumn
1991), pp 16-43.

235



i
'
i.
'

expectations, the planned use of air power was defensive, with little thought
given to offensive employment or any other independent use of air power.

Until 1989, Southwest Asia was, in the global context of U.S. plan-
ning, a secondary theater; the United States would fight a limited, defen-
Sive campaign, Conserving its resources for a far larger and more impor-
tant struggle with the Warsaw Pact on Europe’s central front. Further-
more, as in Europe, the offensive use of air power in a war involving the
Soviet Union seemed to pose unacceptable risks of escalation. In October
1989, newly appointed General Powell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, directed General Schwarzkopf to concentrate planning for a South-
west Asia conflict on a scenario of regional conflict without Soviet in-
volvement, not on operations in the context of a global superpower war.
Furthermore, that planning would reflect a political assessment that Iraq,
not Iran, had become the primary threat to regional stability. The demise
of the Warsaw Pact would allow Central Command to draw on greater
resources for planning than would have previously been available. Asa
tesult, the forces planned for a Southwest Asia contingency doubled and
in some cases tripled. Staff officers had prepared a draft of the new plan,
Operations Plan 1002-90, Defense of the Arabian Peninsula, by the spring
of 1990. In the normal course of events, they would have completed an
‘approved plan by the summer of 1991.3

Pre-August 1990 planning for the Persian Gulf, as for most regions,
concentrated on the requirements for deploying forces over vast distances.
Planners thought more about the means of moving the fighting and
logistical units to the theater—a vast task—than about the tasks of the units
once they got there. The sketchy operational planning that did exist
envisaged three phases. During the first phase, deterrence, American
forces would attempt to discourage an aggressor who had already demon-
strated hostile intent. Air forces would arrive first on the scene; Air
Force tactical fighter squadrons, airlift squadrons, aerial tankers and
airborne command and control aircraft, two Navy carrier groups and one
battleship battle group, and brigade-sized Army and Marine aviation

3(8) Notes, Col Bryan A Sutherland, USA, CENTCOM J-5, handwritten notes, 3 Oct
1990, GWAPS and AFHRA 00881768; (S) Fact sheet, “USCINCCENT OPLAN
1002-90-Arabian Peninsula,” Col John L Buckley, USCENTCOM J-5-P, 1 Jun 1990,
GWAPS and AFHRA 00881768, reel 23630; and (S/NF) USCINCCENT OPLAN 1002-90
Concept of Operations, 16 Apr 1990, pp 19-20, GWAPS, CHC 13.

29



cations centers forced many elements of Saddam Hussein’s government
to relocate (in some cases several times) and to shift to backup communi-
cations. Such strikes disrupted normal telephone communications and
undoubtedly caused a number of government officials to fear for their
lives. Even Saddam Hussein’s control of the Iraqi people seems to have
been shaken; immediately after the war, rebellions against Saddam
Hussein’s rule occurred among the Kurds in the north and Shiite Muslims
in the south. Western reporters observed that, for the first time in years,
ordinary Iraqi citizens were willing to criticize Saddam Hussein openly.
Yet, the question remains: Given these generalized effects and related
symptoms, did the bombing of L and CCC targets come within a hair of
shattering Saddam Hussein's Ba’athist regime, or did it fall well short?
On the evidence available to the Survey, no firm answer can be given.
Without access to high-level Iraqi officials and records, the degree of
disruption and dislocation inflicted by strikes in the L and CCC target
categories cannot be quantified, not even roughly. While there were signs
that the Iragi regime was shaken and its telecommunications disrupted,
the hoped-for collapse did not occur, and judging how close the Coalition
came does not appear possible on the available evidence.

Electricity and Oil

Planners wished to minimize long-term damage to Iraq's economic
infrastructure, even as they provided for attacks against both electricity
and oil targets. This constraint led air planners and targeting specialists
to try to restrict attacks on Iraqi electric power to strikes on transformer/
switching yards and control buildings rather than on generator halls,
boilers, and turbines in order to minimize recuperation time after the
conflict ended.* Similarly, attacks on oil production were supposed to
concentrate on refined-product storage; distillation and other refining
areas were to be aimpoints only if they produced military fuels.

However, in the case of electric power, pilots did not generally re-
frain from hitting generator halls or their contents especially during the

Chris Hedges, “After the War: Iraq in Growing Disarray, Iraqis Fight Iraqis,” The
New York Times, 10 Mar 1991, pp 1, 14.

Memo, Brig Gen Buster C. Glosson, “Target Guidance.”
Memo, Gen Giosson, “Target Guidance.”

71



The Survey’s independence was its reason for being. Each report is
the product of the authors who wrote it and does not necessarily represent
the views of the Review Committee, the United States Air Force, or the
Department of Defense.

xii



Contents

| Foreword 2.2... 06. e ccc ccc eee te eee eee eee ix
| Acknowledgement 2... 0.0... ccc ccc eee eee xi
Introduction 20.2.2... cece eee eee eee Levee eee ees xvii
1 What Happened? ........... 000s 1
2 What was the Air Campaign Plan?...............--- 27
3 What did the Air Campaign Accomplish? ............- 55
4 What was the Role of Intelligence? ..............-- 121
5 Who Ran the Air War? 2.0... eee eee 145
6 What were the Conditions in the Theater? ........... 163
7 What were the Instruments of Air Power? ..........- 181
8 What Supported the Air Power? .........---+---05 207
i 9 Which Technologies Worked? ...........2.00-0005 223
10 Was Desert Storm a Revolution in Warfare? .......... 235
A Note on Sources ....... 20. c cece eee eee tenes 253
i Glossary 2... cee eect eee 257
Index 2.2.6... ee eee ences 265



the hands of the theater commander in chief. By and large it did, but the
dependence of modem military organizations on vast amounts of informa-
tion, and the relative ease with which communications technology could
disseminate that information, meant that supporting authority would, in some
measure, trickle out of the theater. Now, commanders could tap the exper-
tise of large staffs and organizations thousands of miles away to formulate
decisions on courses of action to take during the next few hours. The
formal scheme of organization did not acknowledge this, but the command
system soon depended on informal arrangements and ad hoc groupings.
The prevalence of such organizations may prove part of a broader trend and
not merely an aberration.

The rapid collection, processing, and exploitation of information is
likely to become even more important in future war than it has been in
the past. In this regard, access to space-based sensors and location/
navigation systems provided the Coalition yet another one-sided advan-
tage throughout Desert Shield and Desert Storm, a condition that may not
necessarily be repeated in future conflicts. This may, for example, be the
last war in which only one side will have ready access to precise location
information from satellites. It may also be the last occasion on which air
supremacy could shield a moving army from an enemy’s prying eyes;
observation from space and the proliferation of remotely piloted vehicles
could deny the benefit that XVIII Airborne Corps and VII Corps had in
their swing to the west of Iraqi positions. In future warfare, the struggle
for information may play a central role, taking the place, perhaps, that the
contest for geographical position has held in previous conflicts. In Desert
Storm, the effective operational-strategic employment of precision sys-
tems such as the F-117-GBU-27 combination required correspondingly
precise target information, whereas the areas in which the strategic por-
tion of the air campaign was least effective were precisely those in which
fundamental gaps in Coalition understanding of entire target systems
existed. While the Coalition unquestionably achieved the requisite “infor-
mation dominance” against electricity, the nervous system of Iraq's air
defense system, and the Iraqi Air Force in air-to-air combat, the evidence
suggests that the Iraqis were able to deny the Coalition crucial informa-
tion about their nuclear weapon and ballistic missile programs.

The Political Dimension
Just as important as the operational thresholds crossed in this war

were the political thresholds, among them heightened Western sensitivity
to casualties, both friendly and enemy. The phrase “no target is worth an

248



materials generated by Washington intelligence agencies and sent to the
theater were never disseminated to operational wings.”

What air planners in Riyadh came to refer to as the strategic portion
of the Desert Storm air campaign focused on Iraq proper. Most of the
“strategic” targets in Iraq proper were fixed installations: airfields, naval
ports, permanent troop installations, electric power plants, bridges, tele-
communications switching facilities, command and control centers, weap-
ons research and development facilities, fixed Scud launch sites, govern-
mental ministries, headquarters for Iraq's military services, ammunition
storage depots, and so forth. These installations generally had basic
encyclopedia numbers (BENs) and appeared in the DIA Automated In-
stallations Intelligence File (or AIF). The AIF, which included all instal-.
lations of interest,.and not merely those suitable for targeting, grew some
38 percent between the invasion of Kuwait and the beginning of the air
campaign. Within this growth, the list of installations considered as
potential targets increased nearly 50 percent by early January 1991. By
and large, the vast majority of the more than 770 strategic targets in Iraq
and occupied Kuwait in the Black Hole’s final target list had been identi-
fied in the AIF before 17 January 1991."'

The second major component of the Desert Storm air campaign
consisted of attacks against Iraqi ground forces in the Kuwait theater of
operations. The 43 Iraqi divisions and independent brigades deployed in
the KTO had some fixed installations associated with them. However,
the vast majority (more than 90%) of the roughly 23,000 strikes by
Coalition fixed-wing aircraft and missiles against Iraqi ground order of.
battle involved potentially mobile forces in the field that did not have
basic encyclopedia numbers and were not listed in the AIF. Targets

3°(S) Intvw, Capt O'Connell with Maj Heston, 4 Aug 1992; also, Intvw, Barry Watts
with Maj Lewis Hill, 13 Apr 1993. Experience by tactical units with the dissemination
of targeting materials varied widely from one fighter wing to the nexl, Some units, such
as the F-117 wing, went to extraordinary lengths to obtain needed materials.

“°(S/NF) Doc, Targets Database compiled by Capt John Glock, USAF, GWAPS files.

“Being in the AIF basically meant that the installation had a basic encyclopedia
number, not that il was one of the 774 unique targets that eventually appeared on the
Black Hole's target list.

134



a

FLIR 88, 245

forward air control 147

France 181, 189, 197, 199, 220, 238

Franks, Frederick 154-156

fratricide 20, 22, 156, 246

French Air Force 203

FSCL (see fire support coordination)
line)

G
G-Day 120
GAO (see General Accounting
Office)
Gates, Robert 46, 82
GBU-10 58
GBU-12 104, 243, 245
GBU-15 19

GBU-27 63, 67, 69, 226, 244-246,
248

GBU-28 24

General Accounting Office 213, 219

generator halls 44, 71, 72

Germany 91, 166, 173, 181, 186,
192, 217, 236, 242

global war 2

Glock, John 128-130, 134, 140

Glosson, Buster C, 6, 16, 35, 37-39,
42, 44, 47-49, 53, 62, 69, 71, 80,
103, 129-131, 136, 147, 148, 150,
151, 231
GR-1 63, 81

Great Britain 38, 91, 102, 165, 168,
181, 197, 199, 207

Greece 164

Griffith, Glenn 243

ground forces 6-8, 10,12, 15, 18, 22,
24, 27, 28, 32, 33, 34, 38, 41, 48,
49, 51, 53, 56, 57, 61, 65, 78, 92,
93, 103, 109, 112, 113, 116, 118,
120, 132, 134, 138, 151, 154-157,
170, 179, 183, 192, 193, 204, 247,
249, 250

ground order of battle 134

Guam 214

H

H-2 85
Hammurabi 107

hardened aircraft shelter 56, 64, 72,
76, 89, 108, 133, 145, 179, 200,
226, 228, 229, 235, 238, 240, 248,
249, 250

HARM 12, 66, 197, 198, 223, 229,
230, 245

Harvard Study Team 76

Harvey, Bernard E. 137

HAS (see hardened aircraft shelter)

Hawk 197

Hawr al Hammar 113, 116, 170

helicopters 1, 4, 5, 11, 12, 16, 39, 49,
51, 58, 102, 104, 111-113, 146,
149, 157, 183, 189, 200, 204, 215

Hellenikon 164

Hellfire 104, 204

highway of death 24, 114, 156, 251

HMS Gloucester 103

Homer, Charles A. 3, 5, 6, 22, 31,
33, 34, 37, 38, 41, 48, 53, 62, 69,
91, 95, 96, 105, 124, 129, 131, 142,
145-148, 151-159, 176, 222

hospital 175

Hussein 4, 19, 36-38, 43-45, 47, 53,
57, 66, 67, 70, 71, 75-77, 92, 119,
137, 167, 220, 221, 235

1-2000 63, 245

IADS (see integrated air defense
system)

IL-76 58

Incirlik 16, 52, 165, 166, 169, 176,
177, 192, 194, 196, 199, 201

infantry 10, 15, 107, 117, 127

infrared 16, 21, 23, 56, 61, 62, 84,
87, 92, 119, 124, 170, 194, 195,
223, 226, 244

infrastructure 6, 11, 64, 71, 77, 83,
85, 86, 120, 137, 174, 175

Instant Thunder 6, 36-39, 41, 42, 44,
47, 129, 130, 136, 137, 221

integrated air defense system 12, 56,
57, 119, 125, 230

Intelligence and Threat Analysis
Center 78, 98

intelligence staff 121, 128, 148

interdiction 23, 33, 51, 66, 93, 98,
100, 108, 112-814, 117, 146, 156,
170, 189, 198, 200, 222

269



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26



Who Ran the Air War?

One of the more controversial aspects of the air campaign in the Gulf
was the role of the Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC,
pronounced “Jay Fack”) in the person of Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner,
Commander of Central Command’s Air Force Component (CENTAF).
Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf gave him authority to control most Coali-
tion air power. Horner used that authority with sufficient discretion to
get his job done while maintaining good relations with the other Services
and the allies. Indeed, some would argue after the war that his contribu-
tion had been to coordinate rather than to command or control.'

The idea of a single commander for air goes back at least to World War
TI. The Air Force position has long been that of War Department Field
Manual 100-20, issued 21 July 1943: “Control of the available air power
must be centralized and command must be exercised through the air force
commander if [its] inherent flexibility and ability to deliver a decisive blow
are to be fully exploited.”? Centralized control, however, has usually proved
difficult to implement. In Southeast Asia, a convoluted chain of command
divided North Vietnam into seven geographic areas, called “route packages.”
These packages were then apportioned between the Navy and the Air Force
for separate air operations. Strategic Air Command retained control of
B-52s flying throughout the theater, while the Marines and the Air Force
struggled for control of the former’s aircraft in South Vietnam.

1(S) See, for example, David L. Dittmer, U.S. Marine Corps Operations in Desert
Shield/Desert Storm, Vol f: Overview and Summary (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval
Analyses, 1992), p 36.

>This reflected in part the experience of early fighting in North Africa, when aircraft
had been parceled out to Army corps-a failure which has influenced Air Force thinking
ever since, See Benjamin F. Cooling, ed, Case Studies in the Development of Close Air
Support (Washington: Office of Air Force History, 1990) and Daniel R. Mortensen, A
Pattern for Joint Operations in World War H, North Africa (Washington: Office of Air
Force History and Army Center of Military History, 1987).

145



selected airspace at a given time without prohibitive interference from the
other side—was achieved by the end of 17 January 1991; by 27 January
1991, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, Commander, Central Command,
could declare air supremacy, meaning that the Iraqi Air Force no longer
existed as a combat-effective force.’

To a considerable extent, the Iragis conceded control of the air to the
Coalition even before the war began. The Iraqi Air Force on 17 January
1991 apparently intended to ride out the initial Coalition bombing raids
inside supposedly bombproof shelters while attempting some defensive
counterair action under close control from Iraq’s integrated air defense
system.* The Iraqis may have hoped to disrupt the Coalition air cam-
paign somewhat, inflicting occasional losses on Coalition air forces by
attacking stragglers and egressing strike aircraft low on fuel. This limited
use of its air force mirrored Iraq’s policy in the Iran-Iraq War, when
neither side attempted to establish real air superiority. The Iraqi leader-
ship believed that the army, not the air force, determined victory in
modern war and that an air force had value primarily as a “force-in-
being”-a protected deterrent against regional rivals.*

In the weeks preceding Desert Storm, Saddam Hussein confidently
predicted that after the initial air strikes, the Iraqi army would still be
“safe and sound and ready for battle” when Coalition ground forces ap-
peared.® As in the Iran-Iraq War, ground-based air defenses, rather than
Iraqi fighters, would be relied upon to blunt any Coalition air strikes that
might occur.’ In such circumstances, Coalition air-control operations
were less a contest between opposing air forces than a concerted effort

3U.S. Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Final Report to
Congress, Apr 1992, pp 124, 127, 129.

Norman Cigar, “Iraq's Strategic Mindset and the Gulf War: Blueprint for Defeat,”
The Journal of Strategic Studies, Mar 1992, p 19.

SRonald E. Berquist, The Role of Airpower in the fran-[rag War (Maxwell AFB, AL:
Air University Press, 1988), pp 51, 55, 74. In November of 1980, Saddam Hussein
stressed in a speech to the Iraqi National Assembly his opinion on the proper utilization
of his air force: “We will not use our air force. We will keep it. Two years hence our
air force will still be in a position to pound Bani-Sadr and his collaborators.” (fbid, p 46.)

®Saddam Hussein, speech to the People’s International conference, 11 Jan 1991,
Sawt-Al-Sha'b (Amman), 12 Jan 1991, p 15, cited in Cigar, “Iraq's Strategic Mindsel,”
p 18,

"Cigar, “Iraq's Strategic Mindset,” p 19.

37


ceived.” So these target categories absorbed a disproportionate share of
the precision strikes.

The purposes for which the eight core target categories were chosen
suggest some natural groupings. These groupings, which will be the
subjects of the next three sections, are:

* Leadership and Telecommunications/Command, Control, and
Communications (L_ & CCC),”

¢ Electricity and Oil (E & O), and,
* Nuclear/Biological/Chemical and Scuds (C & SC).

Two core strategic categories are ignored by these groupings; namely,
railroads and bridges (RR) and military research, production, and support
(MS). Bridges and railroad facilities, although defined as a core target
category, were, for the most part, attacked to affect the supply and sup-
port of forces in the Kuwait theater; therefore, effects against this target
category fall in the discussion of air interdiction operations, treated later
in this chapter. Second, the parts of both the MS and RR categories not
associated with interdiction mostly fall under the other six core target
categories. Examples would include Scud-related targets in MS and
bridges in RR that were located in downtown Baghdad or thought to
conceal fiber-optic cables linking the Iraqi leadership to Scud units.

Leadership and Telecommunications/C’
By attacking the two “leadership” target categories-L and CCC,

Black Hole’s category designators—campaign planners hoped to disrupt
the “central nervous system” of Saddam Hussein's Ba‘athist regime. They

22GWAPS Missions Database, 2 Mar 1993. Precision-guided munitions counts
proved such a problem in the case of certain aircraft that in late 1992 it was decided to
exclude them from the statistics report. The 30% figure for the portion of the
precision-guided bombs that were directed against the eight core strategic target categories
ignores antiradiation missiles like HARM as well as Mavericks delivered by A-10s.

3Target-category designators such as “L” for leadership and “E” for electricity were
introduced by Lt Col David Deptula to ease the daily task of reviewing each day’s master
attack plan. These “Black Hole” categories were never entirely reconciled with those in
DIA’s Automated Installations Intelligence File (AIF) by GWAPS researchers through the
end of 1992.

66


Gulf War

Air Power Survey

Summary Report

by

Thomas A. Keaney
and
Eliot A. Cohen

Washington, D. C.
1993



Munitions operated best when released at lower altitudes (particularly the
cluster mines or bomblets) and were thus less effective because of their
excessive dispersion pattern when released from higher altitudes. In
addition, aircrews had a much greater problem in identifying targets and
assessing damage.” Precision weapons did not suffer as much from
changes in release altitudes.

Attacks on the surface forces consisted of several components: (1) air
interdiction of supplies and transport to and within the Kuwait theater;
(2) attacks on the Iraqi Navy; and (3) the main component, attacks on the
Iraqi Army while it remained in place during the air war, during engage-
ments at Al Khafji, and during the ground war.

Air Interdiction

Air interdiction operations aimed to cut the flow of supplies to the
Kuwait theater and to stop the movement of forces. Given that most
Iraqi ground forces were in the Kuwait theater by the start of the air
campaign, the need to block reinforcements was limited. Of greater
concern was the need to prevent Iraqi forces from departing the theater
intact. Because the principal lines of communications between Baghdad
and the theater generally followed and frequently crossed rivers, bridges
became the key targets. There were 126 highway bridges and nine rail-
toad bridges south of Baghdad, and by the end of the war, roughly half
were included in the Black Hole’s “RR” target category. In addition to
the bridges, seven rail yards in Iraq also were targeted as transportation
chokepoints, but the damage to the yards was not a major factor in elimi-
nating rai) traffic between Baghdad and the theater. The destruction of
rail bridges was of much greater consequence.

This subjeci is treated in depth in the Survey’s Weapons, Tactics and Training
Report. See also (S) USAF Fighter Weapons Center, “Tactical Analysis Bulletin, Vol
91-2,” Jul 1991, GWAPS, NA 216; (S) Headquarters, Strategic Air Command, “B-52
Desert Storm Bombing Survey,” 15 Dec 1991, p 33; (S) Frank Schwamb et al, Desert
Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol i: Strike Warfare (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval
Analyses, 1991), pp 5-24 through 5-29; and (S) U.S. Marine Corps Research Center,
“Aviation Operations in Southwest Asia,” Research Paper #92-0003, U.S. Marine Corps,
Quantico, VA, Jun 1992.

92



A further complication arose from the use of the NATO Airborne
Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft, also stationed at Incirlik.
Since NATO as an organization played no official role in the Persian Gulf
War (although member nations did), these aircraft could operate in the
defense of Turkey but not in support of offensive operations against braq.
To avoid the problem, the United States deployed an American AWACS in
addition to the NATO aircraft. The NATO plane provided defensive sur-
veillance, the U.S. AWACS, offensive command and control.‘

Excluding Israel from basing or overflight arrangements defused one
potential political problem for the Coalition, the linking of the confronta-
tion with Iraq to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Israel had no interest in partic-
ipating in the war, but Iraq saw-correctly or not~an opportunity to frac-
ture the Coalition by dragging the Israelis in, and so immediately began
a series of Scud attacks against the Jewish state. The United States
attempted to prevent such a situation by attacking the Iraqi fixed Scud
launch sites in western Iraq on the first day of the air war. More than
1,600 Coalition strikes (and even more sorties) flew against fixed launch
sites, mobile Scuds, Scud production facilities, suspected hide sites, and
communications nodes, all with unknown effect. The United States also
sought to gain Israeli forbearance by actively supporting Israel with
Patriot missile defenses and communication links that increased warning
time of the Scud launches. At the same time, the United States
discouraged any move by Israel to conduct its own air strikes against
Iraq. It remains unclear how close the Israelis came to retaliation for
Iraqi attacks; one can only speculate about the real damage that would
have been done to the Coalition by such a move. Arab Coalition mem-
bers may not have reacted to an Israeli attack on Iraq in the ways that
American decision-makers feared; luckily, the test never came.

4(S) Intvw, CMSgt Jerome E. Schroeder, USAFE History Office, with
Maj Gen James L. Jamerson, Commander Joint Task Force Proven Force, 27 Mar 1991,
Ramstein Air Base, Germany, GWAPS, NA 124.

SDavid Makovsky, “Of Friends and Foes,” Jerusalem Post, 18 Jan 1992, p 14
(excerpts from U.S. News & World Report Staff, Triumph Without Victory: The Unreport-
ed History of the Persian Gulf War).



A second choke point for the retreating Iraqi forces occurred at the
causeway over the Hawr al Hammar, the large lake and marshlands north-
west of Basta. The multilane causeway had been bombed and repaired
several times during the war and could sustain only limited traffic. Air-
craft, principally F-111Fs, destroyed enough vehicles to block the traffic
on the evening of 26 February, and aircraft strikes continued the following
day, most notably a deep attack by AH-64s. Aerial photography 2 days
later showed approximately 550 to 600 vehicles abandoned at the location;
as at Mutla Ridge, only 10 to 20 of these were armored vehicles."

The final chokepoint for traffic out of the Kuwait theater was at the
city of Basra. Here, in the final day of the war, with Coalition ground
forces moving in from the west and cutting off all escape in that direc-
tion, the fleeing Iraqi forces attempted to get through the city and its
canals and across the river to the east, the last remaining exit. With all
bridges over the canal and river either damaged or destroyed, traffic
stopped at the canal on the western side of the city. The backup
stretched approximately twenty miles to the west. Into this congestion,
the remnant of the Iraqi Army, including the remaining Republican Guard
divisions, had retreated.

No scenes of destruction such as seen at Mutla Ridge or the Hawr
al Hammar took place in Basra or at the canal, however, because of
conditions that affected the bombing. First, the area west of Basra was
not open desert but a more built-up area of farms and small towns. Iraqi
tanks and other military vehicles took advantage of this situation by
parking on neighborhood streets and generally mixing in with civilian
buildings in the area.'"? Second, the low weather ceiling in that area, the
proximity of the Coalition ground forces on 27 February, and the close-
ness of the target area to Iranian territory all restricted bombing opera-
tions." And finally, the war was ending; at 8:00 a.m. the next morning,
28 February, the cease-fire took effect, sparing the Iraqi force from
further Coalition air and ground attacks.

'\(S) Army Aviation pp 86-108; GWAPS Missions Database, sorties of 26/27 Feb

1991; and brig, CIA-OIA to GWAPS, 25 Jun 1992,
'(s) Brfg, CIA-OIA to GWAPS, 25 Jun 1992.

"3(s) CENTAF Historian, “TSgt Barton's Notes from TACC,” 25/1020 Feb 1991,
GWAPS, NA 200; (S) TACC Log, entries of 27 Feb 1991, GWAPS, NA 215; and
Airborne Battlefield Command and Control Center LOG, entries of 27 Feb 1992,
GWAPS, NA 287.

115



But even acknowledging that expectations may have been unrealisti-
cally high, the bomb damage assessment system failed to meet the re-
quirements placed upon it by the pace and scale of the air campaign.
Technical systems could not keep pace with demand, much of the requi-
site expertise was in Washington rather than in the theater, and too many
breakdowns apparently occurred in the transmission of information be-
tween Washington and Riyadh.

Intelligence’s record in the air war is mixed, with remarkable success-
es as well as notable (but far from fatal) failures. The accurate strategic
assessment of Iraqi intent and capabilities following the August crisis and
the mass of detailed information about a wide range of targets acquired
from August 1990 through February 1991 contributed immensely to the
air campaign. The overall misestimate of Iraqi order of battle and inade-
quate bomb damage assessment were the largest failures. Explanations for
the former lie in part with the relative neglect of Southwest Asia before
the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Central Command’s area of responsibility
had a far lower priority than other regions during the Cold War, as the
post-August scramble for information and staffs to process it clearly
shows. A pervasive failure to practice bomb damage assessment regularly
on a large scale before the war-a failure shared by commanders as well
as intelligence organizations—set the stage for its inadequacy during the
war. Realistic practice would have uncovered large technical, procedural,
and organizational problems; such rehearsal may have suggested remedies
that could not be improvised during five and a half months of crisis and
six weeks of war.

143



Gulf War Air Power Survey

Review Committee

Hon. Paul H. Nitze, Chainnan
Diplomat in Residence
Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced Intemational Studies

Gen. Michael J. Dugan (USAF, Retired)
Multiple Sclerosis Society

Adm. Huntington Hardisty (USN, Retired)
Center for Naval Analyses

Dr. Richard H. Kohn
The University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill

Dr. Bemard Lewis
Princeton University

Mr. Andrew W. Marshall
Office of the Secretary of Defense

‘Mr. Phillip Merrill
Former Assistant Secretary General
for Defense Support, NATO

Dr. Henry Rowen
Stanford University

Hon. lke Skelton
U.S. House of Representatives

Gen. Maxwell Thurman (USA, Retired)
Association of the U.S. Army

Maj. Gen. Jasper A, Welch, Jr. (USAF, Retired)
Former Assistant Chief of Staff (Studies
and Analysis)

Dr. James Q. Wilson
University of California at Los Angeles



The Saudi air bases owed much to long-standing security assistance
telations with the United States. Dhahran served during World War II as
a resupply point for U.S. forces in Asia, and the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers rebuilt Dhahran Airfield in 1956. In the 1960s and 1970s, U.S.
Army and Air Force engineers designed and constructed several more
bases, including the major bases Taif, King Khalid Military City, and
Khamis Mushait. These bases and support facilities, which accounted for
three quarters of U.S. military sales to Saudi Arabia over the past forty
years, provided the needed infrastructure to help absorb a deployment of
the size and speed of Desert Shield.'?

The American military organized base support on the run. The Desert
Shield deployment was not only larger than anticipated, but almost none of
the units (two percent) deployed to a base originally assigned in the opera-
tions plan. Gen. Walter E. Boomer, Commander of the First Marine Expe-
ditionary Force, commented that the deployment seemed to be “first come,
first served” in acquiring airfields.'* Most bases required a vast array of
services for the early deploying units, which arrived ahead of most of their
logistical support-a calculated risk assumed by CENTCOM in the interest
of deterring an early Iraqi attack. Logistical personnel scrambled to improve
functions such as fire fighting, feeding arrangements, water purification,
sanitation, fuel supply, and secure communications, all of which created
vulnerabilities or could have impeded operations. Fortunately, the bases
could expand, and at many locations local businesses could provide rental
equipment or services to ameliorate shortages. In some cases, Coalition
forces found it necessary to build the bases almost from scratch. In less
than two months, for example, Al Kharj changed from a base with no
buildings to one with tents, dining halls, hangar space, a hospital, electric
power generators, and other services to support a population of almost 5,000
Air Force personnel.

"Remarks by Hon Henry S. Rowen, ASD (ISA), at the Defense Institute of Security
Assistance Management's (DISAM) Fourth International Military Assistance Symposium,
17 Jul 1991, Excerpted from DISAM Journal, Vol 13, No. 4, Summer 1991, p 4.

"3Lt Gen Walter E, Boomer, “Special Trust and Confidence Among the Trail-Break-
ers,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Nov 1991, p 47.

175



1
i
i
i
I
|
\

age of tactical reconnaissance during the war. The Marine Corps had
Tetired its own version of this aircraft, the RF-4B, only months prior to
the war and before an operational replacement was available.”

Other measures compensated for part of the shortfall in tactical recon-
naissance. Six of the British Tornado aircraft (GR1As) and ten Saudi
RF-5Cs flew reconnaissance missions throughout the war. A variety of
fighter aircraft (F-16s, French and British Jaguars, F-14s, A-6s, and F/A-
18s, the latter three mainly in maritime reconnaissance) flew reconnais-
sance missions in an attempt to overcome the shortage.TM Finally, Pioneer
unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), used by the U.S. Army, Navy, and
Marine Corps, flew nearly 300 sorties during Desert Storm, mostly by the
Marines. The UAVs had both infrared and television capability for day
and night reconnaissance and were used for battleship gunfire support;
identifying ships; finding missile sites, command bunkers, and Iraqi
equipment; and assessing bomb damage.” But remotely piloted vehicles
had neither the range nor the capabilities for large-scale reconnaissance.
Inadequate numbers of aircraft that could penetrate enemy air space and
take pictures of targets reflected a belief that national systems could take
up the slack-a confidence that proved misplaced.

Electronic Warfare

Electronic warfare aircraft played a central role in the neutralization
of the Iraqi air defense system, one of the most dramatic successes of the
war that in turn made possible the type of air campaign that followed.
Electronic warfare assets included airbome and space systems designed
to collect electronic intelligence and aircraft devoted primarily to sup-
pressing Iraqi electronic capabilities (communications, radars, and missile
control centers). Given the importance of keeping Coalition aircraft
attrition low, electronic warfare aircraft were of greater importance to -
overall air operations than ever before. Unavailability of electronic
warfare aircraft, in fact, was a reason to abort an attack mission. Of the

3L1 Gen Royal N. Moore, Jr., “Marine Air: There When Needed,” Proceedings,
Nov 1991, pp 63-70.

*GWAPS Missions Database.
Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 723-24.

195



Figure 20
Damaged Bridges in Iraq (DIA)

45+ [Usable
40+ Mi unusable

17 20 23 26 29 1 4 7 #10 13 16 19 22 25 28
January February 1991

Figure 20 presents the first-order effect of the anti-bridge strikes—a
steady increase in the number of damaged bridges in Iraq.” In most
cases, the damage left the bridge unusable. By the time of the cease-fire,
thirty-seven highway bridges and nine railroad bridges no longer were
usable. Another nine highway bridges were severely damaged, though
usable.” As shown in Figure 21, roughly two-thirds of these bridges lay
on the lines of communications from Baghdad to the theater. As
Samawah, An Nasiriyah, and Basra suffered the jargest number of dam-
aged bridges.”

igure 20 reflects data derived from various Defense Intelligence Agency assess-
ments produced during the Gulf War. Dates correspond to the dates of the DIA docu-
ments in which damage to bridges was reported.

T4(TS) Defense Intelligence Agency, Final BDA Status Report, pp 90-91, GWAPS,
NA 519.

*5Figure 21 is based on information derived from Final BDA Status Report, pp
90-98; (S) paper, DIA/DB-8B, list of damaged Iraqi bridges, railway yards, and ferry
facilities, 24 Feb 1991, DB-8B Desert Shield/Desert Storm Translog; (S/WN) large map
with overlay, 28 Feb 1991, DIA/DB-8B; and background paper on Iraq’s Logistics.

93



The nature of the strategic targets in Iraq required careful weaponeer-
ing (choice of weapons to match particular targets) to achieve the desired.
effects and accuracy, to avoid excessive collateral damage, and to reduce
the risk of delivery aircraft having to conduct repeat attacks. Some target
systems succumbed quickly—electrical power, for example. Other target
sets consisting of a greater number of individual targets (for example,
almost 600 hardened aircraft shelters) required repeated strikes throughout
the war. Most targets in these target categories required precision-guided
weapons with a capability to penetrate hardened buildings. The softer,
area targets such as oil storage facilities could be struck with nonprecision
gravity bombs. Virtually all American laser-designating aircraft partici-
pated in the strategic air campaign in Irag. Since the risk of flying
aircraft over Baghdad during daylight was high, TLAMs were used to

Figure 6
Coalition Air-to-Air Sorties by Day
(Defensive Counterair and Combat Air Patrol)

4,400: TI

Sorties
2
3
S

600
100 ne |

200

0 an

a a a ar: a ie a ey
January February 1991

Source; GWAPS Database.



deceived Iraqi radars, diverting attention away from the Coalition aircraft
and exciting the Iraqi radars-which then became HARM targets.”

The most capable jamming equipment, however, was carried in
aircraft dedicated to electronic jamming that masked the presence of the
attack aircraft. The dedicated aircraft were the Air Force’s twenty-four
EF-111s and eight EC-130s and the Navy's twenty-seven and the Marine
Corps’ twelve EA-6Bs. For these types of aircraft, the Air Force compo-
nent was a relatively small one. The numbers reflect the Navy and
Marine Corps preference for relying more on dedicated electronic jam-
ming aircraft than on attack aircraft carrying their own jamming pods.
In this war, everyone sought the dedicated aircraft, and the EA-6Bs
became the key non-U.S. Air Force resource that CENTAF employed to
accompany Air Force attack aircraft.

Air-to-Air Combat Capability

The Coalition shared more widely the mission of controlling the air.
The aircraft of six different countries took part in that mission, and of the
air defense sorties during Desert Storm, the U.S. share was roughly 66
percent, rather than the 85 to 90 percent share of most other mission
types. The Air Force F-15C and Navy F-14, approximately 100 of each,
and 89 dual-role (air-to-air and air-to-ground) U.S. Navy F/A-18s served
as the primary air-to-air fighters.” Saudi Arabia made the largest non-
US. contribution, with 69 F-15Cs and another 24 Tornados (air defense
variant), followed by Canada (18 CF-18s), Great Britain (18 Tornados),
France (12 Mirage 2000s), and Bahrain (12 F-16s).*' More aircraft could
have been available, since many of the air-to-ground aircraft were also
capable of air-to-air missions (F-16s, for example), but the lack of incur-
sions by Iraqi aircraft during the war made it unnecessary. On the con- _
trary, some of the air defense fighters switched to dropping bombs during
the war (the Saudi F-15s and Canadian CF-18s are two examples). The

Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 158.

The USAF F-16 is also a dual-role fighter, but it was not used in the air-to-air role
during Desert Storm.

3"This report does not address the ground components of air defense, such as Hawk
and Patriot missiles and other ground and ship defense systems.

197



The 25 major generating plants of the Iraqi electrical power system
consisted of collocated transformer and switching yards and more than
140 transformer stations (not collocated) linked together on a national
grid. The system had a prewar installed capacity of 9,500 megawatts.”°
However, it generally operated at approximately 5,000 megawatts, less
than 55 percent of installed capacity, prior to the war. Overall, the Iraqi
electric power system was relatively modern, redundant, and flexible. It
served the needs of Iraq with few of the service interruptions and brown
outs typical of many other third-world countries." Similar excess capaci-
ty existed in the Iraqi oil industry. Before Operation Desert Storm, Iraq
could refine more than 580,000 barrels of oi] per day-twice the amount
needed to service its own domestic and military needs.

The Coalition mounted some 890 strikes against electric power and
oil. The bulk of effort against electricity came early in the campaign,
with almost 60 percent of the strikes, including over 60 by Tomahawk
Land Attack Missiles, occurring within the first 11 days of Desert Storm.
The peak effort against oil, by comparison, came more toward the middle
of the campaign.

How effective were Coalition air efforts against the E and O target
categories? In the case of electricity, the attacks rapidly shut down the
generation and distribution of commercial electric power throughout most
of Iraq, forcing the Iraqi leadership and military on to back-up power.
Ultimately, almost eighty-eight percent of Iraq's installed generation
capacity was sufficiently damaged or destroyed by direct attack, or else
isolated from the national grid through strikes on associated transformers
and switching facilities, to render it unavailable. The remaining twelve
percent, mainly resident in numerous smaller plants that were not at-
tacked, was probably only available locally because of damage inflicted
on transformers and switching yards.

Walid Doleh, Warren Piper, Abdel Qamhich, and Kamel al Tallag, “Electrical
Facilities Survey,” Oct 1991, p 1 in International Study Team, Health and Welfare in
drag After the Gulf Crisis: An In-Depth Assessment, Oct 1991.

*Doleh, Piper, Qamhich, and Tallaq, “Electrical Facilities Survey,” p 1.

“'Doleh, Piper, Qamhich, and Tallaq, “Electrical Facilities Survey,” Appendix A,
“Reports of Sites Visited,” pp 1-15.

73



gic airborne reconnaissance system (JSTARS) aircraft monitored and
targeted Iraqi ground forces throughout the Kuwait theater. In addition,
satellites and airborne platforms provided communications, precise navi-
gation, and reconnaissance information to air and ground forces. But it
was the combination of U.S. capabilities, not all of them based on ad-
vanced technologies, that made Coalition air power so predominant. F-
111s, A-6s, and thirty-year-old B-52s, for example, took part in air
strikes, effectively using advanced technology weapons as well as unguid-
ed bombs. To counter their vulnerability to Iraqi defenses, Coalition
aircraft flew into'the heavily defended areas of Iraq escorted by F-4Gs,
EA-6Bs, or A-7s, firing radar-homing missiles to destroy the defenses and
by EF-111s or EA-6Bs to jam Iraqi radars. The success of the aerial
attacks also depended on the ability to mass formations of aircraft, made
possible by an extensive network of aerial refueling KC-135 aircraft.
High-technology systems played a crucial role, but just as crucial was the
ability to employ nearly 200 tankers at a time, organize and maneuver
large attack formations, stage large airlifts routinely, and conduct continu-
ous aircraft carrier flight operations—all based on an underpinning of
intense and realistic training. These American air power capabilities
cannot easily be expressed in numbers.

Coalition air power may be depicted in several ways. Table 5 gives
one common measure, the number of sorties flown by type of aircraft
during Desert Storm. Any one measure can only tell part of the story,
however. Sortie counts do not include the space systems constantly in
use or the hundreds of helicopters attached to ground and naval forces.
The depiction of sorties flown gives an indication of the weight of effort
by each country but does not differentiate an A-4 sortie of 300 miles
carrying five 500-pound bombs from a B-52 sortie of more than 3,000
miles carrying fifty 500-pound bombs. The contributions to air power of
air-to-ground sorties are captured in the January-February statistics.
However, those statistics do not reflect the total contributions to air power
made by air refueling and airlift aircraft during Desert Shield. The statis-
tical compendium of this Survey presents as many measures of air power
as possible; this chapter can only focus on each air power element in its
own terms, with only brief mention of other comparative measures.

183



Figure 13
Precision Strikes against Leadership
and Telecommunications/C’

Strikes against CCC targets
a Strikes agalnst L targets

Strikes by Platform:

81.0% F-117
15.5% TLAM/ICALCM t' Bunker (L390)
38% FANE

by F117¢, TLAMBICALCMs & FIN1Fe

Precision Strikes against LCCC Tergets

17 20 23 26 29 1 4 7 10 13 16 «619 «22 «25 2B
January February 1991

‘Source: GWAPS Missions Databasa,

The climax of effort against these leadership targets came toward the
end of Desert Storm's fourth week; Master Attack Plans for 9 through
13 February reflected renewed interest in this target category by those in
the Black Hole. However, the F-117 strikes against the Al Firdos district
bunker in downtown Baghdad, which were carried out in the early momn-
ing hours (Riyadh time) of 13 February 1991, precipitated a tightening of
higher-level control over strikes on Baghdad in general and on leadership
targets in particular.> The Al Firdos bunker was one of ten leadership
bunkers located in the suburban areas of Baghdad. None of them was hit
during the opening weeks of the war because intelligence believed that

*SHarold P. Myers and Vincent C. Breslin, Nighthawks over Iraq: Chronology of
F-1I7A Stealth Fighter Operations, Desert Shield and Desert Storm (Office of History,
37th Fighter Wing), p 26.

68


Part 2

CHRONOLOGY OF THE GULF WAR

Task Force Chiefs:
Lt. Col. Daniel T. Kuehl

Principal Authors:
Col. Emery M. Kiraly
Dr. Aron Pinker

Principal Contributors:
2Lt. Johnna K. Adams
Mr. Thomas G. Mahnken

PUBLISHING SERVICES
Publishing Manager:

Contributing Editors:
Mr. Chris Pankow

Layout and Design:
Mr. Michacl O. Bowers

RESEARCH SERVICES:
Lt. Col. Murray Berkowitz
Ms, Marguerite Gibson
Maj. Lewis D. Hill
Maj. Robert N. Miglin

DOCUMENT CONTROL:
Mr. J.D, Chandler
SMSgt. James Yeomans

SUPPORT STAFF:
Mr. Ernest D. Cruca
Ms. Cecelia A. French
SSgt Hope M. Garnes-McKinley
Lt. Col. Frank D. Kistler
Ms. Frances Nelson

xvi

Col. David A. Tretler

Lt. Col. Robert C. Owen

SrA. Jeffrey R. Light

Mr. Lawrence J. Paszek

Ms. Anne H. Predzin

Ms. Barbara L. Gardien

TSgt Stephen L. Friedman
Mr. Alan P. Heffernan

Lt. Col. Daniel T. Kuehl
TSgt Tamara A. Scheffler

Mr. Mac Lloyd

SMSgt. Burnell Davis
Ms. Kathy M. Glahe
Ms. Dee J. Hamill

Ms, Peggy Kramer

Maj. Joseph W. Patterson



France, Canada, United Arab Emirates, South Korea, New Zealand, and
Argentina), bore the brunt of this work." These aircraft flew regular routes
to all regional bases and supported large ground unit transfers within the
theater. Where their routes ended, smaller transports or cargo helicopters
continued the lift. The size of the theater and the number of bases made
extensive intratheater airlift essential. Of the 12 reporting categories,
intratheater airlift (22,064 sorties) ranked second only to interdiction (38,277
sorties) in total number of sorties flown during the war."

In addition to moving passengers, spare parts, fuel, mail, and other
items, intratheater airlift accomplished tasks that road transport or com-
munications could not. The C-130s were among the first aircraft de-
ployed to the theater (96 had arrived by 9 September) to move the initial
munitions, tents, and other support needed to stock the bases being estab-
lished. The intratheater airlift aircraft not only were scheduled on the air
tasking order (ATO), they physically delivered the ATO every day to
locations without communications equipment for receiving classified
information and to aircraft carriers, which did not have the equipment for
receiving the ATO electronically. During Desert Storm, daily flights to
Riyadh delivered film from reconnaissance aircraft and videotape from
attack aircraft. When the XVIII Airborne Corps repositioned 400 miles
to the west for the ground attack, C-130s flew scheduled landings at the
repositioning site every 7 minutes, 24 hours a day, for nearly 14 days.
During the ground war, airlifted logistics followed the ground advance,
including an air drop by C-130s of more than 100 tons of food and water
to the 101st Airborne Division on the Euphrates River-the large number
of prisoners taken having depleted the supplies of that division.” This
aspect of airlift, less visible than the large transportation network leading
to the theater, proved no less vital to the war’s smooth prosecution.

"These aircraft augmented the U.S. AC-, MC-, EC-, HC-, and KC-130s that also
took part in operations.
“See GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Table 64.

"Brig by Col Maxwell C, Bailey, Commander, 317th Tactical Airlift Wing, to the
Chief of Staff of the Air Force, 19 Jul 1991.

189



campaign.” Homer retained in the theater several of Warden’s planners
who had accompanied him and thereby some of Warden’s concepts. The
plan that emerged from Glosson’s efforts retained the same target sets,
the same focus on Iraqi leadership, and the same intent of isolating
Saddam Hussein from the Iraqi people and his forces. Instead of consti-
tuting an entire campaign, however, the revised plan became the first
phase of a more general plan to eject Iraqi forces from Kuwait.

On 25 August 1990, General Schwarzkopf briefed General Powell on
a four-phase plan, code named Desert Storm, to eject Iraqi forces from
Kuwait (a briefing from which the quote found at the beginning of this
chapter was taken). The first phase, called the strategic air campaign,
was essentially the Instant Thunder plan, with an added aim of preventing
reinforcement of Iraqi forces in Kuwait; the second phase would gain air
superiority over Kuwait; the third phase consisted of air operations to
reduce Iraqi ground forces capability before the ground attack; and the
fourth phase, which still required much work, was a ground attack into
Kuwait-a planning concept identical to the one executed the following
January and February. Schwarzkopf estimated that he could execute the
first three phases by early October but could not conduct the ground
phase until December.*!

The development of the strategic air campaign, now Phase I in a
larger plan, was a highly classified process. The Special Planning Group,
directed by General Glosson, operated in secrecy. In addition to normal
security concerns, the high classification of the development project
stemmed from American and Saudi sensitivity to the concerns of friendly
Arab governments that threats of offensive military action might impede
a negotiated settlement. The Special Planning Group, nicknamed the
Black Hole, included Army, Navy, and Marine Corps representatives, but
Air Force officers predominated. Most of the latter came from outside
the CENTAF staff. By mid-September, representatives from Great
Britain’s Royal Air Force and later from the Royal Saudi Air Force had
joined the effort. By 2 September, the Black Hole had prepared and
General Horner approved a CENTAF operations order for Phase I.

°(S) Transcript, Lt Gen Horner's taped responses to written questions by CMSgt
John Burton, CENTAF Historian, Mar 1991, GWAPS, CHP 13A.

21(S/NF) Brig Viewgraphs, “Offensive Campaign: Desert Storm,” Hq, Central
Command, 24 Aug 1990, GWAPS, NA 208.

38



target recommendations. Schwarzkopf instructed Homer to meet daily
with Lt. Gen. Calvin Waller, Schwarzkopf’s deputy, to review the re-
quests by ground commanders for sorties. But Schwarzkopf’s own
preference for striking Republican Guards sometimes continued to out- |
weigh his corps commanders’ preference for striking frontline forces."

Tensions between the Air Force and American ground commanders
persisted because the commanders did not understand that many decisions
causing them problems were Schwarzkopf’s and not Homer’s. Some-
times Schwarzkopf’s decisions did please the ground commanders. For
example, they liked to see B-52s dropping bombs in front of their posi-
tions, and Schwarzkopf often obliged. As General Boomer noted later,
ground commanders like himself had been closer to B-52 strikes in
Vietnam than any Air Force officer and knew their psychological impact
first hand. Schwarzkopf ordered extensive B-52 bombing of Iraqi troops
(who were dispersed and dug in) despite reservations on the part of Air
Force officers who preferred to use the big bombers against more vulner-
able area targets like supply depots.

In the dispute over the best use of precision bombing in the KTO,
however, Schwarzkopf made decisions which displeased his ground
commanders and caused grumbling about the JFACC’s execution of those
decisions. Not only did Schwarzkopf emphasize bombing Republican
Guards rather than frontline forces, but he shared Homer’s enthusiasm for
“tank plinking” (the destruction of tanks with precision guided bombs)-an
enthusiasm that was not shared by Generals Franks and Boomer. They
were confident that their tanks would easily outmatch Iraqi counterparts
and were far more concerned about Iraqi artillery, which could make a
Coalition ground attack extremely costly—especially if chemical shells hit
Coalition troops during a breach of Iraqi defenses. For their part, the
JFACC’s air campaign planners complained that targets nominated by
ground forces were often out of date and had already been disabled by
previous air attacks.

'%(S) Memo, Lt Gen Waller to commanders of ARCENT, CENTAF, MARCENT,
and SOCCENT, subj: Air Apportionment Guidance, 15 Feb 1991.

155



navigation 23, 170, 183, 193, 215,
223, 245, 250

NBC (see nuclear, biological, and
chemical)

Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada 84,
159

nerve 79, 82

Netherlands 181

network 17, 69, 170, 183, 189, 198,
216, 228, 233

New York Times 8, 71, 82, 121, 250

New Zealand 181, 189

Ninth Air Force 147

Noriega 45, 220

North Vietnam 62, 145, 221, 226,
230, 234, 241, 243

North Vietnamese 240

NSC (see National Security Council)

nuclear 6, 12, 16, 24, 31, 32, 34, 36,
39-43, 64, 66, 76, 79-84, 91, 120,
123, 136, 137, 138,164, 219, 227,
235, 238, 250

nuclear program 79, 83, 120, 123,
137

nuclear weapons 43, 79, 80, 83, 84,
91, 138, 164, 235, 248

nuclear, biological, and chemical 40,
81, 120

oO

OA-10s 192

Offensive 1, 6, 18, 19, 21-23, 27, 29,
33-35, 37-41, 43, 44, 47, 48, 51,
58, 86, 91, 92, 102, 109, 111,
142-114, 118, 126, 127, 129, 136,
137, 142, 147-149, 151, 152,
156-158, 165, 166, 192, 200, 202,
236-239, 246

Office of the Assistant Secretary of
Defense 45, 131, 140

Office of the Secretary of Defense
238

oil 6, 12, 14, 16, 19, 24, 28, 34, 36,
40, 42-44, 64, 66, 71-73, 76-78,
100, 113, 119, 136, 156, 170, 176,
177, 239

oil production 6, 12, 34, 36, 44, 71,
77, 119

Oman 168, 210

Omnibus Agreement 146

272

operational controt 146

operational level 137

operations order 33, 38, 39, 41,
44-47, 49

operations staff 148

OPLAN 2, 29, 30, 32, 48-51, 128,
146

OPLAN 1002-90 2, 29, 30, 32, 146

OPLAN Desert Storm 49-51

OPORD 39-41, 49

opposing air 57

order 001 160

order 003 47

order of battle 122, 134, 135, 138,
143

OV-10s 192

P

Panama 186, 226, 242

Patriot 4, 89, 90, 166, 177, 197, 216

Persian Gulf 2, 7, 8, 10, 18, 19, 27, -
29, 33, 35, 43, 57, 58, 76, 79, 82,
98, 100, 106, 108, 112, 119, 122,
124, 126, 128, 132, 136, 142, 157,
166, 167, 169, 173, 188, 192, 194,
195, 197, 198, 204, 208, 219, 221,
223, 228, 231, 241

PGMs 225, 226

phase I 6, 35, 38-41, 44-48, 52, 92,
130

phase II 6, 48

phase III 6, 39, 48, 49, 51, 128

Phase IV 6, 7, 39, SI

planners 2, 10, 12, 15, 16, 24, 28, 29,
31, 34, 37, 38, 41, 43-49, 51-53,
55, 60, 62-67, 69-72, 75, 77, 78-80,
87, 89, 91, 92, 103, 124, 125, 126,
128-131, 133-135, 138-141, 151,
154, 155, 158, 163, 169, 173, 196,
202, 207, 213, 215, 220-223, 231,
239, 241, 243, 245, 247, 249, 251

planning 2, 5, 6, 16, 21, 28-31,
33-39, 42-44, 46-49, 52, 55, 60, 92,
103, 113, 122, 128, 129, 131, 133,
135, 136, 140, 141, 146, 147, 148,
150-152, 154, 158, 178, 196, 207,
208, 216, 231, 233, 240, 242, 247

POL 32, 78, 100

Population 43, 46, 158, 175, 177, 236



Figure 16 shows the flow of Coalition air strikes against the Iraqi
nuclear, biological, and chemical (NBC) targets that made up the Black
Hole's “C” target category. In all, the Coalition mounted some 970
strikes against this category. More than 40 percent of the strikes were
made with precision weapons, and about 80 percent of those strikes with
precision weapons were carried out by F-117s. Aircraft making strikes
with nonprecision weapons against NBC targets included B-52s, F-16s,
F/A-18s, GR-1s, F-111Es, and A-6s. In addition, F-111Fs and F-15Es
conducted a few nonprecision-weapon strikes on these targets.

Figure 16
Coalition Strikes against Nuclear, Biological,
and Chemical Targets

Strikes:

40 WB F117, TLAM, F111F, FISE

(ZAatt other Coalition alrcratt Total Strikes
against
NBC (43 Days)

70

60:

50:

40

17 20 23°28 28 1 0 4 7 «1 18 16 10 22 25 28
January February 1601

‘GWAPS Missions Database, Dec 1992.

The bulk of the strikes directed against the C or NBC target category
focused on Iraqi chemical-warfare capabilities. Target facilities included
the three chemical precursor production facilities near Al Fallujah, research
centers such as Salman Pak (which was also associated by Coalition
intelligence with Iraqi work on biological toxins), and chemical-munitions
production facilities such as Samarra. Suspected storage bunkers for

80



Figure 28
Formation of a “Package” for Attacks into Iraq

The basic information for the flights arrived in the daily air tasking
order; delays in publishing the order or late changes forced the flying units
to rely on advance information received by telephone from planners at
Riyadh. The air tasking order provided the targets and timing, but the
mission commander still determined the routing, tactics, and other proce-
dures and passed this information by secure telephone to the other units in
the package. Navy flight crews on board aircraft carriers in the Red Sea or
Persian Gulf faced a more difficult time getting the air tasking orders.
Because of equipment incompatibility with Air Force secure communication
devices, the tasking order documents were flown daily to the ships. Navy
crews had an easier time coordinating the flights, however, since most of the
aircraft from the same ship flew together.

In contrast to the complex communications arrangements of Central
Command forced by the physical dispersion of its air bases, Proven Force
crews at Incirlik, Turkey, faced a much simpler task. Here, the United
States Air Forces in Europe had set up a composite wing organization
composed of attack, air defense, and support aircraft from eight different
flying units, so that the crews could plan the missions and discuss the

169



inventions of clever technologists or the reflections of insightful theorists
would be needed to make armored warfare successful; doctrine and organi-
zation played their part as well. Furthermore, politics~the purposes of war
and the domestic pressures on its conduct-can also shape a revolutionary
change in warfare.

It is therefore insufficient to look merely at the technologies of precision
weapons, airborne radars, and datalinks and to declare the existence of a
“military-technical revolution.” If history is any guide, the technologies
necessary for such dramatic change may require much time and trial before
armed forces can use them as effectively as theory might predict. We are
probably still too close to the Gulf War of 1991 to draw definitive lessons
from it about the nature of future war. Because the conditions under which
Desert Storm was conducted were so special, the question posed at the
beginning of this chapter will elude a definitive answer. We can, however,
ask whether the precursors of a revolutionary change in the conduct of war
appeared in this conflict. To answer that question, it makes sense to ask
which elements of the conflict appeared to have precedents in earlier experi-
ence and which seemed new or radically different.

Things That Were Not Wholly New
Target Sets

With few exceptions, the planners of Desert Storm used the same
target categories as in previous wars. In World War II, Korea, and
Vietnam, aircraft attacked air defenses, fielded armies, oil refineries,
electrical power grids, and, even command, control, and communications.
In the Gulf War, the Coalition achieved successes against some of these
target systems (especially strategic air defenses and electric power) ex-
traordinarily quickly-what took a day or two to accomplish in this con-
flict might have taken months in others. But the concept of what to
attack to disorganize and paralyze an enemy nation did not differ substan-
tially from previous air campaigns. A partial exception to this generaliza-
tion was the emphasis on targeting national-level leadership and telecom-
munications from the outset, rather than vital elements in enemy war
production as had been the focus of the Combined Bomber Offensive of
World War II. But a relatively small proportion of the Coalition effort
(fewer than 1,000 strikes out of a total of about 42,000) went against this
set of targets. Leadership attacks also had precedents, most notably in the
fatal aerial ambush of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto in April 1943.

239



and Control System (AWACS) aircraft could shoot safely at opponents that
they could not see, or not see well.

Air Power’s Dominance of the Iraqi Field Army

The duration, intensity, and military effectiveness of the thirty-nine days
of air operations that preceded the Coalition ground offensive on 24 February
undoubtedly exceeded anything that the Iraqi leaders foresaw, based on their
experience during the Iran-Iraq war. The Iraqi Army's one attempt, in late
January 1991, to move out into the open and precipitate the kind of bloody,
close combat on the ground that Iraqi strategists believed would achieve
important political, if not military, results succumbed swiftly to Coalition air
power. Unlike the previous wars, air power operated almost as effectively
at night as during the day, and in some cases more so. Unable to attack or
retreat in the face of Coalition air power, the Iraqi Army in the Kuwait
theater after Al Khafji could only hunker down and continue to suffer
mounting punishment, both physical and psychological, from the air. When
the Coalition’s ground attack finally came, the ground forces of the U.S.-led
alliance were able to destroy or expel from Kuwait the Iraqi divisions there
in a scant one hundred hours of operations with extraordinarily low combat
casualties. Indeed, the magnitude of what Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf
asked Coalition air power to accomplish against Iraq’s army in the Kuwait
theater was astonishing by virtually any standard: to destroy fifty percent of
the Iraqi armor and artillery in the Kuwait theater before Coalition ground
forces engaged. The fact that Coalition air forces fell somewhat short of this
ambitious goal in the case of some Republican Guard and other units should

not detract from what they accomplished overall in the Kuwait theater. In
the case of Iraqi front-line divisions, the fifty percent attrition equipment
levels were not only met but, in some areas, exceeded.

Whether this remarkable outcome presages a new relationship between
air forces and ground forces will, no doubt, be debated for years to come.
Certainly, the success of air power ran contrary to the expectations of many
experts in the United States before the war. The kill rates achieved against
dug-in armor proved unprecedented. Air power had had successes against
armor on the move in past wars, but in Desert Storm, the combination of
rotary- and fixed-wing aircraft operating against forces on the move proved
devastating. To be sure, given the mitigating effects of political circum-
stances, training, technology, geography, and force ratios that heavily fa-
vored the Coalition, some caution is indicated. We may require a sterner
test against a more capable adversary to come to a conclusive judgment.
But if air power again exerts similar dominance over opposing ground

246



The Navy retained control of air-to-air and air-to-surface sorties for the
purpose of fleet defense. The Marine Corps was able to reserve large
numbers of sorties for its own use on land-at least half of its F/A-18s and
all of its AV-8Bs. Nonetheless, unified command did enable the JFACC to
take other use of aircraft from both Services, particularly in the first few
days of the campaign. As the campaign wore on, Marine aircraft struck
fewer fixed targets and concentrated on Iraqi ground forces opposite the
Marine sector. Marine fighters were directed to bomb in geographical
sectors under the direction of ground and airbome controllers, as were Air
Force and other bomber aircraft in the Kuwait theater. Some Marines
would later say that their planners “gamed” the ATO by overbooking it with
sorties to give them flexibility.'® In fact, the ATO already provided for such
flexibility by scheduling as much air power as possible in the Kuwait theater
and leaving “targeting” to airborne controllers.

The Marine commander Lt. Gen. Walter Boomer, Central Command’s
Army Component (ARCENT) Commander Lt. Gen. John Yeosock, and
Army corps commanders Lt. Gens. Gary Luck and Frederick Franks
expressed major concern over apportionment of air power to support their
forthcoming attacks against the Iraqi front. On 31 January,
General Schwarzkopf told General Homer that

Target development and nomination during the early phases of the
campaign were clearly led by the... (JFACC). As we move into
battlefield preparation, maneuver commander input into the target selec-
tion process becomes even more important. Therefore, the opportunity
for corps and other subordinate commanders to plan for and receive air
sorties to fly against targets of their choosing must increase."”

Although he dealt directly with the Marine Corps’ Boomer, Homer
handled the Army corps commanders through Yeosock. Indeed, Horner
and Yeosock shared an apartment, and the corps commanders could not
be sure how much one affected the other’s decisions regarding corps

*6Lt Gen Royal N. Moore, “Marine Air. There When Needed,” Proceedings, Nov
1991, p 63.

TM(S) Msg, USCINCCENT to COMUSCENTAF, subj: Air Apportionment Planning,
311650Z Jan 1991, in TACC Current Ops Log, GWAPS, NA 215.

154



possessed by the F-117 and cruise missiles, these two platforms carried
out all attacks against downtown Baghdad; the F-117 operated at night,
and the TLAMs during the day. Given American sensitivity to casual-
ties-our own and Iraqi civiliansthey were ideal weapon systems for
attacking targets in the heart of a heavily defended, heavily populated
city. Moreover, the F-117 had a psychological utility that was probably
shared only by the B-52. Both were aircraft of a kind that only a super-
power could have, and both could deliver destruction with no advanced
warning—smal! wonder, then, that both figured prominently in psycho-
logical operations pamphlets that were showered upon Iraqi troops.

On the other hand, the F-117 and long-range cruise missiles also had
limitations: both were less flexible and considerably more expensive than
most conventional systems. The F-117, a subsonic, light bomber, had to
operate at night to maximize stealthiness, and nearly nineteen percent of
the strikes attempted by F-117s were adversely affected by weather
(misses or no drops).* While not as sensitive to weather conditions as the
F-117, cruise missiles had a smaller payload, required a lengthy targeting
process, and could not be retargeted after launch. Even without the
flexibility of other aircraft, however, these platforms were able to set the
terms for air operations over Iraq and to bring the reality of the war home
to the residents of Baghdad.

Laser-guided Bombs

Few scenes were as vivid on television as the picture of a guided
bomb going through a ventilation shaft in an Iraqi office building. From
all appearances, a new age of precision bombing had supplanted years of
employing less accurate, unguided bombs. In fact, the new age had only
partly arrived: laser-guided bombs (LGBs) achieved dramatic success in
the war, in some measure because of the early neutralization of Iraqi air
defenses, but overall, laser-guided bombs comprised only a small fraction
of the munitions expended in the war.

Laser-guided bombs are simply general-purpose bombs with guidance
kits added—computer control and guidance canards in the front to detect
laser energy and give steering commands and a wing assembly in the rear
to provide lift. Laser-guided bombs are part of a larger family of preci-
sion-guided munitions (PGMs), many of which (air-to-air missiles, for

“See GWAPS, Effects and Effectiveness, App 1. The F-117 database contained more
than 400 weather-related misses or no-drops. Equivalent data were not available for other
aircraft.

225



Figure 10
Iraqi Flight Activity versus Coalition Kills

I Fights to tran.

17 Jan: 3 MiG-29 EB) All Other tragi Sorties

3F-1

1204 2MiG-21
4104 19 Jan: 2MiG-29
2MiG-25
100 + 2F-4
80 4 24 Jan: 2F-1
20 26 Jan: 3MiG-23 33
n4 27 Jan: 3MiG-23 Fixed-Wing
. 1F-1 Kills
Sorties 60
1 28 Jan: 1 MiG-23
50 + 29 Jan: 1MiG-23
40 4 2 Feb: 1IL-76
i 6 Feb: 2MiG-21
304 2$u-25
24

42-7 Feb: 3$u-7/17

104
od n Gh | .
7 2 23 2 2 1 4 7 13 6 1G 2k 2S
January February 1091
PGM altacks on
Hardened Aircratt

Sheltars/Bunkers Initiated

Although the thirty-three to one box score provides some insight into
the degree to which Coalition forces dominated in air-to-air combat, it is
by no means the entire story. More than forty percent of the Coalition's
kills from 17 January through 28 February 1991 involved beyond-visual-

aircraft lost on the first night of the air campaign, an F/A-18 from the USS Saratoga, may
have been downed by an [raqi MiG-25. Detailed reconstruction of the circumstances
surrounding the fate of this aircraft produced no positive evidence that it had been lost
to an Iraqi radar-guided surface-to-air missile (as was initially believed), and the known
presence of an Iraqi MiG-25 in the immediate vicinity when the F/A-18 went down left
the Iraqi interceptor as the most likely cause of the loss.

59


air bases in Eastern Europe; the Iraqis had far fewer but much larger
bases, which complicated runway cutting operations, for example.
Weather posed far greater problems in Europe than in the Guif. NATO
planners anticipated far more resistance from Warsaw Pact air forces and
air defense units than the Iraqis would eventually offer, and the terrain in
the Gulf favored air power far more than did Eastern Europe. Above all,
air forces in Europe anticipated a very different mission than they would
undertake in the Gulf where the Coalition was able to initiate the air
campaign. In Europe, air power would delay and disrupt onrushing
Warsaw Pact attacks; in the Gulf, it would serve two very different
Purposes: it would conduct strategic attacks against an enemy’s home-
land and destroy a dug-in army on the defensive, not moving forward.

Coalition air forces contended with some difficulties adapting to the
different circumstances. American munitions had been acquired primarily
for a European war, and some of the initial estimates of Iraqi attrition
rested on calculations of what might happen, for example, to moving
armor that was attacked using aircraft-delivered mines—munitions less
effective against a static opponent. Few units had practiced extensively
for medium-altitude attacks, with the result that efficiency dropped when
such attacks became the norm after the third day of the war. On the
whole, however, Coalition forces used the five and a half months of crisis
before the war well, adjusting to technical challenges posed, for example,
by the use of infrared navigation and targeting systems over the peculiar
terrain and the special climactic conditions of the Persian Gulf.

Perhaps the greatest intangible attribute brought to the Gulf by Amer-
ican commanders, in the air as on land, was supreme confidence in the
ability of their troops and the quality of their equipment. They had spent
the last two decades training for a far sterner test than the one they would
now face, and although few individuals outside the military (and not all
that many within it) understood the full extent of Coalition superiority vis
a vis the Iraqis, few doubted that the war would end other than with a ~
crushing Coalition victory. This mood of confidence mixed with a deep
sense of determination~and the logs of the Tactical Air Control Center
show this vividly-that this war would wipe clean the memory of the half-
hearted efforts and mishaps of Vietnam and other occasions on which air
forces had achieved less than their advocates had hoped. Many officers
expected and desired that this war would, in some fashion, settle an open
account in the history of air power.

221



ended. The Buccaneers were another late addition to the war, brought in by
the British when the laser-designating capability was deemed particularly
valuable. The Buccaneers laser-designated their targets during daytime
while flying with the bomb-carrying British Tornados. Later in the war, the
British expedited to the theater a day and night laser-designating capability,
then still under development, for use on some of the British Tomados.TM

During the war, the U.S. Air Force made the greatest use of precision
munitions, both missiles and laser-guided bombs, on attack aircraft. Table 8
compares Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps use of the three types of
precision weapons expended and presents additional information on British
and French capabilities:””

The Air Force, in flying 60 percent of the attack missions, expended far
higher percentages of guided bombs and air-to-surface missiles than the
Navy or Marine Corps. The expenditure of guided bombs reflected the Air
Force’s heavy bombardment of Iraqi aircraft shelters and employment of F-
111Fs and F-15Es in attacking Iraqi armor in the Kuwait theater.° The
employment of Maverick missiles, almost entirely by A-10s, showed the
dedication of those aircraft to Iraqi equipment attrition in the Kuwait theater.
The use of the Maverick by A-10s stands in stark contrast to the slight use
of the same by other aircraft, most notably the F-16s, which used only
116-far fewer than the planners had anticipated.

The Navy and Marine Corps used relatively few guided bombs and air-
to-surface missiles. A shortage of these weapons in the stocks available to
the Navy and Marine Corps provides. the best explanation for the lack of
employment. In addition, the supply of precision munitions was being
husbanded for possible use during the ground offensive. As it tumed out,
the rate of employment of precision munitions during the ground war by all

3%Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Patrick Hine,” p 42.

The Directorate of Supply, Hq, USAF/LGS, Combat Support Division (LGSP), also
contained in GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Tables 188, 189, and 190; (S) G. J.
Onslow, Operational Research Branch Note for the Record 01/91: Analysis of Attack and
Reconnaissance Operations During Operation Granby (Hq Strike Command, Royal Air
Force, ORB NFR 1/91, Jul 1991), pp A-2, C-2, GWAPS, NA 515.

“GWAPS Missions Database, as displayed in GWAPS Statistical Compendium,
Tables 183 and 184.

202



Figure 7
Attacks of the Iraqi III Corps, 29-31 January 1991

Hi x

While the action at Al Khafji provided the first instances of combined
ground action involving the Coalition Arab forces and U.S. forces and the
first true instances of close air support in the war, it also proved costly.
The engagement produced several incidents of fratricide: thirteen Ma-
Tines and four Saudi soldiers were killed in three incidents, two occurring
during air-to-ground attacks.” It also resulted in the single greatest loss
of Air Force personnel when an AC-130 gunship was shot down with its
fourteen-man crew.

Office of Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public Affairs), News Release No. 504-
91, 13 Aug 1991.

20


|

later to Fairford Air Base in Great Britain and flew bombing missions
from those locations.'

While many NATO countries committed their support to the Coali-
tion, Turkey, owing to its unique position as the only NATO country
bordering Iraq, played a particularly key role and ran great political risks.
Contemplating the prospect of operations from Turkey and increased
access by U.S. forces to Turkish air bases, the Turkish government had
to weigh carefully its relationships in the Middle East. At the outset of
the crisis in August 1990, U.S. Air Force combat aircraft had deployed
to Incirlik Air Base on routine exercise deployments. The United States
sought to augment this force with additional aircraft from Europe, creat-
ing an organization called Proven Force to undertake combat operations
against Iraq from the north. To gain permission for combat missions
from Turkey and to increase the number of U.S. tactical aircraft deployed
there required careful negotiations with the Turkish government. The
U.S.-Turkish Defense and Economic Cooperation Agreement authorized
a maximum of forty-eight tactical aircraft, a number the United States
sought to double temporarily to ninety-six.? Turkish public and govern-
mental opinion diverged over the country’s proper role in the Gulf crisis.
All agreed on the need for defensive precautions against an Iraqi attack,
but many opposed the use of Turkish soil for waging offensive war.
During the fall of 1990, both the Turkish Defense Minister and the Chief
of Turkey’s General Staff resigned over the matter. The final agreement
permitting the use of Turkish air bases came to fruition literally hours
before the opening of the air campaign; on 17 January, the Turkish
Parliament approved offensive use of their air bases by the aircraft of
Proven Force. The additional aircraft, along with the Proven Force
commander, arrived at Incirlik that same day; American aircraft began
flying combat missions that night.’

1(S) History of the Strategic Air Command 1 Jan - 31 Dec 1990, Vol I (Office of the
Historian, Strategic Air Command, 1992), pp 230, 240-41.

?(NATO/S) Jerome E. Schroeder and Thomas L. Raab, History of Join! Task Force
Proven Force (Hq, USAFE History Office, 1991), pp 23-4.

*Sorties were canceled the next day while the Turkish officials reexamined what they
had just signed up to, but operations then restarted less than a day later, with no further
interruptions for the remainder of the war. /bid, pp 30-3.

165


The attack helicopters of the U.S. Army and Marine Corps belong in
any description of air power employed in the Gulf War. The numbers
shown in Table 7 account for only the most capable of the attack helicop-
ters, the ones primarily used to attack Iraqi armor.” The commitment of
attack helicopters in this war was a particularly heavy one: the number of
AH-64 Apaches represented nearly half of the Army’s fleet of that aircraft,
and four of the six Marine AH-1W squadrons were in the theater.? Most
strikes by these attack helicopters took place during the ground war, as they
advanced with, and sometimes ahead of, the ground forces. Marine Corps
and Army VII Corps attack helicopters operated close to the front lines, but
in the areas of the XVIII Airborne Corps, the AH-64s engaged in several
independent deep operations, apart from the ground elements, against with-
drawing Iraqi troops. The main weapon of these aircraft for antiarmor
operations was the Hellfire missile. During the war, the U.S. Army expend-
ed 2,876 Hellfire missiles and the Marine Corps expended 159.4

Summary

Coalition air power was overwhelming in both numbers and in quali-
ty. That predominance applied to the more typical elements of air power:
air-to-air fighters, air-to-ground attack aircraft, and airlift aircraft. It
applied even more to the Coalition’s special capabilities in air power:
aerial refueling, airborne and satellite reconnaissance, electronic warfare,
airborne command and control, stealth, and precision munitions. These
special capabilities, ones that Iraq could not even begin to cope with,
were the province of U.S. forces; while other Coalition air forces pos-

"In addition to the Army AH-64 and Marine Corps AH-IW, the French Army
Gazelle and the British Lynx helicopters were employed in attack roles. The Royal Navy
Lynx helicopters firing Sea Skua air-to-surface missiles, for instance, was one of the most
effective weapons systems against Iraqi ships [(S) Jeffrey Lutz, et al, Desert Storm
Reconstruction Report, Vol VI: Antisurface Warfare (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval
Analyses, 1991), pp 3-14 through 3-17), There were several hundred other helicopters
that performed missions of armed reconnaissance, escort, and maritime surveillance [AH-
1J/FIT, OH-5S8D, and MH-53E Light Airborne Multipurpose system (LAMPS) helicopter].

“Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 666, 669.
“+See Chapter 3, Table 3.



Table 1
Internal Look 90 Target Lists*

CENTAF CENTCOM Joint

Target Categories Target List Target List
Leadership 3 4
Command, Control & Communication 14 21
Air Defense 72 4
Airfields 37 58
Nuclear 1 0
Biological 1 I
Chemical 1 1
Military Production & Support 22 81
Electric 6 0
POL 22 19
Scuds 7 0)
Republican Guard vy) 0
Ground Forces 0 8
Lines of Communications 25 79
Naval Forces (Ports) 7 7

TOTALS 218 293°

§ (S/NFIWN) Target Study, 9 TIS, “Iragi Target Study,” 15 Jun 1990, GWAPS,
NA-168; (S/NF/WN) Doc, “USCENTCOM Joint Target List," Tab A to Appendix 4 to
Annex B to USCINCCENT OPLAN 1002-90, 27 Jun 1990, GWAPS, NA 41.

*Installations listed under more than one category in the Joint Target List have been
counted no more than once. For example, Al Basra Naval Base was listed 11 times.
However, it was counted twice in this table, once as a naval installation and once as a
naval headquarters.

32



patrol boats, missile-firing boats, and mine-laying boats. Of 178 vessels,
the 13 Iraqi missile boats posed the greatest threat."

U.S. Navy aircraft prosecuted the attacks against the Iraqi Navy, assist-
ed by Great Britain’s Royal Navy attack helicopters; other Coalition aircraft
attacked the naval facilities. The aircraft carriers involved were the Mid-
way, Theodore Roosevelt, and Ranger, with the America joining on
15 February. Just as in the case of targets on land, the lack of adequate
bomb damage information prevented timely assessment of the damage to
the Iraqi boats. Later analysis showed that all of Iraq's missile boats had
been damaged or destroyed by 2 February 1991, except for one that es-
caped to Iran, but the Navy's antisurface warfare commander could not
declare the threat defeated until 17 February.“ Even after the threat was
eliminated, however, numerous maritime strikes took place on the many
patrol boats that remained on Faylakah Island, Bubiyan Island, and coastal
artillery positions and Silkworm missile sites. As a result of all engage-
ments, 143 Iragi boats were damaged or destroyed, including 12 of the 13
missile boats. On the eve of the ground attack, however, only 2 of the 7
known Silkworm sites (5 of them in Kuwait) were believed destroyed.*

The attacks against the Silkworm sites contained many of the same
frustrations as in the attacks on Scud sites. Although intelligence identi-
fied seven Silkworm sites before the war, repeated strikes on the sites did
not remove the threat. There were forty-five strikes in all, beginning at
the end of January, and half of those were during the ground offensive.
The fixed sites were suspected of being decoys, because an increasing
number of strikes were not made against the identified sites, but against
suspected sites in adjacent areas. Only two launches were recorded
during the war, from a site south of Kuwait City on 25 February; the

missiles were fired probably just before the site’s capture: one of the
missiles apparently crashed into the sea immediately, and the other was

*\(S) Peter P, Perla, Desert Storm Reconstruction Rpt, Vol f: Sianmary, and Jeffrey
Lutz, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Val Vir Amisurface Warfare (Alexandria,
VA: 1991)

“4(S) Perla, Reconstruction Report, p 78.

*¢S) Lutz, Reconstruction Report, p 4-1; (TS) viewgraph, “BDA, Tactical Systems,
Naval Forces,” J2 Brfg to the President and JCS, GWAPS, NA 353

*(S) Lutz, Reconstruction Report, pp 5-6 to S-8.

101



to use only Air Force assets, including F-117 aircraft."* Warden did not
consider Instant Thunder:a finished product but rather a good first cut.

The plan (which developed constantly from early August on) pro-
gressed through a number of versions during the ten days Warden briefed
it to Air Force Headquarters and the Joint Staff before introducing it to the
theater. The text of the briefing viewgraphs stopped just short of declar-
ing that Instant Thunder alone would force Iraq to withdraw from Ku-
wait.” The Checkmate planners appear to have believed that the conflict
would require attacks on Baghdad and Iraq proper, and not solely, or even
chiefly, on forces deployed in Kuwait. After Warden briefed the plan to
General Schwarzkopf on 10 August, and General Powell on 11 August,
General Powell directed that planners from the other Services and the Joint
Staff join the effort. At this stage, too, the plan expanded to include the
Navy and Marine Corps aircraft deploying to the region and the Navy’s
Tomahawk land attack missiles (TLAMs). The version of the plan re-
ceived on 17 August by General Schwarzkopf retained Warden’s and
Checkmate’s concepts but included more than Air Force aircraft and,
reflecting the Joint Staff sponsorship, bore the logo of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff. Instant Thunder offered the American high command the only
offensive option it would have for months. The plan, however, did not
teceive universal support; General Homer (serving as Central Command
Commander, Forward, in General Schwarzkopf’s stead), gave it a far more
critical reception than it had received in the United States.

General Horner thought the plan seriously flawed in its operational
aspects and disapproved of its relative neglect of the Iraqi forces in Ku-
wail. To produce a more acceptable plan, Homer selected
Brig. Gen. Buster Glosson, an Air Force officer then on another assign-
ment in the region, to direct a secret planning effort for an offensive air

18(S) Brfg, “Instant Thunder,” “Iraqi Air Campaign,” and like names, Aug 1990,
contained in GWAPS, CHSH 5 and 7. Warden was predisposed to focus on the com-
mand element as the true center of gravity in any case [John A. Warden Ill, The Air
Campaign (Washington: National Defense University Press), 1988, pp 51-58], but the
Personality of Saddam Hussein made this focus seem particularly appropriate.

' Versions of the briefing included the following formulation: . . . “degrade Iraqi will
and military capability . . . to conduct defensive operations in Kuwait.” (8 Aug); “Create
conditions leading to Iraqi expulsion from Kuwait.” (11 Aug); “Peninsula nations would
have combat capability to deal effectively with residual Iraqi forces.” (17 Aug) GWAPS,
CHSH § and 7.

37



crews and maintenance personnel resided in the Reserves, and even
before the crisis, at any one time approximately twenty percent of the
Reserve Associate crews were flying on a regular basis.’

The Civil Reserve Air Fleet had been a long-standing contingency
force but had never been used and needed adaptation. The first stage of
CRAF augmentation, an authorization for 38 aircraft and crews, including
12 Boeing 747s, occurred on 17 August; it provided an increase of only
10 aircraft, however, since the other 28 had already begun working under
contract with the airlines. The second stage, authorizing 76 more aircraft,
took place on 17 January 1991, but only 9 cargo aircraft were added; the
remainder were already contracted and flying.’ The CRAF augmentation
provided a vital addition to the airlift, particularly in passenger-carrying
ability, but with some attendant limitations. During the war, because of
the concerns of some of the aircraft owners, CRAF aircraft could not stay
on the ground at bases within range of Scud missiles during hours of
darkness—a problem, since the main debarking base of Dhahran was
within this range; in addition, the aircraft insurance policies specified
geographical exclusion zones in which rates increased 2,000 percent,
making each trip particularly expensive.’ An earlier activation of CRAF
Il, dedicated to transporting personnel {one-third of whom flew on mili-
tary transports), might have eased the initial deployment.

Intratheater airlift distributed the supplies and people throughout the
Arabian Peninsula after they arrived in the theater. C-130s, 149 from the
USS. Air Force (one-third of the total Air Force fleet) and smaller numbers
from across other Coalition nations (Saudi Arabia, the United Kingdom,

7Lt Gen Vernon J. Kondra, Operation Desert Shield-Desert Storm: The Yernon J.
Kondra Notes, 24 Aug 1990-31 May 1991, transcribed by Clayton Snedecker, 21st Air
Force Historian (McGuire AFB, NJ: 1992), pp 6-8; John Lund and Ruth Berg, Strategic
Airlift in Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm, pp 27, 28; (S) Ltr, MAC DCS Plans
and Programs/XPX to MAC History Office, “Review of Chapter Il of 1990 MAC
History, Operation Desert Shield,” 6 Sep 1991.

5MAC History, p 65; Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War,
Final Report to Congress, April 1992, p 420.
°Kondra Notes, pp 84, 111, 114; Strategic Airlift in Desert Shield and Desert Storm,

Pp 22-23; Stacy Shapiro and Meg Fletcher, “War Tensions Heat Up Market: Insurers
Restrict Cover for Gulf Area,” Business Insurance, 14 Jan 1991, p 45.

188


q

at various levels, the relations between producers and consumers of
intelligence, and the expectations, realistic or otherwise, that commanders
and staffs had of intelligence.

Dealing with the role of intelligence in an unclassified format so soon
after the events themselves placed limits on what could be discussed here.
Many details could not be mentioned, and major pieces of the story such
as the roles played by human and signals intelligence in the Gulf War had
to be omitted entirely. This chapter should be read with those constraints
in mind. At most, it represents a start in understanding the capacities and
functions of intelligence in the war.

Estimates

Estimates of Iraq’s military capabilities and intentions were not
central concerns of the United States until the spring of 1990. A 1989
national intelligence estimate had assessed Iraq as not likely to invade
Kuwait, and U.S. intelligence was only beginning to shift its resources
from a focus on the Soviet Union. In the fall of 1989, Central Command
had begun to orient its regional planning on Iraq, but information on
Iraq’s military forces, installations, communications, and leadership was
far short of that necessary for effective targeting. Moreover, the aggres-
sive security and counterintelligence policies of the Iraqi regime made
attempts to collect such information even more difficult.‘ Central Com-
mand’s exercise Internal Look had accelerated the target development
process, but an extensive effort was needed throughout Desert Shield and
continued during Desert Storm to identify and assess the Iraqi target base.
Even after the war, much was still unknown.

Before the war, the national intelligence agencies, along with the
military services and fighting commands, maintained and updated their
installation and order of battle databases as new information became avail-
able. Unfortunately, when Baghdad invaded Kuwait, the most comprehen-
sive database~Defense Intelligence Agency’s (DIA’s) Automated Installa-
tions Intelligence File-was not current, caught in the post-Cold War transi-

‘us. Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Final Report to
Congress, Apr 1992, p 333.

122



ence to attacks on what came to be called the strategic targets of Desert
Storm; the priorities did, however, anticipate the defensive planning
performed in the early days of Desert Shield.'°

Desert Shield Planning

Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait on 2 August 1990 created a situation quite
different from the scenario envisioned in Operations Plan 1002-90 (which
anticipated 30 days warning of an invasion of Saudi Arabia). If anything,
the change made the use of air power even more crucial. When
General Schwarzkopf and General Horner laid out options for
President Bush at a National Security Council meeting on 4 August, it was
clear that all the early options involved air power. The initial land- and
carrier-based air could arrive within days; twelve fighter squadrons, a
bomber squadron, and two carrier battle groups could be in the region
when only an airborne division and a Marine brigade would be available.
Forces for a ground offensive, if necessary, would not be ready for seven-
teen weeks, and even deploying sufficient ground forces to establish a
defense would take several weeks." General Horner briefed the meeting
on the planned employment of air power as envisioned by the operations
plan: gaining air superiority, interdicting the attacking Iraqi forces, and
defending the ports and rear areas. He also briefed a second plan of offen-
sive retaliatory strikes against targets in Iraq, if Iraq used chemical weapons

against U.S. or allied forces.”? As forces began to deploy to the theater, the

CENTAF staff developed employment plans for these two options.

The two initial options were captured in the format of air tasking
orders (ATOs),"* the “Punishment ATO” and the “D-Day ATO.” The

"%() Ltr, Col Richard B. Bennett, USAR, Dir Combat Plans, subj: “Internal Look
90 COMUSCENTAF Air Guidance Letter,” 24 Jul 1990. GWAPS, NA 163.

"(S) Brfg, “USCENTCOM Preliminary Planning, 2-6 Aug 1990,” GWAPS, NA 117.

"Conduct of the Persian Guif War, p 40; (S) Ltr, Tactical Air Command Historian
to 9th Air Force Historian, 12 Jun 1991, subj: General Homer Questions and Answers,
with two attachments, GWAPS, CHP 13A.

"There was no complete operations plan or operations order in existence that
captured the essence of the planning taking place. The air tasking order is the final
distilled product of the planning involving objectives, aircraft sortie allocation, and target
selection, issued in terms of a daily schedule of aircraft sorties matched with missions,
targets, times, and all the coordinating instructions necessary for units to accomplish the

‘ 33



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Table 6
Desert Storm Attack Aircraft

Organization Type* Number
US. Air Force A-10 132
B-52 66
F-15E 48
F-16 244
FAME 18
F-111F 64
FH? 42
U.S. Navy A6 95
AT uw
FIA-18 89
U.S. Marine Corps. A-6 20
AV-8B 86
FYA-18A/C/D a
AH-I1W 50
U.S. Amy AH-64 274
U.S. Special Operations Command — AC-130 4
Saudi Arabia Tomado 4
RS 87
Great Britain Tomado 39
Jaguar 12
Buccaneer 12
Kuwait A4 20
F-l 15
France Jaguar uw
Bahrain FS 12
Italy Tomado 10

* Numbers are approximate, and only those aircraft flying at least one-hundred sorties are
included. Numbers of aircraft varied somewhat during the war because of attrition, replace-
ment, and routine movements and include attack aircraft based out of the theater at Incirlik,

Moron, Fairford, and Diego Garcia.

1991, GWAPS Microfilm Roll 10264, AFHRA 00269612; Conduct of the Persian Gulf
War, pp 666-70, 787.

199



i
|

radars to detect and track ground targets, but in 1990 it was still in devel-
opment and had not undergone operational testing by the Air Force and
Army. Nevertheless, two of these aircraft were pressed into use, and with
civilian technicians to operate the equipment, arrived in the theater only
days before the beginning of the air war. One of the two aircraft flew
every night of the war, performing reconnaissance of Iragi ground forma-
tions {and suspected Scud sites), passing targeting information to the
ABCCC and AWACS aircraft, and even coordinating target information
directly with the strike aircraft.'”

Sixteen military and five commercial communications satellites made
the command and control of Coalition forces possible. Fourteen U.S.
military communications satellites were in orbit when the crisis began,
and they were augmented by two others, one British (SK YNET) and one
NATO spacecraft. Five leased commercial satellites and communications
circuits were also added. Taken together, these systems provided a
transmission rate of 200 million bits per second, or about 39,000 simulta-
neous telephone calls. Military systems provided approximately 75
percent of this total capacity." These space systems carried 90 percent
of the intertheater communications and an undetermined, but substantial,
portion of the intratheater.'®

8) USCENTAF, “Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar System (ISTARS)
Employment Concept,” GWAPS, Microfilm Roll 10238. Target location and navigation
by both aircraft and ground forces were tremendously assisted by a constellation of
sixteen Global Positioning System satellites, intended for operational capability in 1991
but pressed into service ahead of schedule [US Space Command Assessment, pp 25-32;
Andrew Wilson, ed, Interavia Space Directory 1991-92 (Alexandria, WA: Jane’s Informa-
tion Group, 1991), pp 203-05].

"Joint Stafi/J-6Z Brfg, “Use of Satellite Communications Desert Shield/Desent
Storm,” undated; Andrew Wilson, ed, Interavia Space Directory 1991-92; (SINF) Rpt,
Paul High, Jr, “Assessment of USCENTCOM Intelligence Communications Support
(draft),” Apr 1992, S-127/IPSG-INCA, p 8884-28.

‘The entire Desert Storm communications architecture was a collection of inter-
connected land-line, radio, and satellite systems. Since satellites were used for trunking
of local distribution (indigenous systems could not handie the volume of Coalition
communications traffic), phone conversations between units within a few miles of each
other, sometimes even on the same base, could be connected via satellite.

193



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i

iy
i
{

Table 7
Missiles Employed in Desert Storm Strikes

Organization Type Number launched
U.S. Navy Tactical Land Attack Missile (TLAM) 282 (last one launched on
1 Feb)
US. Army Army Tactical Missile System 21 missions (some missions
(ATACMS)* had two missiles employed)
U,S. Air Force Conventional air-launched cruise 35 (all launched the first day
missile (CALCM) of the air war)

* The ATACMS is included in this section on air suikes simply because its range-over 50
miles-sets it apart from other rocket systems and naval gunfire.

U.S. aircraft flew some 88 percent of the over 46,000 attack sorties
conducted during Desert Storm (counting fixed-wing aircraft only); the
Air Force alone flew 60 percent. Nearly all attack helicopter missions
were by US. forces. Numbers of sorties alone do not give the dimen-
sions of the contributions of each type of aircraft, however; for that one
has to look more closely.

Though air attacks took place around the clock, few units flew on
twenty-four-hour-a-day operations: the F-117s, F-111(E and F)s, A-6s,
and F-15Es flew almost entirely at night, TLAM attacks on Baghdad,
after the first night, took place mostly during the day in order to keep the
pressure on day and night (the only other strikes on downtown Baghdad
were by the night-flying F-117s); some aircraft flew almost entirely day
missions because of limited night capability-AV-8Bs, Jaguars, A-4s; and
the A-10s, F-16s, and F/A-18s flew mostly during the day but had some
aircraft or crews dedicated to night flying; B-52s attacked both day and

*S attack sorties counted are those of interdiction, close air support, and airfield attack
(under the offensive counterair category). GWAPS Composite Sorties Database; Lt Col
Steven L. Head, “Briefing on the Conduct and Performance of the Air Campaign in
Operation Desert Storm,” 21 Mar 1991, GWAPS, CHO 1-2.

200



aircraft lost over North Vietnam.'? The Iragis probably hoped that their
ground-based air defenses could be at least as successful as North Viet-
nam's had been. By the time Desert Storm ended, however, the Coali-
tion's loss rate was only about | fixed-wing aircraft per 1,800 combat
sorties. This loss rate was 4.7 times lower than that experienced by the
United States over North Vietnam from January-December 1967 and
some 14 times lower than that American air forces sustained during
Linebacker II.'* Low losses stemmed from the combination of successful
suppression of Iraqi air defense and the decision to bomb from medium
altitudes. How were losses kept so low in Desert Storm? Although some
crews initially tried NATO-style low-level ingress tactics during the first
few nights of Desert Storm, the sheer volume and ubiquity of barrage
antiaircraft artillery, combined with the ability of Stinger-class infrared
SAMs to be effective up to 12,000-15,000 feet, quickly persuaded most
everyone on the Coalition side to abandon low altitude, especially for
weapon release. Coincident with aircrew reactions to the dangers of
low-altitude operations, Brig. Gen, Buster C. Glosson quickly directed the
air force units under his command to shift to medium altitude for ingress,
egress, and weapons release.

This decision had a price. For aircraft such as the F-16 and F/A-18,
which principally employed unguided (or “dumb”) munitions during
Desert Storm, it entailed a definite sacrifice in bombing accuracy.
Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner, the Joint Force Air Component Commander,
Stressed in early February 1991 that American support at home for the
war depended in large measure on the ability to operate “with less than
anticipated” losses of human lives among Coalition airmen, soldiers,
sailors, and marines.'* Coalition planners thought it imperative not to
lose any more aircraft than absolutely necessary.

“Directorate of Management Analysis, USAF Management Summary: Southeast Asia
Review, as of 30:Jun 1973, pp 28 and 30.

DOD, OASD/Comptroller, Directorate of Information Operations, Table 311 (22
Jun 1972) and Table 321 (19 Apr 1972); and (S) Headquarters Pacific Air Forces
(PACAP), Directorate of Operations Analysis, Sunmary: Air Operations Southeast Asia,
Jan 1973, pp 4-B-1 and 4-B-2.

“intvw, Maj Gen Buster C. Glosson with GWAPS personnel, 14 Apr 1992. As
would be expected, the exact flight and weapon-release “floors” for many aircraft fluctuat-
ed during the course of the war in response to tactical conditions and mission require-
ments,

"S<Daily Comments of Lt Gen Charles A. Homer, Commander USCENTAF, during
Operation Desert Storm, 17 Jan - 28 Feb 1991,” entry for 7 Feb 1991/1700, GWAPS, CHC.

62



first week or so of the war.’ Part of the reason was that the planners
elected to go after the majority of Iraq's twenty-five major power stations
and the generator halls offered the most obvious aimpoints. In addition,
some of the flying units were not aware that operational planners in
Riyadh were attempting to limit long-term damage. Much the same thing
occurred with oi} targets; in a number of instances, aircraft attacked
crude-oil distillation towers despite the intended policy of minimizing
long-term damage.TM Both discrepancies illustrate the gap that can exist
between specifying a target such as a petroleum refinery and picking the
particular aimpoints to be hit there.

Figure 14
Strikes against Electricity and Oil

Bo

Strikes against Oll
Gl strikes against Electricity

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

o 1 Bang

Ws2 23 2 29 «24 4 7 0 813 16 «19 «22 28 «28
January February 1991
Source: GWAPS Missions Database.

>" That boilers and generator halls were damaged has been well documented by both
Coalition wartime reconnaissance and postwar site inspections by members the interna-
tional study team that surveyed many bombed facilities from 23 Aug to 5 Sep 1991
(Walid Doleh, Warren Piper, Abdel Qamhieh, and Kamel al Tallaq, “Electric Facilities
Survey,” Oct 1991, Appendix A; and (S/WN) Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), Desert
Storm BDA Imagery Review, DDX-2900-489-91, Vol. 3, pp 48-53).

DIA, Desert Storm BDA Imagery Review, Vol. 3, pp 12-13, 27-29.

72


What was the Air Campaign Plan?

On 8 August 1990, two days after King Fahd of Saudi Arabia had
approved the deployment of American forces to defend Saudi Arabia and
one day after those forces began to deploy, President George Bush out-
lined U.S. objectives in the region. They were to (1) secure the immedi-
ate, unconditional, and complete withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait,
(2) restore the legitimate government of Kuwait, (3) assure the security
and stability of the Persian Gulf region, and (4) protect American lives.!

On 25 August 1990, less than three weeks after the U.S. decision to
commit troops to defend Saudi Arabia, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf,
Commander, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), briefed Gen. Colin L.
Powell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), on the outlines of a
four-phased plan to eject the Iraqis from Kuwait. Although the ground
forces’ concept of operations remained unclear, the concept of the air
campaign had already evolved:

USCINCCENT’s Intent

. .. We will initially attack into the Iraqi homeland using air power to
decapitate his leadership, command and control, and eliminate his ability
to reinforce Iraqi ground forces in Kuwait and Southern Iraq. We will
then gain undisputed air superiority over Kuwait so that we can subse-
quently and selectively attack Iraqi ground forces with air power in
order to reduce his combat power and destroy reinforcing units... .?

"Address to the Nation Announcing the Deployment of United States Armed Forces
to Sandi Arabia, in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George Bush,
1990 (Book I1) (Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Record Administra-
tion, 1991), p 1108, ‘These objectives were a restatement of those put forward by the U.S.
State Department on 6 August. UN Resolutions 660 and 661 of 2 and 6 August also
contained the first two of these objectives,

2(8) Viewgraph from brig, “Offensive Campaign: Desert Slorm,” Hq, Central
Command, 24 Aug 1990, GWAPS, NA 208. Notice the use of thé term “decapitate.”

27



fire at 8:00 a.m. local time on 28 February, the focus of air interdiction
became one of pursuing and destroying the retreating army.'®

For the first two days of the ground offensive, air interdiction strikes
took place on Iraqi troop concentrations and equipment just beyond the
fire support coordination line (the line behind which air attacks require
approval and coordination of the ground commander). Other aircraft
prowled the deeper areas of the theater, often at night, receiving cues
from JSTARS aircraft or control/scout aircraft (F-16 Pointer or F/A-18D)
to attack any movement of forces. After the general retreat of the Iraqi
forces on the evening of 25 February, the interdiction sorties bore down
on the retreating columns of Iraqi forces flowing north in trucks, cars,
boats, and any other means available to depart the country. The units in
the northern part of the theater had the best chance of escaping intact.
The forces that followed them, however, slowed and then stopped at
points where many units converged at bridges or roadway chokepoints.

Mutla Ridge, the high ground to the west of Kuwait City and just
north of the city of Al Jahra, was the first place air strikes stopped the
retreating columns. The major road to Basra passing over the bluffs of
the ridge became a natural chokepoint for the traffic retreating from
throughout southeast Kuwait. This traffic became combined with that
fleeing Kuwait City (see Figure 26). Once air attacks halted the forward
elements of this traffic, the remaining several miles of vehicles were
attacked throughout the evening, leaving a scene of abandoned and burn-
ing vehicles approximately two miles long. The news media identified
this scene as the “highway of death” in the immediate aftermath of the
war.'° A count of destroyed vehicles, made from photos taken on
1 March, put the number at more than 1,400, which included only 14
tanks and 14 other armored vehicles. Reporters found somewhere be-
tween 200 and 300 dead Iraqis at the scene; the other occupants presum-
ably either escaped north or became prisoners.

10°No phases were either planned or announced, of course. The term phases is used
simply to describe the unfolding events. Word of the general withdrawal came from Iraqi
army radio intercepts, communications from the Kuwait resistance in Kuwait City, and
aircraft in the region. (S) TACC Log, entries of 25 Feb, 1991, GWAPS, NA 215.

"steve Coll and William Branigan, “U.S. Scrambled to Shape View of ‘Highway
of Death,’ ” Washington Post, 11 Mar 1991, p 1.

113



The capacity of the Baghdad-to-Basra rail line was entirely eliminated
by the bridge damage described previously. The loss of the rail line was
potentially more significant than these numbers alone would suggest, for
before the air war, it was the principal means for transporting armor and
self-propelled artillery from central Iraq to the Kuwait theater, After the
line was closed, these vehicles could have used the highways, but only
with great difficulty.”

During February, various strike aircraft (notably F-16s) flew armed
reconnaissance missions along sections of the main highways leading into
the Kuwait theater. Besides destroying trucks and their cargo, “road
recce” forced the enemy to take steps that hampered resupply. Iraqi
countermeasures to deal with the air threat led to the dimunition of the
supply flow. By the third week in February, resupply movements were
largely restricted to the night hours, as Iraqi vehicles sought refuge in the
darkness.” The capability of Coalition aircraft to operate at night, how-
ever, undercut the effectiveness of this standard response to air inter-
diction. In addition, Iraq shifted from multivehicle convoys to single
trucks to make its supply transports less detectable and lucrative targets
for Allied aircraft.° Yet, this change also reduced the supply tonnage
reaching the theater each day.

Attacks on Iraqi stockpiles and transportation within the Kuwait the-
ater completed the effort to cut off the theater from Iraq. Here there were
few bridges or chokepoints; instead, the attacks fell on the trucks deployed
with units and those making supply runs. Information from EPW (enemy
prisoner of war) reports suggests that air attacks eliminated more than half
the trucks in the theater. The reports indicated that most of the trucks
broke down for want of spare parts, or were destroyed by air attacks, or
that drivers eventually refused to travel the roads in the theater.

7*(SINFIREL/UK/SA/WN) Rpt, Intelligence and Threat Analysis Center. U.S. Army
Intelligence Agency, /raqi Resupply and Sustainability, ATC-WP- 1 150-032-91, Nov 1990,
p 3, GWAPS, CIM Folder 46; (S/NF/REL/UK, CAN, AUS WN) Memo, Dimon to
Distribution, 7 Feb 1991.

7°(TSINF/SPECAT) Brfg, J-2 Daily BDA Assessment for Operation Desert Storm,
19/20-23/24 Feb 1991, GWAPS, NA 353.

®°(S/NF) Rpt, Defense Intelligence Agency, Persian Gulf War: Trends and Outlook
(19-24 Feb 1991), Defense Intelligence Memo 61-91, Feb 1991, p 3, GWAPS, CBDA
Folder 37.

97



Chain of Command .............- CHC
Overviews ........

Video, Audio
Target Photos
Special Compartmented Information .. CHSCI

Checkmate Office Files

Central .
ATO.
BDA..... tees
Intelligence .......
Gulf War Office

Hq USAF Operations Center Files

Contingency Operations Branch ...... COB
Contingency Support Staff........... CSS
New Acquisitions File ..:...............- NA

GWAPS CHSH 100-29 indicates the twenty-ninth document in
the hundredth folder in the Checkmate Historian's File on Desert Shield.
GWAPS NA 6 indicates the sixth folder in the New Acquisitions file.
Air Force Historical Research Agency microfilm records are referenced
by AFHRA followed either by a six-digit computer index (IRIS) number
or a five-digit roll number.

The Air Force Historical Research Agency is cataloging GWAPS
paper records to allow electronic retrieval through IRIS but the Agency
will retain a cross-reference to the original GWAPS identifiers. ©
Automated finding aids helped the Survey to begin studying the large
body of records on the Gulf War, but much remains to be done. Survey
reports should themselves be seen as finding aids for those who will
continue the study of this war.

255



* The Iraqi Army had approximately 800 fewer tanks and 600
fewer artillery pieces at the beginning of the air war than origi-
nally thought—approximately twenty percent fewer.

* Prior to the ground war, the Republican Guard heavy divisions®
had suffered approximately twenty-four percent armor attrition,
at a time when Central Command estimated thirty-four percent
attrition.

*  Prisoner-of-war reports indicate great variations in unit armor
attrition during the air war, from ten percent for an armored divi-
sion in the middle of the theater (12th Armored) to nearly one
hundred percent for divisions close to the front lines (52
Armored, 25th, 30th, and 48th Infantry Divisions). Prisoners
citing less attrition usually attributed the differences to protective
berms, since those same units suffered substantially higher attri-
tion of trucks that were not so protected.

¢ By the end of the war, the Iraqi Army had suffered approximate-
ly seventy-six percent attrition in tanks, fifty-five percent in
armored personnel carriers, and ninety percent in artillery. The
Republican Guard heavy divisions, however, had suffered only
about fifty percent attrition in these same categories.

+ Battlefield studies groups have had access to only a total of 163
tanks (6 percent of the 2,633 that had been destroyed or aban-
doned). Of this sample, between 10 and 20 percent had been hit
by air-delivered munitions and about half (78 of 163) were not
hit by munitions at all.

The data support several conclusions. First, Central Command’s initial
counts of equipment destroyed were inflated, but so too was the target
base, and the errors are offsetting. In other words, Central Command’s
percentages of equipment destroyed by the beginning of the ground war
were in line with later observations, though the numbers of pieces de-
stroyed was inflated. Second, equipment attrition did not occur evenly
throughout the theater but varied from high attrition to lower attrition by

ay heavy division being an armored or mechanized division. The Republican Guard
had a total of three in the theater: the Tawakalna (mechanized), Madinah, and Hammurabi
(both armored).

i 106



Reconnaissance

| Reconnaissance assets included an array of air and space systems.
| Spacecraft included a total of six meteorological satellites, three Defense
{ Support Program satellites that scanned for and reported bright infrared
¢ “events”—the exhaust glow from Scud launches (the satellites were put in
orbit originally to warn of a Soviet ballistic missile attack against the United
States). Two civil satellites also provided imagery: the U.S. LANDSAT
and the French SPOT.”

A second category of U.S. reconnaissance assets were the strategic
airbome reconnaissance platforms, a group of nine RC-135 Rivet Joint
if aircraft and nine U-2/TR-1 aircraft operated by Strategic Air Command.”
BE! These aircraft had sophisticated sensors for collecting imagery and electronic
3 intelligence, but they were vulnerable while flying in Iraqi airspace.
Bi Therefore, while the Coalition had a large array of strategic airborne and
‘ space systems, greater capability was needed for observing Iraqi forces and
P obtaining targeting data and bomb damage assessment, particularly during
a periods of cloud cover, For these tasks, the Coalition needed a third catego-
q Ty of tactical reconnaissance-aircraft capable of flying under the clouds and
penetrating Iragi-defended airspace.

Tactical reconnaissance aircraft, this third category, proved deficient.
tk The U.S. Air Force employed twenty-four RF-4Cs (six of them flying
from Incirlik, Turkey), and even these were a late addition to the force.
j The six aircraft at Incirlik did not arrive until February 1991, and twelve
of the other RF-4Cs did not arrive in the theater until just before the
beginning of the air war; more were not sent, reportedly, because of a
lack of ramp space.” This “lack of ramp space” argument suggests that
these assets were assigned an extremely low priority, resulting in a short-

20(S/NF) Rpt, United States Space Command Operations Desert Shield and Desert
Storm Assessment, Jan 1992, pp 10-24, 39-46; Interavia Space Directory 1991-92, pp
474-77, 467-69,

2The AWACS and JSTARS aircraft, mentioned in the first category of command

and control, also had an immense reconnaissance capability, AWACS of airborne aircraft
and JSTARS of ground traffic,

22(S) U.S. Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Apr 1992, pp
T-139-41.

|
|
iF
| : 194
i



they had successful missions (131).' Even some of the B-52 sorties
scheduled for bombing the breach sites were redirected in flight to other
targets because the ground advance had already passed beyond the
sites."

Close air support supported the ground attack but was not considered
vital to the attack’s success. Because of the nature of the enemy resis-
tance, or the lack of it, there were few instances in which close air sup-
port sorties had to drop munitions close to Coalition ground forces to stop
an Iraqi attack. The aircraft employed were capable of much more than
was requested from them, but Coalition artillery and rocket launchers, the
superior range of Coalition tank guns and other direct fire weapons, and
the tremendous advantage of thermal imaging sights that allowed M1A1
tanks to engage Iraqi tanks at ranges nearly double the maximum acquisi-
tion range of the Iraqis, allowed the Coalition ground forces to handle
those few instances of resistance without substantial assistance from the
air. Air power’s greater effectiveness was in attacking the forces deeper
in the Iraqi defense areas, in the regions where these attacks blended in
with the interdiction strikes.

During the ground offensive, Coalition helicopter operations provided
great mobility and airborne firepower, Although Army AH-64 Apaches
helped destroy Iraqi air defense installations on the first night of the air
campaign, there was only a limited amount of helicopter employment in
cross-border operations in order to preserve these aircraft for use with the
advancing ground forces. Once the ground advance began, helicopters
moved logistics support rapidly and repositioned the ground forces them-
selves. On the first day of the ground offensive, helicopters of the U.S.
101st Airbome Division conducted the largest heliborne operation ever
staged by moving a brigade of the 101st to a base 93 miles into Iraq and
then reaching that far again to cut Highway 8, the Iraqi army's only
possible line of retreat west from the theater.'*

10S) Marine Corps Reconstruction Report, Vol. IV, p 77; (S) Combat Chronology
23/354 TFW(P), entries for 24 - 28 Feb 1991, GWAPS, Microfilm Roll 26557. A-10 data
are for all sorties; only partial data are available for close air support sorties, but those
data indicate the unsuccessful rate was even higher for these sorties.

1045) History of the Strategic Air Command, 1 Jan-31 Dec 1990, Vol | (Hq, SAC
History Office, 1992), p 273.

"Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 261-62.

1



wing contained elements of several other flying units. The B-52s were even
more fragmented, deploying in only partial squadrons because the squadrons
also maintained a nuclear alert commitment in the United States.

Nonflying Air Force personnel deployed in far more fragmented units
than did flying personnel. These personnel, both active and reserve, were
selected to deploy by functional, not organizational, designation. A mainte-
nance squadron in the United States or Europe, for example, would be
ordered to deploy six jet engine mechanics; this group could then be further
split and deployed to different provisional units in the Gulf. While a provi-
sional wing was composed of two, three, or even four flying units, the
balance of the wing could come from an array of units. This practice was
criticized widely in at least two respects. First was unit cohesion, Support
organizations created in the theater were composed of officers and enlisted
personnel who did not know and had not worked with one another. This
situation became even more difficult, since individuals were assigned tempo-
rarily to provisional units, so their administrative control (for pay, account-
ability, promotions, and the like) remained with their original units. The
difficulties for Reservists in this situation were even greater, since they often
fell under different accounting rules.” Another problem involved the deple-
tion of resources from the parent units, making them less able to respond
to a crisis or further deployment. Here too, the Reserves were most affected
because they first lost personnel who volunteered and later, personnel called
up to fiti other requirements. Their absence could have affected the unit's
readiness and ability to meet unit requirements.”*

Air Reserve Components (Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard)
made up roughly 20 percent of total Air Force personnel in the Gulf and
proved absolutely essential in certain specialties. For example, one-third of
all air reservists mobilized were medical personnel. While fewer in number,
the Reserves comprised large percentages of both strategic and tactical airlift
and air refueling crews and two-thirds of the Air Force communications
personnel deployed. Three of the fighter squadrons in the Gulf were from
the Reservestwo F-16 squadrons and one A-10 squadron. There probably
would have been greater reliance on the Reserve components if not for the
end of the Cold War. When the second phase of deployment took place in
November 1990, the substantial forces in Europe, both Air Force and Army,

2Oneration Desert Shield Problems Encountered by Activated Reservists, “Report
to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs,” United States General Ac-
counting Office, Sep 1991 (GAO/NSIAD-91-290), pp 1-2.

2\eThe Contribution of the Reserve Components to the Persian Gulf War,” in The
Reserve Components of the United States Armed Forces, Jun 1992, p 40.

217



(Above) F-15E
engine change
at Al Khar], SA.
(Right) Weapons
loading, F-16s at
Al Minhad, UAE.

C-5s on the flightline at Rhein Main AB, Germany, enroute to Saudi Arabia,

206



associated with these forces included tanks, trucks, bunkers, and deployed
logistics supplies.

The presence of a target in the DIA’s installations and order of battle
databases did not mean that pilots had adequate information to conduct
an attack. Pilots required photographs and other target materials. Some
target folders were prepared in advance and carried into the theater, while
others were prepared in the theater, especially as new targets emerged.
Combat aircrews at the wing level requested a steady flow of target
materials, especially imagery. At one end of the spectrum were systems
such as the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile and the F-117 that had
prodigious requirements for specialized information. But even in the case
of fighter-bombers with less exacting requirements for mission planning,
the appetite for target imagery and threat information in the units proved
well-nigh insatiable.

In this regard, intelligence analysts had a sometimes ill-defined rela-
tionship with operational planners during the Gulf War. Normally, target-
intelligence officers from Central Command and CENTAF nominated
targets to be attacked according to their own analyses, those obtained
from national intelligence agencies, and their understanding of the overall
campaign strategy. They went into the war expecting that these nomina-
tions would form the basis for each day’s air tasking order. But in Desert
Storm, operational planners in the Black Hole, relying on their own
intelligence sources, made the basic target selections—especially insofar
as the strategic portion of the air campaign was concerned. Inevitably,
this ad hoc arrangement tended to blur and confuse the relations between
theater intelligence and operations.

Once targets were selected, CENTAF and Central Command targeting
officers would begin working with DIA and the Defense Mapping Agen-
cy Aerospace Center (DMAAC) in St. Louis, Missouri, to obtain the most
precise coordinates for the aimpoints to be used in striking them. Two
further problems then emerged: the selection of aimpoints and the preci-
sion of the coordinates passed to the units. Sometimes aimpoints were
selected at CENTAF, but more often they were chosen at unit level.
Who had primary jurisdiction for this responsibility-CENTAF or the
wings—became a point of both contention and added confusion. In addi-
tion, the bombing accuracy possible with platforms such as the F-117s

135


BDA . . . was one of the major areas of confusion. . . . It led to some
disagreements. As a matter of fact, it led to some distancing on the part
of some agencies from the position of CENTCOM at the time, as to
what the bomb damage assessment really was.”

Theater planners and intelligence staffs disagreed among themselves
and with the Washington intelligence agencies over the levels of damage
being achieved by the bombing in Iraq proper and within the Kuwait
theater. At the same time, reports from Air Force, Navy, and Marine
flight crew members and those of other Coalition air forces agreed that
they received little or no bomb damage assessment on the targets they
attacked during the entire war." There were many contributing causes:
some organizational, some procedural, and some technical. Some limita-
tions were not failings at all; they were simply limits of what could be
known or observed. A review of the major impediments to accurate and
timely bomb damage assessment can give some understanding of the
dimensions of the problem.

The intelligence staffs were not prepared for the enormity of the task,
either in numbers of qualified personnel or in established and rehearsed
procedures. Those staffs were particularly not prepared to deal with the
number of attack sorties occurring every day of the war. Exercise Internal
Look, a valuable learning experience for commanders and planners, could
not preview the subsequent bomb damage assessment problems, since that
exercise followed the long-standing practice of simulating the production
of bomb damage assessment to simplify and shorten the exercise.”

“TRpt, Investigations Subcommittee on Armed Services, Intelligence Successes and

Failures in Operation Desert Shield/Storm, House of Representatives, 102d Congress, 2d
session.

“The only exceptions to inadequate BDA at the unit level were units flying aircraft
equipped Lo bring back video recordings of their weapons’ impacts, or those that had their
own reconnaissance assets (e.g., F-14Ds capable of carrying the Tactical Air Reconnais-
sance Pod System).

“Rpt, USCENTAF/IN Afier Action Report and Lessons Leamed, 25 Mar 1991, from
Col Rauschkolb to Col Christon (CENTAF/IN), with 17 attachments.

139



Gulf War Air Power Survey
Staff

Dr. Eliot A. Cohen, Director

Col. Emery M. Kiraly

Lt. Gen. Robert E. Kelley
(Retired, USAF)

Dr. Wayne W. Thompson

Mr. Ernest D. Cruea

Maj. Joseph W. Patterson

Mr. Lawrence J. Paszek

Lt. Col. Daniel T. Kuehl

Lt. Col. Robert C. Owen

Dr. John F, Guilmartin

Mr. Richard A. Gunkel
Dr, Thomas C, Hone

Dr. Alexander S. Cochran
Mr. Barry D. Watts

Dr. Thomas A. Keaney

Executive Director
Senior Military Advisor

Senior Historical Advisor

ANSER Program Manager

Executive Officer

Publishing Manager

Chief, Statistics

Chief, Chronology

Chief, Weapons, Tactics
and Training

Chief, Logistics, Space,
and Support

Chief, Command, Control,
and Organization

Chief, Strategy and
Plans

Chief, Operations and
Effects

Chief, Summary Report

iii



i
i
i
i
:
i

al computers, and telephones had to work around JOPES to get American
forces deployed to Southwest Asia.'*

Computer system after computer system followed the sorry pattern of
JOPES’ performance. Military Airlift Command did not have enough time
to schedule missions using its Flow Generation (FLOGEN) model and
resorted to personal computer spreadsheets." The Combat Ammunition
System was still under development, and the version used by Tactical Air
Command, U.S. Air Forces in Europe, and Pacific Air Forces did not have
sufficiently accurate data to be helpful. As for the larger problem of track-
ing supplies in general, the interim solution of having each deployed unit
linked to the supply computer at its host base in the United States never
worked well. The precrisis plan to deploy mainframes to the theater for
supply accounting gave way eventually to linking as many deployed units
as possible to Tactical Air Command’s Unisys computer at Langley Air
Force Base, Virginia. Achieving that arrangement, however, took the better
part of Desert Shield’s five months and innumerable STU-III calls.'”

The STU-IH, like the other four technologies featured in this chapter, hit
its stride in the Gulf War. For the most part, these technologies were not
really new and were available in less sophisticated forms during the Vietnam
War. Thousands of laser-guided bombs were dropped on North Vietnam,
together with even more numerous radar-seeking missiles, bombing missions
from Thailand depended on air refueling to reach the Hanoi-Haiphong region;
and the bases scattered around Thailand coordinated strike packages over the
telephone. Some other technologies went through more dramatic changes
after the Vietnam War. Airbome radar, for example, came into its own first
with the Airborne Warming and Control System and then (just in time for the
Gulf War) with the Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System. If Iraq’s
air force and army had been more active, these radar systems would have
played a more central role. All of which raises the question: how revolution-
ary was the air campaign against Iraq?

'SJULLS 91055-65325 (00141), Hq MAC CAT Director; JULLS 91154-50811
(00109), USCENTAF Rear/LG.

"SLt Gen Vernon J. Kondra, Operation Desert Shield - Desert Storm: The Vernon
J. Kondra Notes (McGuire AFB, 1992). Kondra was at Hq MAC DCS Plans and later
DCS Operations,

"Inwws, GWAPS with Col Mike Christensen, 18-20 Nov 1992; Col Van McCrea,
4-5 Apr 1992; and Frank Spruce, 22 Oct 1992, all at Langley AFB.

233



The Soviet argument for a dawning revolution in military affairs
focuses less on military hardware catching up with longstanding doctrinal
promises than on technological advances making qualitative transfor-
tations in nonnuclear, or “conventional,” warfare. Soviet theorists have
argued that in the near future, so-called “reconnaissance-strike complex-
es” would enable commanders to detect targets and attack them effective-
ly, at long ranges, and within minutes. These combinations of sensors
and weapons would blur traditional distinctions between offensive and
defensive fires and allow the conduct of war over far greater distances
than ever before. Given the use of advanced reconnaissance systems and
precision munitions in the Gulf War, it was natural for Soviet observers,
as well as like-minded American commentators, to conclude that “the
integration of control, communications, reconnaissance, electronic combat,
and delivery of conventional fires into a single whole” had been realized
“for the first time.”© Close examination of the evidence, however, sug-
gests that this conclusion went too far. Although many of the pieces of
“reconnaissance-strike complexes” were present in Desert Storm, Coali-
tion forces did not integrate them on a large scale. For example, to direct
the use of precision bombs, Coalition commanders relied on an air-task-
ing system whose cycle times and use of advanced reconnaissance sensors
had not changed appreciably from the Vietnam era. Episodes such as
using JSTARS to detect Iraqi forces moving up for the attack on Al
Khafji at the end of January were important exceptions, but exceptions
nonetheless. Despite the presence of airborne, space, and ground sensors,
many mobile Scud launchers still managed to elude the Coalition’s best
attempts at their destruction.

Yet, while neither of these popular arguments for a revolutionary
advance matches precisely what occurred in the Gulf War, the facts of
Desert Storm do require further consideration. If nothing else, the one-
sided character of the war demands explanation. Why was the Coalition
able to smash an army of hundreds of thousands of men and thousands
of tanks, artillery pieces, and vehicles at a cost of fewer than 200 men
killed and fewer than 50 aircraft lost? Why, moreover, did so few expert
observers in the United States and elsewhere anticipate such lopsided

Soviet Analysis of Operation Desert Storm and Operation Desert Shield,” LN 006-
91, trans. Defense Intelligence Agency, Washington, DC, 28 Oct 1991, p 32. For an
example of American defense analysts who reached much the same conclusion regarding
the realization of “recce-strike complexes” in Desert Storm, see Ashton B. Carter, William
J. Perry, and John D. Steinbruner, “A New Concept of Cooperative Security,” Brookings
Occasional Paper (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, 1992), p 3.

237

357-357 0-93 - 9



i SANG Saudi Arabian National Guard
Hh SCUD Soviet-made surface-to-surface missile
} SCI Sensitive Compartmented Information
SEAD Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses
i SECDEF Secretary of Defense
Pe, SNIE Special National Intelligence Estimate
q SOC Sector Operations Center
i a SOCCENT Special Operations Command, Central
a Command
SOCOM Special Operations Command
| SOF Special Operations Forces
| SPEAR Strike Projection Evaluation and Anti-
eh Air Warfare Research (USN)
| SPG Special Planning Group
t SPINS Special Instructions
STU Secure Telephone Unit
| SWA Southwest Asia
HE TAC Tactical Air Command
| TACAIR Tactical Air
TACC Tactical Air Control Center
TACS Tactical Air Control System
! Hi | TACSAT Tactical Satellite
i ] [ TALD Tactical Air-Launched Decoy
i TARPS Tactical Air Reconnaissance Pod .
System
TEL ‘Transporter Erector Launcher
TEMPER Tent Expendable Modular Personnel
TFS Tactical Fighter Squadron

262



to the theater, and, of the. active-duty personnel with any target intelli-
gence training, less than 18 percent were deployed.*> The bulk of the
considerable augmentation to in-theater intelligence organizations consist-
ed mainly of relatively untrained augmentees and reservists. It was not
so much a lack of intelligence personnel that remained a problem, but a
lack of qualified personnel.

Once in the theater, the relationship between the CENTAF operations
and intelligence staffs~an uneasy relationship at best in Air Force organi-
zations-experienced further divisions. When Air Staff officers briefed
Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner in Saudi Arabia on the Instant Thunder con-
cept of a strategic air war, the cool reception they received led Central
Command and CENTAF intelligence staffs to conclude that the Washing-
ton-based plan, along with the officers from Checkmate, would soon
recede to irrelevance. Instead, General Horner kept some of the Check-
mate planners and formed a secret Special Planning Group, the Black
Hole, under Brig. Gen. Buster C. Glosson, to create the offensive air plan.
Due in no small part to the political sensitivity of offensive campaign
planning at this early juncture, the Black Hole planners set themselves up
as a special access organization and made little effort to inform intelli-
gence personnel of their concept of operations.2> CENTAF intelligence
went ahead with its own target planning and viewed initial requests from
Black Hole planners as a nuisance.” When intelligence personnel failed
to respond expeditiously to their initial requests, the Black Hole regarded

23(S/NF) Rpt, HQ USAFVIN, “Operation Desert Storm Lessons Leamed,” 5 May
1991, JULLS Number 41444-77200 (00024), p 50.

24Iruyw, Capt Edward O'Connell with Maj Robert Heston, USAF, AF/INX, formerly
37th TFWAN, 4 Aug 1992; Intvw, Capt O'Connell with Lt William Car, USN,
CENTCOM J-2, 11 Nov 1992; and Intvw, Barry Watts with Capt O'Connell, 9 Apr 1993.

inv, Capt John Glock; and AAR, USCENTAF/IN, “After Action Report and
Lessons Learned,” 25 May 1991, Col Rauschkolb to Cot Christon.

265) Intvw, Dr. Perry Jamison, Center for Ait Force History, with Lt Col Sam
Baptiste, 5 Mar 1992. Tapes at AFCHO.

129


other objects with Scud-like signatures”—were destroyed by fixed-wing
aircraft. So beyond the disruption induced by the level of effort put into
the hunt for the launchers, Coalition air power does not appear to have
been very effective against this militarily insignificant target category.

The Strategic “Core” in Retrospect

Regardless of the private hopes airmen may have had during the Gulf
War that air power might achieve the Coalition's military objectives with-
out a ground campaign,® the modest fraction of the ait-to-surface attacks
focused against the strategic core concentrated primarily on the more
pragmatic objectives laid out in this and the previous chapter. Planners
wished to exert pressure from the outset directly against the heart of Iraqi
power, an idea consistent with other strategic bombing campaigns.”
Strategic air attacks were in some cases less effective than air planners
had hoped for or believed, as in the case of the Iragi nuclear weapons
program—by mid-1992, for example, UN Security Council inspection
teams had identified and destroyed more of Iraq’s nuclear missile pro-
grams than had the air campaign.” In other cases, such as that of Iraq’s
electrical power system, the Coalition met its immediate military objec-
tives. In yet other cases such as the L and CCC target categories, effec-
tiveness cannot be precisely estimated.

For example, on 30 Jan 1991 the videotape from an F-15E “Scud hunt” mission
was shown at a U.S. Central Command press conference as proof of Coalition success.
While it was confidently asserted on this occasion that at least three-and possibly sev-
en-of the vehicles in question were mobile launchers, it appears far more likely that the
objects were in fact commercial fuel trucks (DOD, “Special Central Command Briefing,”
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 30 Jan 1991, transcript #672561; also, discussions with DIA
analysts and Air Force officers who were involved in bomb damage assessment during
the war and saw the tape when it was broadcast over CNN).

Asked if he had hoped that the Iragis might quit before the ground offensive, Gen
Horner replied, “Of course. I'm an airman.” (GWAPS intvw, Shaw AFB, NC, 10 Mar
1992).

Noble Frankland argued in 1963 that the core idea behind the strategic air offensive
against Nazi Germany during World War f-namely, to put pressure directly on the heart
of the enemy nation—was, especially for Great Britain, a logical successor to a naval
blockage [Noble Frankland, The Bomber Offensive against Germany: Outlines and
Perspectives (London: Faber & Faber, 1965), pp 21, 25}.

7K ay, “Arms Inspections in Iraq: Lessons for Arms Control,” p 5.

90


World War 1 236

World War II 56, 91, 145, 175, 226,
228, 239, 240, 242, 244, 247

Wourtsmith AFB, Michigan 164

i Y
il Y'Blood, William T. 208
Yeosock, Lt Gen John 154

ISBN 0-16-041950-6

Wd 90000
1
i| 276

i

9°780160° 41950



i
t
j
H
;
i

Lajes 164

LANDSAT 194

Langley, AFB, Virginia 128, 209,
234, 247

LANTIRN 23

leadership 6, 10-12, 15, 24, 27, 30,
32, 36, 38, 39, 40-42, 44, 55, 57,
64, 66-70, 73, 76, 119, 122, 136,
176, 207, 221, 224, 227, 239, 242,
247

leaflets 18

Leavenworth 49

LGB 226, 227

Libya 163

Linebacker I 243

Linebacker Il 62, 230, 240

lines of communication 51, 100

logistics 13, 64, 78, 94, 97, 112, 113,
135, 186, 189, 208, 210, 213, 223

Loh, John M. 35, 36, 137

Luftwaffe 241

Lynx 113, 204

M

MIAI 112

MAC (sce Military Airlift Command)

Madinah 10, 107, 110, 117

mail 189

maintenance personnel 188, 214, 215

maintenance squadron 219

MARCENT 7, 10, 132, 155

Marine Corps (see U.S. Marine
Corps)

Marine Expeditionary Brigade 7, 34

Marine Expeditionary Force 175

Marines 7, 20, 62, 117, 145, 146,
154, 156, 160, 195, 198, 216

Marshall, Andrew 238

master attack plan 66, 87, 150, 151,
160, 247

Mauz, Henry 153

Maverick 66, 103, 104, 202, 203,
226, 241

MC-130s 22

McConnell, J. M. 127, 131, 132, 148

McGuire AFB, New Jersey 188, 210,
234

medical 178, 219

MH-53 215

Midway 102

MIG-25 59

Military Airlift Command 186, 187,
208-210, 234

military production 32, 36

military support 24, 41-43, 64, 120,
167

Ministry of Defense 44, 47

Mirage 2000s 197

Mirage F-1 1

missile 5, 6, 8, 12, 15-17, 21, 37, 40,
41, 43, 55, 56, 58-60, 64, 66, 73,
79, 80, 84-87, 89, 91, 100, 102-104,
123-125, 134-137, 149, 152, 157,
166, 177, 179, 181-183, 188,
194-197, 200, 202-204, 223-226,
229, 230, 234, 238, 240, 241, 245,
247, 248

Missouri 135

MK-20 103, 104

MK-82 104, 246

MK-84 104

mobility 112, 137

mobilization 128, 186

Moore, Royal 154, 195

munitions 5, 12, 15, 16, 30, 49, 62,
63, 66, 67, 75, 7, 81, 82, 92, 93,
103-105, 107, 108, 112, 159, 176,
189, 202-204, 212-214, 222, 223,
225, 227, 231, 235-237, 241, 243,
247

munitions shipments 213

munitions storage 15, 16, 176

mustard 79, 82

Mutla Ridge 24, 114, 116

N

National Intelligence Estimate 122

National Security Agency 216

National Security Council 2, 33, 39,
46

NATO 62, 159, 163, 165, 166, 181,
192, 193, 207, 216, 223, 249

naval 6, 7, 12, 13, 21, 30, 32, 40, 42,
43, 51, 91, 93, 100-103, 119, 125,
132, 134, 145, 150, 175, 183, 196,
200, 203, 204, 213, 235

NAVCENT 7, 132

271



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50



for help in planning an air option to retaliate against Iraq.
General Schwarzkopf was not looking for an option to eject Iraq from
Kuwait by air power alone, nor was he, as a theater commander, predis-
posed to ask for assistance from a Service staff. But at this time
(8 August), he had few forces available in the theater and needed a way
to retaliate against some new, hostile act by Iraq, such as the seizure of
the American Embassy in Kuwait or a chemical weapons attack.'’ The
punishment ATO provided one such option, but he apparently saw this
attack as an insufficient response and his regular staff as too burdened
with managing the deployment to develop an alternative. He found
Warden’s ideas much more suitable.

The plan developed by Warden and Checkmate, named Instant Thun-
der, called for an intense six-day air campaign designed to incapacitate
Traqi leadership and destroy its key military capabilities. Warden’s cam-
Paign was organized around “centers of gravity”-key elements of the
enemy state and armed forces, the destruction or disabling of which would
compel the enemy to yield to American wishes. The most important
center of gravity was the ability of Saddam Hussein to lead and control his
nation, so attacks on telecommunication sites and command centers would
isolate him from the Iraqi people and his armed forces. Together with a
national-level psychological warfare campaign directed against the
Ba’athist regime, these attacks would disable or even fatally weaken the
regime. Instant Thunder targeted Iraq’s nuclear, chemical, and biological
facilities and its national air defense system and airfields. Other targets
included electric power, oil production, railroads, and military production.
In all cases, however, the United States would strenuously avoid civilian
casualties and, indeed, any long-term damage to the Iragi economy. The
United States would visibly demonstrate its intention to attack Hussein,
not the Iraqi people. The plan had eighty-four targets {nineteen in the _
telecommunications set) to strike over six days. Initially, Warden planned

"Gen Schwarzkopf had first spoken with JCS Chairman Gen Colin Powell about the
need for a retaliation plan. Since the Air Force Chief, Gen Michael Dugan, was out of
town at the time, his request to the Air Staff went to Gen Loh. Intvw, Diane T. Putney,
Center for Air Force History, with Gen H. Norman Schwarzkopf (USA, ret), 5 May 1992,
GWAPS, NA 268,

36



NATO
NAVCENT
NBC

NCA

NF or NOFORN
NIE

OASD

OCA
OPLAN
OPORD
OSD
PACAF
PGM
POL
POW
PSYOPS
RAF
RCAF
RGFC

ROE
RPV
RSAF
RSLF
SAC
SAD
SAM

North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Naval Component, Central Command
Nuclear, Biological, and Chemical
National Command Authorities

Not Releasable to Foreign Nationals
National Intelligence Estimate

Office of the Assistant Secretary of
Defense

Offensive Counter Air
Operation Plan

Operation Order

Office of the Secretary of Defense
Pacific Air Forces
Precision-Guided Munition
Petroleum, Oils and Lubricants
Prisoner of War

Psychological Operations
Royal Air Force (U.K.)

Royal Canadian Air Force

Republican Guard Force Command
(Iraq)

Rules of Engagement
Remotely Piloted Vehicle
Royal Saudi Air Force
Royal Saudi Land Force
Strategic Air Command
Strategic Air Defense

Surface-to-Air Missile

261



under direction from ground or airborne controllers. As the JEACC
corollary to this rule, helicopters and tactical missiles beyond the FSCL
would be controlled by the JEACC. The FSCL definition said little about
coordination of weapons employment beyond the FSCL, however, and the
corps commanders considered supporting fires beyond the tine as "per-
missive,” requiring no further coordination. That is, they resisted any
restrictions on employing missiles or helicopters beyond the line and saw
attempts to include such strikes in the air tasking order as efforts to put
their organic firepower under JFACC control. To avoid JFACC control,
XVIII Airborne Corps advanced the FSCL well north of the Euphrates
River on 27 February and thus reserved an area for attack helicopter
operations unconstrained by any requirement to coordinate with the
JFACC. The effect of this use of the FSCL was to hamper air power’s
ability to destroy escaping Iraqi ground forces until the FSCL was finally
pulled back after several hours.?'

The dispute over the FSCL during the ground campaign had been
building during the air campaign. The corps commanders were dismayed
to find that until they launched their offensive, Schwarzkopf would not
permit them to move the FSCL beyond the Saudi border. Since the
JFACC had the principal responsibility for preparing the battlefield, the
corps commanders were not given the air control they had come to expect
during the years of preparing for war in Europe. But visions of that war
had never included an enemy army that would sit for weeks while bomb-
ing fatally weakened it.

The JFACC and the Allies
General Horner came into the war with several years’ experience in

dealing with the Persian Guif nations, including a cordial relationship
with the commander of the Royal Saudi Air Force, Lt. Gen. Ahmed

?($) TACC log 27 Feb 1991, GWAPS, NA 215; TACC historian notes, Saluda,
GWAPS, NA 200; and Intvw, GWAPS with Maj Gen John A. Corder, 18 Mar 1992,
GWAPS, NA 361. Discussions among the Services and Joint Staff after the war have
produced a more workable arrangement for coordinating strikes beyond the FSCL (Joint
Staff, “A Doctrinal Statement of Selected Joint Operational Concepts,” 23 Nov 1992, pp
15-19).

157



Figure 18
Coalition Strikes Against Scuds

Strikes
90 5
80
70
60 4
50 4
40 4
30
20 +
10 4

1 3 5 7 § 1113151719 21 23 25 27 29 31 33 35 37 39 41 43
January February 1991

AIF strike counts, GWAPS Missions Database, 9 Dec 1992.

While Coalition efforts against ballistic missile production and infra-
structure served the postwar goal of eliminating Iraq’s offensive threat to
its regional neighbors, efforts directed against the fixed launchers do not
appear to have been totalty effective in suppressing Scud launches during
the war. However prudent and necessary it may have been to strike the
fixed sites in order to preclude their later use, the Iraqis, contrary to
expectations, opted to rely exclusively on mobile launchers. In hindsight,
it now appears that a good portion of the mobile Scud force—perhaps the
bulk of it—dispersed from central bases by the end of August 1990, al-
though some dispersal actions may have still been going on toward the
end of Desert Shield.”

®'GWAPS discussions with DIA analysts 30 Sep 1992; also, (S) DIA, “Mobile Short-
Range Ballistic Missile Targeting in Operation Desert Storm,” OGA-1040-23-91, Dec
1991, p 1. DIA analysts who followed Iraqi ballistic missile capabilities during Desert
Shield indicated that many signs of dispersal were observed in the sense of seeing
vehicles and activity incrementally disappear from central support bases and other known
locations. But the inability to find the places to which vehicles and activities had been
moved produced caveated reporting whose broader operational import was not readily

85



tional concept, did suggest a transformation of war. The following exam-
ples illustrate this proposition.

Target/Sortie Ratios

Mission planners normally calculate the number of aircraft that would
have to be sent against a given target to have a specified probability of
destroying it with particular munition, Assuming unguided (or “dumb”)
bombs, they might have to send dozens or even hundreds of sorties to
achieve a ninety percent or higher probability of destroying many kinds
of targets. To cite an extreme example, the Thanh Hoa bridge in North
Vietnam withstood literally hundreds of attacks during Rolling Thunder
from U.S. Air Force and Navy fighter-bombers without sustaining major
structural damage."

In examining the sorties flown by F-117s and F-111Fs during Desert
Storm, however, it quickly becomes evident that target/sortie ratios were
dramatically different even from the Linebacker era, when large numbers
of laser-guided bombs first saw combat use. To provide a sense of just
how different, one can compare 12 representative sorties by F-117s and
F-111Fs delivering laser-guided bombs with 12 sorties flown by Proven
Force F-111Es delivering unguided Mk-82s (500-pound bombs). The 12
Proven Force sorties covered 2 targets (an AM radio transmitter and a
sector operations center in Kirkuk) with 168 Mk-82s; by contrast, the
dozen F-117 and F-111F sorties covered some 26 precision targets with
a total of 28 bombs (mostly 2,000-pound weapons, but including some
500-pound GBU-12s for 2 tank-plinking sorties).'* The target/sortie ratio
for the dozen dumb-bomb sorties was 1:6, whereas it was approximately
2:1 for the 12 precision sorties, Thus, the differential between the preci-
sion and nonprecision cases was 26/2 = 13:1, or better than an order-of-
magnitude difference. Moreover, the low-light laser-guided bombs of the

'4The more than 350 U.S. Air Force and Navy strike sorties flown against the Thanh
Hoa bridge from 1965-68 failed to drop a single span of this overbuilt structure, even
though it was often rendered temporarily unusable [Col Glenn Griffith, et al, “The Tale
of Two Bridges,” The Tale of Two Bridges and the Battle for the Skies over North
Vietnam, ed Maj A. J. C. Lavalle (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office,
1976), pp 31, 38, 42-3, 46, 55-6, 59, 62-3]. USAF losses against the bridge over this
period included F-105s, F-4s, and a C-130. During Linebacker I, two attacks involving
a total of 26 F-4 sorties delivering laser-guided bombs finally succeeded in dropping the

. Thanh Hoa bridge withoul any aircraft losses (ibid, pp 84-6).

"SThe actual sorties selected for this comparison can be found in the second table in
Chapter 7 of GWAPS Effects and Effectiveness report.

243



troops, were either on leave or had deserted when the air war began."
Applying these decrements to the original Defense Intelligence Agency
estimate results in a revised estimate of no more than 336,000 Iraqi
troops in the theater on 17 January 1991.

While exact numbers were unknown, U.S. planners had a fairly
accurate overall picture of Iraqi deployments in the theater by the begin-
ning of the war (Figure 4). Coalition reconnaissance clearly established
the purpose and general location of Iraqi ground forces, which had de-
ployed in three defensive lines or echelons. The frontline forces—closest
to the Kuwait-Saudi border—were intended to slow and attrit the initial
Coalition attack and allow the Iraqi military leadership to determine its
main axis. The frontline forces consisted of infantry divisions from three
corps arrayed east to west with Iraqi ITI Corps facing MARCENT and
JFC-E, IV Corps facing JFC-N, and VII Corps west of Wadi al Batin.
The second Iraqi echelon comprised the tactical and operational reserves
of armored and mechanized divisions deployed throughout central Kuwait
and southem Iraq. Their mission was to reinforce other units and block
Coalition penetration of the front lines. (The tactical reserves were the
Ist, 3d, Sth, 6th, and 52d Divisions. The operational reserves were the
17th and 51st Divisions, the IT Armored Corps, and the 10th and 12th
Divisions, the Jihad Corps.) The Republican Guard formed the third
echelon north and west of the Kuwait border. These divisions, including
the heavy divisions of the Guard-the Tawakalna, Madinah, and
Hammurabi—were the strategic reserve poised to counterattack against the
main Coalition attack.’ Other infantry divisions of Iraq's 1! Corps de-
ployed north of Kuwait City along the shoreline with general missions of
reinforcing the main body, protecting the coast, and defending against
\possible airborne attacks into central Kuwait. Central Command

“SDesertions before 17 Jan are counted within the twenty percent authorized to be
on leave, This decrement could be greater if there was a substantial early desertion rate
in addition to the numbers on leave. Having-such a large portion of the army on leave
with an attack pending appears unusual, but numerous prisoner-of-war reports confirm the
practice. The program of frequent leave appears to have been used to keep troop morale
up and desertions down. A like system was in place during the Iran-Iraq War.

"“Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 110-12. Note: heavy division is the term
describing either an armored or mechanized division.



to seventy-two days, and in many cases, that transit time was to the Gulf
port, not to the intended destination.’

Munitions shipments also faced other complications. Specific trans-
portation restrictions limited the number of roads, railroads, and ports (only
two in the United States) that could be used. In addition, shortages of
qualified drivers and explosives handlers exacerbated accounting problems
for inventories of munitions components. Despite the nearly $100 million
spent on the Air Force’s Combat Ammunition System since its inception in
1982, it was not prepared to handle the task. Specific munitions in the
transportation system could not be tracked, leaving logisticians the unenvi-
able task of determining what exactly had arrived on ammunition ships as
they were unloaded.” Inventories had to be created and maintained manual-
ly, a process that continued throughout Desert Shield and Desert Storm and
resulted in significant inaccuracies in reported inventories. Senior Air Force
planners never could be confident of what munitions were actually available.
One saving grace came from the Air Force Combat Ammunition Center
located at Sierra Army Depot, California. Established in 1985, the Center
sought to develop a cadre of trained personnel skilled in managing muni-
tions production. Graduates of this training constituted the backbone of the
production teams in the theater.

While inventory accounting problems had the potential to create
munitions shortages, those uncertainties were offset by the large quantities
of munitions shipped. By the cease-fire, nearly 350,000 tons of muni-
tions had been shipped by air and sea for use by Air Force units (includ-
ing 48 ships en route); of this amount, 69,000 tons were actually expend-
ed. The percentages listed in Figure 34 depict the major munitions
employed in the war, As the figure indicates, stocks of all munitions
Temained at the end of the war, but some rationing took place in special
munitions, such as the CBU-87 and laser-guided bombs, particularly by
the Navy and Marine Corps, in anticipation of a longer ground war or
higher expenditures of these munitions."

°Rpt, USAF/ACP to General Accounting Office, “Munitions Activity in SWA,” Jan
1992. .

1S) Intvw, Lt Col William Swezey, ASDVALZ, 15 Apr 1992 (Li Col Swezey was
the senior munitions manager in CENTAF during Operations Desert Shield and Desert
Storm).

1S) David L. Dittmer, U.S. Marine Corps Operations in Desert Shield/Desert
Storm, Volume I: Overview and Summary (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses,

1992), p 36; (S) Ronald Nickel, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Volume IX:
Logistics (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1991), p 3-11.

212



If memories of Vietnam explain some of the predilections of com-
manders-to strike massively and for limited but clear political objec-
tives-it also explains some of their aversions. Commanders would not
countenance, for example, “body counts” of Iraqi soldiers killed, an
unwillingness that persisted in postwar reporting. Recollections of Viet-
nam may help explain as well the intention of air campaign planners to
deny the enemy sanctuaries, at any rate in his own territory~the Coalition
waged war throughout the length and breadth of Iraq from the first night.
And memories of Vietnam help account for the unwillingness of General
Horner and his subordinates to endorse anything that might resemble the
“route package” system used in Indochina, which divided the enemy
country into sectors assigned to particular air forces.

Decades of intense preparation for war in Europe also shaped opera-
tions in the Gulf. Such practices as low-level attack, which had been
standard in Europe, were partially reflected in prewar training and in the
first several days of operation in the Gulf. More importantly, the entire
tactical system—the assembly of force packages, escorted by specialized
SEAD (suppression of enemy air defense) aircraft-reflected American
practice in Europe. So too did the definition of key missions; CENTAF
planners referred to attacks against strategic targets as “interdiction,” in
keeping with the absence of any other category of deep targets in Central
Europe. Many of the personnel and units assigned to CENTAF came to
the theater from Europe, and of course, European-based units operated
out of Turkey during the war.

Above all, the constant international cooperation required for a Euro-
pean war had well prepared American forces to lead an international
Coalition and to operate within it. All of the major Coalition partners
had trained extensively with American units, which had become accus-
tomed, in turn, to dealing with other nationalities. Such practices as the
creation of a common air tasking order were routine for all concerned,
and pilots used English as the common language. Commanders and staffs
had rehearsed many large-scale air operations, and although Desert Storm
was far larger than any exercise, it resembled the kind of effort that
would have taken place in a European war. On a more tangible level,
Coalition air forces, to a great degree, flew the same types of aircraft and
used similar munitions and spare parts. Not all the commonalities offered
advantages, however. Because France, Kuwait, and Iraq all flew French
F-I aircraft, identification procedures seemed chancy, and the Coalition
restricted their use during the war.

In some important tespects, Desert Storm posed a different challenge
than did the Soviet threat to Europe. The Warsaw Pact had many small

220



the ground were exempted from direct JFACC control, as were naval
aircraft on overwater flights.

From the first, General Horner had to concern himself with getting
forces to their bases and planning for the defense of the Arabian peninsu-
la. Early on, he appointed U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Buster Glosson as
director of a special planning group to plan for offensive air operations
against Iraq. This effort drew, in turn, on Instant Thunder, a plan devel-
oped in early August by the Air Staff. General Glosson’s special plan-
ning group, known as the Black Hole, consisted primarily of Air Force
officers but eventually included officers from all the Services as well as
British and Saudi representatives. The Black Hole, working in great
secrecy, had a plan ready for implementation in mid-September, ahead of
the arrival of the main ground forces. The plan sought to dislodge the
Iraqi forces from Kuwait by attacking key Iraqi targets such as leadership
and command and control systems; key nuclear, biological, chemical,
electrical, military, and oil production facilities; bridges, railroads, and
port infrastructure; and air defense, naval, missile, and ground forces,
particularly the Republican Guard. The offensive air campaign supported
the CENTCOM plan,-which called for four phases: Phase I, a strategic
air campaign against Iraq; Phase II, suppressing enemy air defenses in the
Kuwait Theater of Operations; Phase III, preparing the battlefield; and
Phase IV, a ground campaign. This air campaign plan from the Black
Hole was accepted by the President in October, as was the plan for
employing the Coalition ground forces. Lack of ground forces limited the
ground attack options to a frontal assault into Kuwait.

Because a Coalition frontal assault raised the likelihood of heavy
Coalition losses, the President authorized the addition of more ground and
air forces to enhance Schwarzkopf’s options. As a result, a second phase
of deployment, begun in late November 1990, increased the forces al-
ready in the theater by 400 Air Force aircraft, 3 carrier battle groups, and
more than 4 Army and Marine divisions, including the European-based
U.S. VII Corps. The new deployments also entailed activation of more
reserves. Arab and European Coalition members proportionally increased



comparable to that of the second week. For the final eight days, the
salvo size decreased—again presumably because of the pressure put on
Scud units by Coalition forces—but was still greater than that achieved
during the third and fourth weeks.

There were, of course, areas in which the Desert Storm air planners
reached fairly accurate assessments of how the Iraqis might plan against
or respond to air attack. The reactions of Iraqi surface-to-air missile
defenses in Baghdad to decoys and HARMs on the opening night, and the
possibility that the Iraqi air force would not seriously contest air superior-
ity in the opening days of the air campaign, constitute instances in which
the Coalition assessed Iraqi behavior with reasonable accuracy before
17 January 1991. In the case of the Iraqi Scud units, however, the evi-
dence suggests that a series of incorrect assumptions was made by intelli-
gence analysts, air planners, and commanders alike. Furthermore, the
way the Scud hunt unfolded tended to mask these errors well into the air
campaign. In the first ten days or so, aircrews made substantial claims
of Scud mobile launcher kills, backed up in some cases by vivid video
footage from airborne recording systems. The lull in launches during the
third and fourth weeks probably gave hope that a good portion of the kill
claims were legitimate. In such circumstances, it should not be surprising
that a full picture of the history and extent of the Iraqis’ Scud-decoy
program was not developed until some months after the war ended.

In retrospect, nothing in the launch or other data bearing on the anti-
Scud effort is incompatible with an Iraqi Scud force that had, at most,
thirty or so mobile launchers at the start of the war. Certainly, Scud-
hunting operations by Coalition aircraft and special forces harassed the
launch operations of these units. More importantly, in conjunction with
the perceived effectiveness during the war of Patriot in defending against
incoming Scuds, the Iraqi Scud campaign failed in its strategic purpose
of fracturing the U.S.-led Coalition. Nevertheless, the fundamental sensor
limitations of Coalition aircraft, coupled with the effectiveness of Iraqi
employment tactics (including the use of decoys), suggest that few mobile
Scud launchers were actually destroyed by Coalition aircraft or special
forces during the war. Given the level of effort mounted against mobile
launchers, a few may have been destroyed, but nowhere near the numbers
reported during the war. Once again, there is no indisputable proof that
Scud mobile launchers~as opposed to high-fidelity decoys, trucks, or

89



Although “JFACC” became official Joint Chiefs of Staff terminology
in the mid-1980s, old tensions between the Services over control of
theater air power were not completely resolved. The Marine Corps
agreed to make sorties available to the JFACC for air defense, interdic-
tion, and reconnaissance, but the Marines would give up their direct
support sorties to JFACC control only after Marine requirements had been
satisfied. The Navy would continue to control sorties it deemed neces-
sary for fleet defense, and the Army would fly its helicopters with few
constraints from the JFACC. Nevertheless, the notion that joint air opera-
tions required at least a coordinating authority gained ground.’

Meanwhile, Central Command began preparing for a JEACC in South-
west Asia. By the time draft Operations Plan 1002-90 appeared in the spring
of 1990, a fairly conservative definition of the JEACC’s functions had taken
shape. Those functions were “planning, coordination, allocation, and tasking
based upon U.S. Commander-in-Chief Central Command (USCINCCENT)
apportionment decisions.“ Schwarzkopf would use Homer’s recommenda-
tions to decide how much air power would be apportioned among missions
or geographic areas; Homer would then allocate particular forces to particular
targets. Horner would have “operational control” of Air Force units but only
“tactical control” of aircraft sorties made available by the Navy and the
Marines.’ In the coming months, Schwarzkopf would permit Homer to make
the most of this limited authority.

>For an early use of the term “JFACC.” see Msg, JCS Chairman, subj: Joint Doc-
trine for Theater Counterair Operations, 4 Mar 1986. The Air Force and Marine Corps
had already reached an “omnibus agreement” in 1980, and this was reaffirmed by JCS
Pub 12, Vol IV, in 1986.

‘Draft CENTCOM OPLAN 1002-90, 18 Jul 1990, p 28. This language had already
been used in JCS publications, including Joint Pub 1-02, Department of Defense Dictio-
nary of Military and Associated Terms, | Dec 1989, and would be echoed in the opera-
tions orders for Desert Shield. Joint Pub 1-02 was careful to point out that the JFACC’s
functions would “include, but not be limited to” this list.

‘Joint Pub 1-02 (1 Dec 1989) defined “tactical control” as the “detailed and, usually,
local direction and contro! of movements or maneuvers necessary to accomplish missions
or tasks assigned.” It defined “operational control” as the “authority to perform those
functions of command over subordinate forces involving organizing and employing
commands and forces, assigning tasks, designating objectives, and giving authoritative
direction necessary to accomplish the mission.”

146



day the ATO listed details about almost every Coalition fixed-wing sortie
scheduled over the Arabian peninsula and Iraq.° The other Services and
the allies readily appreciated the importance of being in the ATO, if only
to avoid mid-air collisions with any of the more than two thousand sorties
flown daily during the air campaign. Besides, the great distances of the
theater demanded air refueling by Air Force tankers, and that was ar-
ranged through the ATO.

Nevertheless, the ATO’s many critics said that its hundreds of pages
were too cumbersome.’ In earlier wars, the Air Force had handled as
many sorties by sending each unit only the fragment (“frag”) of the daily
order that applied to it. The arrival of networked computers in every
unit, however, had encouraged CENTAF to send the complete order to
all through its Computer Assisted Force Management System (CAFMS).
The units could then scroll through the order on a monitor and print only
the relevant portions. But the volume of communications overwhelmed
old transmission equipment and computer terminals. Some units reported
that transmission and printing were taking more than five hours. In this
context, flying the ATO to Navy carriers may not have been a bad alter-
native, even if the carriers had the necessary hardware (which they did
not). Partly because Pacific Air Force (PACAF) and U.S. Air Forces in
Europe (USAFE) did not share CAFMS and had their own systems, Navy
carriers resisted using any of their crowded space for a system that might
not be the right one." Furthermore, many units had already received the

°Some helicopter sorties were included in the ATO, but most were not. Navy and
Air Force cruise missiles were in the ATO, but Army tactical missiles were: not.

‘The number of pages in the ATO varied both with the day and with the means of
transmission. The peak was Day 40 of Desert Storm, the second day of the ground
offensive. When sent through CAFMS, that ATO required 982 screen pages; sent through
the AUTODIN message system, it required 261 pages (131 sections). Many units used
their STU-ITI secure telephones (with modems) for more rapid reception. For a discussion
of CAFMS by authors involved in its creation from the late 1970s and in its use during
the Gulf War, see John Paul Hyde, Johann W. Pfeiffer and Toby C. Logan, “CAFMS
Goes to War” in Alan D. Campen, ed, The First Information War (Fairfax, VA: Armed
Forces Communications and Electronic Association, 1992).

''Atempts to install CAFMS at sea during Desert Shield were frustrated by the
aircraft carriers’ lack of suitable communications equipment.

149



and also complained that too much effort was expended on tanks, which
were less to be feared than artillery, especially if the Iragis resorted to
chemical shells. Here again, not realizing it was Schwarzkopf’s appor-
tionment, some ground commanders blamed Homer. The upshot resulted
in tension between ground commanders, who felt their needs were not
being met, and the JFACC and his staff, who were responding to the
theater commander’s direction.

The JFACC and the Components

The notion of a single air commander had troubling implications for
the Army, the Navy, and the Marine Corps. For the Army, the JEACC
per se was acceptable, even desirable, but corps commanders feared that
their needs would not receive adequate attention from an Air Force that
might wish to fight its own war in its own way. As in the past, the
Army to some degree wanted an allocation of sorties to use as it saw fit.
The Navy, concerned about fleet defense, had reservations about a
JFACC who could control rather than just coordinate. And the Marine
Corps, organized on the basis of the Marine Air-Ground Task Force,
whose aircraft could remedy relative weaknesses in artillery and tanks,
believed that control of its own aviation was essential.

Air Force-Navy relations sometimes reflected procedural and doctrinal
differences. The physical location of Vice Admiral Henry Mauz, and
later Vice Admiral Stanley Arthur, aboard the USS Blue Ridge (rather
than in Riyadh) made matters worse; the inability of the aircraft carriers
to receive the air tasking order electronically further hindered cooperation.
Substantive disagreements occurred as well. The Navy favored more
permissive rules of engagement than the Air Force thought prudent. The
Navy appealed the dispute between Horner and Arthur (with the former’s
consent) to General Schwarzkopf, who supported Horner’s more restric-
tive rules of engagement.'*

*5(S/NF) See Msg from COMUSNAVCENT to USCENTAF, Personal for Lt Gen
Horner from Arthur, subj: Rules of Engagement, 112120Z Jan 1991.

153



shelters to remove the threat of these aircraft. Attacking the nearly 600
Iraqi shelters required a substantial shift of resources, mainly F-117s and
F-111Fs dropping laser-guided bombs. For two weeks, F-111Fs devoted
approximately 60 percent of their strikes to these shelters. They were
then drawn off for use against tanks and other ground force equipment.
Twenty-eight percent of the total British precision-bombing effort was
against hardened shelters. Meanwhile, F-117s continued to prosecute
shelter attacks until the last week of the war.

The shelter campaign took away the Iraqi air force’s last chance of
surviving the war reasonably intact. Unable to maintain the force as a
strategic reserve (as it had during the Iran-Iraq War), Baghdad attempted
to evacuate its combat aircraft to Iran. In the four-day period beginning
on 26 January, nearly 80 aircraft fled across the border. By the end of
the first week of February, a total of more than 100 aircraft fled and were
interned by the Iranian government. The Coalition established air patrols
between the Iraqi air bases and the border in an attempt to stem these
escapes and shot down several Iraqi aircraft. Other Iraqi aircraft, in their
efforts to escape in low-level dashes, ran out of fuel and crashed. The
Iraqis also dispersed their remaining aircraft around airfields, on roads,
in residential neighborhoods, and even near archaeological sites, taking
advantage of the Coalition's known desire to avoid collateral damage.
Through these measures, some Iraqi aircraft survived the war, but the
Iraqi Air Force ceased to operate as an effective combat force. In fact,
Baghdad’s only known attempt at an offensive air strike took place on
24 January when two Iraqi F-1s attempted a low-level dash over the
Persian Gulf, most likely to attack Coalition ships. A Saudi F-15C pilot
downed both aircraft before they could reach their target.

The weight of effort by nonlaser-designating aircraft shifted to the
Kuwait theater beginning in the second week. Air attacks attempted to
fix the Iraqi ground forces in place, seal off the area from resupply by
attacking traffic within the area, and destroy equipment. Together with
the bombing effort, psychological operations increased as Coalition leaf-
lets in the millions, radio broadcasts, and loudspeakers encouraged Iraqi
soldiers to lay down their arms.

After a week of air attacks against Iraq and its forces in the Kuwait
theater, Baghdad began taking desperate measures to precipitate a ground



of their ground units. Whenever Coalition governments stood aside, their
airmen displayed a practiced capacity for working as allies. NATO forces
were especially familiar with American procedures, and the Saudis and
other Coalition members had sent pilots to the flying range at Nellis Air
Force Base, Nevada, for Red Flag exercises.

Allied cooperation did not, however, simply make Coalition air forces
extensions of the U.S. Air Force. The governments concerned kept
control over the targets that their forces could strike; on the whole, the
limitations were neither burdensome to the JFACC nor substantially
different from those imposed on American forces. Nonetheless, the
weapon systems foreign air forces favored did at times shape Coalition
tactics. Most notable was the Royal Air Force’s strong preference for
JP-233, a runway cratering and mining munition that required low-level
flight over Iraqi air fields. Horner’s B-52 wings also wanted to execute
low-level attacks on runways, but by and large, American fighter com-
manders did not think that runway attack was all that necessary (given
Coalition air superiority) or even productive (given Iragi capability to
repair runways, the extent of their airfields, and the density of antiaircraft
gun defenses that made low-level runs very hazardous). But again,
because of the abundance of Coalition aircraft and initial uncertainty
about how much of a fight the Iraqi air force would make, there was at
first no strong impetus to recommend a different use of RAF aircraft.
Not until the RAF had lost some aircraft in the opening days of the air
campaign did Horner suggest that they might use other bornbs on other
targets from medium altitude. Even then, the decision was left to the
discretion of RAF commanders.

Unified Control of Air Power

The emergence of a single air component commander for Desert
Storm attested to an effective control over an exceedingly crowded air
space. A single air commander also allowed a degree of coherence in the
conduct of air operations that would not have occurred had most air
forces been assigned separate operating areas (“route packages”) as in
Vietnam. Horner resorted to something like a route package only for
northern Iraq, since European Command’s Joint Task Force Proven Force
in Turkey could best reach those targets, with its own equipment provid-

159



260

JOPES

JSTARS

JTF
JULL
KKMC
KIA
KTO
LAMPS

LANDSAT

LANTIRN

LGB

Loc
MAC
MAGTF
MAJCOM
MAP
MARCENT
MEB
Mech Div
MEF
MEL

MLRS
MPS

Joint Operations Planning and
Execution System

Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar
System (E-8)

Joint Task Force

Joint Uniform Lessons Learned
King Khalid Military City
Killed In Action

Kuwait Theater of Operations

Light Airborne Multi-Purpose System
(USN)

Land Satellite, NASA/NOAA Satellite
Program

Low Altitude Navigation and Targeting
Infrared System for Night

Laser-Guided Bomb

Lines of Communication

Military Airlift Command

Marine Air Ground Task Force

Major Command

Master Attack Plan

U.S. Marine Corps, Central Command
Marine Expeditionary Brigade
Mechanized Infantry Division

Marine Expeditionary Force

Mobile Erector Launcher used for
mobile missiles

Multiple Launch Rocket System
Maritime Prepositioning Squadron


areas. The use of the secure telephone, the STU-III, became a vital link
in every operational element. The Saudis, into whose telephone system
these instruments were linked, asked for access to the secure system.
Since the STU-IIIs were based on sensitive technology, the National
Security Agency modified a commercial version of the STU-IIT and
distributed sets to the Arab forces. These modified sets could communi-
cate only with others of their type, could not link with a STU-III, and
could not link with the STU-IIs used by NATO forces. As a result, U.S.
commanders had to use multiple phone lines to talk to all the members
of the Coalition." Even with these shortcomings, Central Command
established more communications links in the first 90 days of Desert
Shield than U.S. forces had assembled in Europe in the past 40 years.
Forty Automatic Voice Network trunks were in Europe; 265 were func-
tioning in Saudi Arabia by March 1991.'*

As with land communications, the number of aircraft arriving in the
theater quickly overwhelmed the capabilities of the air traffic control system.
Large gaps in radar and radio coverage created flight safety problems and
magnified the difficulty of providing adequate air defense. The complex
airspace structure created to handle the 3,000 sorties a day during Desert
Storm grew to 122 airbome refueling orbits, 195 Army aviation flight routes,
76 strike routes, 36 training areas, 60 Patriot engagement zones, and a host
of other areas, routes, and orbits. CENTAF deployed approximately 320
controllers to handle the U.S. facilities and augment host nation air control-
lers. The Army, Navy, and Marines also deployed organic air control equip-
ment and controllers to support their operations."

Handling the volume of aircraft airborne at any one time required an
extensive network even in peacetime; adding communications and control
procedures in a wartime environment compounded problems in all systems
and networks. With more than 900 frequencies in the daily air tasking order
by January, virtually saturating the frequency spectrum, the CENTAF staff
formed a planning group to manage radio frequency allocation. The group

"Col Randy Witt, “Air Force Tactical Communications in War, the Desert
Shield/Desert Storm Comm Story,” Hq, USCENTAF, Riyadh, Mar 1991, p 2-38,
GWAPS, NA 49.

'(S) Defense Science Board, Lessons Learned During Operation Desert Shield &
Desert Storm, “for comment” draft (Washington, DC, 1992), p 5; “Lessons From The
First Space War," Interavia Space Markets, Apr 1991, p 10.

'°Memo, Maj Howdeshell, AFCC, Air Traffic Service, to Maj Leary, GWAPS, subj:

Air Traffic Support of Desert Storm, 27 May 1992; (S) Defense Science Board, Lessons
Learned During Operations Desert Shield & Desert Storm, pp 20-21.

215



or simply did not attempt to communicate with one another."? Reports
after the battle at Al Khafji provided examples of Iraqi units lost in the
desert or unable to coordinate actions with jammed communications.

Given the above evidence of the effects of Coalition air attacks
against Iraqi supply lines both to and within the theater, what conclusions
can be drawn regarding the operational effectiveness of air interdiction in
Desert Storm? Strikes against key bridges on the main lines of communi-
cation between Baghdad and Basra, as well as armed reconnaissance
flights along those routes, succeeded in reducing the flow of supplies to
the Iraqi army, even if the aircraft weapons did not completely sever
those lines and totally isolate the theater. Because of the limited require-
ments of an essentially inert army, the overall capacity of the supporting
transportation net, and the use of countermeasures (temporary bridges and
alternate routes), Iraq was able to move sufficient supplies to the Kuwait
theater in the weeks before the ground war, despite the air campaign.
Whether several more days or weeks of air interdiction operations alone
would have eliminated all resupply of the theater is a matter of specula-
tion. What is certain is that the outbreak of large-scale ground combat
increased the demand for supplies (especially ammunition and POL) to
the point where the residual route capacity and daily supply flow would
not have been sufficient to sustain the Iraqi army in a prolonged conflict.

Attacking the Iraqi Naval and Coastal Defense Forces

Coalition aircraft attacked Iraqi naval targets to secure freedom of action
in the northem Persian Gulf. The Iraqi Navy was small, but the presence
of even small missile-firing boats posed a threat to Coalition battle groups
and amphibious forces. Carriers and battleships carried firepower to support
the ground attack, and the amphibious forces had to be in position to carry
out the strategic deception plan and be ready for landings, if necessary. The
targets included Iraqi ports and facilities at Basra, Az Zubayr, and Um Qasr;
humerous operating locations in Kuwait and on islands; oil terminals;
Silkworm missile sites along the coast (see Figure 24); and a fleet of

®ys. signals intelligence personnel depicted the Iraqi army as having committed
“Emcon (emissions control) Suicide.”

99



airplane” (a dictum that did not hold if it came to supporting troops in
contact with the enemy on the ground or rescuing a downed pilot) cap-
tured an attitude toward losses that prevailed during the war. The cessa-
tion of daylight attacks against Baghdad targets following the loss of two
F-16s on 19 January and the withdrawal of A-10s from attacks against the
Republican Guard following the loss of two on 15 February revealed a
sensitivity to loss having few precedents in American military history.’

The degree of concern about enemy losses, though less strong, was
nonetheless pronounced. Including some 300 deaths reported by the
Iraqis to have occurred when the Al Firdos bunker was bombed, the
Iraqis themselves claimed fewer than 2,300 civilian dead despite the
intensity and scope of the 43-day air campaign.’ Regarding collateral
damage, American peace activists who visited Iraq immediately after the
war looking for evidence that Baghdad had been razed by Coalition
bombing instead found “a city whose homes and offices were almost
entirely intact, where electricity was coming back on and the water was
running.”"® In fact, even Iraqi combat deaths seem to have been remark-
ably low. While the Survey concluded that total Iraqi combat fatalities
over the 43 days of Desert Storm were higher than the estimate of 9,500
one observer has recently made,'® it seems clear that although Coalition
forces waged high-intensity combat, including extensive bombing of

"In imerview after interview conducted by GWAPS personnel with military partici-
pants in the Gulf War, the “lesson” that the low casualties experienced in Desert Storm
established a “norm” that the U.S. military will have to meet in future wars was virtually
‘universal.

"William M. Arkin, Greenpeace Intemational, briefing to GWAPS, 31 Oct 1991.

'8Erika Munk as cited in John G. Heidenrich, “The Gulf War: How Many Iragis
” Foreign Policy, Spring 1993, p 118. Munk’s conclusion that “Baghdad wasn’t
razed” is from an article in the May 1991 issue of Nation.

'Heidenrich, “The Gulf War: How Many Iraqis Died?,” p 123. The Survey's best
estimate, based primarily on enemy prisoner of war reports, is that Coalition air power
Killed some 10-12,000 Iraqi military in the Kuwait theater prior to the ground war.
Available data did not permit a serious estimate of the number of Iraqi soldiers killed
there during the 100-hour ground war. However, that total, which could easily have been
as high as 10,000, would have 10 be added to the total for the first 39 days of the cam-
paign. Iraqi personnel losses in the KTO are also covered in sections 4-6 of a forthcom-
ing RAND (S/NF/WN) pt, by Stephen T. Hosmer, MR-305-AF, “Effecis of the Coalition
Air Campaign Against Iraqi Ground Forces.” Much evidence gathered after the war has
consistently indicated that relatively few Iraqi soldiers died during the 100-hour ground
war (see, for example, George Kuhn, “Numbers from Combat,” Phalanx, Jun 1993, p 22).

249



Life on the bases meant a combination of hectic round-the-clock
schedules, boredom on off-duty time, and Scud alerts after the air cam-
paign began. As the supply system became established, recreational
equipment arrived, base stores opened, and local commanders pushed to
improve living conditions. Bases could operate on more normal routines,
but with many restrictions. Because the objectives and time of the de-
ployment were uncertain initially, Central Command in October 1990
began planning for rotations of forces after six months; the command
abandoned that policy within several weeks when the second deployment
was announced. Everyone would remain for the duration.

Life for the aircrews during the air campaign involved little beyond
sleep and the flight schedule. Crew routines varied with the type of
aircraft they flew. Fighter and support aircraft missions often lasted five
to ten hours, and these crews flew every day (or night), with an occasion-
al day off. Crews for longer missions flew every other day. For exam-
ple, crews on B-52 missions from Diego Garcia or from bases in Europe
spent fifteen hours or more in the air; AWACS or JSTARS aircraft
missions lasted more than twelve hours. And flight times did not count
the hours of preparation and debriefing on either side of the missions.
Additional crews augmented the flying squadrons, but commanders of
every type of aircraft unit cited a need for greater crew manning to
support the number of sorties flown daily. Flight surgeons cited fatigue
as the most pervasive problem facing aircrews, attributing at least two
noncombat fatalities to it. A study of Tactical Air Command crew mem-
bers reported that two-thirds used medical stimulants and sedatives during
the deployment, and fifty-seven percent did so during the war.'*

Theater Conditions and the Preparation of Air Power

As noted, the overall political and physical conditions of the theater
proved uniquely suitable to the deployment and application of air power.
Even the great distances involved worked to the Coalition's benefit: only
Iraqi Scuds could hit Coalition bases, and not all of them. Once the war
began, Coalition aircraft could pummel the enemy without serious fear of

“Rpt, HQ USAF/SGPA, Aerospace Medicine: Consolidated Afier-Action
Report-Desert Shield/Desert Storm, San 1992.

178



forces, the conclusion will be inescapable that some threshold in the rela-
tionship between air and ground forces was first crossed in Desert Storm.

Operational Concepts and Organizational Adaptation

The general absence of new operational concepts for the use of air
power in this war suggests that if a revolutionary change in the conduct of
war is under way, the harder parts of its implementation may still lie in the
future. To a surprising extent, the master attack plan/air tasking-order
process used by the air planners and commanders in Riyadh merely modi-
fied an approach long used within NATO; it also bore a striking family
resemblance to the way in which American planners had constructed and
executed air campaigns as far back as World War II. Although staffs made
improvised use of computers for word processing, construction of databases,
and record-keeping, planners appear to have made surprisingly extensive use
of pencils and yellow legal pads for their work. On the whole, the Coali-
tion had not automated the extremely complicated tasks of developing force
packages and air tasking orders and monitoring bomb damage nearly as
much as those who speak of a military technical revolution would expect.

Concerning organizational innovation, the Black Hole planning group
in Riyadh was an ad hoc organization staffed largely by outsiders. It
disappeared at the end of the war, as has the wartime version of Check-
mate. No organizational structure capable of operating as a genuine
reconnaissance-strike complex existed, even though, as has been noted,
most of the military systems needed for such a complex were present in
the theater, and some swift attacks based on JSTARS information did
occur. Imaging the kind of organization and doctrinal context necessary
for a true reconnaissance-strike complex is not easy. In fact, our present
situation regarding such strike complexes may be analogous to trying to
imagine a 1940 Panzer division and its associated operational culture
from the vantage point of 1922 or 1923.

One large organizational innovation that did occur~unforeseen and by
force of circumstances—was the dispersion of much cornmand and control
activity outside the theater. Officers in the basement of the Pentagon helped
pick targets and plan attacks; staffs at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia
managed CENTAF'’s spare parts accounts; Space Command provided warn-
ing of missile attacks against Israel and Saudi Arabia; meteorologists in the
United States processed weather information for use within the theater.
From the outset, the civilian and military leadership of the American high
command declared its strong desire that direction of this war should rest in

247



esescners FST IT eee

|

Precision Munitions

For many noncombatant observers, the most vivid images from the
Persian Gulf War came from videotapes of laser-guided bombs hitting
particular points on buildings and bridges with seemingly unerring accu-
racy. Yet, the use of precision munitions in general and laser-guided
bombs in particular was not new. The Air Force used laser-guided
bombs, for example, fairly extensively during the Linebacker operations.”
But it was the intensity of the operation more than the technology em-
ployed that represented a departure. Desert Storm saw in 6 weeks the
dropping of more than double the number of laser-guided bombs released
over North Vietnam in 9 months. Aircraft attacked a much broader range
of targets than in the Linebacker operations, prosecuted the bulk of the
attacks with these munitions at night rather than in the daytime, and used
precision-guided missiles (most notably some 5,400 Maverick antiarmor
missiles and more than 2,000 HARM antiradar missiles) more extensively
than ever before. Again, the war saw qualitative rather than a quantita-
tive change in weapons employment.

Functional Effects

In the Gulf War, planners consciously sought functional effects; that
is, they measured their success in terms other than pure destruction. It
mattered little, for example, if bombs had leveled a sector operations
center in the Iraqi air defense system. It would suffice if a couple of
accurate and damaging hits had so intimidated the occupants that they
abandoned the site. Similarly, if the pervasive presence of F-4G Wild
Weasel aircraft deterred enemy radar operators from turning on their
equipment, the physical destruction of those radars mattered little. Func-
tional effects thinking led planners to assign fewer aircraft and fewer
bombs to many targets, which in turn meant that they could attack more
targets simultaneously rather than a few repeatedly and in depth. Al-
though the capability to hit a wide range of targets simultaneously was
new, seeking functional effects was not. Daylight bombing attacks on
German aircraft production in the spring of 1944 to force the Luftwaffe’s
fighter arm into the skies to fight reflected a similar approach," Here
too, the effect sought was a functional one that was, to some extent,

°See discussion of laser-guided bombs in Chapter 9.

‘william E. Kepner, Eighth Air Force Tactical Development: August 1942-May
1945 (England: Eighth Air Force and Army Air Forces Evaluation Board, Jul 1945), pp
16-71.

241





classified, cargo was often shipped to “Desert Shield” and invariably
ended up at Dhahran, unmarked as to final destination or priority.*

When Central Command assigned priority to move combat power to
the theater, sustaining supplies became backlogged awaiting shipment
along with partial sets of unit equipment. A second difficulty arose at
this juncture because the separate supply and transportation systems,
while having independent tracking mechanisms, had poor connectivity.
Therefore, supply items became "invisible" during shipping and could not
be tracked down, much less expedited. Invariably, an item delayed meant
an item reordered, further clogging the system. Furthermore, the back-
logs of equipment and supplies in the United States awaiting shipment
were insignificant when compared to the situation at Dhahran where the
backlog of arriving supplies awaiting further sorting and distribution soon
teached crisis proportions.

! With such an unpromising start, it was all the more remarkable that
supplies flowed as well as they did and that the Air Force could later claim
that no Desert Storm sortie was lost because of unavailability of repair parts.
Those results came from new procedures instituted on the fly. First, the Air
| Force supply system envisioned for the theater had to be completely aban-
: doned—its computer system was inadequate, and the designed telecommuni-
H cations capability never worked properly. As a result, at the end of August
Hl 1990, all Air Force Desert Shield supply accounting was transferred to a
mainframe system at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia. This system includ-
ed almost all aircraft supplies but only 50 to 60 percent of all other supplies.
Still, with over 288,000 item records, it was the largest Air Force retail
supply account ever assembled.>

When the supply system began to resemble a water pipe crimped at
both ends, the transportation system went to work eliminating the backlogs.
Military Airlift Command personnel reviewed cargo at the aerial ports in the
United States and found that over half of it was coded as top priority, but
much of it did not need to go by air at all; teams periodically went through

“hid, p 10.

SCENTAF Supply Support Activity briefing viewgraphs, undated, provided to
GWAPS during 4-5 Aug 1992 intvw, GWAPS, NA 584.

209



{Above) CENTAF Intelligence (CENTAF-IN) facility, set up on the U.S.

Military Training Misslon Compound, adjacent to, but several hundred

yards from, the Roya! Saudi Air Force Headquarters (location of Gen
Horner's headquarters and the Tactical Air Control Center), Rlyadh, Saudi

Arabla. (Photo courtesy of Lt Col Bruce Weigle, USAFR)
(Below) Col John Warden and staff brief Air Force Secretary
Donald Rice and Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney in Checkmate offices,
Pentagon, Feb 1991.

120



Ultimately, the result was probably a more coherent application of air
power than would have resulted from the compromises required by a
stronger joint targeting authority. The JFACC's authority in targeting,
just as the arrangements settled on for other command and control ar-
Tangements for air operations, developed to a great degree in reaction to
the situation the Coalition forces faced in the theater. That situation
involved organizing air power of tremendous capabilities to fulfill the
sweeping objectives planned for its employment. At the time, too, there
was little experience or guidance concerning the power of the JFACC.
The JFACC did not play by the book, but it is by no means clear that
playing by the book would have achieved more.

161



j
i
i
i
j
:

Powell, Colin 27, 29, 36-39, 45, 46,
127, 133, 250

president 1, 2, 4, 6, 27, 33-35, 39,
45, 102, 220, 250

Presidential palace 34

priority system 210

Prisoner of war 19, 56, 98, 99, 108,
110, 249

Proven Force 5, 16, 17, 23, 52, 75,
159, 160, 165, 166, 167, 169, 176,
192, 196, 201, 243, 245

psychological operations 18, 22, 225

public affairs 20, 45

Punishment ATO 33, 34, 36

Purvis, Joe 49

push CAS 51

Qasr 100
Qatar 181
Quayle, Dan 45

R

RAF (see Royal Air Force)

RAND 187, 208, 210, 235, 249

Ranger 102, 249

RC-135 3, 12, 194

readiness 210, 215, 219

reconnaissance 3, 10, 16, 17, 19, 41,
72, 98, 100, 133, 139-142, 146,
148, 181, 183, 189, 193-195, 198,
202, 204, 205, 229, 231, 237, 247

recovery 89

Red Flag 159

Red Sea 7, 167, 169, 192, 228

refuel 190, 228, 229

refueling 12, 149, 150, 160, 167, 182,
183, 187, 190, 191, 198, 204, 205,
210, 212, 216, 219, 223, 228, 229,
234

regular army 7, 22, 125

reliability 215

reorganization 48, 126

Republican Guard 1, 6, 7, 10, 15, 22,
32, 39, 40, 42, 46, 47, 49, 51, 56,
92, 99, 103, 105, 107, 110, 116,
120, 125, 156, 244, 246, 249, 250

research and development 83, 134

reserves 6, 10, 99, 109, 152, 187,
188, 205, 217, 218, 219

Resolution 687 83

resupply 18, 95, 98-100, 170, 175

RF-4Cs 194

Rhein-Main AB, Germany 186

Rivet Joint 3, 194

Rockeye 103, 104

ROE (see rules of engagement)

Rolling Thunder 221, 243

Roosevelt, Theodore 102

route package 145, 159, 160, 222

Royal Air Force 4, 38, 63, 159, 202,
203, 226

Royal Saudi Air Force 38, 130, 147,
157, 158

tules of engagement 22, 46, 60, 153

s

$-3s 190, 192

SAC (see Strategic Air Command)

Salman Pak 79, 81, 83

SAM (see surface-to-air missile)

satellite communications 67, 193, 215

Saudi Air Force (see Royal Saudi Air
Force)

Saudi Arabia 1, 2, 4, 5, 19, 27, 33,
34, 47, 48, 84, 87-89, 91, 127, 129,
148, 151, 158, 164, 167, 168,
173-177, 181, 187, 188, 191, 192,
197, 199, 208, 210, 216, 220, 247

Schwarzkopf, H. Norman 2-7, 15, 16,
27, 29, 33, 35-39, 45-49, 57, 69,
82, 84, 92, 106, 121, 127, 136, 138,
142, 145-148, 151-158, 164, 176,
221, 246, 250

Scud 12, 17, 24, 31, 32, 34, 40-43,
66, 70, 79, 80, 84-91, 102, 103,
120, 123, 124, 134, 137, 138, 152,
166, 176-178, 188, 193, 194, 228,
237

Scud alert 177

Scud hunt 17, 89, 91, 124

SEAD (sce suppression of enemy air
defenses)

SEAL 18, 64

sealift 4, 28, 179, 211

SECDEF (see Secretary of Defense)

273



Table 2
Growth of Targets, August to December 1990”

Target Sets (symbols used by
the Special Planning Group 21 August 20 December
and their explanations)

SAD (strategic air defense) 10 27

C (chemical, nuclear, and 8 20
biological facilities)
L (leadership) 5 27
CCC (command, contro] and 19 30
communication sites)
E (electric power) 10 16
O (oil facilities) 6 8
RR (railroads and bridges) 3 21
A (airfields) 7 25
N (naval ports and facilities) 1 4
MS (military support facilities 15
SC (Scud facilities) NIA 13
RG (Republican Guards) N/A

Totals 84 237

Notes: Highway bridges were added to the category that was originally railroads
alone; Scud facilities were counted as part of the chemical, nuclear, and biological
category in August; the Republican Guard was a new target set; specific targets were
added at a later date.

28(S/NF) Brig, Joint Chiefs of Staff, “Iraqi Air Campaign, Instant Thunder,”
GWAPS, CHSH 5-3; (S) Brig, CENTAF/CC to SECDEF in “General Glosson’s Brief.”

42



Decreases in the capacities of individual routes to the Kuwait theater
can be seen in Figures 22 and 23.” Note that the thickness of each
highway line (as well as the line for the railroad) is proportional to its
relative capacity. By the end of the war, all but Routes 6 and 8 effective-

ly were closed, and even those two retained only fractions of their prewar
capacities.

Figure 23
Baghdad-to-KTO Route Capacities, 28 Feb 1991

KUWAIT

—— ROUTES - 10,0000
ROUTE 8 - 10,000 vd

(CAPACITY ON ALL OTHER ROUTES,
ESSENTIALLY ELIMINATED)

T Data for the figures were derived from Final BDA Status Report, pp 93-97; back-
ground paper on Iraq's Logistics.

96



range (BVR) shots." The Gulf War was the first conflict in history in
which a large percentage of the air-to-air engagements that produced con-
firmed kills—sixteen of the thirty-three victories against fixed-wing Iraqi
aircraft credited to Coalition fighters during Desert Storm-involved BVR
shots. These BVR shots were possible because Coalition fighters, operat-
ing in conjunction with platforms such as the E-3 AWACS (Airbome
Warning and Control System), could shoot BVR with little risk of acci-
dently hitting friendly aircraft.

Coalition planning against Iraq's ground-based air defenses had two
objectives. The first was to destroy the French-built KARI command and
control system—the nervous system of Iraq's air defenses—by directly
attacking the system’s sector and interceptor operations centers (SOCs and
JOCs) and the numerous reporting and listening posts that provided early-
warning information. Second, planners intended to suppress Iraq's radar-
guided SAMs with drones and large numbers of antiradiation missiles
from “Wild Weasel" F-4Gs, F/A-18s, and other aircraft. This Coalition
endeavor produced some of the most complex attacks of the air campaign.

The most conclusive evidence of Coalition success in rendering KARI
and its associated “strategic” SAMs impotent can be seen in Coalition
attrition data (Figure 11). From an operational standpoint, the relevant
measure of effectiveness against Iraq's ground-based air-defense system
was not SOCs, IOCs, or missile-firing batteries physically destroyed but
the numbers of Coalition aircraft that were not shot down or damaged
while carrying out their missions over Iraq and the Kuwait theater of
operations. During the first 6 days of Desert Storm, radar SAMs downed
or damaged 8 Coalition fixed-wing aircraft; for the rest of the campaign,
this segment of Iraq's air defenses only damaged or downed another 5
Coalition airplanes. Given the large numbers of combat sorties flown
daily by Coalition air forces—on average, over 1,600 “shooter” sorties
daily plus another 540 combat-support sorties—the relatively light losses
suffered by Coalition air forces strongly support the conclusion that this
portion of the air campaign was highly effective.

"IGWAPS Statistical Compendium, Table 206, “Coalition Air-to-Air Kills Matrix”;
(S) Christie, Comfort, and Guild, Desert Shield/Desert Storm Air-to-Air Performance
Study, pp 30-31; also Deur, Wall of Eagles: Aerial Engagements and Victories in Opera-
tion Desert Storm, pp 5, 8, 11, 14-15, 18-20, 25-26, 28, 31, and 33. In most cases, the
nules-of-engagement (ROE) for F-15 BVR shots were salisfied by E-3A Airborne Warning
and Control System (AWACS) aircraft, which were able to confirm “hostile target, no
friendlies” (Christie, Comfort, and Guild, p C-5).

60



attacking an early-warning radar site in southern Iraq, B-52s from Barks-
dale Air Force Base in Louisiana were en route with conventional cruise
missiles, Navy ships had fired salvos of Tomahawk land-attack missiles
(TLAMs), and F-117 stealth aircraft were approaching Baghdad. Waves
of aircraft followed, rapidly sweeping into Iraq, attacking airfields, nodes
of the integrated air defense system, and leadership command and control
systems, known Scud sites, nuclear/chemical/biological production sites,
and electrical power facilities. By dawn, the attacks spread to include
ground forces in the Kuwait Theater of Operation. (The Kuwait Theater
of Operations was defined as the area north of the Saudi Arabian border,
south of the 31 degrees north latitude line, west of the Gulf and the Iran-
Traq border, and east of the 45 degrees east longitude line.) The second
night and day were characterized by more of the same attacks, with oil
production and storage facilities and naval sites coming under assault. The
first 2 days of air operations were the most thoroughly planned and the
most complex of the war, as Coalition commanders attempted to dismem-
ber Iraqi air defenses and at the same time attack targets across the entire
spectrum of strategic target sets. To accomplish this, planners employed
their entire arsenal of air weapons, including stealth F-117s, Tornados with
JP-233 runway attack munitions, F-15Es, attack helicopters, drones, and
conventional air-launched cruise missiles. The Coalition hit virtually every
target set on the initial strikes, although the greatest weight of effort was
directed against air defenses, airfields, and command elements of the Iraqi
regime. Although sortie rates remained at similar levels throughout the war
(with 2,759 fiown the first day, including 432 refueling sorties), subsequent
strikes were never as complex or focused, nor perhaps did they need to be
(see Figures 5 and 6).

The prime concern of commanders during the first days was to gain
and maintain air superiority. To do this, they employed an array of
specialized aircraft that included dedicated air-to-air fighters (F-15Cs and
F-14s); airborne warning, control, and intelligence aircraft (E-3s and
RC-135s); electronic jamming support aircraft (EF-111s and EA-6s); and
aircraft firing high-speed antiradiation missiles (HARMs) at Iraqi search
and tracking radars. Additionally, two types of radar-decoy drones stimu-
lated Iraqi radar activity, thereby deflecting attention from strike aircraft
and encouraging surface-to-air missile radars to remain active and there-
fore vulnerable to HARM missiles. The F-4Gs alone expended 118
HARMs the first night. Almost half of the 1,96] HARMs expended by



Nuclear/Biological/Chemical Targets and “Scuds”

Coalition planners had the explicit military objective of destroying
Iraq's chemical, biological, and nuclear capabilities. In the short term, that
goal supported Coalition's generic military objective of destroying Iraq's
capability to wage war. In the far term, destroying Iraq's nuclear program
and its modified Scud ballistic missile capability would support the political
objective of promoting the peace and stability of the Persian Gulf region.

The U.S. intelligence community agreed during the final months of
1990 that Iraq had extensive nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare
capabilities housed in a number of facilities, but the true extent of these
programs was unknown. By 1990, Iraq was estimated to be producing
as much as 1,000 tons of chemical agents annually, including mustard-
type blister agents and the nerve agents sarin and tabun, at the Samarra
and Habbaniya facilities.“ Iraq had also used chemical agents against
Tranian forces during the Iran-Iraq War. So there was little doubt about
the existence of Iraqi chemical-warfare capabilities. What proved harder
to predict with certainty was whether, and under what circumstances, Iraq
would employ its chemical weapons against the Coalition.

Iraq's biological weapons program dated from the late 1970s, but
pre-Desert-Storm estimates as to its exact nature and status were much
less certain than those on chemical weapons. The United States believed
that Iraq had developed anthrax spores and botulinum toxin as agents, and
that Iraqis were pursuing other toxins and live agents. Enough research,
production, and storage facilities suspected of being involved with biolog-
ical weapons had been identified at various locations (Salman Pak, Taji,
and two facilities at Abu Ghurayb) to suggest that the Iragis had produced
such agents in militarily significant quantities.”

The Iraqi nuclear program was massive, for most practical purposes
fiscally unconstrained, closer to fielding a nuclear weapon, and less

4*(SAWN) Michael J. Eisenstadt, “The Sword of the Arabs:” Iraq’s Strategic Weap-
‘ons, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Policy Paper Number 21, 1990, p 5;
Defense Intelligence Agency, “Special Analysis: Degradation of the Iraqi Chemical
Warfare Capability,” DDB-1620-28-91, 20 Feb 1991,

“*Bisenstadt, pp 7-8.

after the war, it was determined that the Iragi nuclear program had employed over
20,000 people (David Kay, “Arms Inspections in Iraq: Lessons for Arms Control,” p 2,
GWAPS, NA 375).

78



GULF WAR AIR POWER SURVEY

Director: Dr. Eliot A. Cohen
Senior Military Advisor: Lt. Gen. Robert E. Kelley (Ret.)

VOLUME I

Part 1

PLANNING THE AIR CAMPAIGN

Task Force Chief:

Principal Authors:

Dr. Alexander S. Cochran
Mr. Lawrence M. Greenberg
Dr. Wayne W. Thompson

Principal Contributors:
Maj. Mark Clodfelter

Lt. Col. Allan W. Howey

Dr. Alexander S. Cochran

Mr. Michael J. Eisenstadt
Mr. Kurt R. Guthe

Capt. John R. Glock

Part 2

COMMAND AND CONTROL

Task Force Chief:
Principal Authors:

Dr. Thomas C. Hone

Lt. Col. Sanford S. Terry
Principal Contributors:

Dr. Eliot A. Cohen

Lt. Col. Frank D. Kistler
Ms. Georganne Thibault

VOLUME Ir

Task Force Chief:
Principal Author:

Principal Contributors:
Lt. Col. Gary P. Cox

Dr. Thomas C. Hone

Dr. Mark D. Mandeles

Maj. Robert J. Heston
Maj. Anne D. Leary

Part 1
OPERATIONS

Mr. Barry D. Watts

Dr. Williamson Murray

Dr. Wayne W. Thompson

xiii



Figure 11
Coalition Fixed-Wing Combat Attrition By Cause

Total Fixed-Wing Attrition due to
Enemy Action: 38 Lost, 48 Damaged

13% {includir
Fixed-Wing twome bone
Aircraft Lost Unknowns)
or Damaged (
in Combat

185

7 202326299 1° 4 «7 «10 13 1 19 22 25 28
January February 1991

Source: GWAPS Statistical Compendium.

The role not played in this war by the large numbers of antiaircraft
artillery pieces and infrared SAMs deployed around most Iraqi cities and
targets and integral to Iraqi ground forces reinforces this conclusion.
Such weapons had accounted for the vast majority (85 percent) of U.S.
Air Force aircraft losses during the Vietnam war, including the 637

61



targeted the various governmental facilities—official residences, govern-
ment ministries, and command and control bunkers—used by Saddam and
his close associates to rule the country, maintain control over the people,
and direct military operations (the L targets). The various means by
which the Ba’athist leaders communicated with one another, the Iraqi
people, the Iraqi military, and the outside world-redundant coaxial and
fiber-optic land lines for voice and data, TV and radio stations,“ micro-
wave radio relays, associated switching facilities (many of them comput-
erized), and satellite communications stations—were identified as a second
“leadership” target category (the CCC targets). Attacking these targets
would directly threaten those most responsible for the occupation and
pillaging of Kuwait. At the same time, Coalition air planners reasoned
that if they could erode the ability of Saddam Hussein and his close
associates to exercise tight control of Iraq's military forces, the Iraqi
regime would not be able to react effectively to Coalition initiatives or to
conduct coordinated military operations.

The strikes that inflicted the bulk of the physical damage to the L and
CCC target categories involved precision munitions, carried out principal-
ly by F-117s. Given the hardness, small size, and location in urban areas
of many of the targets involved, primary reliance on the F-117/GBU-27
combination made considerable sense, both for certainty of destruction
and limitation of collateral damage. Fiber-optic relay stations offer a case
in point; only a precision-guided weapon or a lucky hit against the below-
ground junction box really effected a cut in the fiber-optic line. Even if
strikes against these relay stations with unguided bombs succeeded in
completely destroying the above-ground structures, the fiber-optic line
often remained intact unless cut with precision munitions.

The peak levels of precision strikes against Iraqi leadership and its
means of communication occurred on the first two nights, and relatively
significant numbers of strikes continued for much of the first week. Over
the second and third weeks, L targets received less emphasis. CCC, by
contrast, got a smaller but fairly steady number of precision sorties over
the first three weeks. The level of precision effort against CCC picked
up during the fourth week, only to be followed by a more sporadic pat-
tern for the rest of the conflict.

>4Radio stations could not only be used to rally the traqi populace but were correctly
assessed by Coalition intelligence to be a eonduit for triggering Iraqi agents abroad lo
initiate terrorist attacks.

67



this fuel remained as a significant obstacle that was surmounted by a combi-
nation of new pipelines and the Air Force's supply of fuel bladders, hydrant
systems, refueling vehicles, and trained personnel gathered from all over the
United States, Europe, and the Pacific. However, to meet this requirement,
the Air Force deployed ninety-two percent of its entire refueling assets to
the theater, leaving other combatant commands with limited ability to
establish any kind of bare-base aircraft refueling capability had that been
necessary. This would not have been the only shortfall, since the Air Force
had also deployed eighty-five percent of all its equipment for operating from
bare bases—tents, dining facilities, and so forthto the Gulf (See Figure 34).

Figure 34
Deployment of Selected USAF Assets
Percent
100 83%
92%
85%
63% 63%
504
0
TAF CBUs HARM LGBs Maverick Bare Fuels LGB
Aircraft Base Mobility Aircraft
HMM Expended

Problems with supplying aircraft munitions were similar to those for
sustainment supplies—and might have brought significant degradations to air
operations in August or September of 1990-but were overcome by the start
of the air campaign. Here, accurate accounting of munitions was necessary
because the Air Force employed more than thirty kinds, the Navy nine
varieties, and Army aviation thirteen. The other Coalition air forces added
some twenty-six unique types of their own munitions. Furthermore, Central
Command Air Forces (CENTAF) had anticipated a forty-five day transit
time for munitions from the United States, but the actual time was fifty-five

211



Foreword

From 16 January through 28 February 1991, the United States and its
allies conducted one of the most operationally successful wars in history,
a conflict in which air operations played a preeminent role. The Gulf
War Air Power Survey was commissioned on 22 August 1991 to review
all aspects of air warfare in the Persian Gulf for use by the United States
Air Force, but it was not to confine itself to discussion of that institution.
The Survey has produced reports on planning, the conduct of operations,
the effects of the air campaign, command and control, logistics, air base
support, space, weapons and tactics, as well as a chronology and a com-
pendium of statistics on the war. It has prepared as well a summary
report and some shorter papers and assembled an archive composed of
paper, microfilm, and electronic records, all of which have been deposited
at the Air Force Historical Research Agency at Maxwell Air Force Base,
Alabama. The Survey was just that, an attempt to provide a comprehen-
sive and documented account of the war. It is not a definitive history:
that will await the passage of time and the opening of sources (Iraqi
records, for example) that were not available to Survey researchers. Nor
is it a summary of lessons learned: other organizations, including many
within the Air Force, have already done that. Rather, the Survey provides
an analytical and evidentiary point of departure for future studies of the
air campaign. It concentrates on an analysis of the operational level of
war in the belief that this level of warfare is at once one of the most
difficult to characterize and one of the most important to understand.

The Survey was directed by Dr. Eliot Cohen of Johns Hopkins
University’s School of Advanced International Studies and was staffed by
a mixture of civilian and military analysts, including retired officers from
the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. It was divided into task forces, most
of which were run by civilians working temporarily for the Air Force.
The work produced by the Survey was examined by a distinguished
review committee, which included scholars, retired general officers from
the Air Force, Navy, and Army, as well as former and current senior gov-
ernment officials. Throughout, the Survey strived to conduct its research
in a spirit of impartiality and scholarly rigor. Its members had as their
standard the observation of Mr. Franklin D’Olier, chaitman of the United
States Strategic Bombing Survey during and after the second World War:



Anybody that does a campaign against transportation systems [had]
better beware! It looks deceivingly easy. 1 is a tough nut to crack.
[The Iraqis] were very ingenious and industrious in repairing them or
bypassing them... I have never seen so many pontoon bridges.
[When] the canals near Basra [were bombed], they just filled them in
with dirt and drove across the dirt.”

Figure 22
Prewar Baghdad-to-KTO Route Capacities

Baghdad

ROUTE @ - 45,000 ud

ROUTE 7 - 38,000 vd

ROUTE 16 - 33,000 vd

SECONDARY RTE FROM 16 - 19,000 tid
RAILROAD - 11,000 vd

ROUTE 6 - 78,000 METRIC TONS PER DAY tet / kuwart ©&
\

+] TTL

7S) intvw, Perry Jamison, Richard Davis, and Barry Barlow, Air Force History
Program, with Lt Gen Charles A. Horner, 4 Mar 1992, GWAPS, NA 303, pp 49-50.

95



face forces absorbed at least fifty-six percent of the strikes, and efforts
aimed at air control, another fourteen percent.”

The percentage of strikes against the eight strategic target categories
shown in Figure 12 may appear relatively small, given the degree of
attention devoted to this aspect of the air war by planners and, subse-
quently, by the public. This attention reflected the importance that a
number of the air planners ascribed to attacking the core of Iraqi power
and the hopes that some harbored for bringing down the Iraqi regime
through the use of air power alone.

Figure 12
Coalition Strikes by Target Categories and Air-Power Function
(17 Jan-28 Feb 1991)

Target Categories Strikes
$,000 10,000 15,000 20,000

tragl Ground Forces
Airlletde

Scud T1460 Uncategoried Alr-Power Functions using
‘SAMs 1,370 15.0% = Black Hole Target Categories
Lote 1,170
Alr Attack of Iraqh
rcenee e Core Strategic E oieesrovee
ADs (RAR) T7 630 14.8% Air Controt
Tetscommnrca fysso
on fasa0 Il “Strategic” Target

aval Tergete 370 Categories

Electric Power 345,

the Alr
Leadership 260 13.9%

Source: GWAPS Missions Databese, Dec 1992. All strike totals have been rounded off to the nearest
multiple of ten (2.9. 284 was rounded off to 280, and 539 to 540), Strike ‘totals include a number still
uncategorized, Most of these uncategorized sirikes were A-10, F/A-18, or AV-@ sorties that, in all
likelihood, wera targeted against Iraqi ground forces. Strike totals do not include maritime sitikes carried
out by U.S. Navy sircratt as part of fleet defense operations.

An estimated thirty percent of the precision-guided bombs delivered
during Desert Storm were targeted against the eight core strategic-target
categories, roughly double the percentage of the total strikes they re-

devised to capture this aspect of Coalition air power in the Gulf War.

?""These percentages total well short of 100% due to the portion of reported strikes
that GWAPS was unable to categorize by target category due to incomplete data. The
majority of these strikes, though, almost certainly went against Iraqi ground forces. Note
too that the more than 340 air-to-air sorties a day that the Coalition averaged during
Desert Storm are over and above the roughly 42,000 strikes in the GWAPS Missions
Database,

65



frequently as historical climatology would have indicated.’ Particularly
in the early days of the air war, as many as half of the sorties did not
attack or missed their assigned targets because of poor weather. Some
aircraft thus had to employ less accurate radar-aimed bomb releases
through the clouds; other aircraft, such as A-10s and AV-8Bs, returned
with their weapons or did not take off at all. Laser-guided bombs could
not be guided if the target lay beneath fog or clouds. On the second and
third days of the air war, more than half of the F-117 flights were unsuc-
cessful or canceled because of low clouds over Baghdad; on the following
2 days in the Kuwait theater, A-10s that normally flew a total of over 200
sorties a day successfully flew a 2-day total of only 75.5 Weather condi-
tions did not remain as severe for the entire war, but the adverse condi-
tions for the first 10 days, and again during most of the ground war,
created a vivid impression on flight crews.

The weather encountered during the air war proved unexpectedly bad,
not just because it differed so much from the climatological record but
because it differed so sharply from the weather of fall 1990. During
training for the air campaign, skies remained clear for weeks at a time,
and even visibility restrictions from blowing sand were absent in the
operating areas.” The briefings on the air campaign included a depiction
of the anticipated January-February weather patterns, but the expected
patterns typically suggested two days of a passing weather front, followed
by three to five days of clear skies. Instead, the weather fronts came and
stayed, bringing more fog and lower ceilings than expected. Moreover,
the decision to bomb from medium altitude multiplied the impact of the
weather, for a target visible to an aircraft at 1,000 feet altitude might
escape observation at 10,000 feet.

7 Air Weather Service, Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm, Report No. 2, “An
Analysis of AWS Support to Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm," 6 Dec 1991, p 125,
GWAPS, NA 76. (Henceforth AWS Report 2.)

8B.7 Summary Data, GWAPS Missions Database; 23/354 TFW(P), “Combat
Chronology,” 20 and 21 Jan 1991, AFHRA 00885046-51.

SUSAF Environmental Technical Application Center Technical Note 92/003, “Gulf
War Weather,” pp 2-1 to 2-2-57.

172



|
4

Air Attacks on the Iraqi Surface Forces

The vast weight of the Coalition air effort in the war flew either
directly against Iraqi ground forces in the Kuwait theater or against the
supply lines to those forces. These ground forces absorbed the prepon-
derance of the attack sorties of the war and an even larger proportion of
the bomb tonnage. This portion of the air war was characterized by the
gradual attrition of Iraqi forces rather than by a sudden change in Iraqi
capabilities, such as had characterized the attacks on the Iraqi air force,
air defense system, and electrical power grid. Bomb damage assessment
focused more on measuring the cumulative effort of many sorties over
time than on scoring the successes of individual sorties.

The planners of air attacks against the Iraqi army recognized the
important status of the Republican Guard units, but those forces proved
a difficult target. They were singled out as a center of gravity for the
part they played as the strategic reserve in the Iraqi ground scheme of
maneuver and for their political role as defender of Saddam Hussein’s
regime. Central Command planning, in fact, addressed the possibility of
staging an earlier-than-planned ground attack if it discovered that Repub-
lican Guard forces were about to retreat into the interior of Iraq before
the planned ground offensive got underway. Fearing an early withdrawal,
General Schwarzkopf directed that bridges be struck early in the air cam-
paign (in Phase I), not simply to stop the flow of supplies into the theater
but to block the retreat of the Guards.”' Still, the position of these forces,
which were the farthest back in the theater, made them the most difficult
units to observe and to attack and allowed several of the Republican
Guard divisions to be among the least damaged Iraqi units by the end of
the war.

The bombing altitudes employed by the Coalition aircraft limited both
the prosecution and effectiveness of the air campaign in the Kuwait the-
ater. Crews bombed from much higher altitudes than those at which they
had trained in order to remain above the effective altitude of the antiair-
craft artillery and infrared SAMs. As a result, aircraft delivering unguid-
ed munitions lost accuracy because of the greater slant ranges to the
targets and the resulting magnification of aiming errors. Some of the

7\(S) Hq, U.S. Central Command, Combined Operation Desert Storm, 17 Jan 1991,
para 3.f.(1)(b)3, GWAPS, CHP 18-1.

91



Coalition planners believed from the outset that if Saddam Hussein's
forces were decisively defeated, the Iraqi leader would not long survive
the war in power. They further believed that once an accommodation had
been reached with the new government in Baghdad, members of the
Coalition could provide the parts and anything else necessary to restore
electric power speedily throughout Iraq after the war. The political out-
come turned out to be something that no one foresaw. Saddam Hussein
both retained power and continued to defy the United Nations, thereby
causing the continuation of economic sanctions that prevented Coalition
assistance in reconstruction or humanitarian relief. To attribute responsi-
bility for Iraq's increased mortality rate in the aftermath of a major mili-
tary defeat solely, or even primarily, to the damage inflicted on Iraq's
electric-power system ignores the Iraqi government's responsibility for its
own prewar and postwar decisions.

Turing to Coalition efforts against Iraqi oil, strikes against refining
capacity appear to have been considerably more effective than those
directed against stores of refined products that could be put to military
use. Iraq’s refining capacity resided in the three large facilities at Baji,
Basra, and Baghdad. The CIA eventually concluded that Coalition air
strikes had rendered more than 90 percent of Iraq’s petroleum refining
capacity inoperative.” This judgment was based primarily on damage to
distillation towers, inflicted chiefly by a very small number of precision
strikes. For the most part, aircraft delivering nonprecision munitions
attacked oil storage tanks with more visible but less damaging results.
Given the small level of effort expended to disable over 90 percent of
Iraq's refinery capacity, this aspect of the air campaign appears to have
been both highly leveraged and effective.

How enduring was the damage inflicted on the Iraqi oil industry as
a whole? As of October 1992, Iraqi officials claimed that crude-oil
production had returned to 800,000 barrels a day and could be increased
to 2 million barrels a day (about two-thirds of Iraq's prewar capacity). In
addition, restored refineries were supplying more than enough gasoline
and heating oil for Iraq's domestic needs and exports to Jordan. Thus,
there is no evidence that the air campaign inflicted lasting infrastructure
damage to Iraq's oil industry.

“6(S/WN/NFIREL UK, CA, AS) CIA, “Imagery Update: #35,” 19 Mar 1991, p 1.

76



aerial tankers at numerous bases from Lajes Air Base in the Azores to
Cairo West Airfield in Egypt. Their access was speedily negotiated.
Hellenikon Air Base in Greece and Torrejon Air Base in Spain became
key locations even though U.S. forces had begun leaving the bases before
the Gulf crisis at the insistence of the host governments. Later on, sever-
al East European countries granted overflight rights, as did Thailand and
India for air missions across the Pacific.

There were some exceptions to this unprecedented extension of
staging and overflight rights, most notably the basing of B-52s requiring
bases with extensive runway and ramp operating areas and access to
specialized logistical support. The stationing of B-52s overseas raised
political concerns for several potential host nations. Throughout the
aircraft’s history, host foreign governments had allowed B-52 basing only
under limited conditions because of the B-52s’ link with nuclear weapons
and their widely publicized role in the Vietnam War. These restrictions
and the concerns that drove them proved resistant to change. General
Schwarzkopf ranked the employment of B-52s an important element of
the attacks on Iraqi forces, but when the air campaign began, the only
B-52s stationed close to the theater were the 20 aircraft on the British-
controlled island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, approximately
3,000 miles from the target areas.

During Desert Shield, the U.S. Air Force proposed B-52 basing in
several countries, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Spain, but no
moves took place until the air campaign began. It is unclear who was
more reluctant: the potential host governments or American officials who
did not wish to press them on a potentially delicate issue at a time when
weightier matters appeared to be at stake. Certainly the base in Saudi
Arabia proposed for B-52 basing raised such concerns, given that Iraq
had already accused Saudi Arabia of allowing Westerners to desecrate the
Mustim holy places. To minimize the problem, B-52s deptoyed to their
wartime operating bases, but with no publicity and only after the air cam-
paign began. Some B-52s flying from Diego Garcia or Wurtsmith AFB
in the United States landed in the theater after the initial attacks of the air
campaign. Soon after, B-52s deployed to Moron Air Base in Spain and



Iran, which could have affected Coalition air operations most directly,
did not in fact play a substantial role militarily during the crisis, but
gained much politically. During Desert Shield, Saddam Hussein attempt-
ed to secure his easter flank by allowing territorial concessions to the
enemy that Iraq had vanquished only two years before. During the war,
Iranian action indicating potential hostility or military support for Iraq
would have kept aircraft carriers out of the Gulf, thereby greatly increas-
ing their aircraft range to the target (adding to the already high demand
for air refueling tankers). Also, such action would have made air opera-
tions close to the Iranian border, particularly in the Basra area, a subject
of great concer. Iran, recognizing immediately the political advantages
accruing from having the Coalition dispose of its ten-year nemesis, creat-
ed no such difficulties. Instead, it provided a service to the Coalition
(and even more so to its own interests) by remaining strictly neutral and
interning the Iraqi aircraft that fled to Iran beginning in late January. Iran
reaped additional benefits by retaining those aircraft, and even more from
the military devastation wreaked on its chief rival for dominance in the
Persian Gulf region.

Physical Factors
Distances, Terrain, and Weather

To employ Coalition air power against Iraq, aircraft had to fly extended
distances and operate in conjunction with other aircraft from distant bases.
The flight distances from the air bases to the target areas (see map) made
aerial refueling-often multiple refueling-a nearly standard part of most
combat missions. The closest land or carrier basing put aircraft 175 or more
miles from the nearest targets in the Kuwait theater and more than triple that
distance for targets in the Baghdad region. The bulk of the combat aircraft
flew from bases in southern Saudi Arabia and the coastal Gulf states; for
them and the Red Sea carrier aircraft, the targets were 700 to 1,000 miles
away, well beyond the unrefueled combat radius of most aircraft. Proven
Force attacked most of the targets in northem Iraq, but even these aircraft,
which could not overfly Syria and therefore had to fly a dog leg around it,
still traveled 600 miles or more to their targets. For the B-52s, the 700-mile
distances for the aircraft based in the theater were the shortest; most of the

167



“complicate movement of goods and services.”** On the other hand,
planners harbored an “intent to convince the Iraqi populace that a bright
“economic and political future will result from the replacement of the
Saddam Hussein regime . . .” and that “execution planning will empha-
size limiting collateral damage and civilian casualties and preserving the
Iraqi and Kuwaiti capability to quickly reconstitute their economies,”
To comply with this guidance, targeting attempted to distinguish between
short-term and long-term damage to electric power generation and oil
facilities. For oil targets, this meant that Coalition aircraft would hit oil
refining and storage facilities, but not oil production facilities. Within the
refinery target subset, aircraft would hit distribution points, not cracking
towers. For electric power targets, they would strike transformers, which
were thought to take months to repair, instead of the generator halls,
which were thought to take years to repair.“

Attacks against leadership and command and control had political and
military dimensions. Separating the national leadership in Baghdad from
the military forces in the field would delay the coordination of military
operations and show the Iraqi forces the powerlessness of their leaders.
Planners also hoped for a more direct political effect. If Saddam Hussein
could not communicate with the Iraqi people, he could not propagandize
against the United States and its allies, mobilize the country for war, or
court world opinion. As a result, the air campaign targeted radio and
television transmitters, relay stations, telephone and telegraph facilities,
and military command posts. Also attacked, in addition to facilities that
might house Saddam Hussein, were the buildings of the Ministry of
Defense, Ba’ath Party headquarters, and similar sites. Planners counted
most on these strikes to end the war by air power alone. The strikes, in

(8) Brfg, Joint Chiefs of Staff, “Iraqi Air Campaign Instant Thunder.” 17 Aug
1990, GWAPS, CHSH 5-3; (S) Operations order, COMUSCENTAF Operations Order
Offensive Campaign—Phase 1, 2 Sep 1990, p 4.

33(§) COMUSCENTAF Operations Order, Offensive Campaign~Phase I, 2 Sep 1990,
pp 3-4,

**There were no prewar limitations on striking bridges and railroads, though some
were instituted during the war. This chapter will not go into the effectiveness of
this guidance, but later chapters will. For instance, weapons and aircraft accuracy
limitations sometimes did not allow such discrimination, and when Iraq began to dump
oil into the Gulf and employ oil-fired trenches as past of their defenses, some of the
pumping stations in southern Iraq and Kuwait were attacked. (Glosson intvw, 12 Dec
1991, GWAPS Cochran files; Deptula intvw, 8 Jan 1992.)

44



Centers of Gravity

* Iraqi National Command Authority;
* — Iraq’s chemical, biological and nuclear capability; and
* The Republican Guard Forces Command.

Phase I Targeting

Phase I, the strategic air campaign, called for attacks against twelve
interrelated target sets” in order to “result in disruption of Iraqi command
and control, loss of confidence in the government, and significant degra-
dation of Iraqi military capabilities.”"> First, command of the air was to
be gained by attacks on the Iraqi strategic air defense system and air-
fields. The most important centers of gravity were leadership and com-
mand, control, and communications facilities. To eliminate long-term
Iraqi offensive capabilities, the nuclear, biological, and chemical weap-
ons research, production, and storage facilities, and the Scud missiles,
launchers, and production and storage facilities were targeted. The
key elements of the Iraqi armed forces and their supporting industries
made up the remainder of the target sets: the Republican Guard forces,
military storage and production sites, naval forces and ports, rail-
roads and bridges, electricity production, and oil refining and distri-
bution facilities. To simplify its task, the Black Hole assigned each
target category an alphabetic identifier (e.g., L for leadership, SAD for
Strategic Air Defense) and a number for each target in that category (e.g.,
SADO1, L15, etc.). This identification system would cause some confu-
sion during the air campaign when targeting and intelligence communities
outside the Black Hole used a more complicated but standard identifica-
tion system. Furthermore, the simple Black Hole system developed an
ambiguous categorization of targets—naval targets, for example, included
at least one air defense site and one petroleum terminal.

The term strategic air campaign means simply those activities planned as part of
Phase {. The term was a controversial one at the time, and as of this writing discussions
continue within the U.S. military concerning the appropriateness of the terms “strategic
targets” and “air campaign.”

?5(S) OPORD 91-001, para 3C.

40


security policy. Yet, although preoccupied with Europe and the end of
the Cold War, military planners had taken preliminary steps to reorient
their focus from a global war with the Soviets to regional contingencies.
Beginning in the fall of 1989, U.S. military planning for Arabian Peninsu-
la security shifted from a potential Soviet threat to a regional threat with
Traq as the focus. By the spring of 1990, Central Command
(CENTCOM) had prepared a draft operations plan (OPLAN 1002-90,
Defense of the Arabian Peninsula) to address such a contingency. The
plan, however, only slightly resembled the operations that would unfold.
Defensive in nature, it called for early-deploying U.S. forces to trade
space for time, while reducing the attacking Iraqi forces until sufficient
U.S. forces could deploy for a counteroffensive to recapture lost territory.

Two days after the Iraqi invasion, President Bush convened a meeting
of the National Security Council to discuss U.S. options. After briefing
possible military options to the President, including those in Central
Command’s draft contingency plan, the Commander of U.S. Central
Command, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, and his staff prepared for a
deployment of forces to Southwest Asia.'! Their deployment plan would
take four months to execute (plus an additional two months for the forces
added later) and would depend on the use of some twenty-five regional
bases, including some not mentioned in existing plans. Ultimately it
would also involve command arrangements with forces from thirty-eight
countries. Weeks would be needed to deploy enough troops to defend
Saudi Arabia against the Iragi forces across the border in Kuwait.
Schwarzkopf and his planners understood the precariousness of the situa-
tion and placed priority on deploying combat units first, at the expense
of support and sustainment personnel and equipment.

General Schwarzkopf depended on air power as the essential shield
for the build-up of forces necessary to defend the Arabian peninsula. The
only forces he had immediately available in the region were a carrier
battle group (USS Independence), two KC-135 tankers and a mobile
operations center deployed (Operation Ivory Justice) to Abu Dhabi at

‘U.S. Department of Defense, Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Final Report to
Congress, Apr 1992, pp 32, 334, 350. See Chapter 2 of this report for a discussion of
planning for the air campaign.



“Rolling Thunder,” the initial air campaign in Vietnam. Vietnam-era com-
manders had taken part in a campaign of gradual escalation tied to theories
of diplomatic bargaining stretching out over months; Gulf War commanders
hoped to strike decisive blows in a war that might last only a week or two.
Warden's codename for the plan did not survive, but many planners in
Washington and the theater accepted this concept wholeheartedly. Civilian
decisionmakers, no less than soldiers, had in mind a host of Vietnam-era
lessons; in particular, they willingly let the military design the campaign in
accordance with broad political guidance from the White House.TM During
the Vietnam War, U.S. politicians directed the military to use force
incrementally, in a restricted fashion, and for ambiguous political objectives.
Against Iraqi forces, civilians allowed the massive use of force, with few
constraints (aside from those dictated by the laws of war and common
sense) and for clear purposes. Washington headquarters did not
micromanage the Gulf War, targeting suggestions were sent to the theater,
but theater commanders ran the war.

Such, at any rate, was the view among the civilian and military leader-
ship. In truth, the distinction between the conduct of the Gulf and the Viet-
nam Wars was in certain respects overstated. The restrictions imposed on the
use of air power in North Vietnam, for example, were shaped considerably
by a fear of igniting a broader war, with Chinese or Soviet intervention-a
concem wholly absent in the Gulf. Political guidance for the use of air
power in South Vietnam created considerably fewer constraints than in the
North. In addition, in the Gulf War, targeting of downtown Baghdad
changed following the bombing of the Al Firdos bunker on 13 February. In
the two weeks preceding that incident, F-117s hit twenty-five targets in
downtown Baghdad; in the two weeks after, they struck only five, very
carefully chosen.

The political objectives in the Gulf War were, in important respects,
ambiguous as well; the Presidential goal of securing a stable Persian Gulf
could mean many things. Commanders could not know for certain just .
how much value they should place and how much effort they should
direct on the destruction of the Ba’ath regime and the rule (if not the
person) of Saddam Hussein. These qualifications notwithstanding, how-
ever, planners were undoubtedly correct to see a tremendous difference
from the conduct of the Vietnam war.

2441, Norman Schwarzkopf, /t Doesn’t Take a Hero (New York: Bantam Books,
1992), p 320; Bob Woodward, The Commanders (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1991),
pp 324, 339, 347,

219



}
}

j

okies

i
;
i
i
'

carried out during Desert Storm. They came as the final element of the
campaign rather than as its critical opening phase. Exercise-ending
against the enemy homeland reflected the decades of planning for East-
West conflict in Europe, in which such strikes were closely associated
with the escalation to nuclear conflict. Furthermore, Central Command
classified the Intemal Look simulated attacks as “long-range interdiction,”
a term very different in its connotations from the “strategic targets” of
Desert Storm. And finally, the concluding strikes of Internal Look in no
way matched the weight and intensity of the air campaign that began on
16 January 1991.

Internal Look 90 did perform useful service in some areas, however.
The targets selected by staff for the scenario served as a useful starting
point for the eventual Desert Storm target list. Two lists were drawn up
in the summer of 1990 for Internal Look: an Air Force Component Cen-
tral Command (CENTAF) list and a Central Command composite. list,
using nominations from the Service components. Both lists are shown in
Table 1.

Too much can be made of the difference between these early lists,
some of which derived from the access of the Service components to
specific target intelligence. However, two aspects of the lists are note-
worthy: first, the emphasis by CENTAF on attacking the air defense
system as a prelude to other attacks; second, the negligible attention of
both lists to nuclear, biological, chemical, and Scud facilities. Planners
lacked information on the location and extent of such facilities, which in
any event were not central to the war envisioned in Internal Look 90.
Furthermore, detailed information needed for actual mission planning did
not exist for most of the targets nominated on the lists.

Internal Look 90 and the draft plan from which it flowed had a
defensive purpose, and the planned air employment reflected this impera-
tive. The list of aircraft missions provided in order of priority by
Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner, the CENTAF commander, carried no refer-

Reporis, 15 Jul 1991, Appendix L, GWAPS, NA 9.

7In the planning of the Desert Storm air campaign, these targets were identified as
“strategic” targets; in the mission reports accomplished after each mission, the strikes
were identified as “interdiction.”

31


A Note on Sources

Most of the paper and electronic records used by the Gulf War
Air Power Survey (GWAPS) are available to researchers with appropriate
clearances at the United States Air Force Historical Research Agency
(AFHRA), Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama. The agency began to
accumulate Gulf War records before the Survey was established in
Washington during the summer of 1991. Early in Desert Shield, the Air
Force deployed more than thirty enlisted historians under Chief Master
Sergeant John R. Burton to the theater, where they collected documents,
conducted interviews, and drafted unit historical reports. More than five
hundred rolls of agency microfilm reached the Survey during its research
phase, and a thousand rolls were available by the end of the writing
phase. Agency microfilmers shot the first hundred rolls in Riyadh, the
second hundred at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia (headquarters of
Tactical Air Command and CENTAF Rear), and the rest at Maxwell.

During the Vietnam War, the Air Force had begun the practice
of microfilming paper records in the field to insure their preservation, but
the Service did not meet with as much success in preserving the
electronic records of that war. Since then electronic records have grown
rapidly in quantity and importance. The Survey gathered a large
collection of electronic records, many of which have been integrated in
the three principal Survey databases: the missions database, the sortie
database, and the target database. When the Survey was established,
work on these databases was already underway at Langley Air Force
Base. The chief of Langley’s Gulf War database team, Maj. Lewis
“Dough” Hill, moved the project to the Survey, where his team’s work
was the foundation of the statistics report, Statistical Compendium.

The target database permits researchers to determine quickly
whether a potential target appeared on any of several intelligence or
planning lists. The sortie database gives researchers information on
Coalition sorties, both attack and support; this database was introduced
in Riyadh by Maj. Roy Lee of the Tactical Air Control Center. Most of
the Survey’s database development effort has been expended on the
missions database, which attempts to pull together all available

253



tet REEDS lw atta

updated throughout the period of Desert Shield, the D-Day ATO also
served as a focus of the overt planning for an air campaign. The true
offensive plan, however, was not the D-Day ATO but a plan being devel-
oped by a special planning group, the “Black Hole,” whose existence and
planning was known to only a few on the Central Command and
CENTAF staffs.'®

Offensive Air Campaign, Phase I

Precrisis planning had called attention to deficiencies in basic intelli-
gence information, had acquainted staffs with the region in which they
would fight, and perhaps most important, had familiarized them with one
another. But these efforts did not shape the Desert Storm air plan. The
strategic purpose of the actual war that occurred—an offensive operation
to liberate Kuwait and shatter Iraqi power rather than a defensive opera-
tion to protect Persian Gulf allies—was utterly different from that of
precrisis planning. Furthermore, much of the Desert Storm air plan
emerged from planning prepared by special and ad hoc organizations,
whose existence no one had anticipated before the war.

Shortly after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, a group of Air Staff offi-
cers in the Pentagon began planning an air campaign designed to eject
Traqi forces from Kuwait, Col. John A. Warden II, the Air Staff’s
Deputy Director for Warfighting, supervised this effort. The group
initially numbered six but quickly grew to more than one hundred officers
from the Air Force and other Services, operating out of offices that were
previously the facility of an Air Staff division called Checkmate; this ad
hoc group itself became known as Checkmate. Warden and his Check-
mate organization developed military objectives, a concept of operations,
and a targeting scheme designed to accomplish the President’s objectives
using air power alone.

The initiative might have ended there had General Schwarzkopf not
called the Air Force Vice Chief of Staff, Gen. John M. Loh, and asked

*S(S/NF) Fact sheet, Maj John Heidrick, 9th AIS, Shaw AFB. “9 TIS/INT Planning
Procedures for Internal Look-90 and Operation Desert Shield,” 4 May 1992. GWAPS,
NA 267 and in Continuity Book (S/NF), maintained by Capt Heidrick, 9th TIS containing
miscellaneous reports, summaries, and charts located at HRA, Maxwell AFB, AL;
(S) Intvw, Dr. Alexander Cochran with Brig Gen Buster Glosson, 12 Dec 1991, GWAPS
Cochran files.

35



Whether combinations like the F-117 and GBU-27 will exert compa-
rable dominance in future wars with different terrain or a more mobile
adversary remains unclear. Only a more difficult test than the Gulf War
could establish without question the supremacy of the precision-guided
air-delivered bomb as the dominant weapon of war. Nevertheless, the
shelter busting and “tank-plinking” that occurred in Desert Storm were
qualitatively different from and superior to the laser-guided bombing
effort of the last phase of the Vietnam war.

Stealth, Air Superiority, and Campaign Options

The F-117, in conjunction with unmanned precision weapons such as
the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM), gave Coalition air forces the
wherewithal to attack a wide range of targets systematically, from the outset
of operations. Above all, the Coalition could prosecute these attacks with-
out first “rolling back” Iraq’s air defenses. The “air superiority” built into
the F-117 also allowed it to attack key elements of Iraq's strategic air
defenses as an integral part of Coalition efforts to gain early control of the
air, In effect, platforms like the F-117 provided low-risk attack options that
required neither traditional air superiority as a prerequisite nor electronic-
warfare and fighter-escort support. As a result, planners had a far greater
array of options available to them than would have been the case with
conventional aircraft. In this connection, the difference between the opera-
tions of Proven Force—which relied exclusively on conventional aircraft
using unguided munitions—and the operations of rest of the air campaign
Operating from areas south, west, and east of Iraq is instructive. The Proven
Force attacks looked more like the traditional “roll-back” efforts of previous
campaigns, in which attacks on air defenses proceeded from the enemy’s
perimeter inward.

Beyond Visual Range (BVR) Shots

Desert Storm was the first major air campaign in which a sizable por-
tion (over forty percent) of the air-to-air engagements that produced kills
began with beyond-visual-range (BYR) missile shots. Here, the limit was
less technology (although improved long-range radar-guided missiles helped)
than command and control. In the past, fears of air-to-air fratricide had
inhibited the use of long-range missiles fired BYR. The overwhelming
superiority of Coalition air and Iraq’s conservative air doctrine meant that
the Iraqi Air Force did not rise to fight very much. When it did, however,
Coalition aircraft making use of information gathered by Airborne Warming

245

357-357 0 - 93 - 10



ners to target individual aircraft. By dispersing aircraft off the airfields,
they could increase the area to be searched. And, last but not least, the
Iraqis exploited the Coalition's reluctance to risk damage to cultural monu-
ments such as Islamic mosques by parking combat aircraft near them.

In the end, the Coalition destroyed some 375 hardened aircraft shel-
ters across a total of 44 major airfields, including three in Kuwait.” As
for the Iraqi Air Force, it lost as many as 400 of the more than 700
combat aircraft it had possessed on 17 January 1991, either through
destruction or as a result of being retained by Iran. By war's end, the
Iraqis still possessed an estimated 300-375 combat aircraft, and the level
of destruction of the Iraqi Air Force was not as complete as the air plan-
ners and commanders in Riyadh would have preferred. The Coalition's
emphasis on aircraft shelters did permit some Iraqi aircraft to survive the
war out in the open, while the short flight times (10-15 minutes) to
Iranian airspace from fields in central Iraq made it nearly impossible for
Coalition aircraft to seal off the Iranian border to fleeing Iraqi aircraft.

Strategic Attacks

In the minds of the Desert Storm air planners, the “strategic core” of
the air campaign consisted of the following eight out of twelve target
categories: (1) command, control, and communications; (2) leadership
facilities; (3) nuclear, chemical, and biological warfare capabilities and
weapons programs; (4) military support facilities (e.g., ammunition stor-
age, logistics and repair sites); (5) ballistic missiles launchers and their
supporting infrastructure; (6) electric power; (7) oil refineries; and (8) key
bridges and railway facilities. The Black Hole’s target list for these eight
categories contained 295 targets on 15 January 1991 and 535 on
26 February 1991, a growth that reflects a continuing influx of intelli-
gence throughout the 43-day war.

Using strikes~meaning occasions on which individual aircraft released
ordnance against distinct targets or aimpoints—the eight “strategic” target
categories absorbed about fifteen percent of the Coalition's air-to-ground
efforts during Desert Storm.” By comparison, attacks against Iraqi sur-

'S(S/WNIREL UK, CA, AS) DIA/DX-5B, “Baitle Damage Assessment: Iraqi and
Kuwaiti Airfields, Summary Report,” 10 May 1991.

?°The traditional input measure for level of effort by air forces has been sorties.
However, early research revealed that aircraft like the F-117 and F-111F often used
precision-guided bombs to hit two or more targets on a single sortie. Strike counts were

64



The limited amount of [all-weather] fighters compared with Iraq’s large
number of strategic [radar-guided] SAMs ... makes the SAM the
logical choice as the primary air defense weapon . . . . Iraq probably
will not put up a determined, concentrated fighter defense, thus avoiding
quick elimination of its interceptor force.'*

SPEAR’s assessment was distributed widely within the theater and briefed
to aircrews before Desert Storm; it remains perhaps the best assessment
of the Iraqi air force and air defense system.

Intelligence encountered greater difficulty in determining the number
of Iraqi troops and equipment in the Kuwait theater. Although Coalition
leaders knew the general disposition of Baghdad’s forces in the theater
before Desert Storm, they understood far less well the actual numbers of
men and combat equipment in the Iraqi units. As a result, manning and
equipment estimates rested on an assumed full manning. Intelligence
attempted to verify that information by imagery. The resulting numbers,
which proved to be a considerable overestimate of the actual Iraqi force
in the theater, remained the basis for Coalition action against that force.
Intelligence analysts and Coalition planners originally estimated that the
Tragis had about 540,000 troops in the Kuwait theater just before the air
campaign, and about 450,000 when the ground offensive began.'* These
same estimates put Iraqi equipment totals at nearly 4,300 tanks and slight-
ly more than 3,100 artillery pieces in the Kuwait theater at the beginning
of the air campaign,'* but the intelligence agencies and theater assess-
ments differed widely on how much equipment remained at the beginning
of the ground campaign.

Several factors complicated a more accurate assessment of the true
strength of the Iraqi army. First, that army had undergone a reorganization
after the Iran-Iraq War, changing the divisional manning and complicating

“Ibid, pp 3-51 and 3-52; also Intvw, Cmdr Fitzgerald, SPEAR, with GWAPS, 15
May 1992,
"Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 254. Also see Chapters 1 and 3 in this report

for the Survey's estimates of the strength and equipment totals of the Iraqi army at the
beginning of the air campaign and the beginning of the ground offensive.

‘Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 254.

126



Table 4 (Continued)
Operational-Strategic Summary

Target Sets* Desired/Planned Actual Results
Effects
NBC (C) Destroy chen/bio weap- Some chemical weapons destroyed
ons * But most survived (UN Special
* Prevent use against Comm)
Coalition * Chemical use deterred
& * Destroy production * No biological weapons found
capability (UN)
Destroy nuclear program Nuclear program “inconvenienced”
5 * Long term (UN)
* Most program elements sur-
SCUDs (SC) Prevent/suppress use vived
“ * Destroy production Firings somewhat suppressed, not
& infrastructure salvos
+ Keep Israel out of + SCUD operations pressured
the war * Aircraft destroyed few, if any,
MELs/TELs
Railroads Cut supply lines to KTO All important bridges destroyed
Bridges (RR) + Prevent retreat of + Many Iraqi workarounds
Iragi forces Short duration of war limited effects
: Republican Desiroy the RG RG immobilized
, Guard (RG) * Attrition by G-Day <50%
& + Some RG units and 800+ tanks
. Other Ground Reduce combat effec- escape
5 Forces in the liveness 50% (armor, Front-line forces waiting to surren-
KTO artillery) by G-Day der or destroyed in place

* Attrition by G-Day >50%
* Morale destroyed by air

*Military support (MS), Breaching targets (BR), and KTO SAMs are subsumed in
the target categories shown.

119



i
1
i
i
1
j

i
i

Introduction

This report captures some of the key findings of the ten reports of the
Gulf War Air Power Survey (GWAPS). It does not, however, merely offer
an executive summary of each report; rather, it asks a number of ques-
tions that cut across each of the reports. In all cases, the main reports of
the Survey contain far fuller treatment of any given issue than is possible
here. Furthermore, the authors of this study could not treat some issues,
particularly in the realm of space and intelligence operations, in an un-
classified forum such as this.

Chapter 1, What Happened?, gives a brief overview of Desert
Shield, the deployment to the Arabian peninsula following Iraq’s invasion
of Kuwait in August 1991 and a longer account of the Gulf War. It sets
a chronological context for the discussions that follow. Chapter 2, What
was the Air Campaign Plan?, describes the evolution of the air cam-
paign plan that General Schwarzkopf, Commander in Chief Central
Command (CINCCENT) authorized for execution on 17 January 1991.
Chapter 3, What did the Air Campaign Accomplish?, evaluates the
effects and effectiveness of the air campaign. Chapter 4, What was the
Role of Intelligence?, examines the many aspects of intelligence as they
related to air operations in the Gulf War, including strategic estimates and
bomb damage assessment. Chapter 5, Who Ran the Air War?, exam-
ines the organizations that orchestrated the air campaign and some of the
controversies that emerged, including those centering on the role of the
Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC) and the lengthy Air
Tasking Order (ATO) that coordinated the vast majority of sorties. Chap-
ter 6, What were Conditions in the Theater?, briefly treats the political
considerations and physical constraints of distance, terrain, weather, and
basing structure that shaped the employment of air power in the Gulf.
Chapter 7, What were the Instruments of Air Power?, covers the role
of different air platforms, with particular attention to the unique contribu-
tions of the United States. Chapter 8, What Supported the Air Power?,
discusses some of the other elements of air power, including munitions
and logistical support required for the conduct of operations. Chapter 9,
Which Technologies Worked?, picks five pieces of hardware that reveal
distinctive features of the air war. Chapter 10, Was this a Revolution

xvii





4
i
i
5

What was the Role of Intelligence?

Few issues from the Gulf War remain more controversial than the
performance of American intelligence organizations. Participants have
both damned and praised intelligence support of the war effort. In post-
war testimony before Congress, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf stated that
while the “intelligence community as a whole did a great job,” he felt
that he, as a theater commander, was not well served.’ His specific
criticisms centered on national intelligence estimates so heavily caveated
as to be “useless” to him in the field and on bomb damage assessments
done in Washington that varied from those done in theater.” At the same
time he wrote, “I was blessed with an intelligence staff whose work was
so good that the military intelligence community in Washington usually
let Central Command take the lead, seconding our assessments of devel-
opments in the Middle East.”*

Part of the difficulty in judging the adequacy of intelligence during
Desert Shield and Desert Storm lies in the range and complexity of
functions it covers. Another part of the difficulty undoubtedly stems
from the uncertainties endemic to intelligence functions such as targeting
and bomb damage assessment—uncertainties that are ultimately inherent
in any use of military force to achieve political ends. This discussion
surveys the various intelligence requirements in the Gulf War and how
well they were satisfied, the accuracy and timeliness of information, the
variety of purposes served by intelligence and intelligence organizations

"U.S. Congress, House, Committee on Appropriations, Department of Defense
Appropriations for 1992, Hearings before the Subcommittee on the Department of
Defense (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1991), Part 2, pp 288 and 290.

Michael Wines, “Gulf Intelligence Draws Complaint by Schwarzkopf,” The New
York Times International, 13 Jun 1991, pp Al and A7.

3Gen H. Norman Schwarzkopf, It Doesn’t Take a Hero, written with Peter Petre
(New York: Bantam Books, 1992), pp 293, 430-32, hereafter cited as Hero.

121



General Schwarzkopf then heard the briefing (3 September) as did
General Powell (13 September), Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, President George Bush, and members of the Nation-
al Security Council (10 and 11 October). At these meetings, less devel-
oped plans for Phases II and III were briefed; Glosson and the Black
Hole continued to concentrate on Phase I. The CENTAF staff, which
prepared the daily air tasking orders and had custody of the D-Day ATO,
worked on plans for the close-in battle in Kuwait, plans that would form
the basis for Phase III and the air portion of Phase IV. As noted this
CENTAF planning staff operated in isolation from the Black Hole, with
little knowledge of its plans.

The strategic air campaign of Instant Thunder envisioned approxi-
mately 150 attack aircraft; the plan briefed to the President in October
called for more than 400 attack aircraft, with another 300 (half of them
helicopters) reserved for defense against an Iraqi attack and to initiate the
third phase.” Nonetheless, the concepts of the first phase remained
remarkably constant.

According to the operations order for Desert Storm, there were six
military objectives, and Phase I was to focus on three “centers of gravity:””

Theater Military Objectives

« — Attack Iraqi political/military leadership and command and control;
* Gain and maintain air superiority;

+ — Sever Iraqi supply lines;

« Destroy chemical, biological, and nuclear capability;

* Destroy Republican Guard forces; and

* Liberate Kuwait City.

7(8) Operations Order, COMUSCENTAF Operations Order “Offensive Campaign—
Phase I,” 2 Sep 1990, GWAPS, BH 8-133; (S) Brig slides in “General Glosson’s Brief,”
GWAPS Box 3, Folder 60.

25(§) USCINCCENT OPORD 91-001 for Operation Desert Storm, 16 Jan 1991, paras
1D, 3B and 3C, GWAPS, NA 357.

39



15

16

vi

Map of Region ......... 0.0.0.0 cece ee eee 3
Shift to the West by U.S. XVIII Corps and VII Corps ..... 8
Coalition Plan for Ground Attack ...........--.0000% 9
Iraqi Deployment in KTO on 17 Jan9] .........-.... 10
Coalition Air Strikes by Day Against Iraqi Targets ...... 13
Coalition Air-to-Air Sorties by Day ...........--00005 14
Attacks of the Iraqi III Corps, 29-31 Jan91 ..........- 20
Chokepoints for Retreating Iraqi Troops

in the Kuwait Theater ........... 0.0020 e eee 25
Phases of Desert Storm Campaign Plan .........----+ 50
Iraqi Flight Activity versus Coalition Kills ...........- 59
Coalition Fixed-Wing Combat Attrition by Cause ....... 61

Coalition Strikes by Target Categories
and Airpower Function . 2.22.0... 00222 e eee eeee 65

Precision Strikes against Leadership

and Telecommunications/C? .... 0.0... eee eee 68
Strikes against Electricity and Oil ...........0000005 72
Estimated Drawdown of Iraqi Electric Power .........- 74

Coalition Strikes against Nuclear, Biological
and Chemical Targets 0.00.00... cece ee eee eee 80



Ibrahim Behery. Good working relations helped smooth what might have
been a difficult relationship. Half a million young American men and
women poured into a country with a smal] population and very different
customs. Since the Americans provided the bulk of the forces, they
dominated the Coalition, and they did so in ways that were usually sensi-
tive to the views of the Saudis and the other allies. Schwarzkopf and
Horner cooperated with the Saudis in putting as many of the Americans
as possible well outside the cities. The command solution adopted was
not the creation of a truly unified command but rather of a parallel struc-
ture that put all Arab forces under a Saudi officer, Lt. Gen. Prince Khalid
Bin Sultan al-Saud, who was Schwarzkopf’s counterpart. Homer and
Behery shared a similar relationship on paper and exhibited compatible
personalities. Both Behery and Khalid had attended the Air War College
at Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.”

From the beginning of the American deployment, Saudi and Ameri-
can personnel cooperated closely on planning the defense of Saudi Arabia
and producing the daily air tasking order. The latter process, with which
the Royal Saudi Air Force was familiar, allowed the Saudis a measure of
control over the air operations unfolding in their country. The Saudis, for
example, initially prohibited low-altitude flying, live bomb training runs,
and breaking the sound barrier. The offensive plan for war with Iraq
was developed with less Saudi participation. Nevertheless, by the end of
1990, Saudi planners had joined the Black Hole, where British planners
had hitherto provided the only allied involvement.

Other nations also seemed reasonably comfortable with the authority
exercised by the JFACC. They could not begin to duplicate his command
and control apparatus, and the allied air commanders were eager to do
everything they could for him. They were restrained in doing so only by
restrictions placed on their activities by their governments. The French
government, for example, insisted at the outset that French air be used
only in support of French troops. But the French government came
around and eventually permitted French air units to operate far to the east

Invw, GWAPS with Lt Gen Behery, Riyadh, 11 Jul 1992, GWAPS, NA 377.
?3(S) Msg, CENTAF Sitrep, 191800Z Aug 1990, GWAPS, CSS 12.

158



ground, and struck targets throughout Iraq and Kuwait. This chapter
discusses each of these elements.

American crews flew more than eighty-five percent of the sorties
during the war. Many countries supplied air-to-air fighters, air-to-ground
attack aircraft, and cargo aircraft, but the United States provided all or
almost all of the Coalition’s command and control systems, electronic
warfare aircraft, heavy bombers, cruise missiles, and stealth capability.
Overall, the key contributions of the United States came not just in
numbers of systems but in capabilities of the various elements of air
power, some based on quatity (e.g., stealth), others on a quantity so great
that it brought a quality of its own (e.g., aerial refueling and airlift) (See
Figure 31).

Figure 31
Coalition Aircraft Totals in Key Elements of Air Power Support

Command
and Control

Electronic Warfare

Reconnaissance

RSAFRANAASSAASAASSS
FA a]

Alrlift - Tactical

New Zealand]

us| y Ee)
Air Refueling UK
RSAF ,

10 20-30-40 50—greator

An array of high-technology American systems gave the Coalition a
devastating advantage. The F-117s, Tomahawk missiles, and convention-
al air-launched cruise missiles delivered conventional warheads with great
precision, unchecked by Iraqi defenses. Airborne warning and control
aircraft monitored Iraqi and Coalition flight activity, and the joint strate-

182



sessed some of these capabilities (except for stealth), their contribution
was nowhere near that of the United States.

How much of its total air power capability did the United States em-
ploy? The answers vary, but in the special capabilities mentioned above,
the United States was close to fully committed: effectively all of the
stealth capability and airborne designators for laser-guided bombs; the
predominant amount of reconnaissance and electronic warfare aircraft;
and over half of aerial refueling and command and control assets. Fur-
thermore, over half of the U.S. Air Force aircraft normally stationed in
Europe participated in the Gulf War.

The high percentages of U.S. air power devoted to the Gulf War does
not necessarily mean that the United States would have been unable to
apply air power in another contingency elsewhere at the same time. The
emergence of a second contingency would have called for a reappraisal of
the air power needed for the Gulf War and of the options for air employ-
ment. Clearly, some flexibility was possible. That flexibility would have
entailed adjustments of aircraft sortie rates, target or mission priorities, and
the tempo of the air campaign. In addition, while the Air Force, Navy, and
Marine Corps used a large part of their Reserve components in airlift and
aerial refueling, only three tactical fighter squadrons (two F-16 and one A-
10) from the Reserves took part. The flexibility, however, lay at the lower
technology end of the available air power, not in the higher technology,
special capabilities. All that can be reasonably said is that facing multiple
contingencies the United States would have fought a very different war with
air power in the Gulf.

205

357-357 0 - 93 - 8



The JFACC and the Tactical Air Control System

General Horner did not have a joint staff. To begin with, he had only
the staff that normally served him in peacetime as commander of Ninth Air
Force. In Riyadh, that staff expanded to handle wartime responsibilities
both for CENTAF and for the JFACC, but the new members were mostly
Air Force with only a few liaison officers from the other Services and the
allies. This fact would shape the way Homer exercised his authority as
JFACC and cause some lingering suspicion among the other Services.

Homer inherited a mechanism for controlling air power called the
“Tactical Air Control System” (TACS). The TACS was designed to
control theater-level air operations focusing on the battlefield. Here,
however, it would be called upon to conduct an independent strategic air
campaign as well. This mechanism included forward air control officers
(on the ground with Army units or flying above them) linked to a hierar-
chy of airborne and ground command posts culminating in the air compo-
nent commander’s Tactical Air Control Center (TACC).

Homer tailored the Tactical Air Control System for the task at hand
in ways that made some of his staff uncomfortable. Most of these chang-
es centered on a small planning group that began outside the TACC and
eventually absorbed many of its functions. Homer brought in Brig. Gen.
Buster Glosson to run this special planning group, whose original four
members came from Washington, where Glosson had also served until his
recent transfer to Central Command.° Horner wanted Glosson’s group to
work in great secrecy while planning an offensive air campaign. After
they moved into the basement of Royal Saudi Air Force headquarters
(which CENTAF shared), the old CENTAF staff began to call them the
“Black Hole.” Eventually, the Black Hole grew to about 50 personnel in
a CENTAF headquarters staff of more than 2,000.

SGlosson was Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Legislative Affairs until July
1990, when he became Deputy Commander of CENTCOM’s Joint Middle East Task
Force. The fact that he was already working for Schwarzkopf may have contributed to
their good relationship throughout Desert Shield and Desert Storm, Similarly, Homer
already knew Glosson before picking him to run the offensive planning efton.

147



shea

sured against actual military and political objectives. GWAPS had no
direct access to sites in Iraq nor Iraqi records other than those captured
in the Kuwait theater during the war. Visitors to Iraq (particularly United
Nations inspections teams) provided useful information, but much remains
uncertain. As a result, many of the conclusions of this report are prelimi-
nary and depend heavily on the interpretations of intelligence imagery,
the recollections of Coalition participants, and the statements of Iraqi
defectors and prisoners of war. However, the quantum improvement in
intelligence-gathering means since World War II and such Iraqi sources
as were available (prisoner of war debriefs and the like) provided enough
information for the Survey to arrive at some conclusions that even site
surveys of bombed facilities could probably not affect.

The Survey attempted to assess both direct and indirect or second-
order effects, in the belief that the latter were as important as the former.
An example of a direct effect would be the destruction of a hardened
aircraft shelter with a 2,000-pound laser-guided bomb that penetrated the
structure and detonated inside. An example of an indirect effect would
be the Iraqis’ subsequent efforts to preserve a portion of their air force in
the face of shelter “busting” by dispersing some aircraft in the open and
sending others to sanctuary in Iran. Indirect effects can also have more
distant second-order consequences. The use of laser-guided bombs to
“plink” Iraqi armor in the Kuwait theater not only destroyed equipment
(the direct effect) but also quickly. persuaded Iraqi tank crews to spend
less and less time with their vehicles (the indirect effect). By the time
the ground war began, the indirect effect appears to have left many Iraqi
armor units unable to respond effectively to engagement by Coalition
ground forces (the second-order consequence). Naturally, the method-
ological problems involved in assessing such intangible, but very real,
indirect and second-order effects are substantial.

Control of the Air

To wage the air campaign in the Gulf, the Coalition had to control
the air space over Iraq. When war came, Coalition air forces soon bottled
up the Iraqi Air Force on its airfields and largely prevented effective
employment of Iraq’s integrated air defense system and radar-guided
surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). Save for low-altitude antiaircraft artillery
(AAA) and infrared SAMs in highly defended areas like Baghdad and the
portions of the Kuwait theater occupied by Republican Guard divisions,
the Coalition air forces quickly gained relatively unimpeded freedom of
action. Air superiority-the ability of one side’s aircraft to operate in

56


Figure 4
Traqi Deployment in KTO on 17 Jan 91

Jihad Corps
i

aN
‘yx,
BF moon th

i 136

x Brigade
xx Division v= BSCS 2s
(53) Infantry

1] Armored
[Ba Mechanized
x Major Airfields
© Major FOLs

assessed the three lines of defensive formations as twenty-five committed,
nine reinforcing, and eight theater reserve divisions.’

Early on 17 January, the Coalition launched a concentrated air cam-
paign against strategic military, leadership, and infrastructure targets in Iraq.
Even before the first shots were fired at 0238 local time by helicopters

'5($) USCENTCOM Situation Report, 23 Feb 1991, GWAPS, CHST 68.



(Left) Remains of an Iraqi tank destroyed most likely by a laser-guided
bomb. (Right) Aircraft shelter pierced by a laser-guided bomb with a
7 penetrating warhead. (Photo taken by GWAPS Kuwait Battlefleld
: Survey Team.) (Below) Destroyed bridge at Nasiriyah, Iraq.

54



them as generally nonresponsive and looked elsewhere for support.”
Thus began an unfortunate rift between theater intelligence organizations
and the Black Hole, a gap that widened as time went on.

The unfortunate physical separation between the two entities exacer-
bated an already tender situation. CENTAF’s intelligence facility resided
in a large tent on a soccer field adjacent to the Royal Saudi Air Force
headquarters building, while the Black Hole was located in the basement
of that building. Although not far, the physical separation had conse-
quences.” Theater intelligence personnel did not take part in the many
ad hoc discussions that refined the Instant Thunder (Desert Storm
Phase I) concept. This meant that they could not anticipate Black Hole
Tequirements. By the time that some intelligence personnel joined the
Black Hole staff, the planners had already forged new links to disparate
intelligence and other organizations outside the theater.”

Perhaps the single biggest factor that contributed to the rift was the
initial inability of theater intelligence to produce imagery of potential
targets for General Glosson’s planners in a timely fashion. This failure
had a variety of sources, beginning with the generally incomplete and out
of date national database on Iraq before the crisis.” Within the theater,
no one told intelligence officers of the evolving target list. The collection
management system in theater took time to get started, and since the
Black Hole was a compartmented operation with little resident intelli-
gence experience, that organization did not fully appreciate or properly

27Rpt, Lt Col J S Meyer, Jr, “Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm,” SAC/CC, 9
Jul 1991, GWAPS, NA 123; (S) Intvws, GWAPS with Lt Col David Deptula, 20 Nov
1991, 20 and 21 Dec 1991, 8 Jan 1992; and Intvww, GWAPS with Maj Gen Buster
Glosson, 9 Apr 1992.

**Rp1, Meyer, “Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm,” SACICC, 9 Jul 1991; AAR,
USCENTAF/IN, “After Action Report and Lessons Leamed,." 25 May 1991,"
Col Rauschkolb to Col Christon; and Glock intww.

2S) Inwww, GWAPS staff with Lt Col David Deptula, 20 Dec 1991; and Glock and
Baptiste intvw. There were, it should be noted, intelligence officers in the Black Hole,
but they could not bridge the gap.

*%(S) Intvw, Capt John Glock with Maj John Heidrick, 9th TIS/INT, 7 Jan 1992,
GWAPS, NA 267.

130



gravity of the campaign and a priority target of the air campaign. Not
only did the Guard serve as the strategic reserve of the Iraqi forces in
Kuwait, it also provided essential support to Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Schwarzkopf’s planners intended to rout them so that they could not help
Saddam Hussein retain order in the country. The operations order direct-
ed that the roads and rail lines south of Basra should be blocked in order
to prevent the withdrawal of the Republican Guard forces.“ While the
Guard forces were seen as a target that had to be dealt with in Phase I of
the air campaign, that issue became moot when, because of the number
of Coalition aircraft available, the first three phases of the air campaign
began at essentially the same time.

Planning for Phases II, I, and IV

The planning for the second, third, and fourth phases of the air cam-
paign dealt with the Iraqi forces in the Kuwait theater. Initially deemed
unnecessary by Warden and the Instant Thunder plan, attacks on these
forces came to play a much larger role once the plan got to the theater.
Besides being a part of the offensive campaign that became the Desert
Storm plan, attacks on Iraqi forces in the Kuwait theater received atten-
tion during the Fall of 1990 in the planning for a contingency in which
Traq attacked Saudi Arabia. On 14 August, Central Command and Saudi
officials formed the U.S.-Saudi Joint Directorate of Planning (JDOP) at
the Saudi Ministry of Defense headquarters in Riyadh to develop com-
bined operations plans. The JDOP’s first product, Combined Operations
Order 003, published on 20 August, assigned CENTCOM forces missions
in concert with Saudi and Coalition regional forces to defend Saudi
Arabia as far forward as possible. The concept of operations had Saudi
forces establish a picket line close to the northern border while U.S.
forces shielded Jubayl and Ad Dammany/Dhahran to protect deploying
U.S. forces at those major airports and seaports of debarkation.

The JDOP continued its planning efforts throughout Desert Shield and
Desert Storm, publishing the final plan for the defense of Saudi Arabia
on 29 November 1990, but the locus of planning lay elsewhere. While
the JDOP produced three other combined operations plans dealing with
the occupation and defense of Kuwait, it served chiefly as a forum to

“Operations Order 91-001, para 3.E.2.b.2; Glosson intyw, 12 Dec 1991, GWAPS
Cochran files.

47



the end of August, the Royal Air Force had two fighter squadrons in
place with accompanying tanker and maritime patrol aircraft, and U.S.
forces had increased to 14 tactical fighter squadrons (U.S. Air Force and
Marine Corps), 3 carrier battle groups, a B-52 squadron, 4 tactical airlift
squadrons, 7 Army and Marine Corps brigades with attack helicopters,
and a Patriot air defense system. By the end of the war, more than 3,800
U.S. fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, 500,000 personnel, and almost 3
million tons of cargo had arrived in the theater.

Moving such a large force over 8,000 miles to Southwest Asia put a
tremendous strain on the military transportation system. Over the months
of Desert Shield, sealift brought about 95 percent of the equipment and
supplies to the region, and strategic airlift (C-5, C-141, KC-10, and Civil
Reserve Air Fleet) brought 99 percent of the personnel. In the early days
of deployment, all supplies and equipment except for that prepositioned
on ships in the region came by air? Moving personnel and equipment
from the few points of debarkation in the theater to the many airfields
and staging areas required almost 17,000 C-130 tactical airlift sorties. On
18 August, the President authorized the first-ever activation of the first
stage of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet, and on 22 August, he signed Execu-
tive Order 12727 authorizing the call-up of 200,000 reservists for a period
of up to 180 days.> Without these measures, the U.S. airlift, taxed to the
limit, could not have sustained the required buildup in the theater.

When General Schwarzkopf returned to the theater in late August, an
Traqi invasion of Saudi Arabia seemed less imminent. In retrospect, it
appears unlikely that Iraq had ever intended to invade Saudi Arabia
immediately after seizing Kuwait. Once in Kuwait, Iraqi forces quickly
assumed a defensive posture, and Saddam Hussein's determination to
retain Kuwait was beyond all doubt. Baghdad remained unmoved by the
United Nations resolutions of 2 and 6 August, which condemned the
invasion, called for the restoration of Kuwait, and authorized a multina-
tional embargo of all trade to Iraq. Saddam Hussein declared Kuwait the
nineteenth province of Iraq,‘ took Americans and other foreigners in

?Chapter 8 discusses equipment and supplies brought to the theater.

>Chapters 7 and 8 contain further discussion on the airlift forces employed.
‘Radio Baghdad broadcast, 8 Aug 1990.



Before and during the Al Khafji attacks, Coalition aircraft destroyed
nearly all Iraqi missile boats. Many of them were destroyed as they
apparently attempted to flee to Iran, much as Iraqi aircraft had done
several days before. The Iraqi Navy was small, but even the presence of
small missile-firing boats posed a threat to the Coalition battle groups and
amphibious forces. The destruction of the missile boats allowed freer
action for the Coalition forces in the northern Gulf, although the presence
of Silkworm missile sites along the coast remained a threat throughout
the remainder of the war!

In early February, as CENTCOM'’s focus shifted to the Kuwait the-
ater in preparation for the ground offensive, aircraft claims in reducing
the effectiveness of the Iraqi Army (planning was based on attriting 50
percent of Iraqi armor, artillery, and armed personnel carriers) began to
be questioned. Washington and the theater leaders disagreed over what
level of success was being achieved, but a greater effort was clearly
called for. To increase the lethality of the attacks, A-10s, thought to be
the most effective aircraft against armor, decreased their attack altitude
to between 4,000 and 7,000 feet.” A second adjustment, one that led to
far better results, was employing laser-guided bombs against Iraqi armor.
F-111Fs conducted night tests during the first week of February using
their infrared sensors to detect the hot skin of the tanks (or any other
metal equipment) contrasted against the cooler sand that surrounded them.
Following these tests, F-111F, F-15E, and A-6 aircraft flew laser-guided
bomb attacks against Iraqi armor in a procedure known as “tank plink-
ing.” From that point, the number of recorded armor and artillery kills
climbed rapidly.” During the later stages of the air attacks to prepare the

"The missile boats and Silkworm missiles were not the only threat to the naval
forces. Aircraft with air-to-surface missiles could launch from Iraqi (and possibly Tranian)
bases and pose a longer range threat to the fleet. Information drawn from two Center for
Naval Analyses reports: (S) Peter P. Perla, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Volume
4: Summary, and Jeffrey Lutz, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Volume V1:
Antisurface Warfare (Alexandria, VA: 1991).

22During this same period, the employment of F-16 killer scouts (Pointers) began,
and F-16s were directed 1o release bombs below 8,000 feet (see Lt Col Lewis point paper,
“Corps Air Support at Desert Storm,” 3 Jul 1991, GWAPS, CHST 22-15); (S) 23/354
TFW(P) “Battle Staff Directive No. 26,” 31 Jan 1991, GWAPS, Microfilm Roll 26554,

23Sce discussion in Chapter 3.

21



Collection managers had to set priorities for the imagery collected
from limited assets, but these managers often had not taken part in target
planning, nor were they aware of changes to the daily air tasking order.
Furthermore, Black Hole planners were unfamiliar with collection tasking
procedures and did not attend meetings of the coordinating boards that
assigned priorities to collection lists. This meant that people not involved
in planning the air campaign and unaware of its direction determined each
day’s reconnaissance requirements.

As in the past, imagery interpretation proved a difficult art. It was
difficult to assess damage to Iraqi hardened aircraft shelters, command
bunkers, and communication buildings attacked by penetrating bombs.
Analysts could see a smal! hole on the target's exterior where the bomb
had entered, but most of the effects were contained within the target.
Unfortunately, the requisite expertise on structural vulnerabilities and
weapons effects largely resided in Washington, and some hardened air-
craft shelters ended up being attacked again and again after they had been
penetrated and the aircrews had observed large secondary explosions.
The problem of imagery analysis also extended to the Kuwait theater,
where assessing the operability of Iraqi equipment became an issue.
Unless imagery showed a catastrophic kill, it was often impossible, for
example, to determine whether a tank intact after a “near-miss” had its
engine, aiming devices, or radios disabled by blast or shrapnel.

CENTAF and ARCENT adjusted to the situation. CENTAF’s Black
Hole had videotape recordings of F-117, F-111F, and F-15E bombing
missions collected and flown daily to Riyadh for analysis. Although
these recordings did not have the video quality to permit precise bomb
damage, they did show bomb detonation on the targets.” The Black Hole
planners used this evidence, for instance, to determine bomb damage of
an aircraft shelter, not the later and often indeterminate intelligence
assessment from overhead imagery. ARCENT developed a system that
combined pilot reports and video readouts with imagery, but at a dis-

Some “blooming” on the screen al the instant of the detonation made it difficult
to determine the exact point of impact.

141

357-357 0 - 93 - 6



Air Refueling

Air refueling between aircraft took place well before World War IT
and has been a part of normal U.S. air operations since the 1950s. Dur-
ing the Gulf crisis, it was absolutely essential both to the deployment and
to the war itself. Some aircraft required as many as 17 refuelings to
deploy from the United States to the Gulf region. More than 100 tankers
operated the Atlantic and Pacific air refueling bridges, permitting the
rapid deployment of some 1,000 fighters, bombers, and support aircraft.
During the war, Air Force tankers alone flew almost 17,000 sorties,
usually with multiple receiver aircraft per tanker sortie.”

Nearly 60 percent of the wartime sorties by aircraft capable of being
refueled in the air actually required tanker support. An elaborate network
of air refueling tracks and anchors extended from the Red Sea across the
Arabian Peninsula and into the Persian Gulf to support these require-
ments. This complex arrangement produced more than 60 air refueling
tracks in which 275 tanker sorties per day operated, responding to the
changing demands of the receiver aircraft. Liaison officers placed
onboard the E-3 airborne warning and control aircraft managed the dy-
namic air refueling process, changing tankers from track to track to fill
gaps as plans changed or emergencies developed.

The distances between Coalition air bases and targets meant that
aircraft attacking deep into Iraq frequently had to refuel at least
twice—once en route to the target and again on the return to home base.
In some cases, refueling was conducted over Iraqi territory, an indication
of the extent to which the Coalition controlled the air. Coalition air
forces also relied on refueling to help them control the skies over the
battlefield and strike into the enemy heartland. A list of representative
aircraft and target areas shows the extent of the dependence:

Aircraft Combat Radius Target Distance

F117 550 nm to Baghdad—905 nm

F-1SE 475 nm to Western Scud areas—680 nm

FYA-18 434 nm Red Sea Carrier to Kuwait City—695 nm
B-52G 2,177 nm Diego Garcia to Kuwait—2,500 nm

7(S) Hq SAC, Plans and Requirements (XP), “Desert Shield/Desert Storm Tanker
Assessment,” 23 Sep 1991, p 2-13.

228



The original Instant Thunder plan had begun in August 1990 with a
total of eighty-four targets to be struck over a six-day period, and al-
though the target sets remained essentially the same, the total number of
targets grew during the fall of 1990. The growth in numbers is shown
in Table 2. The August date corresponds to the final plan of Warden and
Checkmate as it was presented to General Horner; the December date
indicates the Phase I plan as it was in its final stages before execution.

The growth in numbers reflected sharply increased knowledge of the
Iraqi military forces and leadership structure gained after the United
States focused its reconnaissance capabilities on Iraq in the summer and
fall of 1990. The growth also came about as an indirect consequence of
the increased number of strike aircraft available and the resulting ability
to target a larger portion of the Iraqi air defense and military support
structure. Throughout the war, in fact, the target list would continue to
grow. The intensity of the planned campaign also grew, because al-
though its duration remained constant (six days), the number of aircraft
available for its prosecution continuously increased.”

The air planners’ first priority was gaining command of the air. This
goal was a basic tenet of air operations, and its achievement would gener-
ate at least three specific advantages in the war. First, the incapacitation
of airfields and the air defense system would allow sustained prosecution
of attacks against the other target sets. Second, command of the air
would prevent Iraqi offensive strikes against Coalition forces, in particular
strikes delivering chemical weapons. Third, the Coalition would prevent
Traqi reconnaissance flights that might uncover the shift of ground forces
to the west, the surprise to be sprung at the start of the ground offen-
sive.” The planners therefore directed their most intense and immediate
attention to destroying the Iraqi defense system through the use of
F-117s, other aircraft employing antiradiation missiles to attack radar sys-
tems, and a vast array of electronic countermeasures. :

The attacks against the nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and
Scud facilities served short-term and long-term objectives. In the short

?6The operations order stated 6 to 9 days. (S) OPORD 91-001, para 3A, t6 Jan 1991.

27) MR, Lt Col David A. Deptula, USAF, subj: Observations on the Air Campaign
Against Iraq, Aug 1990-Mar 1991, 29 Mar 1991, p 3, GWAPS, Safe #12, D-01.

41



Laser-guided bombs carried principally by F-117s and F-111Fs were
planned for precision air attacks on nearly the entire Iraqi target structure:
air defense operations centers; national leadership and military headquar-
ters; communications nodes; nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons
research and storage facilities; and bridges were the most prominent.
Beyond this planned use, much of the LGB employment was unplanned,
growing instead out of adaptations made in the midst of the air campaign.
Originally, the Coalition intended to destroy the Iraqi Air Force when its
aircraft rose to meet the Coalition attacks. When the Iraqi aircraft instead
temained on the ground in hardened shelters, Coalition aircraft shifted the
attacks to the nearly 600 shelters themselves. Only weapons with the
accuracy of LGBs and with hardened warheads, often dropped two at a
time, were able to penetrate the reinforced concrete of these shelters. The
results of these attacks were the flight of much of the Iragi Air Force to
Tran and the dispersal or destruction of the rest.

In the Kuwait theater, CENTAF turned to the use of LGBs when the
planned air attacks on Iragi armor with cluster munitions or unguided
bombs proved to be largely ineffective. Iraqi revetted armor was simply
less vulnerable to these munitions, particularly at the bombing altitudes
used by the Coalition. The use of F-111Fs, F-15SEs, and A-6s carrying
500-pound LGBs against the dug-in Iraqi armor was one of the major
innovations of the war and marked a major turning point in the attrition
operations against the Iraqi Army. This episode was an excellent exam-
ple of the flexibility of the weapon, the aircraft, and the organization in
dealing with the unexpected.

Laser-guided bomb employment also had limitations. Laser designa-
tion was not possible through overcast skies, fog, or smoke. The desig-
nating aircraft also had to remain in the target area and within line of
sight of the target until bomb detonation. On the one hand, LGBs opened
up new targeting possibilities: without them, systematic attacks on a
communications system would have been unlikely simply because the
probability of disabling a telephone switch or an antenna would have
been too low without an excessive number of sorties; second, targets that
would have been considered lucrative and vulnerable but too costly to
attack were now open to assault. On the other, LGBs were of less value
against large area targets, such as supply depots or deployed forces,
without a single key node to attack. Against the key Iraqi targets in this
war, LGBs were as devastating to the Iraqis as they were unexpected.

227



their forces. Arrival of the additional forces coincided with the deadline
set for Iraq to evacuate Kuwait-15 January 1991.7

By mid-January, the Coalition force included nearly 1,800 combat
aircraft from 12 countries, a large naval force in the Persian Gulf and Red
Sea, and approximately 540,000 ground troops from 31 countries. The
total Coalition force numbered in excess of 660,000.* The increased
number of Coalition air and ground forces allowed Schwarzkopf to con-
centrate on his main goal, enveloping the Republican Guard and Iraqi
regular army divisions. To do this, he would launch Phases I, I, and HI
of the aircraft campaign, while he repositioned the bulk of his forces to
the west in preparation for Phase IV. During the preceding months, the
Coalition air forces had honed their skills and learned to operate together
through exercises that not only rehearsed planned missions but also
desensitized the Iraqi air defenses to Coalition flight patterns. Once the
air campaign began, effectively shutting off Iraqi surveillance of the
Coalition ground forces, the U.S. XVII Airborne Corps and VII Corps
would deploy to the west (Figure 2) to set the stage for enveloping the
Traqi ground forces. As the Marines (MARCENT) and two Arab corps
(JFC-N and JFC-E) attacked to hold Iraqi forces in place, and as the 4th
Marine Expeditionary Brigade faked an amphibious assault, the two
westward corps would attack the Iraqi force on the flank (Figure 3).°

Traqi ground forces facing the Coalition also grew over the months
of the Coalition’s build-up. Beginning with the 14 divisions estimated to
be in the theater in September, the Iraqi army increased gradually until
November, when Baghdad announced it would send another 250,000

70n 29 Nov, the UN Security Council voted to authorize force to expel Iraqi forces
from Kuwait if they had not evacuated by 15 Jan 1991.

®Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 85-86. As of 15 Jan 1991, Central Command
strength was 454,128: ARCENT-247,637; CENTAF-48,679; NAVCENT-67,851;
MARCENT-85,447, SOCCENT-3,279; CENTCOM HQ and JCSE-1,235. By 27 Feb
1991, CENTCOM strength had grown to 541,376 (GWAPS, Statistical Compendium,
Table 14, Theater CENTCOM Personnel Strength at Weekly Intervals, p 60).

This brief summary does not identify all the ground forces engaged in this attack.
For instance, a French division was attached to the XVIIJ Corps and a British division to
the VII Corps. Maps are extracted from Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 244, 247.



equipment totals and made them serve as a basis for assessing Phase III
of the campaign, preparation of the battlefield. Leaders measured their
success in terms of percentages of equipment destroyed. Considering that
postwar analysis credits the Iragis with 800 fewer tanks than originally
estimated, this meant that attaining 50 percent attrition of the estimated
number of tanks would have brought approximately 62 percent attrition to
the actual number of tanks. However, just as much uncertainty applies to
the amount of equipment actually destroyed, thereby offsetting the errors.

Organizational Relationships

Various planning documents written before the war outlined the
organizational relationships that would exist between intelligence analysts,
targeteers, and operations planners.” Those that developed during Desert
Shield and Desert Storm differed considerably from what had been envi-
sioned. At the outset, neither Central Command’s intelligence nor that
of the air component of Central Command (CENTAF) staff had adequate
manpower to support an air war of Desert Storm’s scope.”' The plan had
always been that skeleton staffs of these organizations would gain
augmentees from other organizations during mobilization. The CENTAF
intelligence staff was formed from the 9th Tactical Intelligence Squadron
and consisted of only 8 personnel, 6 of whom were not fully qualified.”
Although these personnel participated in the Central Command Com-
mander-in-Chief’s Exercise Internal Look, which concluded only days
before the Iraqi invasion, the exercise was not designed to test intelli-
gence analysis and dissemination. During the Desert Shield buildup,
national and Service intelligence organizations did send a limited number
of qualified specialists to various intelligence organizations in the theater.
However, of the some 180 active-duty, fully trained, target-intelligence
personnel available throughout the U.S. Air Force, only 40 were deployed

2°USCINCCENT OPLAN 1001-90 (Second Draft), 18 Jul 1990, Annex 7 to Annex B,

"Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Appendix C, p 337; and (S/NF) Rpt, HQ
USAF/IN, “Operation Desert Storm Lessons Learned,” 5 May 1991, JULLS Number
41960-26699 (00031), p 64, GWAPS, NA 136.

*inwww, Lt Col Kistler, Mark Mandeles, and Maj Terry with Capt John Glock,
USAF, Langley AFB, VA, 30 Jan 1992.

128



Figure 15
Estimated Drawdown of Iraqi Electric Power

ATO Days 1-2: 11 power plants hit, most of which
4 shut down; also 7 translormer/switching facilities

BF 8,000
BE
| & 6,000 com
Ses J-2UCS Daily BDA Estimates for 22-25 Jan 91
<
sz
=
=O
es Numerous restrikes
—& ~
and
£5
z

17 20 23 26 291 4 7 40 13°16 19° 22, 25° 28
January February 1991

In northern Iraq, Coalition aircraft did not have precision munitions;
hence, the drawdown of commercial electric power there took place more
gradually than in the central and southern portions of the country. U.S.
pilots flying missions from Turkey into northern Iraq occasionally report-
ed seeing illuminated towns through the end of January 1991, and Proven
Force F-111Es continued to attack northern power plants during the first
week of February.” Nevertheless, the electric power in central and
southern Iraq went down during the initial days of the war, just as the
planners had hoped.

How much damage did air attacks ultimately do to Iraq's electric
power system? Despite the continuation of United Nations sanctions, the
Iraqis restored commercial power considerably faster than had been
anticipated. For example, planners initially thought that two years would
be required to repair the main power plant in Baghdad. But by
mid-1992, this plant was reportedly working at ninety percent of its
prewar capacity, and, despite a blazing hot summer, not one power black-
out occurred in Saddam Hussein's capital even though almost everyone

“.GWAPS Missions Database.

4


CBU-87 104, 213

CBU-89 103, 104

CENTAF 3, 5, 7, 22, 31-33, 35, 38,
39, 42, 45, 48, 49, 55, 103, 105,
110, 116, 128, 129-133, 135,
139-142, 145, 147, 148-150, 155,
158, 197, 198, 209, 210, 212-214,
216, 217, 222, 227, 231, 247

CENTAF intelligence 128, 129, 132,
133, 139, 140, 148

CENTCOM (see Central Command)

Center for Naval Analyses 21, 93,
103, 145, 150, 196, 203, 204, 213

center of gravity 36, 37, 39, 40, 46,
92

Central Command 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 15,
19, 21, 27, 29-3 7, 38, 43,
45-49, 51, 57,-70, 84, 91, 92, 105-
108, 110, 121, 122, 127-129, 132,
133, 135, 136, 139, 142, 143,
145-147, 151, 152, 154, 160, 169,
175, 178, 193, 208, 209, 211, 214,
216, 233, 251

Central Intelligence Agency 77, 82,
106, 116, 125

CF-18s 197

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
27, 29, 133

chaplains 177

Checkmate 16, 35-37, 41, 55, 69, 70,
129, 131, 132, 137, 148, 220, 231,
233, 236, 247

chem/io 120

chemical 5, 6, 12, 16, 24, 31-34, 36,
39-43, 52, 53, 64, 66, 79-83, 120,
136, 137, 153, 155, 177, 227

chemical warfare 53, 79

chemical weapons 3 4, 36, 40, 41,
43, 52, 79, 82, 83, 120, 177

chemical/biological 12, 136

Cheney, Richard B. 3, 39, 46

Chief of Staff 35, 43, 99, 142, 148,
189

CIA (see Central Intelligence
Agency)

civil reserve air fleet 4, 186, 188

close air support 20, 22-24, 30, 51,
111, 112, 117, 145, 156, 192, 198,
200

cluster bombs 214

CNN (see Cable News Network)

Coalition 1, 3, 5-24, 28, 34, 41,
43-45, 47-49, 51, 52, 53, 55-65, 67,
69-73, 75-92, 98-100, 102, 103,
109, 111-113, 116, 118, 120,
123-127, 133, 134, 137-139, 145,
149, 155, 156, 158, 159-161, 163,
165-168, 170, 171, 173-176, 178,
179, 181-183, 188, 192-197, 201,
204, 207, 210, 212, 216, 222-224,
227, 228-230, 235, 237, 239, 240,
242, 245-250

Cold War 2, 122, 143, 207, 219, 235

combat air patrol 14, 198, 229

combat support 202

Combined Bomber Offensive 236,
239

combined OPLAN 48, 51

command and control 6, 12, 27, 29,
30, 39, 40, 44, 55, 58, 60, 67, 71,
116, 134, 158, 161, 166, 181, 182,
192-194, 204, 205, 217, 233, 245,
247

command post exercise 30

command, control and communication
42, 66, 68-70, 103, 119, 136

composite wing 16, 169

computers 149, 233, 234, 249

Congress 2, 57, 121, 122, 138, 139,
188

contingency plan 2

Corder, John 142, 148, 157

Corps:

VII Corps 6-8, 10, 99, 117, 156,
204, 248

XVIL Airbome Corps 7, 118, 56,
157, 189, 204, 250

XVIII Corps 7, 8, 113

counterair 14, 57, 146, 198, 200

counterintelligence 122

CRAF (sce Civil Reserve Air Fleet)

CSS 106, 158

D

D-Day 33-35, 39

DCS 188, 231, 234

deception 100, 123, 127, 137

Defense Department (see Department
of Defense)

Defense Intelligence Agency 8, 10,
19, 64, 66, 69, 72, 79, 86, 91, 94,

267



Most of the demand for more bombing of Iraqi frontline troops was
coming from VII Corps.” Since the Marines used much of their own air
power for that purpose, they were relatively satisfied. XVIII Airborne
Corps hoped to avoid Iraqi front lines entirely by executing a flanking
movement into empty desert. As for VII Corps, even its planned thrust
was shrouded in enough secrecy to make especially heavy bombing along
its front unwise. In the last two weeks before the ground offensive,
Schwarzkopf did increase bombing in front of VII Corps almost to equal
the bombing intensity elsewhere along the front lines.” :

The month-long pounding of Iraqi ground forces before the Coalition
ground offensive was not the kind of warfare Coalition airmen had prepared
for before the Gulf crisis. Rather they had trained to support troops against
an enemy offensive. However, the tactical air control system designed to
do the defensive close support job could also move ahead easily to support
Coalition ground forces when they finally launched their offensive.

General Homer used a “push” close air support technique to feed sorties
steadily to the battlefield where ground commanders and airborne controllers
could direct strikes in clear weather. Although the battlefield was some-
times obscured by bad weather and smoke from buming oil wells, the
ground work laid by air power in the preceding weeks meant that the
ground offensive met little opposition and required little close air support.

During the ground offensive, Homer assumed a more important
task—helping to block an enemy retreat. The outcry over the “Highway
of Death” and the early cease-fire conspired with the weather to permit
much of the Republican Guard to escape destruction. One aspect of this
interdiction failure was a dispute over the proper use of the Fire Support
Coordination Line (FSCL, pronounced “fissile”), Ground forces used the
FSCL to integrate fire support with their movement and to protect their
troops from fratricide by “friendly” air attack. In the area between Coali-
tion ground forces and the FSCL, Coalition aircraft could only attack

*Intvws, GWAPS with Gen Frederick Franks, 3 Sep 1992, and Maj Gen Thomas
Rhame, 11 Jul 1992.

See the GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Table 180, especially kill boxes ADS and
AES.

156



In the months that followed, increased forces became available for war,
and planners developed specific elements of the air and ground campaign.
The four-phase structure of the air campaign, however, remained un-
changed: a strategic air campaign into Iraq, air supremacy over the Ku-
wait theater, preparation of the battlefield by attrition of the Iraqi Army,
and air support for the ground attack. Turning this concept into reality
would require a great deal of time and labor.

No single “air campaign plan” recognizable as such existed. Rather,
the air campaign plan executed by Coalition forces at the outset of the
Gulf War consisted of three elements:

+ a broad statement of purpose, including the idea of a four-phased
war;

* extremely detailed air tasking orders for the first two days of the
war, plus additional staff work on the third day of operations; and

* amore diffuse set of expectations about how the air war would
unfold and what it would accomplish against any given target set.

The air campaign plan was imbedded in the operations plan for all forces
and consisted of an amalgam of thick scheduling documents, an extensive
series of briefings, each slightly different from the last, and a set of
intentions captured only sporadically on paper. Nonetheless, the result
was a unified concept for applying air power against Iraq.

Precrisis Planning

The plan for using air power in Desert Storm had surprisingly little to
do with planning done before August 1990. The Soviet threat and the
nature of the theater had long shaped the expected role of air power in the
defense of the oil-producing areas in the Gulf region. The distance of the
theater from the United States and the lack of any in-place forces on the
ground made airlift and sealift critical to any defense of the region. Ameri-
can planners expected air forces, land- and sea-based, to serve as the first
line of defense in the early stages of a conflict, which might last months
until large ground forces could arrive. In the early weeks of war in the
Gulf, planners expected air power to interdict and delay the attacking ground
forces, be those forces Soviet, Iranian, or Iraqi. On the basis of these

28



the Iraqis were not using them. Not until the first week in February
1991 did intelligence sources indicate that the Al Firdos bunker had been
activated.”” Subsequently, various delays, including weather, prevented
an attack until the early hours of 13 February.” Unknown to Coalition
air planners, the upper level of the bunker was, according to the Iraqis,
being used at night by families. Hits on the facility by two GBU-27s,
both aimed at the same point on the bunker's roof by two different
F-117s, were reported that momming by CNN (Cable News Network) as
having caused hundreds of civilian casualties.” Iraqi sources claimed that
200-300 civilians, including over 100 children, died in the bunkerTM and
quickly exploited the tragedy. In the wake of dramatic television cover-
age, a sharp reduction in Coalition air strikes against L targets ensued.
Among other changes, General Schwarzkopf thereafter personally re-
viewed any targets selected for air attack in downtown Baghdad.*' Con-
sequently, air planners in Riyadh did not resume their efforts until the
sixth and final week of the war to “finish off” the L targets.

By the end of the second week of the war, Coalition air planners and
intelligence analysts became increasingly convinced that Iraq’s national-

26s late as 31 Jan 1991, Checkmate analysts characterized the ten bunkers as “second-
ary leadership targets” [(S) “Additional Leadership Targets List,” Msg from Checkmate to
the Black Hole, 3117302 Jan 1991; BH, Box 2, Folder 24, [ntel/Tgt Info #1].

?(S/WN) DIA, Desert Storm Intelligence Bulletin, “Possible C3 Bunker Activated
(63-91), as of 080530Z Feb 1991, (BH, Box 2, Folder 24, Intel/Tgt Info #1). The

judgment that the bunker had been activated appears to have been based on the fusion of
separate pieces of intelligence.

intvw, GWAPS with Lt Col David Deptula, 20 and 21 Dec 1991.

25Misg from Checkmate to the Black Hole, “Additional Leadership Targets List,”
311730Z Jan 1991 (BH, Box 2, Folder 24, Intel/Tgi Info #1, p 3); GWAPS Missions
Database for ATO Day 27. The records on L targets in the Intelligence/Target Informa-
tion folders used by Lt Col Deptula during the war, as well as comments recorded at the
time in the Tactical Air Control Center and Gen Homer's daily briefings all confirm this
account of how and why the Al Firdos district bunker came to be struck. It was a
legitimate military target, and Coalition planners had no indications before seeing post-
strike Wlevision coverage over CNN that it had been occupied by civilians.

Middle East Watch, Needless Deaths in the Gulf War (Washington, DC: Middle
East Watch, 1991), pp 128-129.

"Lt Col David Deptula, GWAPS Intvw, 20 & 21 Dec 1991. Deptula’s personal
notes from the war confirm that on 13 Feb 1991 Gen Glosson was instructed by Gen
Schwarzkopf to begin showing him all targets selected for attack in downtown Baghdad
before they were struck.

69



results? And why did the war look so different from the conflicts of the
past few decades, in which air action served as a prelude and accompani-
ment to a bloody struggle on the ground?

What Do We Mean by a Revolution in Warfare?

The notion of periodic and radical changes in the conduct of war is
an old one. Scholars have written of the military revolution of the seven-
teenth century and of the revolution brought about by the advent of the
railroad, rifle, and telegraph in the middle of the nineteenth century.
During the twentieth century one can identify at least two such dramatic
changes in warfare. The first culminated in the period 1939-1942 with
the appearance of Blitzkrieg (lightning warfare), strategic bombardment,
offensive carrier aviation, and amphibious warfare. These developments
depended in various ways on the technologies involved in mechanization,
aviation, and radio communication. The second, which centered on the
marriage of atomic weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles, cov-
ered the period from the late-1940s to the mid-1960s and culminated in
the fielding of large arsenals of ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads
that were never used in anger.

In each case, revolutionary change in the conduct of war required the
advent or maturation of new military technologies (€.g., the internal com-
bustion engine, armor, etc.), their integration into new military systems (e.g.,
the tank or the long-range bomber), the adoption of appropriate operational
concepts (e.g., the armored breakthrough and its exploitation), and finally,
the requisite organizational adaptation (e.g., the Panzer division and the
Clausewitzian approach to war embedded in the German troop regulations
of that era.’ Technology alone does not a revolution make; how military
organizations adapt and shape new technology, military systems, and opera-
tional concepts matter much more. In France and the low countries in May
1940, the British and the French had technology and military systems at
least comparable to those of the Germans, and British tank enthusiasts such
as J.FC. Fuller and B.H. Liddell Hart had articulated the requisite operation-
al concepts. But without the necessary organizational adaptation, the British
and French were unable to withstand the German Blitzkrieg. More than the

7See Gen Ludwig Beck, Truppenfiihrung (Troop Leading): German Field Service
Regulations, Part I, trans. U.S. Army, report no. 14,507, 18 Mar 1936, pp 1-2. This way
of thinking about military revolutions is based on work that has becn done on the subject
in recent years by Mr. Andrew Marshall, the Director of Net Assessment, Office of the
Secretary of Defense.

238



98, 106, 122, 124, 131, 132, 134,
135, 237

Defense Mapping Agency 135

Defense Science Board 88, 216

Defense Suppor Program 194

Department of Defense 2, 46, 57, 62,
82, 84, 91, 108, 121, 122, 146, 188,
194

Deptula, David 16, 41, 44, 66, 69,
130, 132, 235

Desert Express 210

Desert Shield 1, 4, 5, 30, 33, 35, 46,
47, 60, 68, 83, 86, 88, 94, 104, 113,
121, 122, 128, 130, 131, 139, 140,
145-149, 151, 163, 164, 167, 172,
175, 178, 183, 186-188, 190, 193,
194, 198, 203, 208-210, 213,
215-217, 219, 220, 224, 228-231,
233, 234, 236, 237, 248

Desert Shield/Storm 104, 113, 131,
139, 140

Desert Storm 1, 5, 2t, 27, 28, 30, 31,
33, 35, 38, 39, 46-51, 57, 58, 60,
62-65, 68, 69, 72, 73, 78, 80,
82-86, 88, 89, 92-94, 98, 100,
102-104, 109, 113, 121, 122, 124,
126, 128-131, 134-138, 142, 145,
147, 148-151, 159, 163, 171, 172,
173, 174, 178, 181, 183, 186,
187-190, 192-200, 203, 204, 207,
209, 210, 213, 215, 216, 217, 220,
222, 228-231, 233-237, 239, 241-
249

desertion rate 10

Dhahran 34, 47, 175-177, 179, 187,
188, 209, 210

DIA (see Defense Intelligence
Agency)

Diego Garcia 164, 168, 178, 199, 228

Divisions:
82d Airborne 3, 34

DOC 32, 125, 134, 140

doctrine 146, 207, 239, 240, 245

DOD (see Department of Defense)

drones 12, 58, 60, 181, 196

DSB (sec Defense Science Board)

Dugan, Michael 36

E

E-3 3, 12, 60, 192, 228

268

E8 19

EA-6s 12

EC-130s 192, 197

EF-IIls 12, 168, 183, 197, 245

Egypt 164

Eighth Air Force 24t

Eisenhower, Dwight D. 223

electrical power 12, 14, 55, 73, 91,
92, 239

electricity 40, 66, 71-73, 76, 119,
248, 249

electronic warfare 103, 148, 182,
195, 196, 198, 204, 205, 230

enemy prisoner of war 19, 98, 250

enriched uranium 83

Europe 2, 3, 16, 29, 31, 80, 87, 149,
157, 165, 169, 178, 186, 196, 205,
207, 210, 212, 214-217, 219, 220,
222, 223, 234

European Command 52, 159

European Express 210

exervises 7, 124, 159 -

exploitation 124, 238, 248

F

F-4 243

F-4G 12, 60, 168, 183, 196, 198,
229, 230, 241

F-5. 15, 199, 201

F-15 60, 197

F-ISE 12, 15, 21, 23, 49, 58, 81, 84,
87, 88, 91, 141, 190, 199, 200-202,
208, 217, 226-228

F-16 15, 21, 23, 49, 62, 81, 103, 105,
111, 114, 195-197, 199-202, 205,
208, 218, 219, 226, 249

F-105s 243

F-11115, 23, 183, 200

F-11712, 17, 18, 22, 23, 30, 37, 41,
63, 64, 67-70, 81, 135, 141, 172,
182, 196, 199, 200, 201, 224-226,
228, 243, 244, 245, 248

F-ll7A 68

facsimile 131, 231

FAHD 27

fax 131, 231

Faylakah 102

fire support coordination line 114,
156, 157

fleet defense 146, 153, 154



ing air refueling and escorts. Even in this case, however, the Black Hole
provided Proven Force with target lists and included Proven Force strike
sorties in the Master Attack Plan.”*

On the whole, the theater commander wielded air resources as a
unified force. Moreover, air forces from many nations operated with a
harmony rarely seen at the outset of any large war and could conduct
combined operations with relative ease. Circumstances overwhelmingly
favored this happy outcome. The superabundance of Coalition aircraft,
the absence of serious opposition in the air or effective attack against
Coalition air bases, and the ability of the Coalition to choose the timing
of the war’s beginning all meant that neither the theater commander nor
the JFACC ever had to make harsh, choices in less favorable circumstanc-
es. They never, for example, had to strip Marines of air support provided
by Marine aircraft; they never had to endanger the fleet by leaving it with
less than full air defenses in the face an Iraqi air attack; they never had
to pull air cover from the soldiers of an ally in the face of enemy attack.

Furthermore, the war did not witness complete control of all air
power by the JFACC. In addition to Proven Force’s de facto route
package in northern Iraq, the Navy controlled fleet air defense sorties and
the Marines controlled direct support sorties. It was not necessary for the
JFACC to share much authority with the Central Command staff (includ-
ing the operations deputy). Although a Joint Target Coordination Board
formally existed, its real authority was limited.”* In practice, most critical
recommendations and decisions about the apportionment and allocation
of air power were made by the theater commander, the JFACC, the Black
Hole, and the TACC. Certainly, the concepts underlying the air cam-
paign directed against Iraq proper had not come from the Central Com-
mand staff, although the theater commander himself did personally shape
their implementation.

245) Msg, USCINCEUR/ECJ3 to USEUCOM components and USCINCCENT/J3,
Order 001, 231243Z Dec 1990.

Most of the board’s members were below the rank of full colonel. See
USCENTAF Combat Plans records and schedules, AFHRC, microfilm roll 23643



one hundred mission packages flown from Incirlik during the war, only
one was flown without such aircraft—the first night, before these aircraft
had arrived at the base-and in that case, planners changed targets to a
lower threat area than originally chosen.** Of the manned attack aircraft,
only the F-117s did not require careful integration of electronic warfare
aircraft support into mission planning. The United States dominated this
mission area: of the nearly 3,000 electronic warfare sorties flown in
Desert Storm, U.S. air forces conducted all but 80.”

USS. capabilities in electronic warfare included aircraft that destroyed
Iraqi air defense radars. The sixty-one Air Force F-4Gs (almost the entire
USS, inventory, stationed in Bahrain and Incirlik) and twelve F-16s (spe-
cially configured versions of the F-16), flown from Incirlik, were dedicated
to this mission. These aircraft attacked Iraqi surface-to-air-missile and
waming radars, most often with AGM-88 high-speed anti-radiation missiles
(HARMSs) that sought out and destroyed air defense radar systems by hom-
ing in on their emissions. U.S. Navy and Marine Corps F/A-18s, EA-6Bs,
and to a lesser extent A-7s carried HARMs (although none of these aircraft
could equal the missile programming capability of the F-4G). The British
had six Tomados capable of launching a similar type of missile.”

Some aircraft could destroy radar systems, and many other aircraft
had electronic jamming equipment to blind Iraqi radars and block radio
communications. Often, this jamming equipment was in a pod attached
to the aircraft, along with bombs and missiles, for self-protection of the
aircraft. Such configurations were common, not just for U.S. aircraft but
for other Coalition aircraft and Iragi aircraft, as well. Decoy drones

4s) CMSgt Jerome E. Schroeder and SSgt Thomas L. Raab, History of Joint Task

Force Proven Force, Office of History, Hq United States Air Forces in Europe, Dec 1991,
p59.

"Those 80 sorties were by British Nimrod aircraft. GWAPS Statistical Compendi-
um, Table 64.

28(S) Robert W. Ward, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol VIII: Space
and Electronic Warfare (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1992), pp 3-30 to
3-35; “Despatch by Air Chief Marshal Sir Patrick Hine, RAF, Joint Commander of
Operation Granby, Aug 1990-Apr 1991,” second supplement to The London Gazette,
Number 52589, 29 Jun 1991, p 40.

196



Airlift

The airlift that brought the forces to the region, along with the sup-
plies to sustain them, was the greatest such airlift in history. On the basis
of a common measure for airlift capacity, millions of ton-miles per day
(MTM-the product of aircraft cargo weight in tons and the distance
flown), Desert Shield/Desert Storm activity far surpassed earlier airlifts:

Peak period of Desert Shield/Desert Storm: 17 MTM/day
1973 airlift to Israel during Arab-Israeli War: 4.4 MTM/day
Operation Just Cause, to Panama, 1989: 2.0 MTM/day
Berlin airlift, 1948-1949: 1.7 MTM/day

“Hump” airlift of WW I: .9 MTM/day

The size of the effort is even more impressive considering the short-term
H nature of the next two largest airlifts compared with the Desert Shield and
fi Desert Storm effort of over 9 months.

C-5s, C-141s, and commercial cargo and passenger aircraft mobilized
for military service as part of the Civil Reserve Air Fleet (CRAF) carried
out the U.S. strategic, or intertheater, airlift.) The C-141s flew most of
5 the missions (fifty-three percent), the C-5s carried the most cargo (forty-
i two percent), and the CRAF aircraft carried most of the passengers (sixty-

3 four percent). From bases in the United States, these aircraft flew to air
e ' bases in Europe in transit to bases in the Southwest Asia theater, Europe-
an bases served as both stopover points and terminals; Rhein-Main in
Germany and Torrejon in Spain saw the heaviest use (twenty-seven and

*Brfg, Hq USAF/XOXWG, “Logistics in the Air Power Campaign,” 16 May 1991,
GWAPS, NA 584B.

The Civil Reserve Air Fleet consists of civil aircraft committed to augmenting the
Military Airlift Command fleet in certain emergency conditions. The aircraft are mobi-
i lized in stages, or increments, based on Presidential order. Since institution of the
program in 1952, however, CRAF mobilization had never been invoked before Desert
Shield.

186



Operation Just Cause the previous year and hesitated to specify an out-
come that aerial bombing simply could not ensure.”*

The political effects of the attacks on Iraq remained of concem
throughout the planning effort. The operations plan included rules pro-
hibiting attacks on cultural and historic sites, hospitals, mosques, civilian
population centers, and other nonmilitary structures, in accordance with
any military operation.” “Anything which could be considered as terror
attacks or attacks on the Iraqi people will be avoided.“ A joint no-fire
target list dated September 1990 was updated just before the war and then
revised several times during the war. The State Department and the
intelligence agencies contributed to the list, which included archeological
sites, sites of special significance to the Islamic religion, foreign embas-
sies in Baghdad, and camps thought to be holding Kuwaiti prisoners of
war.” Finally, just two days before the beginning of the air campaign,
Secretary of State James Baker and Under Secretary of State for Political
Affairs Robert Kimmitt went to the Pentagon to make a final examination
of the target list with Cheney and Powell, and, according to Kimmitt, “It
was very clear to both Secretary Baker and me . . . that those political
considerations that had been expressed, both at the Cabinet level and [in
the NSC Deputies Committee), had been well taken into account, and we
both teft the meeting very comfortable from a political perspective.”*

The Republican Guard received particular attention in Central Com-
mand planning, enough to have it specified as one of the target sets in the
Phase I plan. Planners identified the Republican Guard as a center of

*Robert Gates in “The Guif Crisis: The Road to War,” Program Three, p 19;
Gen Colin L. Powell, transcript of News Brfg, 17 Jan 1991, p 6; and Gen H. Norman
Schwarzkopf, in Hearings before the Committee on Appropriations, House of Representa-
tives, Department of Defense Appropriations for 1992, Part 2, 102d Cong, Ist sess
(Washington, 1991), p 277.

%5) Operations plan, Hq, U.S. Central Command, Combined Operation Desert Storm,
17 Jan 1991, Appendix 4 to Annex C, “Rules of Engagement,” GWAPS, CHC 18-1.

“"(§) COMUSCENTAF Operations Order, 2 Sep 1990, p 3.

“2(S) Msgs, USCINCCENT, subj: USCINCCENT Joint No-Fire Target List for
Desert Shield, 14 Sep 1990, GWAPS, CHSH 100-26; and USCENTAF, subj: Joint No-
Fire Target List, 16 Feb 1991, GWAPS, BH 2, Section 4.

“Transcript, American Enterprise Institute, “The Gulf War Conference,” 7 Dec 1991,
p 236.

46



EMIS
EPW
FAC
FLIR
FLOGEN
FSCL
GWAPS
G-Day
HARM
HAB
HAS
IFF

IIR

10c

IR

IRIS
J-2
Jaguar
Jcs
JDOP

JFACC

JFC-E
JFC-N
JIC

JMEM

Electro-Magnetic Isotope Separation
Enemy Prisoner of War

Forward Air Control
Forward-Looking Infrared

Flow Generation computer model
Fire Support Coordination Line
Gulf War Air Power Survey

Day the ground war began
High-Speed Antiradiation Missile
Hardened Aircraft Bunker
Hardened Aircraft Shelter
Identification Friend or Foe
Intelligence Information Report
Intercept Operations Center

Infrared

AFHRA Computer Indexing System
Intelligence Directorate (Joint)
Land-based ground attack aircraft
Joint Chiefs of Staff

Joint U.S./Saudi Directorate of
Planning

Joint Force Air Component
Commander

Joint Forces Command East
Joint Forces Command North
Joint Intelligence Center

Joint Munitions Effectiveness Manual

259



level telecommunications system had not collapsed as a result of attacks on
central switching and microwave relays, despite the lethality and precision
of the attacks.” The system turned out to be more redundant and more
able to reconstitute itself than first thought. Fiber-optic networks and com-
puterized switching systems proved particularly tough to put out of action.

How effective were the Coalition attacks on Iraqi leadership and
Telecommunications/Command, Control, and Communications (C3)?
Using the Black Hole’s target categories, a total of some 260 precision
and nonprecision strikes were carried out against the L targets by the
war’s end; another 580 precision and nonprecision strikes were mounted
against the CCC category. Yet, at the war’s end, Saddam Hussein was
still alive and his Ba’athist regime still in power. Moreover, the Iraqi
government had been able to continue launching Scuds during the final
days of the campaign.” Although the capacity of the communications
links between Baghdad and its field army in the Kuwait theater of opera-
tions had been greatly reduced, sufficient “connectivity” persisted for
Baghdad to order a withdrawal from the theater that included some
redeployments aimed at screening the retreat. Thus, the results of these
attacks clearly fell short of fulfilling the ambitious hope, entertained by
at least some airmen, that bombing the L and CCC target categories
might put enough pressure on the regime to bring about its overthrow and
completely sever communications between the leaders in Baghdad and
their military forces.

Coalition attacks on the L and CCC targets categories need not, how-
ever, be judged against this ambitious goal. In retrospect, it may be fairer
to ask how much disruption and dislocation these attacks imposed on the
functioning of the Iraqi government and its telecommunications. Com-
mon sense would argue that strikes against these two target categories
must have imposed some, if not considerable, disruption and dislocation
on the Iraqis involved. F-117s carried out the bulk of the 480-plus
precision strikes against L and CCC targets. Hits from 2,000-pound
bombs within feet of the desired aimpoints on government ministries,
national command and control facilities, headquarters, and telecommuni-

32S) Lt Gen Thomas W. Kelly, Director of Operations, JCS, Memo to USCENT-
COM/J-3, “Iraqi Backbone Telecommunications Vulnerabilities”; also, handwritten note
from Checkmate to the Black Hole, 28 Jan 1991 (GWAPS, BH, Hox 2, Folder 24,
Intel/Tgt Info #1).

33The last Scud launches occurred on 26 Feb 1991.

70



Secretary of Defense 3, 16, 20, 39,
42, 45, 53, 103, 131, 140, 147, 219,
238

Secretary of State 46

sector operations center 241, 243

secure telephone unit 131, 149, 216,
223, 231, 233, 234

security 2, 7, 27, 33, 38, 39, 43, 80,
91, 122, 123, 152, 175-177,
214-217, 220, 237

security police 176, 220

Shaw AFB 35, 91, 152

shelter busting 245

short-range ballistic missile 86

Sierra Army Depot 213

signals intelligence 100, 122

Silkworm 8, 21, 100, 102, 119

SITREP (see situation report)

situation report 11, 158

SKYNET 193

smoke 156, 170, 227

SOCCENT 7, 155

software 233

SORTS 78

Southeast Asia 62, 145, 173, 220,
226

space war 216

Spain 164, 168, 186

spare parts 98, 109, 189, 210, 214,
222, 231, 247

SPEAR 125, 126

special forces 90, 111

special instructions 150

special operations 84, 181, 190, 199

Special Operations Command 84,
181, 190, 199

special operations forces 84

Special Planning Group 6, 35, 38, 42,
55, 129, 136, 147

SPINS (see special instructions)

SPOT 194

State Department 27, 46

stealth (2, 17, 30, 68, 182, 204, 205,
223, 224, 226, 230, 242, 245

stealthy 224

strategic air campaign 6, 14, 17, 22,
28, 38-40, 52, 76, 131, 132, 137,
147, 152, 224

Strategic Air Command 93, 112, 130,
145, 165, 187, 190, 194, 228

274

strategic air defense 40, 42, 55, 58,
242

strategic level 76

stralegy 109, 117, 135

STU (see secure telephone unit)

SU-20 58

SU-22 58

Sultan 158

supply system 178, 209

suppression of enemy air defenses
222, 240

surface-to-air missile 12, 56, 58, 59,
60-63, 89, 92, 119, 120, 125, 126,
129, 229, 230

surge 187

sustainment 2, 78, 212

SWA 213

Syria 167

Syrian 240

T

TAC (see Tactical Air Command)

TACAIR 51

TACC (see Tactical Air Control
Center)

TACS (see Tactical Air Control
System)

Tactical Air Command 33, 178, 217,
231, 234

Tactical Air Control Center 69, 110,
11), 114, 116, 117, 147, 148, 151,
154, 157, 160, 223

Tactical Air Control Party 51

Tactical Air Control System 147, 156

Tactical Air Reconnaissance Pod
System 139

tactical aircraft 165

tactical control 146

Tactical Fighter Wing 3, 21, 63, 84,
112, 129, 172, 208, 217, 230

Tactical Intelligence Squadron 30, 32,
35, 128, 130, 140

Taji 79, 83

tank plinking 21, 155

tankers 2, 29, 30, 148, 149, 164, 167,
183, 187, 190, 228, 229

tanks 8, 18, 21, 49, 77, 106, 107,
112, 114, 116, 118, 120, 126-128,
135, 153, 155, 237, 245



greatest impact on Iraqi equipment attrition, however, was rendered by
employing laser-guided bombs on Iraqi armor, beginning on 6 February
and continuing for the duration of the war. These changes increased the
rate of Iraqi armor and artillery attrition, but the fifty percent goal for the
theater was not attained throughout the entire theater before the ground
war began.

The amount of equipment attrition suffered by the Iragi Army before
the ground war was a highly contentious issue at the time, and postwar
reconstructions can only partially update these wartime estimates. On the
eve of the ground war, Central Command estimated that there had been
thirty-nine percent attrition of Iraqi tanks, thirty-two percent of armored
personnel carriers, and forty-seven percent of artillery.” At the same time,
the Central Intelligence Agency and Defense Intelligence Agency held to
far lower estimates, differences that caused controversy between the theater
and Washington.” By that time, however, General Schwarzkopf and his
staff had rethought the practice of tying Iraqi unit effectiveness directly to
equipment attrition. General Schwarzkopf refused to allow briefings that
focused on specific percentages of equipment attrition, opting instead for
a more subjective assessment of Iraqi unit capability with equipment attri-
tion as only one of the variables. By this system, on the eve of the ground
war, Central Command estimated the frontline Iraqi divisions to be below
fifty percent effectiveness and the rear divisions, in general, at approxi-
Mately seventy-five percent effectiveness.”

Since the war, several additional sources of additional information
have become available: photography of the entire theater at the beginning
and end of the campaign (15 January and 1 March 1991), photography
of portions of the theater during the air war, partial battlefield studies of
Traqi equipment, and reports on individual divisions from Iraqi prisoners
of war.’ These sources permit the following general assessments:

528) USCINCCENT Situation Rpt, did 232115Z Feb 1991, GWAPS, CSS 29,
See Chapter 4 in this report for a discussion of these differences.
“Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 256.

55(S) Memo, Lt Col Allan W. Howey, USAR, subj: Tank Kills in the KTO, 26 Feb
1992, GWAPS, NA 167; (S) Memo and viewgraphs, Foreign Science and Technology
Center, “Joint Intelligence Survcy Team Rpt,” 14 Jan 1992, GWAPS, NA 167; (S) U.S.
Marine Corps Research Center, “Armor/Antiarmor Operations in Southwest Asia,”
Research Paper #92-0002, USMC, Quantico VA, Ju! 1991.

105



i
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i

disruption from enemy ground forces, artillery, surface-to-air missiles, or
aircraft. The desert has always proven the most favorable environment
for the application of air power, and in this war it afforded the additional
important benefit of removing most concems about collateral damage
throughout much of the Kuwait theater. And despite the deficiencies of
some the bare bases inhabited by Coalition forces, never has an expedi-
tionary force deployed to a region so well-endowed with air and sea
ports,"* first-class roads, and a wealthy local economy to provide various
support services. Above all, Coalition forces benefitted from the passivity
of an opponent who had, at least in theory, the capability to make the
deployment a harrowing and costly military ordeal, rather than the ex-
hausting and chaotic but nonetheless peaceful operation it was.

"Of these Dhahran and the associated port at Ad Dammam were by far the most
important, serving as (hey did as the main points of debarkation for both air- and sealift.
An Iraqi attack on the port and associated air fields could have complicated the deploy-
ment tremendously.

179



crumble. Many, particularly the frontline forces, ran short of water, food,
fuel, and all spare parts. Some units had their supply stocks destroyed.
Training in the units ceased. Soldiers moved apart from their equipment
because they well understood what the targets were. Many captured
Iraqis stated they thought the air campaign would last several days to a
week at most. When it did not end, the sense of futility and inevitability
of the outcome became more apparent. During the course of the air war,
many Iraqi soldiers, particularly those in the front lines, decided not to
fight. Many deserted and others remained in place, but the effect on the
capability of the Iraqi units was the same. The deserters from the front-
line divisions told their interrogators that most of those remaining in their
units would surrender at the first opportunity without any resistance. And
this is what happened.

The ground offensive ended quickly, but there may well have been
units qualified to fight and willing to resist. Few of those units were in
the front lines, however. When the soldiers and officers in these frontline
units decided not to resist, any opportunity for an organized defense in
the theater collapsed. The Iraqi strategy called for the operational and
strategic reserves to move to resist the points of the Coalition ground
attack, but these reserve forces were fooled not only by the direction of
the attack but by how fast it was upon them; the utter collapse of the
Iraqi front lines made any planned movements by the reserves irrelevant.
The reserve forces were themselves under attack before they had a
chance to maneuver or present an organized defense.

Air Power with Engaged Ground Forces

The effectiveness of air power in supporting engaged ground forces
during Desert Storm is particularly difficult to assess because the support
took place only during the one-hundred-hour ground war and briefly
during the Iraqi incursion into the Saudi town of Al Khafji. The brief
time involved and the conditions under which the engagements took
place-against thoroughly demoralized Iraqi troops, many in full flight or
surrendering even before being engaged-make any generalizations based
on these circumstances questionable. Moreover, the speed of the ground
action added to the difficulty of making a precise accounting of specific
actions that took place. After the war, no theater-wide survey was under-
taken, although various organizations attempted reconstructions of some
of the battlefield engagements.

108



keep the pressure on during daylight. Precision weapons were at a premi-
um, so much so that aircraft capable of using them could not be spared
to attack bridges until the second week in the war. Only then did bridges
receive attention. While most of the laser-guided bombs and surface-to- ~
surface and air-to-surface missiles expended in the course of the 43-day
air campaign were expended against facilities, a large number were used
against air installations and Iragi ground forces, mainly in the course of
direct attacks against armor.

Although strikes in Irag required the use of precision weapons, the air
attacks that began almost simultaneously in the Kuwait theater employed
mainly unguided bombs and a variety of antiarmor and antipersonnel
cluster munitions. Many targets in the theater were well suited for these
weapons-storage areas and troop concentrations called for area weapons,
However, the type of aircraft available frequently dictated the choice of
armaments. While the relatively small number of aircraft equipped to
laser-designate targets operated over Iraq, the larger number of aircraft
Not so equipped operated profitably throughout the Kuwait theater, drop-
ping less precise munitions in large numbers. General Schwarzkopf
desired that air power reduce enemy ground force combat potential in the
Kuwait theater by fifty percent before he would start the ground assault.

Even within the Kuwait theater, there was a division of labor between
the aircraft employed in the northern portion against the Republican
Guard and those employed in the southern portion near the front line.
F-16s, F/A-18s, F-15Es, F-111s, and A-6s flew against the more distant,
better equipped, and better dug-in Republican Guard. Closer to the front,
AV-8Bs, A-10s, and many of the other Coalition aircraft (F-5, Jaguars,
A-4s) tackled the entrenched Iraqi infantry. B-52s, dropping approxi-
mately thirty-two percent of the bomb tonnage in the war (most of it in
the Kuwait theater), attacked area targets (breaching sites, ammunition
stockpiles, troop concentrations, and military field headquarters) and
became one of the most sought-after aircraft by the ground commanders
for strikes against Iraqi ground forces. Attempts by air planners to em-
ploy B-52s outside the Kuwait theater (on munitions storage sites in Iraq,
for example) ran into much opposition from the CENTCOM leadership,

i
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L



Although regulations and operation plans detailed organizational
structures to handle tasking of national reconnaissance assets, the system
did not work well in practice because of inadequate numbers of trained,
qualified personnel. To complicate matters further, only a small portion
of those assigned to CENTAF intelligence during the crisis had any
experience in collection management, while the campaign planners failed
to anticipate how massive and time-consuming the bomb damage assess-
Ment process would be once the war began.” The CENTAF plan for
handling such assessments via three computer workstations required
modifications during Desert Shield and reduction to a single computer
workstation, but the system was still unproven when the air campaign
began.” The situation was ripe for breakdowns when unexpected circum-
stances occurred. ‘

The unexpected took place on the first day of the air campaign when
weather presented itself as a formidable obstacle to bomb damage assess-
ment. Heavy overcast during the early days of the war prevented adequate
reconnaissance of many strategic targets-most were not covered until 21
January, five days after the beginning of the air campaign. This circum-
stance put intelligence assessments behind from the outset and derailed the
prewar planning assumption that imagery of a target would be available
to analysts in time for the target to be revisited, if necessary, two days
later. When imagery was not forthcoming, the air tasking order (ATO)
Process went ahead anyway, and operations planners looked to other
sources—mission reports and video recordings-to judge the effectiveness
of the previous day’s strikes. Eventually, the imagery flow settled into a
regular pattern, but a lag remained between collecting imagery of a target
and disseminating it to planners for consideration in the ATO cycle.

Doc, Majors P.J. Nagy and F.D. Houston, “Intelligence Operations in Southwest
Asia,” Marine Corps Research Center Research Paper 92-0008, part 1, Jul 1991, p 3,
GWAPS, NA 355; AAR, USCENTAFAIN, “After Action Report and Lessons Learned,”
25 May 1991, Col Rauschkolb to Col Christon; Intvw, Mr. Lawrence Greenberg, GWAPS
with Capt John Glock, USAF, member of 9th TIS and CENTAF/IN, Jan 1992, GWAPS,
‘TF V files.

5s) Rpt, Intelligence Program Support Group, Office of the Assistant Secretary of
Defense (Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence), Operation Desert
Shield/Storm Intelligence Dissemination Study-Final Report, Appendix L-CENTAF,
28 May 1992.

140



What were the Conditions in the Theater?

Planners for operations in any theater attempt to anticipate not only
the physical conditions of the area in which they must operate but also
the political circumstances. In both cases, Desert Shield and Desert
Storm presented commanders and staffs with a number of surprises. The
Political circumstances assumed in prewar plans differed from those
actually applying to deployment to the Arabian peninsula. The physical
conditions of the theater, although anticipated, differed greatly from those
experienced by U.S. air forces in the past. Understanding these differenc-
es affords a clearer picture of the circumstances under which air power
was employed in the Gulf War.

Political Factors

The Gulf crisis began during international political conditions unique-
ly favorable for forming a broad Coalition of states to oppose Iraq. The
blatant character of the Iraqi aggression, condemned almost universally
in the Arab world, promoted local support for a large U.S. force deploy-
ment to the region. Iraqi efforts notwithstanding, the crisis remained
detached from the Arab-Israeli conflict, which had long complicated
American relationships with Arab states in the region. At that same time,
the dissipation of the NATO-Warsaw Pact confrontation allowed both
NATO and former Warsaw Pact members to support the deployment and
contribute forces. Unlike American experience in the 1973 Arab-Israeli
War and the 1986 raid on Libya, the United States encountered few
difficulties in securing overflight rights and obtaining access to bases
within and leading to the theater. In all respects, the political circum-
stances favored the early, massive deployment of air power to the region.

The key countries along the route from the United States to the
Arabian Peninsula and on the Peninsula itself gave swift or blanket
approval for the air deployments. The nonstop deployment by fighter and
bomber aircraft along an “Atlantic Bridge” to the Gulf required staging

163



Acknowledgments

The Survey’s members owe a great debt of gratitude to Secretary of
the Air Force Donald B. Rice, who conceived of the project, provided it
with resources, and set for it the highest standards of independence and
objectivity. Many organizations and individuals gave generously of their
resources and time to support this effort. Various branches and com-
mands of the Air Force were particularly helpful in providing material for
and, in some cases, personnel to conduct the study. The United States
Navy, Marine Corps, and Army aided this study in different ways, includ-
ing the sharing of data pertaining to the air war. A number of the United
States’ Coalition partners also made available individuals and records that
were vital to the Survey’s work. Many participants in the war, including
senior political officials and officers from all of the Services were willing
to speak with the Survey and share their recollections of Desert Shield
and Desert Storm. Private students of the Gulf War also made available
their knowledge of the crisis and conflict. | Wherever possible and
appropriate, such assistance has been acknowledged in the text.

The Summary Report is based on the research done by the authors
and contributors of the other ten reports of the Gulf War Air Power
Survey. The individuals responsible for those reports are listed on pages
xi-xiv. We also wish to recognize the work of Mr. Barry D. Watts, who
wrote portions of Chapters 3, 4, and 10, and Dr. Wayne W. Thompson,
who wrote portions of Chapter 5; both Mr. Watts and Dr. Thompson also
provided extensive comments on the entire report. This report also
benefitted greatly from the comments and contributions of Mr. Lawrence
M. Greenberg, Mr. Richard J. Blanchfield, Col. Emery M. Kiraly, Col.
Mark L. Tarpley, Lt. Col. Daniel T. Kuehl, Capt. Jeffrey A. Hodgdon,
and Mr. Steven L. Orton. Some graphics and tables are taken from the
other reports of the Survey; those produced for this report were done by
Mr. Alan P. Heffernan, Mr. Barry D. Watts, and Mr. Lawrence M. Green-
berg. Finally, a special word of thanks for the work of the primary
typists, Ms. Peggy Kramer and Ms. Cecelia A. French; the editors, Mr.
Lawrence J. Paszek, Ms. Anne Predzin, and Mr. Chris Pankow; and
layout designers Mr. Michael O. Bowers and Barbara L. Gardien.

xi



Aerial Refueling

Aerial refueling facilitated two different aspects of the Gulf War: the
speedy deployment of large air forces to the region, and the use of these
forces in large and complex air combat operations. Five countries using
twelve different types of aircraft provided this refueling capability.
Participating aircraft included nearly 300 U.S. Air Force KC-10s and
KC-135s-almost half of the USAF fleet. Others included 20 Marine
Corps and Special Operations Command KC-130s, 16 Navy KA-6s (plus
other A-6s and S-3s configured for aerial refueling), 15 British aircraft
(VC-10/Victor/Tristar), 12 Saudi KE-3s/KC-130s, 6 French KC-135s, and
3 Canadian Boeing 707s. Non-U.S. tankers mainly refueled aircraft from
their own nation but could refuel others and often did. All were needed,
since air defense fighters and airborne control aircraft remained aloft for
extended periods, and many of the attack aircraft needed to refuel on the
way to the targets and again on the return leg to their bases because of
the distances involved. The tanker aircraft proved a critical resource, but
a heavier commitment of the U.S. fleet would not have helped; the limita-
tion was airspace, not numbers (See Figure 32). With a daily average of
360 tanker sorties, the refueling tracks saturated the available airspace;
the number of refueled aircraft is uncertain, but SAC tankers alone refu-
eled an average of 1,433 aircraft a day.'? Some 60 percent of all attack
sorties required air refueling. Of the total number of Desert Storm sorties
by category, aerial refueling ranked third, behind airlift. U.S. aircraft ac-
counted for 90 percent of that total, with the U.S. Air Force fleet of KC-
10s and KC-135s assuming the preponderant share.

Aerial refueling capability enabled fighter squadrons and bombers to
deploy nonstop from the United States to the Southwest Asia theater even
loaded with armaments; more than 1,000 U.S. aircraft deployed in this
way. It took nearly 100 tankers operating out of en route bases to create
an Atlantic air refueling bridge and a less frequently used bridge across
the Pacific. Fighter aircraft deployments from the United States to the
theater traversed 6,900 nautical miles, took 15-16 hours’ flying time, and
required from 7 (for F-15Es) to 15 (for F-4Gs) refuelings en route. The

“GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Tables 109-113; (S) Desert Storm/Desert Shield

Tanker Assessment, Hq, Strategic Air Command, Plans and Requirements (XP), 23 Sep
1991, pp 2-3, 9-3.

190


tion from Soviet to regional threats. However, in preparation for Exercise
Internal Look, work had begun to rectify this situation, and during the
second half of 1990, considerable advances were made. Still, in many
areas the intelligence was old and therefore either misleading or useless.

Traq’s deception efforts made the problem of updating information far
worse, particularly in the case of its nuclear research program. The Iraqis
successfully relocated, dispersed, and, in some cases, buried nuclear pro-
cessing equipment to avoid attack.’ As a result of its hidden facilities and
Baghdad’s unorthodox procedures undertaken to preserve its nuclear
capabilities, the Coalition’s understanding of the Iraqi program remained
slight. From August 1990 and extending through the beginning of the air
campaign, the target list contained only two known and two suspected
nuclear facilities; this increased to eight by the end of the war.® After the
war, International Atomic Energy Administration inspectors identified
more than twenty sites involved in the Iraqi nuclear program, including
some sixteen main facilities.’ These inspections revealed that the Iraqis
had a far more extensive and dispersed program than Western intelligence
had previously estimated. The intelligence community could not, of
course, have produced a picture as comprehensive as the one United
Nations Special Commission inspectors pieced together after recurring
and intrusive on-site postwar visits. Nevertheless, certain first-order
questions do not appear to have been asked, much less vigorously pur-
sued, about the extent of active deception and concealment measures that
Baghdad might take to complicate Coalition targeting.

In addition to protecting its nuclear program, Baghdad went to excep-
tional lengths to conceal the composition and operation of its Scud mis-
sile force. Unlike the case of the nuclear program, intelligence estimates
correctly identified most Scud production and support facilities, which
Coalition air forces subsequently bombed. Intelligence analysts, however,

SDavid Kay, “Arms Inspections in Iraq: Lessons for Arms Control,” 12 Aug 1992,
p 3, GWAPS, NA 375.

6(S) Master Target Lists, Master Target Folder, GWAPS, BH 53.

TSecurity Council Rpt, S/23215, Seventh IAEA on-site inspection, 11-22 Oct 1991,
14 Nov 1991, p 63.

123



avail itself of the imagery tasking and prioritization system." Moreover,
few tactical systems in theater could provide the images needed to sup-
port planning for a strategic ait war.” And, once the war began, those
that were available were not fully used after Horner and Glosson made
a conscious decision “not to waste aircraft to shoot pictures of targets we
knew had already been struck.”

Early in Desert Shield during one of General Glosson’s trips to
Washington, he met with Rear Admiral J. M. McConnell, DIA/J-2, who
promised to provide whatever intelligence support he could. The relation-
ship blossomed, and soon Glosson spoke to McConnell several times a
day on a secure telephone line. McConnell also used secure facsimile to
send intelligence materials into theater, mostly one- or two- page analytic
reports on recommended targets with accompanying imagery.“ Other
members of the Black Hole, many of them on assignment from the Air
Staff, turned to friends in Checkmate. By the middle of Desert Shield,
Checkmate had become an ad hoc fusion center for intelligence and
operational information and maintained contact with national intelligence
agencies and a number of specialized planning cells in Washington. It
did not take Black Hole personnel long to realize that they could obtain
more current information by calling Washington on their STU-II] secure
telephones and secure faxes than they could get from in-theater intelli-

"AAR, USCENTAFIIN, “After Action Report and Lessons Learned,” 25 May 1991,
Col Rauschkolb to Col Christon; (S) Report, Intelligence Program Support Group, Office
of the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Command, Control, Communications, and Intelli-
gence), Operation Desert Shield/Storm Intelligence Dissemination Study~Final Report,
Appendix L-CENTAF, 28 May 1992.

2(S/NE) Rpt, HQ USAFAN, “Operation Desert Storm Lessons Learned,” 5 May
1991, JULLS Number 41965-98270 (00034), p 68; JULLS 32033-32800 (00028), pp 58-
59, GWAPS, NA 136; (S) Rpt, Thomas P. Christie, et al, Desert Storm Strategic Air
Campaign Bomb Damage Assessment (BDA), IDA Document D- 1088, Jan 1992, pp 3-5,
GWAPS, NA 223.

*intvw, Capt O'Connell with Maj Gen Glosson, Pentagon, 28 Jan 1992.

44S) Intvw, Rear Admiral J.M. MeConnell, Joint Staff Intelligence J-2, by Diane T.
Putney, AF/HO, and Ron Cole, JCS/HO, 14 Feh 1992, Pentagon, GWAPS, NA 261. In
addition, Checkmate also forwarded such intelligence products to the Black Hole planners.



In addition to supporting Coalition attack aircraft, aerial tankers refueled
combat air patrol aircraft and an entire array of airborne warning, reconnais-
sance, targeting, and control aircraft that had to provide 24-hour coverage
during both Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Only aircraft such as A-10s and
AV-8Bs, flying from the more forward operating bases and attacking targets
in the Kuwait theater, could fly back and forth without in-flight refueling.

Air operations without the extensive support of aerial tankers would
have changed the character of the war; by how much can only be guessed.
Initial deployments to the theater would have been delayed, making more
use of en route bases and requiring considerable logistical support at these
bases. Because of the ranges to the targets, all dimensions of the air cam-
paign would have been altered: the number of sorties a day as well as
operating bases used. In short, the air campaign was designed with the
assumption that all necessary tanking would be available, and a change in
that assumption would mean a change in the design. Aerial tankers facili-
tated the speed and mass of the attacks and provided a margin of safety in
air operations. Moreover, against an enemy capable of attacking air bases
close to the border, the ability to refuel extensively permitted operations
from distant, secure bases and provided a buffer of inestimable worth.*

HARM

Several air power weapons contributed to the Coalition’s command of the
air over Iraq and the Kuwait theater, but no single weapon was as significant
as the high-speed antiradiation missile (HARM). The use of HARMs effec-
tively neutralized both elements of Iraqi ground-based defenses—antiaircraft
artillery (AAA) and surface-to-air missiles (SAMs)-by suppressing the SAMs
and thereby allowing Coalition aircraft to fly above the lethal range of AAA.
Other forms of countermeasures to Iraqi radars (jamming, in particular) were
important, but the HARM was the chief lethal component of the effort to
suppress enemy air defenses.? The HARM homed in on Iraqi radar emissions
and destroyed the emitter, and it was launched from a variety of platforms,
most notably the F-4G “Wild Weasel” aircraft. The U.S. Air Force fired
some 1,067 HARMs, and the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps fired 894. Com-
bined with the destruction of Iraqi ait defense control centers and of Iraqi
aircraft in the air and on the ground, overall air defense suppression resulted
in an attrition rate for Coalition aircraft of less than a tenth of that incurred by

*Chapter 7 has further discussion on aerial refueling operations.

*Other lethal missiles that homed in on Iraqi radars included the British ALARM and
the older American Shrike system, of which fewer than 200 were launched.

229



the Air Staff in August 1990 were adequate for the selection of target
categories. However, the choices of target categories were shaped at least
as much by doctrinal considerations about the proper offensive use of air
power at the operational level of war as by detailed intelligence on targets
and target systems in Iraq. While Air Staff intelligence officers did much
to fill in the target categories as best they could, the idea: of a strategic air
campaign rested upon only the most general understanding of Iraq, its
society, infrastructure, and military capabilities.“

At the most elementary level, there were individual targets that were
never located prior to the end of the war. The concealed “hide” sites from
which Iraq's mobile ballistic launchers probably operated throughout
Desert Storm provide one of the most telling examples of a set of targets
that were not pinpointed even by the final day of the conflict. There were
other targets that were to one degree or another located but whose full
significance or extent was not understood during the war. Al Atheer, for
example, was bombed before the end of the war, but not until afterwards
did the Coalition leam about its central importance in the Iraqi nuclear
program. Similarly, while Ash Shargat was attacked as a part of Iraq’s
ballistic missile program during Desert Storm, it was not until after the
war that its involvement in isotope separation came to be fully understood.

What these examples suggest is that notwithstanding the massive
amounts of intelligence data produced on Iraqi installations and forces,
there were some systemic blind spots. Iraq’s nuclear, chemical, and
biological warfare programs, along with the extended-range Scuds, were
areas that Saddam Hussein wanted to protect as much as possible from
Coalition air attacks, and the extent to which the Iraqis were able to do
so with concealment, deception, hardening, dispersal, redundancy, and
mobility does not appear to have been fully appreciated until after the
war. In general, Coalition intelligence located most fixed installations
throughout Iraq but did not always appreciate the significance of every

John A. Warden III, The Air Campaign (Washington: National Defense University,
1988), pp 51-58; Warden’s views may be traced in his series of Instant Thunder briefings,
8-17 Aug 1990, GWAPS, CHSH 5 and 7; and (S) Brfg, Col John A. Warden III for
Gen John A. Loh, VCSAF, “Iraqi Air Campaign," 8 Aug 1990, GWAPS, CHSH 7-11;
(S) Notes, La Col Bernard E. Harvey, Checkmate, 7-8 Aug 1990, GWAPS, CHP 9-1.

137


i

assets would arrive within the first two weeks. A B-52 squadron and a
third carrier battle group would follow shortly. During a second phase,
defensive operations, the United States would gain air superiority against
an attacking enemy, protect the air and naval bases used for debarking
forces, and interdict enemy lines of supply and communication in order
to disrupt the attacking force. In addition, air power would provide any
necessary close air support. A third phase, counteroffensive operations,
‘was anticipated after sufficient forces had assembled and the enemy’s
combat power had declined by an unspecified level of attrition. The
specifics of this last phase received almost no treatment in the plan, other
than a reference to the tasks of defeating enemy forces and regaining
control of key facilities.‘

Central Command leaders examined the draft operations plan in a
command post exercise, Internal Look 90, that took place in July 1990 and
ended just days before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Central Command
designed the exercise to test the draft plan and uncover potential difficul-
ties in its execution. An important addition to the exercise force list were
the Air Force’s stealth aircraft, the F-117s. F-117s did not figure in the
draft plan (their existence had only become public in November 1988), but
theater commanders could now begin to tap them for regional operations
plans. The exercise revealed several shortfalls: not enough precision-
guided munitions, a shortage of aircraft tankers to accommodate the
aircraft of the carrier battle groups, and difficulty obtaining timely bomb
damage assessment for use in planning further air strikes.°

The exercise proceeded through its phases to counteroffensive opera-
tions when, on the final two days of game play, the National Command
Authority granted players “cross-border authority.” As a result, the staff
ordered aircraft to strike several leadership and command and control
targets in Baghdad.° But these attacks differed greatly from those later

‘(SINF) USCINCCENT OPLAN 1002-90, second draft, 18 Jut 1990, Concept of
Operations, pp 20-26,

5 Whirlwind War, draft of Jun 1992, U.S. Army Center of Military History, Washing-
ton, DC, p 85, GWAPS, NA 304; (S/NF) USCINCCENT, Desert Shield/Desert Storm and
Internal Look 90 After Action Reports, 15 Jul 1991, GWAPS, NA 9.

S(SINF) Fact Sheet, Maj John Heidrick, 9 AIS, “9 TIS/ANT Planning Procedures for
Internal Look 90 and Operation Desert Shield,” 4 May 1992, p 1, GWAPS, NA 267;
(S/NF) USCINCCENT, Desert Shield/Desert Storm, Internal Look 90 After Action

30



|
|

STU-III

The Secure Telephone Unit (STU) II was an essential item of support
equipment for the units that deployed to the Persian Gulf region. Over 350
STU-IIIs were used in the area of operations alone. This unit and the associ-
ated family of secure facsimile machines and field phones enabled air cam-
paign planners and staffs to preserve operational secrecy and still establish the
informal and ad hoc organizations that sprang up to conduct the campaign.'”

Campaign planners communicated regularly with agencies in Washing-
ton and with deployed wings, frequently bypassing intermediate theater-
level organizations. The STU-III and secure fax created the potential for
a tremendous volume of communication between parallel groups in the
theater and the United States, dealing with everything from the selection of
targets to the status of various spare parts or key munitions. Traditional
hierarchies and cumbersome procedures were bypassed, leading to improvi-
sation and creativity on the one hand and confusion on the other.

Targeting and sortie production were affected in many ways. On
numerous occasions, the Checkmate organization in the Pentagon worked
with Washington intelligence organizations to develop prospective targets,
then called or faxed the target identification, often including building or site
diagrams, to the strategic planning cell in Riyadh. If the target was a high
priority one, General Glosson might call a fighter unit on the same day and
divert aircraft to this new target. A day later, another call from Washington
could bring the first information on target damage. Significantly, the entire
intelligence organization in Riyadh could be unaware of these actions until
later, if at all. Similarly, adequate coordination with tanker, electronic
countermeasures, and reconnaissance aircraft was at times omitted in these
late targeting changes, with a resulting loss in sorties and effectiveness,'*

Conditions in the theater made extensive use of secure telephones a
necessity. In the early days of the deployment, the STU-III tied into the
local commercial telephone system was one of the few communications
capabilities available. Later, premission communications by a mission
commander with elements of an attack package at distant bases still took

"Col Randy Witt, et al, “Air Force Tactical Communications in War: The Desert
Shield/Desent Storm Comm Story,” Hq CENTAF, Mar 1991, GWAPS, NA 49; Hq TAC
DCS Communications-Computer Systems, “Desert Shield/Desent Storm After Action
Repon,” 16 Jul 1991, GWAPS, NA 180.

See Chapters 2, 4, and 5.

231



“Command and Control

U.S. forces had almost a monopoly on airborne command and control
systems, although Saudi and NATO airborne warning and control system
(AWACS) aircraft performed supporting roles. Nearly half of the U.S.
Air Force’s AWACS fleet took part. Flying from Saudi Arabia, a contin-
gent of eleven Air Force E-3 AWACS aircraft, flying three at a time,
Maintained continuous coverage of the air picture from the Red Sea to
Persian Gulf throughout the war. On the flanks of the E-3 orbits, U.S.
Navy E-2C aircraft augmented the AWACS coverage, working principally
with Navy aircraft, and a Saudi E-3 flew in a rear orbit over Central
Saudi Arabia. Flying from Incirlik, Turkey, a contingent of three U.S.
Air Force E-3 AWACS provided airborne control for the Proven Force
missions into Iraq. NATO E-3 AWACS defended Turkey, but were not
authorized to take part in offensive operations against Iraq. Both systems
played their part: NATO for defensive purposes only and U.S. AWACS
for controlling offensive strikes.'*

AWACS aircraft organized the air battle, and airbome battlefield com-
mand and control center (ABCCC) aircraft, specially equipped Air Force
EC-130s, took part in controlling air attacks against Iraqi ground forces.
Several other systems acted with them. U.S. Air Force EC-135s served as
radio relays for the ABCCC aircraft (antenna placement on the ABCOC
aircraft hindered communications with aircraft at higher altitudes). Air
Force OA-10s and Marine OV-10s and F/A-18Ds served as forward air
controllers to direct strike aircraft on close air support missions. And the
Joint Surveillance and Targeting Attack Radar System (JSTARS) aircraft,
a late addition to the theater, detected moving Iraqi forces.'®

The JSTARS aircraft was not designed to perform command and
control, but it did, in part, serve in that role. JSTARS had advanced

15S) Memo, Capt Guy Cafiero to GWAPS, Task Force 4, “E-3 Employment Desert
Storm,” AWACS File, GWAPS; (S)Intvw, CMSgt Jerome E. Schroeder with
Maj Gen James L. Jamerson, Commander, JTF Proven Force, Ramstein AB, Germany,
27 Mar 1991, GWAPS, NA 124.

"Other aircraft, such as the U.S. Navy’s S-3s and British Nimrods, also assisted with
command and control connectivity-a particularly difficult task for the Coalition given the
great distances to the target area and the broad dispersion of the strike aircraft.

192



the cargo and redesignated some for sea transport.® At the other end of the
pipeline, units did the best they could to get the material out of Dhahran:

Deployed tactical airlift units would fly the first sortie of the day to Dhahran
and leave several people (from units deployed to the various operating
locations) there to roam about the yard looking for their shipments and
Tetum on the last sortie of the day with whatever they had found.’

Military Airlift Command addressed weaknesses in the priority system by
setting up a special airlift route, Desert Express, to move critical parts to the
Gulf quickly. By the end of October 1990, a MAC cargo aircraft flew daily
to the theater from Charleston Air Force Base, South Carolina, with the most
critical parts needed for wartime readiness. Commercial air express services
brought critical supplies to Charleston, where they were transloaded to Desert
Express and delivered to the theater usually within 72 hours of requisition
(previously, it took as long as two weeks). A similar system, European
Express, brought parts to the Gulf from Europe. Results were dramatic:
grounding actions for Air Force aircraft decreased from 500 (for the 750
aircraft being maintained) on 1 October 1990 to 219 (for 1,229 aircraft) on
17 January 1991. No comparative data are available for the other Services,
but they received similar service—half of the shipments, in fact, were destined
for Army units. During Desert Storm, the overall rate for Air Force aircraft
being unready to fly because of supply shortages was less than 4 percent,
better even than the standard for peacetime, and far less than the projected
war standard of up to 25 percent after 30 days of combat.*

Supplying jet fuel for Coalition aircraft could have been an even greater
problem than spare parts, had it not been for fuels support by the host na-
tions and requisitioning refueling equipment from Air Force units around the
world. The amounts needed were staggering; the Air Force alone used
fifteen million gallons of jet fuel a day at the height of the war. Except for
some specialized jet fuels, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and the United Arab Emir-
ates contributed all fuel for land, sea, and air operations—approximately
$2 billion dollars worth—and negated the need for a substantial sealift effort
by an inadequate U.S. sealift tanker fleet. Storing, transporting, and issuing

SJULLS Number 31952-58451 (00218), submitted by Jerry Rife; RAND, Assessment
of Desert Shield Deployment, p 68; Lt Gen Vernon J. Kondra, Operation Desert Shield -
Desert Storm: The Vernon J. Kondra Notes, 24 August 1990 - 31 May 1992, transcribed
by Clayton Snedecker, 21st AF Historian (McGuire AFB, NJ: 21st AF, 1992), pp 16-17.

7MACILERX staff paper, undated, provided during an intyw with Mr. Orson Glover,
HQ MACILGSW, 11-12 Aug 1992.

“Background Paper, “CENTAF Logistics Story.” CENTAF/LG, Apr 1991.

210



“We wanted to burn into everybody’s souls that fact that the survey’s
responsibility . , . was to ascertain facts and to seek truth, eliminating
completely any preconceived theories or dogmas.”

The Survey attempted to create a body of data common to all of the
reports. Because one group of researchers compiled this core material
while other task forces were researching and drafting other, more narrow-
ly focused studies, it is possible that discrepancies exist among the reports
with regard to points of detail. More importantly, authors were given
discretion, within the bounds of evidence and plausibility, to interpret
events as they saw them. In some cases, task forces came to differing
conclusions about particular aspects of this war. Such divergences of
view were expected and even desired: the Survey was intended to serve
as a point of departure for those who read its reports, and not their ana-
lytical terminus.



Stealth/Low Observability

Stealthy, low-observable platforms were the keystones of Coalition
attacks against the Iraqi air defense system, leadership, and communica-
tions targets early on the first day of the war, even in heavily defended
areas. Throughout the war, they attacked with complete surprise and
were nearly impervious to Iraqi air defenses. Stealthy platforms needed
minimal support from other aircraft but were able to provide stealth to a
much larger force by disabling the enemy’s air defense system, thus
making all Coalition aircraft harder to detect and attack.” Stealth thus not
only restored a measure of surprise to air warfare, it provided air forces
some freedom of action that otherwise would not have been attainable.

USS. forces used three platforms during the Gulf War that were in the
stealth/low-observability category: the F-117 stealth fighter’ and two long-
range cruise missiles, the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile (TLAM) and.
the Conventional Air-Launched Cruise Missile (CALCM). Neither cruise
missiles nor the stealth fighter figured in the deployment plans envisioned
in pre-Desert Shield of Operations Plan 1002-90, but they became vital
parts of the strategic air campaign. The F-117, which flew only two
percent of the total attack sorties, struck nearly forty percent of the strate-
gic targets and remained the centerpiece of the strategic air campaign for
the entire war. Two hundred and eighty-eight TLAMs were launched
during the war, sixty-four percent in the first two days of the air war and
none after 1 February. Only thirty-five CALCMs were employed, all
launched from B-52s on the first day of the war.

Low observability made possible direct strikes at the heart of the Iraqi
air defense system at the very outset of the war. In the past, air forces
fought through elaborate defenses and accepted losses on their way to the
target or rolled those defenses back. In the Gulf War, the Coalition could
Strike Iraqi air defenses immediately, and they never recovered from these
initial, stunning blows. With the combination of stealth and accuracy

2Low observability as a design and engineering goal involves the systematic reduc-
tion of observable signatures in various spectra, including, but not limited to, radar. The
design of stealthy aircraft like the F-117 focused on reducing radar signatures because
radar-based air defenses have long posed the greatest threat to air operations. Striclly
speaking it is the combination of low observability and tactics that produces stealth in an
operational sense. During this discussion, however, these terms will be used somewhat
interchangeably.

3in some ways it is incorrect to call the F-117 a fighter—it is really a single-seat
bomber.

224



support aircraft, and a period of poor weather and restricted visibility
caused by oil fires limited the ability of many aircraft to perform close
air support.

Fortunately, Coalition planners enjoyed a comfortable surplus of
available close air support sorties that could engage alternate targets well
ahead of the rapidly moving ground advance. Aircraft equipped with
radar-aimed release systems used this less accurate tactic, while many of
those not so equipped had to return with their bombs. While some sorties
of true close air support did fly, most of the effort, and the subsequent
destruction, fell on the heavy reserve divisions and the retreating columns
of the Iraqi army as it fled Kuwait. The highway proceeding northwest
out of Kuwait City and Al Jahra and over Mutla Ridge, the “highway of
death,” was one such bottleneck of traffic that came under attack during
this retreat (see Figure 8).7*

In the later stages of the war, the air effort focused on supporting the
ground campaign. Air attacks throughout Iraq continued, however, de-
stroying bridges to the theater, military support facilities, and communi-
cations within the theater, and attacking surviving or newly identified
Scud, chemical, biological, and nuclear sites. In addition, Baghdad,
which generally had been spared since 13 February, came under renewed
air attack during the final four days of the war, as U.S. planners made a
last attempt to cripple the national leadership. This last effort included
an F-111F attack on deep bunkers with GBU-28 deep-penetrator weapons.

The war ended with a Coalition-declared cease-fire at 0800 on
28 February 1991. The Iragi army had been driven into a comer of
southern Iraq, south of the Euphrates River and west of a canal near
Basra; neither waterway was easily passable. Coalition ground forces had
teached the banks of the Euphrates River and had approached to within
thirty miles of Basra, Arab forces occupied Kuwait City. By any mea-
sure, Iraq had suffered a crushing military defeat, and air power had
proved central to that outcome.

See discussion in Chapter 3.



Note the highest totals are for those kill boxes containing the heavy
divisions of the Republican Guard and other nearby heavy divisions in
central Kuwait (AF7, AE6, and AF6).

Figure 25
Strikes Targeted by Kill Box, 17 Jan-28 Feb 1991

Several adjustments in tactics and munitions took place before Iraqi
equipment attrition began to rise at a satisfactory rate. Those adjustments
included an increased number of sorties to the Kuwait theater,”
CENTAF’s direction that the F-16s and A-10s lower attack and release
altitudes, and increased proficiency of the crews as they gained experi-
ence. A sharp increase in the destruction of Iraqi equipment also oc-
curred at the end of January during the battle of Al Khafji, when the Iraqi
armored vehicles left their revetments and moved on roads.*' By far the

°(S) Text of CENTCOM brig, 26 Jan 1991, GWAPS, CHST 28; Gen Horner Com-
ments, 26 Jan 1991, GWAPS, CHP 13-B.

*"This battle is discussed later in the chapter.

104



Kuwaiti F-1 squadron was an air-to-air unit, but because Iraq also flew
F-1s (thus causing an aircraft identification problem), Kuwaiti F-1s were
not allowed to fly air defense missions. They did, however, fly bombing
missions, escorted by Kuwaiti A-4s so they could be readily identified.”

The air defense mission and others such as reconnaissance, aerial
refueling, and airlift began in earnest in August 1990, not January 1991.
The number of combat air patrol missions during Desert Shield was
similar to the defensive counterair missions of Desert Storm—-13,887 and
13,075, respectively.” During Desert Shield, the U.S. portion of combat
air patrol was similar to the portion flown in Desert Storm, approximately
67 percent, but the Service contributions were much different: the Marine
Corps F/A-18s flew 4,461 combat air patrol sorties during Desert Shield,
far out of proportion to the number of F/A-18s in the Corps, and more
even such sorties than the Air Force (3,580). During this period, U.S.
Navy carriers were not yet in the Gulf, and Marine aircraft in Bahrain
were well placed to fly these sorties over the Gulf. The Marine Corps
flew some escort missions during Desert Storm but no defensive
counterair sorties, dedicating its effort instead to interdiction and close air
support; the U.S. Navy essentially took over flying the defensive
counterair sorties flown earlier by the Marines.*

Attack

The largest air power mission in terms of numbers of sorties and of
aircraft involved was surface target attack. The assets involved in this task
included many types of aircraft and several very different weapons systems.
Tables 6 and 7 give some idea of the variety of instruments used:°*

*°When the Kuwaiti F-1s flew, word was passed to the air defense network that F-1s
in the company of the A-4s were not hostile. (Discussions, GWAPS personnel with
Kuwaiti pilots, 15 Jul 1992, Kuwait City, Kuwait, GWAPS, NA 377.)

33There were, in addition, another 14,000 air-to-air training missions during Desert
Shield. GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Tables 47, 54, 58, and 64.

MGWAPS Statistical Compendium, Tables 47, 68, and 69.

>5USAF F-4Gs and USN and USMC EA-6Bs, discussed under electronic warfare,
could as well be included in this listing based on their HARM employment.
(S) CENTAF Combat Plans Handout, “Desert Shield Beddown/Sortie Rates,” as of 15 Jan

198



Figure 1
Map of Region

the request of the United Arab Emirates, and the six Navy ships of Cen-
tral Command’s Joint Task Force Middle East. On 6 August, Saudi King
Faud requested military assistance following a meeting in Riyadh with a
U.S. delegation that included the Secretary of Defense Richard B.
Cheney, Gen. Schwarzkopf, and Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner, Commander,
Air Force Component, Central Command (CENTAF). Schwarzkopf
designated Horner the CENTCOM forward commander, placing him in
charge of the beddown of forces that began flowing into the theater
within days, while Schwarzkopf returned to the United States.

Under an umbrella of Saudi F-15Cs and AWACS on 24-hour defen-
sive air patrol, the build-up of Coalition forces on the Arabian peninsula
began. The first aircraft in the region included the USS Independence
carrier air wing, the First Tactical Fighter Wing (F-15Cs) and E-3 Air-
borne Warning and Control Aircraft from the United States, and RC-135
(Rivet Joint) reconnaissance aircraft from Europe. Troops from the 82d
Airborne Division assumed defensive positions around the airports. By



in Warfare?, concludes the report by assessing the extent to which the
success of air operations in this war augurs a broader transformation of
warfare.

Then-Secretary of the Air Force Donald B. Rice gave the Survey a
Mandate to examine the widest possible range of issues relating to air
power in the Gulf War. In this endeavor the Survey soon became aware
that it suffered from both a glut and an insufficiency of source materials.
The glut is easily understood. In the age of the personal computer and
copying machine, organizations create vast quantities of paper, including
incremental modifications of working documents. The professional
historians of the Air Force and other Services conducted interviews
(subsequently transcribed), collected and microfilmed key papers, and in
a few cases directly recorded events as they happened. Subsequently, a
host of private and public research organizations conducted studies on
virtually every aspect of the war, uncovering further material and produc-
ing their own secondary sources. The Survey assembled its own archive
of all available material on the Gulf War (see “A Note on Sources” in
this report), an archive subsequently shipped to the Unite States Air Force
Historical Research Agency, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.

The insufficiency of information requires some explanation. Much
important discussion in this war took place via telephone conversa-
tions-rarely did participants, pressed as they were for time, take notes of
these conversations. The prevalence of the briefing (rather than the
memorandum) as a form of official communication further obscured the
historical record. Briefing slides usually consist of “bullets,” cryptically
phrased assertions or observations that take on meaning only in the
context of a discussion-for which notes rarely exist. Such slides usually
contain numbers or factual assertions of unknown provenance; very often
the Survey began tracking a number down only to find itself caught in a
circle of briefings referring to briefings.

Individuals rarely retained electronically recorded information (target
databases, for example, or videotapes of bombing runs) in archives;
rather, they updated or recorded over computer disks and videotapes.
Many of the computer management systems that should have captured
adequate information suffered partial or complete breakdowns under the
stress of operations on a vast scale and were replaced by ad hoc combina-

xviii



17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

Daily Scud Launches during Desert Storm (Riyadh time) .. 84

Coalition Strikes against Scuds ........... 2.000000 85
By-Week Launch Totals and Maximum Salvo Size

for Iraqi Scuds .. 6.6... cc eee eee 88
Damaged Bridges in Iraq (DIA). ..........0 02000005 93
Status of Bridges on Baghdad-to-KTO Routes,

28 Feb 1991... ec eeeee eee 94
Prewar Baghdad-to-KTO Route Capacities ............ 95
Baghdad-to-KTO Route Capacities, 28 Feb91 ......... 96
Fixed-Site Iraqi Naval Targets ...........0. 000 000s 100
Strikes Targeted by Kill Box, 17 Jan- 28 Feb91 ...... 104
Chokepoints for Retreating Iraqi Troops

in the Kuwait Theater... 0.2.0.0... 060 e cece eee 114
Relative Distances in the Area of Operations ......... 168
Formation of a "Package" for Attacks into Iraq .......- 169
Map of Iraq and Kuwait ... 2.2.0.2. 00 -e eee eee eee 171

Map of Region Depicting Major Air Bases used by
Coalition Air Forces During Desert Storm......... 174

Coalition ‘Aircraft Totals in Key Elements
of Airpower Support... 00.0... ccc cee ee eee 182

Aerial Refueling Tanker Tracks over Saudi Arabia
and Nearby Regions ........... 002-200 eee eee 191

vii



Air power had two important effects on the Iraqi army during the four
days of the ground war—one imposed during those four final days, the
other imposed during the preceding weeks of the campaign. Air strikes
during the air war had made the Iraqi forces in some cases unwilling and
in other cases unable to maneuver or mount an effective defense. Lack
of communications, equipment attrition, and destruction of the theater
distribution system had combined to bring about these conditions. The
rout of maneuvering Iraqi forces during the engagement at Al Khafji gave
those forces a preview of what was in store. During the ground war,
concentrated attacks on the Iraqi heavy divisions prevented them from
playing any other role than self-defense, and several of these divisions did
not even do that. In some instances involving frontline Iraqi divisions,
air power had merely to show up to prompt the forces to surrender.'"*

Estimates of air power’s worth during the ground war must look
beyond the last four days themselves. The most important contribution
of air power in the Kuwait theater during the ground war, and a prime
reason why the ground campaign was so short and so overwhelming, was
the success of air interdiction in preventing the heavy divisions from
moving or fighting effectively. Those several days of air interdiction did
not have that result—the interdiction sorties after 23 February were just
a continuation of the campaign that began on 17 January. Nor were the
interdiction sorties dissimilar from the close air support sorties flown,
interdiction and close air support sorties often occurred just a few miles
apart. What the events on the ground made clear is that air power essen-
tially paralyzed or demoralized the Iraqi heavy divisions on which the
Iraqi strategy depended. The remnants of some divisions were destroyed
in place or surrendered with little resistance; others fled the theater with-
out much of their equipment, while those closer to the border were able
to make a more orderly departure. Those left with a will to fight were
able to do little more than face the attack and return fire, with no hope
of maneuvering, or being reinforced, or achieving even tactical success.
The engagements of the Marines with elements of the Iraqi 3d Armored
Division at Kuwait International Airport on 26 February and of VII Corps
with elements of the Tawakalna, 12th, and Madinah Divisions on 26 and
27 February were just such desperate actions.

"4eSoon as air showed up, Iragis started surrendering.” (S) TACC Log entry for

25 Feb, recording comments passed by members of 1st Infantry Division, GWAPS, micro-
film roll 10263.

116



Figure 21
Status of Bridges on Baghdad-to-KTO Routes, 28 Feb 1991

ZA Damaged and \Unusable Permanent Bridges.
[21 Damaged Bur Usable Permanent Bridges
©. damaged and Unusable Pontoon Bridges

D> vente Ponoon Breo82
‘V7 Damaged and Unusable Ferry

Throughout the war, Iraq attempted to offset the destruction of its
, permanent bridges by rerouting traffic, constructing temporary bridges,
: using amphibious ferry vehicles, and building earthen causeways. The
: Iragis did not attempt to repair major structural damage to bridges, per-
haps because of the brevity of the conflict and the threat of further:
strikes. Resupply traffic moving south used secondary routes to bypass
damaged bridges, but rerouting became more difficult as bridge damage
spread. The skill the Iragis exhibited in coping with the destruction of
their permanent bridges led General Horner after the war to caution,

94



and another 800 air defense fighters and electronic combat aircraft to
prosecute the air campaign.*

‘When the air campaign began on 17 January 1991, air planners and
commanders were confident. At a relatively low cost-one hundred or so
losses maximum-they thought that the ambitious objectives set in the
operations plan could be met. They were concerned about the possibility
of a preemptive Iraqi attack, but thought that only a few enemy aircraft
would penetrate Coalition defenses. Chemical warfare posed a threat, but
less to air than to ground forces. Planners had little doubt that within a
month, the Iraqi Army would flee Kuwait or, more likely, lie shattered
in place, that Iraqi military industry and the Iraqi Air Force would be de-
stroyed, and that Saddam Hussein’s grip on Iraq would be, if not re-
moved, weakened beyond repair.

‘5Viewgraph, Gen Horner Briefing to the Secretary of Defense, 20 Dec 1990, in
“General Glosson Briefings.”

53



ability to fly nonstop enabled F-15Cs to be on alert in Saudi Arabia
within a day after notification to deploy and 5 U.S. Air Force fighter
squadrons to arrive in the region within 5 days. Similarly, aerial refuel-
ing not only extended the range of attack aircraft, it allowed massive
concentrations of strikes and continuous airborne control and surveillance
of battle areas.

Figure 32
Aerial Refueling Tanker Tracks over Saudi Arabia
and Nearby Regions

Two aircraft carriers were also on station in the region by this time.

191



Figure 2
Shift to the West by U.S. XVII Corps and VII Corps

As-Samawah
eo

E“D rates AreNasiiy ah
2

SAUDI ARABIA %

Gourdary repinseriations ere nc necessarily athritave,

troops to the theater in response to the announced Coalition increase,
bringing the number of Iraqi troops to a nominal 680,000."° In January
1991, the Defense Intelligence Agency estimated that Iraq had 42 to 43
divisions in the theater with 540,000 troops, more than 4,200 tanks, 2,800
armored personnel carriers, and approximately 3,100 artillery pieces. In
addition to its ground forces, Baghdad had more than 700 combat aircraft
and a multilayered air defense system, a navy of missile-firing patrol
boats, and Silkworm surface-to-surface missiles for coastal defense."

"New York Times, 20 Nov 1990, p A-1.
"Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, pp 11-13, 84-85.



the analysts’ task of determining a unit’s size and composition once the
unit itself was identifiec. Second, the size of the Iraqi army in the Kuwait
theater increased throughout the fall of 1990, just as the Coalition forces
did, so any estimate of Iraqi strength was soon out of date. Third, the
Iraqis made major efforts to thwart accurate preconflict estimates by Coali-
tion intelligence agencies through extensive deception, such as constructing
numerous unoccupied berms and deploying decoy tanks and artillery. And
finally, indications of independent Iraqi brigades and of divisions with
additional attached brigades compounded the process of identifying and
properly classifying all the units in the theater. Because of these compli-
cating factors, the estimates used figures for the Iraqi units at full strength
in men and equipment. Later analysis would indicate that the less-than-full
manning made the estimates too high by twenty to twenty-five percent.’”

Enough information became available during the air campaign (pri-
marily reports from Iraqi soldiers defecting into Saudi Arabia) to cast doubt
on the original strength estimates, but those estimates remained unchanged.
Defector reports numbered in the hundreds, but these Iraqi soldiers came
almost entirely from the frontline infantry divisions and thus gave little
indication of the status of heavy divisions in the rear.'* Furthermore, the
US. military command structure refused to comment on or engage in
assessments of Iraqi personnel strength, or losses, either during or after the
war. Generals Powell and Schwarzkopf, made wary of body counts by
their experiences in the Vietnam War, chose what they thought a more
important estimate-the numbers of maneuver divisions and brigades.’

The overestimate of the Iraqi equipment totals induced an unintended
consequence in theater targeting. Central Command carefully considered

‘7Analyses of Iraqi personnel and equipment strengths at the beginning of the air
campaign, beginning of the ground offensive, and the end of the war, are examined in
Chapters | and 3 of this report.

‘SWhile the Survey estimates there were well over 100,000 Iraqi deserters, the bulk
of these retumed to Iraq, not across the line into Saudi Arabia.

'SCENTCOM News Brfg of Gen H. Norman Schwarzkopf, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,
27 Feb 1991; (TS) Intww, Mr. Ron Cole, JCS/Historical Staff, and Ms. Diane Pulney,
Office of Air Force History, with Rear Admiral J.M. McConnell, USN, Deputy Director
for Intelligence. Joint Staff, 14 Feb 1992, GWAPS, NA 261.

127



Which Technologies Worked?

The uniqueness of a war is partly reflected in its characteristic tech-
nologies and equipment. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower and his staff
identified what they believed were the five most important pieces of
equipment contributing to success in Africa and Europe. Eisenhower
speaks of them in his memoirs:

... the “duck,” an amphibious vehicle . . . proved to be one of the most
valuable pieces of equipment produced by the United States during the
war....[FJour other pieces of equipment... [that] came to (be)
regarded as among the most vital to our success . . . were the bulldozer,
the jeep, the 24 ton truck and the C-47 airplane. Curiously enough,
none of these is designed for combat.

The uniqueness of the Gulf War can be approached in a similar way by
looking at five kinds of technology—not always single pieces of equip-
ment—that seem to best characterize the air campaign. The number five
is of course arbitrary and was chosen simply to limit the discussion and,
in part, to mirror the Eisenhower example. We selected five capabilities
and technologies from a longer list of candidates, any one of which could
arguably have been included in the top five. Space systems, logistics,
and strategic and tactical airlift were just a few of the candidates, Unlike
Eisenhower’s list, however, the Gulf War listing focuses solely on the
execution of the air campaign, not on the many worthy logistical and
support elements that could have been cited. Note, too, that our selec-
tions are not intended to suggest that these technologies are the best or
most important items of U.S. air power but only that they worked best in
the Gulf War. The five topics chosen for discussion are Stealth/Low
Observability, Laser-Guided Bombs, Aerial Refueling, the high-speed
antiradiation missile (HARM), and the STU-IIL, a secure telephone.

‘Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe (New York: Doubleday and Company,
1948), pp 163-64,

223



Part 2

EFFECTS AND EFFECTIVENESS

Task Force Chief:

Principal Authors:
Dr. Thomas A. Keaney

Principal Contributors:
Capt. William W. Bruner
Mr. Kurt R. Guthe
Mr. Steven L. Orton

VOLUME Ill

Part 1

Mr. Barry D. Watts

Mr. Barry D. Watts

Capt. Gary L. Crowder
Lt. Col. Richard P. King
Dr. Stephen P. Rosen

LOGISTICS

Task Force Chief:
Principal Author:

Contributing Authors:
Mr. Roger K. Coffey
Maj. Daniel L. Draper
Lt. Col. Constance D. Graham
Maj. Gen. (Ret) Click D. Smith, Jr.

Part 2
SUPPORT

Task Force Chief:

Principal Authors:
Mr. Ted Beck
Capt. Ariane L. Desaussure
Mr. Fonce B. Gipson
Lt. Col. Harry L. Heintzelman, IV
Dr. James S. Nanney
Lt, Col. Lorraine K. Potter
Maj. Michael H. Whitaker

xiv

i
1
H
tl
\
Hl

Mr. Richard A. Gunkel

Mr. Richard L. Olson

Mr. Francis E. Cartwright
Mr. Dennis K. Dakan
Mr. James A. Forbes

Mr. John W. Schade

Mr. Richard A. Gunkel

Lt. Col. Donald G. Belle
Mr. Edgar L. Franklin

Dr. Ronald B. Hartzer

Maj. Thomas R. MacPhail
Dr. Albert C. Pierce

Lt. Col. Michael L. Warden



Intelligence made much more accurate estimates of Iraqi army and air
force dispositions and intentions. In the early fall, intelligence estimates
correctly noted that the invading Iraqi force had transitioned to a defen-
sive posture. Intelligence knew the locations and intentions of the less
capable regular army units digging in near the Kuwaiti/Saudi Arabian
border and the more capable Republican Guard being kept as a strategic
reserve. By the end of 1990, the national intelligence community be-
lieved that Iraq would defend in place, try to force the Coalition (if it
were to attack) into a war of attrition on the ground, and attempt to arrive
at a stalemate that would undermine U.S. national will."

Of particular interest to air power planners was the appraisal of the
Iraqi air force and its supporting air defenses; an October 1990 Central
Intelligence Agency assessment correctly surmised that

The Iraqi Air Force would not be effective because it would either be
neutralized quickly by Coalition air action or it would be withheld from
action in hardened shelters. Within a few days, Iraqi air defenses would
be limited to AAA [antiaircraft artillery} and hand-held and surviving
light SAMs [surface-to-air missiles]. The AAA would present a signifi-
cant threat to low-level air operations. . . .'

In the months to follow, other intelligence organizations addressed
this issue. The Naval Intelligence Command's Strike Projection Evalua-
tion and Anti-Air Warfare Research (SPEAR) group made a particularly
accurate forecast. They held that the Iraqi air force would not put up a
determined defense, relying instead on hit-and-run and dispersal tactics
to enhance its survival. In addition, the naval analysts (a highly success-
ful mix of operational and intelligence personnel) correctly foretold
Baghdad's reliance on radar-guided surface-to-air missiles as the mainstay
of its air defense and accurately assessed the strengths and weaknesses of
its KARI integrated air defense system."*

"(S/NFINC/OC) CIA memo of Jan 1991.
"CIA assessment of Oct 1990.

'(S/NF(WNINC) Doc, SPEAR, Naval Intelligence Command, Iragi Threat To
U.S. Forces, 10 Dec 1990, p 3-53.

125



B-52s traveled 2,900 or more miles from Diego Garcia, Moron Air Base
(Spain) or Fairford Air Base (Great Britain).

Figure 27
Relative Distances in the Area of Operation

ry
Chicago, IL is
px, (Kuwait Clty) fi ?

5
= Washington, DC
f4—— (Al Minhad)

Cheyenne, WY!
(Wel Aviv) 7

Memphis, TN
(Riyadh)

Lexington, KY
(Dhahran)

New Orleana, LA
{Khamis Muahait)

Flying from the Saudi and other Gulf state bases meant coordination
and flight rendezvous with other aircraft from bases hundreds of miles apart.
From Al Minhad in the United Arab Emirates, for example, F16s would
typically join in a “package” of aircraft that could include F-15Cs from
Tabuk in Saudi Arabia, EF-111s from Taif in Saudi Arabia, F-4Gs from
Shaikh Isa in Bahrain, and KC-135s from Seeb, Oman, along with airbome
control aircraft from several additional bases. While the above example
names only U.S. Air Force aircraft, packages also included Navy, Marine,
and other Coalition aircraft. The complexity of the coordination and the
distances involved added to the scale of operations: the package cited above
might involve twenty-four to thirty-six aircraft, and dozens of such packages
flew every day.

168



the Services were launched during the first week of the war. After that,
just the threat posed by the HARMs kept most Iraqi radars off the air.
The decoys, too, were used principally during the first week of the war,
most on the first night and only sparingly after that. Not surprisingly,
most Iraqi air combat sorties and air-to-air losses (14) to Coalition fight-
ers occurred during that same first week of the war. Subsequent losses
occurred when Iraqi aircraft attempted to flee to Iran, not while trying to
defend Iraqi airspace. By 27 January, air supremacy was achieved.

Figure 5
Coalition Air Strikes by Day Against Iraqi Targets

1,400

1,200

1,000

B00

Strikes:

600

400

200

FER Strategic Tarpers rag Amy [i Arrond Sea Contra

Strategic targets are defined in Chapters 2 and 3 (see in particular Figure 12). Iraqi
army strikes include attacks on equipment, troop concentrations, and logistics sites of the
Traqi army in the Kuwait theater. Air and sea control includes attacks on airfields, air
defense sites, and Iraqi naval and coastal defense targets.

Source: GWAPS Database.


most essential information over the telephone long before the ATO ar-
rived electronically or physically.

Some critics of the ATO complained that it took too long not only to
transmit and receive but also to prepare. After the war, one report on the
Marine experience said that the ATO was “an attempt to run a minute-by-
minute air war at a 72-hour pace.” This criticism was not entirely
warranted because most Marine sorties went into the Kuwait theater of
operations, and many were handled by airbome controllers on a minute-
by-minute basis. Indeed, in the case of fixed targets in Iraq, the opposite
complaint was made; instead of permitting the ATO process to plan at
least two days in advance, Glosson was prone to calling his wing com-
manders with last minute changes.

The three-day ATO process began with the creation of a Master
Attack Plan in the Iraq target planning cell (the Black Hole) and the KTO
target planning cell (drawn from the old CENTAF staff). The Master
Attack Plan was much shorter than the ATO because the former included
less information and dealt with fewer sorties. The Master Attack Plan
that dealt only with sorties that penetrated Iraq and Kuwait air space did
not include air refueling and airlift sorties. In addition the Master Attack
Plan listed only times on target, mission numbers, target numbers, target
names, aircraft types, and number of aircraft. The ATO added radio call
signs, munition loads, identification “squawk” codes, air refueling guid-
ance (tanker call signs, mission numbers, and tracks), and special instruc-
tions (or “spins”) on air refueling procedures, airspace control, rescue,
communications, jamming, and so forth. Since the Master Attack Plan
listed strike packages chronologically according to time on target, it
offered a more comprehensible picture of the air campaign than the ATO,
which listed sorties by unit. The Master Attack Plan was a new tool for
building a more coherent ATO.

"John D. Parson, Benjamin T. Regala, and Orman H. Paananen, Marine Corps
Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol IV: Third Marine Aircraft Wing Operations
(Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1992),

150


CAP Combat Air Patrot

CAS Close Air Support
CBU Cluster Bomb Unit
CEM Combined Effects Munition
RI. CENTAF Air Force Component, Central
ae Command
CENTCOM U.S. Central Command
I CES Civil Engineering Squadron
| CIA Central Intelligence Agency
1 CINC Commander-in-Chief
CINCCENT Commander-in-Chief, Central
Command
CICS Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff
CNN Cable News Network

COMUSCENTAF Commander, U.S. Air Force
Component, Central Command

t CRAF Civil Reserve Air Fleet
1 CSAR Combat Search and Rescue
| | CVBG Aircraft Carrier Battle Group (USN)
ay D-Day Unnamed day on which an operations
| begins
A | DIA Defense Intelligence Agency
3 Div Division
| | | DMAAC Defense Mapping Agency Aerospace
1 Center
| DMPI Desired Mean Point of Impact
| l DOD Department of Defense

: i | DSB Defense Science Board —
ECM Electronic Countermeasures

| 258
|



results face-to-face in the same room, minimizing even the need for a
published air tasking order.

Terrain in the target areas presented several advantages to the attack-
ing aircraft but posed some problems as well. The flat, undifferentiated
desert terrain of the Kuwait theater made visual orientation of targets by
the attack aircraft quite difficult. The combination of the high altitudes
flown by the attacking aircraft, the Iraqi use of decoys and camouflage,
obscuring smoke, and conditions of blowing sand (and, particularly late
in the war, smoke from oil fires) complicated both visual and infrared
observation of vehicles and equipment. Aircrews in aircraft equipped
with infrared targeting and navigation systems discovered that they could
pick out vehicles effectively at night, and particularly in the early eve-
ning, since the different cooling rates of the sand and the metals of Iraqi
vehicles made the vehicles stand out at night as beacons in the infrared
targeting systems of Air Force and Navy aircraft.

The geography of Iraq dictated the paths of resupply to the Kuwait
theater. Supply route from the north had to cross a series of bridges over
the Euphrates or Tigris Rivers and transit a network of roads that merged
as they approached the city of Al Basra. These bridges and roads provid-
ed excellent targets for air interdiction operations. At the same time, the
open and rather hard-packed ground allowed the resupply effort to bypass
damaged sections of roads and many bridges. Perhaps the most dominant
terrain feature of the Kuwait theater was the large marshy lake, the Hawr
al Hammar, beginning west of Al Basra and extending further west
towards An Nasiriyah. This lake formed a northem barrier for the Iraqi
army in the theater, passable at one main causeway. When the Coalition
ground forces attacked from the south and west, the Iragi army’s only
path of retreat lay north over this causeway or eastward to the damaged
and destroyed bridges over the canal west of Al Basra.° On 27 February,
the last day of the war, the area bounded by Coalition forces, the Hawr
al Hammar, and the canal became the Basra pocket. This area contained
most of the Iraqi forces that had not fled the theater earlier or fallen
prisoner to the Coalition.

*See Chapter 3 for discussions of the attacks on the bridges in Iraq and the retreat
of the Iraqi army to Al Basra.

170



information about strikes on targets. The Survey counts as a single
“strike” one aircraft delivering any number of munitions against a single
target on one sortie. If four aircraft bomb a target, that is counted as four
strikes. If one aircraft bombs two targets on a single sortie, that is
counted as two strikes. In addition to its utility in building cumulative
statistics on Coalition air attacks, the missions database enables a
researcher to learn when a particular target was struck by particular
aircraft and munitions; damage assessments are included.

The missions database relies heavily on the mission report
messages saved by a CENTAF intelligence computer, the Limited Enemy
Situation/Correlation (LENSCE) message processor. The Survey was
disappointed to learn that information storage devices associated with
operations computers in the theater were reused after thirty days, wiping
out much of the electronic record of the war. Fortunately, some of that
electronic record was preserved by LENSCE. While most mission report
Messages were saved only electronically, the Survey obtained a large
volume of other printed messages (many of which were not saved
electronically). These comprise about a third of more than 500,000 pages
of the Survey’s paper records.

The Survey’s archive of paper records is divided into four sets:
(1) records of CENTAF’s Black Hole planning group (2) records of the
Air Staff's Checkmate planning group (3) records of the Air Staff's
Operations Center, and (4) new acquisitions. The first three sets came to
GWAPS at the outset and are maintained in the filing systems of the
organizations that created them. New acquisitions include the reports of
other agencies studying the Gulf War as well as wartime records
subsequently acquired by Survey researchers. Many footnotes in the
Survey’s reports cite these records, using the identifiers listed below:

GWAPS File Series Abbreviations
Black Hole Files ...... 0.0.0... 000 eee eee BH

Checkmate Historian’s Files

Desert Shield ........... 2.00005 CHSH
Desert Storm
Planners 6.2... 2c.

254


ways in which decisionmakers may find themselves considering not only
actual media coverage of events such as the air attacks on Iraqis trying to
flee the Kuwait theater but anticipated coverage of such activities. The
principle here-that political considerations permeate war-is old, but the
acute predicament implicit in satellite coverage is relatively new.

Conclusion

Did Desert Storm constitute a revolution in the nature or conduct of
war? At a distance of two years and after careful scrutiny of the evi-
dence, some of the aspects of the war that seemed most dramatic at the
time appear less so than they did in the immediate afterglow of one of the
most one-sided campaigns in military history. Despite the talk of Iraq
possessing the fourth largest army in the world, the fact remains that in
this war a minor power found itself confronted by the full weight of the
world’s sole superpower, amply and ably aided by the forces of its key
allies. While the overall outcome-the ejection of Iraqi forces from Ku-
wait-was likely from the moment the war began, the cost and longer term
consequences were not.

True revolutions in war may take decades and require not merely new
technologies but new forms of organization and behavior to mature. It
is probably too soon to conclude without reservation that we have entered
a new era of warfare. But as we consider the war, some signposts of
change surely stand out. Military planners and organizations will wish
to reflect on the undoubted departures made during the Gulf War for
some time to come. But whether the signposts identified here really point
down paths very different from those the armed forces of the United
States have been down before will depend on the future actions of the
travellers themselves. The ingredients for a transformation of war may
well have become visible in the Gulf War, but if a revolution is to occur
someone will have to make it.

York: Bantam Books, 1992), p 468.

251



How effective was Coalition bombing of Iraq's biological-warfare
program? Two basic types of biological-warfare targets were attacked
during the air campaign: (1) infrastructure targets such as the Salman Pak
and Taji research facilities and Iraq's suspected production plants for
biological weapons (one at Al Latifiyah and two near Abu Ghurayb), and
(2) the specially designed, refrigerated bunkers scattered throughout Iraq
suspected of containing biological or other special weapons. Although
the facilities were destroyed, United Nations inspectors could not confirm
after the war that the Iragis had actually produced any biological weapons
before 17 January 1991. As in the case of attacks on chemical weapons,
however, attacks against known or suspected research and development
facilities for biological weapons served the long-term goal of reducing
Traq's postwar threat to its neighbors.

The relationship of weapons delivered on aimpoints to achievement
of operational and strategic effectiveness was particularly strained in the
case of the Iraqi nuclear program. We now know that the Iraqis’ program
to amass enough enriched uranium to begin producing atomic bombs was
more extensive, more redundant, further along, and considerably less
vulnerable to air attack than was realized at the outset of Desert Storm.
Moreover, Iraqi willingness, once the war began, to take such unorthodox
measures as disposing nuclear fuel or critical machinery from known
nuclear installations like Al Tuwaitha quickly made Iraq's nuclear pro-
gram even less vulnerable to bombing, no matter how accurate, than it
had been during Desert Shield. In this sense, elements of the Iraqi nucle-
ar program were transformed into targets that could be, and were, mobile.
Bombing known locations, therefore, failed to achieve the objective of
eliminating the existing Iraqi nuclear weapons program. The Iraqi nucle-
ar program's redundancy, advanced status on the eve of the war, and
elusiveness, in conjunction with the extraordinary measures the Iraqis
took immediately after Desert Storm to conceal its extent by destroying
certain facilities, led the United Nations to conclude that the air campaign
no more than “inconvenienced” Iraqi plans to field atomic weapons.”

Some eighteen bunkers were known before to the war, and others were discovered
during the course of the campaign. Not all of those eventually identified were hit before
the cease-fire.

5®The judgment that the bombing at most “inconvenienced” the Iraqi nuclear program

was offered by an American who participated in some of the LAEA inspection teams that
went into Iraq under UN Resolution 687 in 1991.

82



never knew enough about Iraqi employment procedures to provide the
cueing necessary to bring effective air power to bear on the mobile
Scuds. Several intelligence teams examined the mobile Scud issue and
relayed promising information to DIA and the theater.’ These teams were
schooled in how the Soviets had operated Scuds in Warsaw Pact exercises
and the infrared and radar signatures mobile Scud launchers would emit
if employed according to previous Soviet practices. The DIA/J-2 intelli-
gence team in particular created target materials illustrating how hard it
would be for aircraft to acquire mobile launchers with onboard sensors—
especially from medium altitude or higher.” When war finally came, this
inherent difficulty with target acquisition by fixed-wing aircraft operating
at night from medium altitudes was further compounded by major Iraqi
divergences from known Soviet practices. The Iraqis would arrive at a
mobile launch site, set up within a few minutes, and, dispensing with
many of the normal calibrations, launch and be on their way within about
ten minutes."

Although intelligence identified most, if not all, of the fixed launch
sites, analysts could not find mobile launch or intermediate assembly or
preparation sites, and so could not predict with any precision the locations
from which Scuds might be launched. Moreover, the “Scud hunt” un-
folded in a way that tended to mask this problem from intelligence ana-
lysts, strike planners, and commanders alike. The first ten days of the air
campaign saw numerous claims of mobile Scud kills by aircrews, backed
in some cases with cockpit video, and the lull in launches during the third
and fourth weeks seemed, at first, to substantiate pilot reports. In retro-
spect, however, many of the Coalition aircraft had struck decoys, other
shorter range missiles, or traffic such as fuel trucks. Intelligence had not
understood the full scope of Baghdad's Scud decoy program and exploita-
tion of “low signature” firing locations.

®(SINF) Rpt, HQ USAF/IN, “Operation Desert Storm Lessons Learned,” 5 May
1991, JULLS Number 41421-92977 (00018), pp 34-35; (S) Intww, L1 Gen Charles A,
Horner, transcript dtd 28 Jan 1992, GWAPS, NA 303.

*Intww, GWAPS with Capt Edward O'Connell, 23 May 1992. O'Connell was in the
DIA targeting branch during the war.

"Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 167; Hero, p 420.

124



target list 31, 32, 41, 43, 46, 64, 80,
123, 130, 134, 160

Tawakalna 10, 107, 110, 117

Tenoso, Edwin E. 148

terrorism 176

TFS (see Tactical Fighter Wing)

TFW 21, 63, 84, 112, 129, 172, 217

the America 102

TIS (see Tactical Intelligence
Squadron)

TLAM (see Tomahawk)

Tomahawk 12, 14, 37, 73, 135, 182,
200, 224, 225, 245

Torrejon AB, Spain 164, 186

TR-1 194

TriStar 190

Turkey 5, 16, 52, 75, 159, 165, 166,
169, 177, 181, 192, 194, 220, 222

Turkish 52, 165

Tuwaitha 83

U

U.S. Air Force 4, 6, 16, 61, 128, 159,
164, 165, 168, 176, 188, 190-192,
194, 197, 199, 200, 202, 205, 229,
240, 243

U.S. Army 30, 51, 78, 98, 104, 113,
138, 175, 176, 195, 199, 200, 204,
236, 238

U.S. Central Command (see Central
Command)

U.S. European Command 52, 160

U.S, Marine Corps 4, 37, 38, 51, 93,
104, 106, 108, 111-113, 140, 145,
146, 150, 153, 154, 181, 190, 195-
199, 202-205, 213, 229

U.S. Navy 3, 8, 12, 21, 23, 29, 37,
38, 93, 100, 102, 104, 108, 127,
129, 139, 145, 146, 149, 153, 154,
160, 168-170, 181, 190, 192,
195-200, 202-205, 212, 213, 216,
229, 243

USS. Special Operations Command
84, 199

USS Independence 2, 3

USS Ranger 250

USS Saratoga 59

U-2 194

UK (sce United Kingdom)

UN (see United Nations)

United Arab Emirates 3. 168, 181,
189, 210

United Kingdom 64, 77, 98, 188, 203

United Nations 1, 4, 7, 27, 45, 56,
75, 77, 80, 82, 83, 87, 91, 120, 123

United Nations Special Commission
80, 82, 123

United States 181, 207

USAFE 17, 52, 149, 165, 166.

USCENTAF 46, 62, 129-131, 139,
140, 142, 153, 160, 177, 193, 216,
234

USCENTCOM (see Central
Command)

USCINCCENT 5, 27, 29, 30, 32, 39,
46, 49-51, 106, 111, 128, 146, 154,
160

USEUCOM (see U.S. European
Command)

USMC (see U.S. Marine Corps)

USN (see U.S. Navy)

v

¥C-10 190

Vietnam 61, 62, 127, 145, 152, 155,
159, 164, 173, 201, 207, 214,
219-221, 226, 230, 234, 237,
239-241, 243, 244, 245

w

Waller, Calvin 155

Walleye 203

War of the cities 83

Warden, John A. 35-38, 41, 47, 137,
220, 221, 236

Washington 19, 21, 22, 30, 34, 37,
45, 46, 63, 69, 79, 85, 106, 114,
121, 129, 131, 132-134, 137, 139,
141-143, 145, 147, 148, 152, 208,
216, 221, 231, 236, 237, 243

Washington Post 113, 252

weaponeering 14, 132

weapons of mass destruction 43, 82

Weasel Police 230

weather 16, 22, 24, 69, 103, 113,
116, 140, 151, 156, 167, 171-173,
181, 203, 215, 223, 225, 247

weather information 249

Wisconsin 242

275



in Baghdad with air conditioners were running them full blast? The
speed with which the Iraqis restored capacity without external assistance
provides evidence that Coalition air inflicted little long-term damage on
the Iraqi power system. Even those who charged that the bombing of
target systems like electric power had been “unnecessary” readily conced-
ed, on the basis of extensive postwar site inspections, that the strategic air
campaign had resulted in very few Iraqi civilian casualties.“

Some critics argued, however, that the bombing of electric power had
“contributed to” 70,000-90,000 postwar civilian deaths above normal
mortality rates over the period April-December 1991~principally because
of the lack of electricity in Iraq for water purification and sewage treat-
ment following the cease-fire. These calculations were made without
anticipation of the unexpectedly rapid resumption of electric power in
Iraq, however.

Marie Colvin, “Saddam Erases the Scars of War,” London Sunday Times, 4 Oct
1992, p 16.

“Greenpeace’s estimates of countrywide Iraqi civilian casualties caused by Coalition
bombing totaled 2,278 dead and 5,976 injured (William Arkin, brig viewgraph titled,
“Civilian Casualties and Damage,” presentation given to GWAPS personnel, 31 Oct
1991). Arkin, for example, has stated that the air war was “clean on a strategic level,”
and that he could find no evidence of indiscriminate attacks on cities or civilians, inten-
tional damage for postwar leverage on the government of Saddam Hussein or extensive
collateral damage of civilian structures near targets” (‘Tactical Bombing of Iraqi Forces
Outstripped Value of Strategic Hits, Analyst Contends,” Aviation Week & Space Technol-
ogy, 27 Jan 1992, pp 62, 63). After the war, Arkin was able to inspect ‘13 of the
targeted leadership and command bunkers; 49 of the 170 command, control and communi-
cations sites; 16 of the 20 oil refineries and distribution faci . and all of the 75
railroad and auto bridges” hit during the war (ibid, p 62).

Tactical Bombing of Iraqi Forces Outstripped Value of Strategic Hits, Analyst
Contends," p 63. By May 1991, the Harvard Study Team reported sharply increased
levels of gastroenteritis, cholera, typhoid, and malnutrition in Iraqi children due to the
delayed effects of the Gulf War (Harvard Study Team, Harvard Study Team Report:
Public Health in Iraq after the Gulf War, May 1991, pp 12-13). One of the most vocal
advocates of this view has been William M Arkin, director of the nuclear information unit
of Greenpeace International. The estimate of 70,000-90,000 additional deaths was derived
from a survey of some 90,000 Iraqi households conducted in 1991. Based on this data,
the additional deaths above the January 1991 “norm” were calculated for April-December
1991 (Arkin, GWAPS intvw, 19 Oct 1992). The final death total due to the “indirect
detrimental health effects” of the war cited by Arkin was 111,000 (Beth Osborne Daponte,
“{raqi Casualties from the Persian Gulf War and Its Aftermath,” p 2).

75


fixed-wing aircraft was far less than expected, a result of both the weather
and the tactical conditions at the time.’

Table 8
Desert Shield/Desert Storm U.S. Weapons Expenditures

(and Percent of Total U.S. Expenditure)

Munition types: Guided bombs, Anti-radiation Air-to-surface
all types missiles (princ+ missiles (Maverick
pally HARMs) _for AF; principally
Walleye for N and
MC)

Air Force 8,456 (90%) 1,120 (55%) 5,255 (96%)

Navy 623 (7%) 679 (33%) 147 (3%)

Marine Corps 263 (3%) 240 (12%) 46 (1%)

Totals 9,342 2,039 5,448

Royal Air Force 1,126. 112 Air- N/A

(UK) Launched Anti-

radiation Missiles
(ALARMs)

French Air Force. NA N/A approx 60 AS-30s
(laser-guided mis-
siles)

Grand Totals 10,468 (U.S, 89%) 2,151 (U.S. 95%) 5,508 (U.S. 99%)

“1(S) Frank Schwamb, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol Il: Strike
Warfare (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1991), pp 61 through 6-11;
(S) John D. Parsons, Benjamin T. Regala, and Orman H. Paananen, Marine Corps Desert
Storm Reconstruction Report, Vol IV: Third Marine Aircraft Wing Operations (Alexan-
dria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1992), pp 27, 79.

203



Most often, security outside the base remained with the host nation’s
security forces, and this proved effective. Despite Iraqi threats to unleash
terrorists against U.S. forces in the theatér and around the world, only one
confirmed terrorist incident occurred in the theater during the entire
period of the deployment: shots were fired at a bus carrying American
Servicemen near Jeddah Air Base, inflicting only minor injuries. Saudi
security forces apprehended four Palestinians and two Yemeni.’* The
efficiency of Saudi police work, lack of preparation and perhaps coordi-
nation by the Iragis and their allies, and the protection offered by distance
secured the bases from attack. This proved extremely fortunate, since
many bases had little in the way of passive protection—bunkers for ammu-
nition and fuel, extensive perimeter defenses, and aircraft shelters.

A final threat to the bases came from Scud missiles, possibly armed
with chemical warheads. Launched from Iraq, they could reach bases on
the Arabian Peninsula~Bahrain, Dhahran, and Riyadh-and Incirlik Air Base
in Turkey. Patriot missile batteries protected the bases, but a Scud alert
meant that military personnel had to take shelter and don gas masks and
other protective gear. Multiple Scud alerts dulled the reactions of personnel
to these measures, but the threat of a Scud-delivered chemical weapons
attack persisted, a threat that Central Command took with increasing serious-
ness as the war went on and Iraq's position became more desperate.

Base personnel had minimal contact with the local population, both for
security reasons and, particularly in Saudi Arabia, to ease Saudi fears of
disruptive Western influence on their culture. Central Command prohibited
possession of alcohol or sexually explicit material, set off-base dress codes
for men and women, and did not allow chaplains to wear religious insignia
off base. While the Saudis were sensitive to the actions of U.S. personnel
off base, they made no moves to curb religious services on U.S. sites, and
chaplains conducted Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish services. Easing the
relationship was the extensive Saudi experience in coping with large num-
bers of Westerners working on vast development projects in or near the oil
fields. The physical isolation of most bases also helped.

‘air Force Office of Special Investigation Briefing, nd, presented to OSI Command-
ers Conference 1991, p 3, USCENTAFISP Battle Cell Log, 3 Feb 1991.

177



$2 te tests este B dine

previa meny ype

VOLUME IV

WEAPONS, TACTICS, TRAINING

Task Force Chief:

Principal Authors:
Mr. Richard J. Blanchfield
Mr. Jon Dunham
Col. Frank L. Goldstein
Capt. Jeffrey A. Hodgdon
Lt. Col. Charles P. Marshall

Principal Contributors:
MSgt. Richard Blair
MSgt. Linda Morrison
Maj. Theron L. Severance

Dr. John F. Guilmartin, Jr.

Mr. Paul S. Bloch

Lt. Col. Robert D. Eskridge
Dr. John F. Guilmartin, Jr.
Col. Daniel W. Jacobowitz
Col. Mark L. Tarpley

Mr. Donald Kelium
Mr. Dewey Nash

SPACE OPERATIONS

Task Force Chief:

Principal Authors:
Maj. Theresa R. Clark
Mr. Lawrence R. Lausten
Lt. Col. Mitchell P. Slate

Principal Contributors;

Lt. Cot. Stephen P. Hoffhines
Capt. Thomas R. McCabe

VOLUME V

Mr. Richard A. Gunkel

Mr. Richard A, Gunkel
Capt. Barbara A. Phillips

Mr. Andrew G. Landrus
Col. Eugene O’Neill (USA)

A-STATISTICAL COMPENDIUM

Task Force Chiefs:
Lt. Col. Daniel T. Kuehl

Principal Authors:
Ms. Doris Cook
Dr. Aron Pinker

Principal Contributors:
Mr. Peter Clive
Mr. Michael Hansen
TSgt. Tamara A. Scheffler

Col. David A. Tretler

Maj. Lewis D. Hill

Ms. Marguerite Gibson
Capt. David Leeper
Mr. Jim Vernon

xv



chemical weapons were scattered throughout Iraq, and some of these,
notably the “S shaped” bunkers seen primarily at airfields, had unique
signatures. By the time the war began, Coalition intelligence indicated
that chemical-warfare units might be operating from Kuwaiti airfields,
which transformed virtually all the hardened shelters on those bases into
potential storage facilities for chemical munitions. All in all, Iragi chemi-
cal-warfare capabilities offered a large number of potential aimpoints.

Despite Coalition attacks on the chemical-weapons targets, postwar
inspections by United Nations Special Commission teams eventually
uncovered some 150,000 chemical munitions.** Why, with such a stock-
pile, did Iraq not use chemical weapons during Desert Storm? One likely
answer is that Iraq feared the Coalition's potential for retaliation more
than it did the Coalition’s destruction of its chemical-warfare capabili-
ties.“ However, the portion of the effort aimed at destroying research,
development, and production facilities for chemical munitions began the
process of eliminating Iraq's ability to threaten its regional neighbors with
weapons of mass destruction. Furthermore, the attrition of artillery in
demoralized Iraqi frontline units eventually rendered any coordinated,
systematic use of chemical munitions difficult to execute against the
initial penetration of Iraqi defenses. Even though air attacks against Iraq's
chemical-warfare capabilities fell well short of destroying them complete-
ly, it by no means follows that these attacks were militarily: futile or
served no purpose.

S41raq's initial postwar declaration to the UN on 18 Apr 1991 acknowledged nearly
10,000 nerve-gas warheads, some 1,500 chemical-weapon bombs and shells, and 1,000
tons of nerve and mustard gas (Kay, “Arms Inspections in Iraq: Lessons for Arms Con-
trol," p 1). By the end of 1992, Iraq had admitted to 150,000 chemical munitions, and
the head of the CIA believed that the Iragis still possessed additional munitions that
United Nations inspectors had not found (Robert Gates, “Proposed Remarks to the
Comstock Club,” 15 Dec 1992, p 12).

*4sked during a 27 Feb 1991 press conference why the fragis had not used chemi-
cal weapons, Gen Schwarzkopf speculated that air attack, particularly of the anillery in
frontline Iraqi units, had probably timited their cape ly to employ such weapons; he
also raised Sraqi fears of nuclear retaliation as a possible explanation (“Excerpis from
Schwarzkopf News Conference on Gulf War,” The New York Times, 28 Feb 1991, p A8).
However, Gen Schwarzkopf's bottom line was that, while he might never know the
answer, he was thankful that chemical weapons had not been used. Much the same view
was reiterated in the Defense Department's final report on the Gulf war (Conduct of the
Persian Gulf War, p 155).

81



29
Map of Iraq and Kuwait

be tae

y

Weather was another of the physical conditions that came to frustrate
Coalition operations. Desert Storm air operations encountered the worst
January and February weather reported in the theater in 14 years, condi-
tions that hampered bombing effectiveness considerably. Analysis by the
Air Weather Service determined that the Coalition encountered cloud
ceilings below 10,000 feet over Baghdad and Kuwait roughly twice as

171



As a result, the initial hope of the air planners in Riyadh that heavy
attacks on the fixed Scud sites during the opening hours of the air cam-
paign would largely eliminate Iraq’s capability to launch ballistic missiles
against Israel or regional members of the U.S.-led Coalition proved to be
illusory? The fixed Scud launchers in western Iraq functioned, on the
night of 16-17 January 1991, as “decoys” that diverted attention away
from the mobile launchers that had already deployed to their wartime
“hide” sites, and the first of Iraq’s extended-range Scuds were fired at
Israel the following night.®

Once Scuds started falling first on Israel and on Saudi Arabia two
days later, the next best military option would have been to locate and
attack mobile launchers before they had time to fire. Soviet exercise
patterns in central Europe with Scud-Bs and Iraqi practice during the
Iran-Iraq war indicated that if the Iraqis followed prior practices, there
might be enough prelaunch signatures and time to give patrolling aircraft
some chance of attacking mobile launchers before they fired. During the
Gulf War, however, the Iragis dramatically cut their prelaunch set-up
times, avoided any prelaunch electromagnetic emissions that might give
away their locations before launch, and seeded the launch areas with
decoys (some of which were very high fidelity“) and other vehicles.

The next tactical option was to mount airbome “Scud patrols” in the
hope that, once launches were detected, the strike aircraft would be able
to identify the firing locations quickly enough to acquire the launchers
with onboard sensors and destroy them before they could leave the scene.
The link in this chain that proved to be the most difficult to close was the
ability of the sensors on strike aircraft to identify and acquire vehicles
whose radar and infrared signatures were easily masked and extremely
difficult to distinguish on any reliable basis from background clutter,

understood by air planners in Riyadh as pointing to widespread dispersal.

Getting F-15Es and other strike aircraft cleanly through Iraq’s air defense during
the opening moments of the air campaign so that they could strike the fixed Scud launch-
ers in western Iraq was a central feature of the master attack plan for ATO Day 1.

®3The first launches against Israel occurred around 0300 on the moming of 18 Jan
1991, Riyadh local time.

“United Nations observers, who eventually oversaw the destruction of both mobile
launchers and decoys, reported that the high-fidelity decoys were impossible to distinguish
visually from the real thing outside of 25 yards-even on the ground. The Iraqis also
made use of relatively low-fidelity decoys.

86


What Supported the Air Power?

The air power described in the previous chapter was the combat
potential or operational instruments of air power, and as such represented
only the end product of the organizations, doctrine, training, supplies and
Support structure required to make aircraft or satellites militarily signifi-
cant. This chapter focuses on other elements necessary for employing air
power, dividing them into two categories: the tangible and the intangible.
The intangibles include aspects of doctrine, predispositions to the use of
air power, and the role of air power in military operations (some would
say mindset) that affected air planning and operations. They also include
the expectations of the different Services concerning the integration of air
power in land or sea operations, the effect of the orientation by Great
Britain and the United States to NATO employment concepts for using
air power, and the effects of the Vietnam experience on senior American
leadership. The tangibles are the vast support structure of supply, mainte-
nance, communications, and people to which all aircraft and other opera-
tional systems are tethered. First, the tangibles.

On the eve of the Gulf conflict the, United States had an extensive
system of bases and lines of communications for projecting and sustain-
ing air power, but that support structure, a product of the Cold War, was
centered in the United States and Europe and required further extension
to support a Southwest Asian conflict. Materiel prepositioned in the
theater and the number of bases available in the Gulf states provided a
great advantage for U.S. military planners, as did the amount of prepara-
tion time between the August invasion and the start of Desert Storm in
January 1991. The key to success, however, was a willingness to inno-
vate and adapt when plans changed and automated systems failed. De-
spite some early chaos and a continuing lack of precise accountability for
much of the equipment and supplies that flooded into the theater, the air
campaign was never constrained by a lack of fuel, parts, or maintenance
capability, truly a remarkable accomplishment. Airlift forces proved vital
to the success of this support and, by enabling other U.S. forces, to the
entire Coalition effort. By war’s end, strategic airlift had moved more
than 500,000 people and 540,000 tons of cargo, an unprecedented

207



Table 5 (Continued)
Total Sorties by U.S. Service/Allied Country by Aircraft Type

Service Alreraft Type Flowa Service Alreraft Type Flows
Saudi Arabia Tomado/ADV 451 Canada B-707 163
Saudi Arabia BAE-125 110 Canada €-130 124
Saudi Arsbia C-130 1,606 Canada OC-144 $4
Saudi Arabia E-3 303 Canada C18 961
Saudi Arabia F-15C 2,088 Total 1,302
Saudi Arabia F-5 1,129
Saudi Arabia H-212 113
Saudi Arabia Tornada/IDS 667
Saudi Arabia _KC-130 267 Kuwait A4 651
Saudi Arabia RF-S ug Kuwait Fl 129
Total 6,852 Total 780
France C130 2m Bahrain F-16 166
France C160 582 Bahrain F5 122
France FI-CR 92 Bahrain H-212 s
France Gabriel 4 Total 293
France Jaguar on
France KC-135 223
France M-20 2
France M2000 512 aly G-222 13
France SA-330 1 Naly Tornado 224
: Total 2,258 Total 237
:
: UK BN2T 35
UK BNIS $17 UAE C130 35
UK Buccaneer 226 UAE C-212 io
UK C-130 832 UAE M2000 64
UK F3 705 Total 109
UK Tomado/GR-I 1,644
UK Jaguar 600
UK Nimrod 147
UK Tristar 5
UK VC-10 359 Qatar Alpha 2
UK VCTR 207 Qatar Fl 41
: Total SA17 Total a3

: Source: Composite Sorties Database

185



The rapid growth from August 1990 to January 1991 did not happen,
of course, without shortcuts in procedures and turbulence on the bases
themselves. People, for lack of quarters, slept in hallways and in han-
gars; pilots flew extended missions without adequate rest; aircraft were
parked in open rows without protection; tent cities adjoined munitions
storage areas; and the leadership at each base cut whatever deals they
could with local merchants for food, transportation, and other services.
Tt was only after months of such improvisation that more orderly routines
and support structures came to the bases.

Proven Force operations at Incirlik faced different circumstances.
Incirlik had long served as a host base for U.S. Air Force operations and
in addition to Air Force personnel housed more than 2,000 Air Force
family members and other U.S. civilians. Because of the Scud and
terrorist threats in the area during the Gulf conflict, the Air Force evacu-
ated these people between 15 and 21 January, providing room for more
than 3,000 additional deploying forces. Thus, although a tent city arose
to house many of the personnel, maintenance and support facilities and
office space were already in place and operating.

Base security personnel alone could not protect the air bases. The
principal threat in August and September was expected to come from an
Traqi army attack south into Saudi Arabia, with the most dangerous thrust
along the coast to the oil fields. Early-arriving U.S. Army and Marine
forces moved in to hold the key enclaves around Aj Jubayl and Dhahran,
from which the Coalition aircraft would Jaunch to meet the attack. By
September, the threat of a direct attack by the Iraqi Army had receded,
but the danger of terrorism remained a primary concern throughout the
deployment period and the war. Both Generals Schwarzkopf and Horner
pushed to get the American forces out of the communities, particularly
high-rise hotels, and onto the bases in dispersed quarters as rapidly as
possible. When the air campaign began, the U:S. forces on Dhahran Air
Base even moved from base facilities to bunkers and makeshift quarters
near the aircraft. At peak strength, Air Force security police numbered
only 4,500 throughout the theater. On the whole, they had to confine
their activities to providing security within base perimeters and limited
exterior screening but not to defense of the base itself.

176



shot down by a missile fired from HMS Gloucester®” Just as for
anti-Scud operations, one cannot judge to what extent the attacks sup-
pressed launches. The Iraqis may have retained the missiles for use only
in the event of an amphibious landing, or they may simply have lacked
sufficient targeting data to attack Coalition ships.

Attrition of Iraqi Ground Forces

Air campaign planners aimed to decrease the combat effectiveness of
the Iraqi Army by 50 percent. The quantitative measure of that attrition
was destruction of Iraqi armor and artillery to that level throughout the
theater. But a variety of factors came into play. The factors included a
more extensive target set to attack than simply armor and artillery, fewer
sorties than planned, poorer bombing accuracy from the higher release
altitudes, and worse-than-planned weather. Perhaps the greatest change
from the plan entailed the munitions employed. Prewar planning comput-
ed attrition by relying heavily on the use of air-to-surface missiles—
Mavericks—by several types of aircraft (F-16, A-10, and AV-8B) and a
variety of special munitions.” As Table 3 shows, a significant number
of Mavericks were fired, but almost exclusively by A-10s (5,013 of the
5,296 employed by the Air Force). Pilots also used other antiarmor
munitions (CBU-89 and GATOR), but not nearly as many as general-

purpose bombs.

Air strikes targeted against Iraqi ground forces started on the first day
of the air campaign and continued with increasing intensity throughout
the war, apart from daily variations based on weather in the region. Air
strikes against Republican Guard divisions and other Iraqi heavy divisions
in central Kuwait reached their highest daily totals in the first two weeks
of February. Daily totals for air strikes against Iraqi front line divisions
peaked just prior to the ground attack on 24 February. Figure 25 displays
wartime totals for air strikes against each of the principal kill boxes.

*7(5) Robert W. Ward, et al, Desert Storm Reconstruction Rpt, Vol VIII: C3/Space

and Electronic Warfare (Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1992), pp 4-6 to
410.

%s) Tn addition to Mavericks, CBU-89 (Gator) and 30-mm cannons were planned
for use against armor; CBU-52 (fragmentation bomb) and MK-20 (Rockeye) were planned
against artillery. Viewgraph, CENTAF/CC Brfg to the SECDEF, 20 Dec 1990, in “Gen
Glosson Brief,” GWAPS, Box 3-60.

102



percent goal in September with Col. Joe Purvis, chief of a special group
of Army planners that Schwarzkopf had recruited from graduates of the
Amny’s School of Advanced Military Studies at Fort Leavenworth, No
one really knew what would constitute a measurable fifty percent attrition
of combat effectiveness, however. Initial planning called for attrition of
troops and all major pieces of equipment, but CENTCOM planners later
narrowed these indicators to tanks, armored personnel carriers, and artil-
Jery. Moreover, the attrition was left as a theaterwide goal, not attached
to specific divisions or areas of the theater.

CENTAF planners, supported by Air Staff calculations, divided the
air attacks on the Iraqi ground forces into two parts: those directed
against the Republican Guard and those aimed at the remainder of the
army in Kuwait. The planners earmarked higher performance aircraft
(F-16s, F/A-18s, F-15Es, F-111Fs) for attacks against the Republican
Guards, reserving the ‘A-10s, AV-8Bs, and attack helicopters for the
divisions in Kuwait. Attrition calculations assumed 600 sorties a day
against each of the two parts of the Iraqi Army, relying primarily on
precision munitions (but not laser-guided bombs-—that innovation occurred
during the air campaign) and various cluster munitions to create the
attrition. On the basis of these criteria, General Glosson briefed General
Schwarzkopf in December 1990 that air power could achieve the desired
fifty percent attrition in five days against the Republican Guards and in
approximately twelve days against the remainder of the forces in Ku-
wait.” Schwarzkopf not only accepted these attrition estimates, he re-
duced the time available, issuing an operations plan two weeks later that
specified eight days for Phase III (see Figure 9).

Some flexibility returned in the operations order issued on 16 January
for the campaign; in it, the duration of Phase III was left “to be deter-
mined.” The requirement for 50 percent attrition made the ground

°(S) Brig to the CINC, Phases II and III, 1 Dec 1990, in “Gen Glosson Briefing.”
Subsequent to this briefing, the Iraqi Army in the Kuwait theater continued to increase
in amount of equipment, but so too did the Coalition air forces. Coalition air did not
attain a level of 600 strikes a day in the Kuwait theater on a sustained basis until three
weeks into the air campaign. For the first two weeks, air strikes against Iraqi ground
forces averaged just over 300 a day.

5%$) USCENTCOM OPLAN Desert Storm, 16 Dec 1990, p 13, AFHRA 269602;
(S) USCINCCENT OPORD 91-001, 17 Jan 1991, p 6.

49



instance) have been around for over 30 years. Radio-guided bombs were
used in World War II and Korea, and the Air Force dropped over 4,000
LGBs on North Vietnam during the period April 1972 to January 1973,
targeted almost exclusively against bridges.’ In the Gulf War, more than
17,000 PGMs were expended, of which 9,342 were LGBs; 5,448 were
aif-to-surface missiles (predominantly Mavericks); 2,039 were
antiradiation missiles (predominantly HARMs, discussed later); and 333
were cruise missiles (see above). By way of comparison, approximately
210,000 unguided bombs were dropped in the Gulf War.

What, then, explains the wartime prominence of LGBs, a not-so-new
weapon that comprised less than five percent of the total weapons em-
ployed? There are three reasons, one of which has been noted-the mar-
riage of LGBs and imaging infrared target sensors with stealth in the F-
117. The stealth characteristics of the F-117 made the normally high-risk
tactic of directing the path of an LGB while flying in a heavily defended
area a much more routine affair. Any target in Iraq became open to
destruction by the F-117’s GBU-27, a 2,000-pound bomb designed to
penetrate hardened facilities: A second reason for the importance of
LGBs was Iraq’s extensive system of hardened bunkers and aircraft
shelters that were vulnerable only to a precision bomb with a penetrating
warhead; it was vital that these targets be destroyed, and the LGBs were
the only option for doing so. And third, LGB attacks were needed to
attain attrition of the heavily revetted Iraqi armor in the Kuwait theater.

Laser-guided bombs were particularly effective because their employ-
ment came as something of a surprise to the Iraqis. Their reaction is
understandable, because the LGB performance also surprised the United
States. The one new U.S. weapon system prepared to drop LGBs was the
F-117, an aircraft whose existence had been kept secret until just a year
or two before the Gulf crisis and whose capabilities were largely un-
known. Its one publicized employment had been in the Just Cause opera-
tion in Panama; in that conflict, the F-117’s main notoriety came from a
dispute on whether its LGBs, deliberately aimed to miss a building,
missed by the correct amount. The U.S. fighter bombers designed in the
1970s, the F-16 and F/A-18, could not laser designate, and the first
squadron of F-15Es received laser-designating equipment only after
deploying to the theater, as did the RAF Tornados.®

SHeadquarters, Pacific Air Forces Summary, Air Operations Southeast Asia, monthly
reports for May 1972 through January 1973.

See Chapter 7 for a discussion of all aircraft capable of laser designation,

226



What Did the Air Campaign Accomplish?

The Survey examined the Iraqi target base identified in the previous
chapter, measuring effects and effectiveness of the air campaign against
the objectives set by the Coalition, That target base included the fixed
targets that CENTAF’s Special Planning Group divided into twelve target
categories! and Iraqi aircraft, ships, mobile missiles, and the Iraqi Army
deployed in the Kuwait theater. As a way of dealing explicitly with the
various objectives and target sets, the Survey considered the air campaign
as having three major components: control of the air, strategic attacks,
and air attacks on surface forces. Although considered separately, these
three components obviously reinforced one another in a variety of ways.

In assessing the effectiveness of air power against the various “target
sets” devised by air campaign planners, it should be noted that many sets
overlapped. Attacks against command and control, for example, affected
the ability of the Iraqi leadership to function; attacks against electrical
power facilities forced air defense system components to resort to backup
generators, which are less reliable and more prone to voltage fluctuations
than normal power supplies. Furthermore, most target categories used by
Black Hole planners to structure the air campaign did not constitute ho-
mogenous sets. For example, they put the Al Kharhk telephone switching
facility in Baghdad, one of the most important telecommunications facilities
in Iraq, in the command, control, and communications category. Another
important telephone exchange, however, the so-called AT&T building in
downtown Baghdad, ended up in the strategic air defense category.”

Defining Effectiveness
The Survey attempted to gauge the effectiveness of air power at the

operational and strategic levels in the Gulf War; it focused less on the
performance of particular weapon systems than on overall results mea-

"See Chapter 2 (Table 2) for a list of these target categories, hereafter ‘referred to as
the Black Hole categories.

2($) Master Target Folder, GWAPS, BH 2-23; (S) CHECKMATE Intelligence Target
Files, “Baghdad AUTO MPUR-RADREL TERMINAL,” GWAPS, CIT 684.

55



Table 5
Total Sorties by U.S. Service/Allied Country by Aircraft Type

q Service Flown Service Aircraft Type Flown
i USAF 8,084 USSOCCENT AC-130 104
cm USAF 1,741 USSOCCENT AH4 3
i USAF Fy USSOCCENT C-130 B
i USAF 13,971 USSOCCENT CH-47 4
USAF 1,766 USSOCCENT EC-130 155
USAF 256 USSOCCENT HC-130 107
USAF 20 USSOCCENT HH-3 63
USAF 740 USSOCCENT HH-3E 112
USAF 6 USSOCCENT HH-60 9
USAF 379 USSOCCENT MC-130 84
USAF a2 USSOCCENT MH-3 19
USAF 450 USSOCCENT MH-47 2
USAF 24 USSOCCENT MH-53 282
USAF 1,105 USSOCCENT MHS 1
USAF 458 USSOCCENT MH-60 284
USAF 2,423 USSOCCENT UH-60 10
er USAF 1,299 Total 1,262
[: USAF 5.685
ne USAF 2172
+ USAF 13,087
1 USAF 4 USN AG 4,824
USAF 2,683 USN AT TBI
USAF 1,465 USN £-2C 4,183
USAF 9,559 USN EA-6B 1,126
USAF 660 USN F-i4 4,005
USAF 4 USN FA-I8 4,449
USAF 197 USN P3 23
USAF n9 USN S3B 1,674
USAF RF-AC 103 USN TLAM 282
j USAF TR-1 a9 Total 18,03
: USAF U-2 149
i Total 69,406
aa USA C12 183
Vie USA C23 3
i USMC AS 795 USA OV-ID 161
i USMC AV-B 3,359 USA RC-I2 216
he USMC C12 9 USA RU-21 242
q / q USMC EA-6B 504 USA RV-ID mw
Bie | USMC FAI 4,936 Total 916 .
HIRE USMC KC-130 598
AM USMC OV-10 482 CRAF CRAF 300
BW” Total 10,683 Total 800
i
ti
i
i |
Wi. 184



F-15s trom 71st Squadron of 1st Tactical Fighter
Wing (Langley AFB, VA) land at Dhahran on 8 August 1990.

General Schwarzkopf and other Coalition leaders
meet with Iraqis at Safwan, Iraq, 3 March 1991.

XX



144

(Top) The Joint Force Air
Component Commander,
Lt. Gen. Charles A. Homer,
USAF. (Bottom) Brig. Gen.
Buster C, Glosson, USAF,
and members of his staff In
the Iraqi Planning Cell of
the Directorate for Cam-
paign Plans (the Black
Hole).



had to take note of the frequencies used by the Sandis, who did not have an
assignment policy, and those of Army units on the ground; in such an envi-
ronment, the chances for communications interruptions and radio interference
were enormous. For security purposes, the frequencies during wartime were
usually changed daily, but CENTAF had to abandon this practice.” In short,
creating and staffing this control system was a tremendous effort and could
only be done in steps. Although the system was put together piecemeal
beginning in August 1990, it was operating as an entire system in a month
and was multinational by the end of December. To do this, however, the Air
Force depleted command and control units in the U.S. and Europe to the
point where it exhausted effective tactical air command and control reserves.

One of the most misleading but accurate statistics was that less than ten
percent of active duty Air Force personnel deployed to the Gulf" It is
misleading because so much more of the Air Force’s total capability was
dedicated to that theater. In addition, without considering the deployed units
themselves, the numbers give no indication of the total number of Air Force
units affected. A review of the identities of the Air Force wings and air
divisions in the theater would reveal a “(P)” following their designations,
meaning “provisional.” That is, the unit combined personnel and squadrons
from more than one existing unit. Thus, no Air Force wing deployed in
total to the Gulf but dispatched flying squadrons that would join other
squadrons in the Gulf to form new, provisional wings.

The composition of wings took on many variations for Desert Shield
and Desert Storm. One pattern was to deploy two of a wing’s three flying
squadrons, usually sending with them the most experienced crews, best

, aircraft, and an augmented crew force and support staff. Whal remained on

the home station was something less than one-third of a wing. The two
squadrons joined in the theater at some later date (during the second phase
of the deployments) with one or more squadrons from other wing(s) (from
Europe, for instance) and formed a provisional wing. As an example, the
4th Tactical Fighter Wing (TFW) at Al Kharj consisted of the two squad-
rons it deployed, the 335th and 336d Tactical Fighter Squadrons (TFS)
flying F-15Es, plus the 53d TFS (of the 36th TFW, Bitburg Air Base,
Germany) flying F-15Cs, and the 157th TFS and 138th TFS (from the
Reserves) flying F-16s. There were exceptions, such as when all of a
wing’s squadrons deployed to the same provisional wing, but even then that

2 Air Force Tactical Communications in War,” p 2-16.

21 approximately five percent of the Air Force Reserve and four percent of the Air
National Guard were deployed. GWAPS Statistical Compendium, Table 40.

216



Efforts by Coalition air forces to suppress Iraqi launches of Scud
missiles against Israel, Saudi Arabia, and other Gulf nations during Desert
Storm ran into many of the same problems evident in the case of the
Iragi's nuclear weapons program. Key portions of the target set-notably
the presurveyed launch sites and hiding places used by the mobile launch-
ers—were not identified before 17 January 1991, and, even in the face of
intense efforts to find and destroy them, the mobile launchers proved
remarkably elusive and survivable. Although Iraq's average weekly
launch rate of modified Scuds during Desert Storm (14.7 launches per
week) was lower than it had been during the 1988 “war of the cities,”
and while launch rates generally declined over the course of the Gulf
War, the actual destruction of any Iraqi mobile launchers by fixed-wing
Coalition aircraft remains impossible to confirm. Coalition aircrews
Teported destroying around eighty mobile launchers;*’ another score or so
were claimed by special operations forces. Most of these reports un-
doubtedly stemmed from attacks that did destroy objects found in the
Scud launch areas. But most, if not all, of the objects involved now
appear to have been decoys, vehicles such as tanker trucks that had
infrared and radar signatures impossible to distinguish from those of
mobile launchers and their associated support vehicles, and other objects
unfortunate enough to provide “Scud-like” signatures.

Over the 43 days of Desert Storm, roughly 1,500 strikes were carried
out against targets associated with Iraqi ballistic missile capabilities. This
total includes missions reported as having bombed mobile iaunchers
(TELs and MELs), suspected hiding places for the mobile launchers
(highway culverts, overpasses, etc.), fixed launch sites (such as those at
the H-2 airfield in western Iraq), and Scud-related production and support

STimmediately after the war, the A-10s alone claimed to have destroyed 51 Scud
launchers [“‘Operation Desert Storm: A-10 Combat Recap: 23/354 TFW(P), 17 Jan 1991
to 28 Feb 1991,” slide entitled “A-10 Mission Results: Targets Destroyed-Confirmed,”
GWAPS, NA 292}. F-15Es were reported by Gen Schwarzkopf to have destroyed 6-10
mobile launchers on the night of 29 Jan 1991 (DOD, “Special Central Command Brief
ing,” Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 30 Jan 1991, transcript #672561). Hence, an estimated total
of some 80 mobile launchers claimed to have been destroyed by Coalition aircrews is
consistent with wartime claims, as well as information presented during a GWAPS visit
to Nellis AFB, NV, in Feb 1992.

®GWAPS members visited the U.S. Special Operations Command in March of 1992.

83


Kuwait and Iraq hostage, and in October, declared that if war came, Iraq
would launch missile attacks against Saudi Arabia and Israel. Since Iraq
was known to possess chemical munitions and was believed to have
biological weapons, these threats raised the prospect of grave danger to
the Gulf states, Israel, and deployed Coalition forces.

As Coalition forces grew, a dua} chain of command evolved, with
Saudi Lt. Gen. Khalid as the Commander, Joint Forces and Theater of
Operations, and General Schwarzkopf as the commander of all U.S.
forces in the theater. General Horner assumed operational duties as the
area Air Defense Coordinator, the Airspace Control Authority, and the
Joint Force Air Component Commander (JFACC) responsible for plan-
ning, coordinating, allocating, and tasking theater air operations derived
from General Schwarzkopf’s apportionment decisions.* Horner exercised
his authority through the daily air tasking order (ATO), which provided
detailed direction, with some exceptions, for all Coalition flight opera-
tions during both Desert Shield and Desert Storm.

The daily air tasking order became a subject of contention. It com-
prised some 200 pages in standard message format or approximately 800
pages on the Computer-Assisted Force Management System. It contained
times, targets, altitudes, call signs, radio frequencies, and other necessary
mission information. CENTAF found its daily construction and dissemi-
nation to all units concerned a massive task. The Services and Coalition
forces accepted the need for a single authority to coordinate an air cam-
paign and to provide safe separation of the 2,000 to 3,000 aircraft sorties
flown per day in the theater’s limited airspace. However, they had, to
varying degrees, reservations about General Horner’s authority to select
the targets and prescribe the flight operations for the many elements of
the Coalition air forces. Eventually, the ATO directed almost ail Coali-
tion fixed-wing aircraft sorties, although it did not always impose tight
control over these aircraft.° Helicopters flying less than 500 feet above

Ss) Msg, USCINCCENT, 101100Z Aug 1990, para 3E26, GWAPS, CHC 12-15.
See A Note on Sources at the end of this report for an explanation of GWAPS citations
used in footnotes.

“Discussion of the JFACC organization and procedures is contained in Chapter 5.
Sortics from Turkey (Proven Force) did not appear in the ATO.



first plan of August 1990, the punishment ATO, may also be seen as the
first of the true offensive plans. This ATO, an outgrowth of General
Horner’s briefing to the President on 4 August, involved a single retalia-
tory strike in reaction to the use of chemical weapons by Iraq. The
targets (seventeen total) were economic (oil production and storage facili-
ties and electric power generation), military (including the known chemi-
cal, nuclear, and biological facilities), and one political target—the presi-
dential palace. The ATO assumed no accompanying ground attack. The
objectives were punitive to discourage further Iraqi use of chemicals and
were not assumed to be a part of any larger campaign; there was no
mention of a next step if the punishment did not work.'* This effort soon
gave way to the larger offensive air campaign, for which planning began
in Washington during this same period. Meanwhile, Riyadh planners
working on the D-Day ATO concentrated on the possibility of an Iraqi
attack into Saudi Arabia and planned for the sorties envisioned in Opera-
tions Plan 1002-90-that is, to gain air superiority, attack the invading
Iraqi forces, and defend key facilities in Al Jubayl, Ad Dammam, and
Dhahran, the principal bases through which the deploying Coalition forces
had begun to enter the theater.

The D-Day ATO as it existed in August 1990 represented a totally
defensive air employment, based as it was on the inadequate number of
U.S. ground forces in the region in August. Central Command's studies
at the time indicated that it could not successfully defend the key facili-
ties along the coast against an Iraqi assault until near the end of August,
when the 82d Airborne Division and a Marine expeditionary brigade had
arrived to protect these enclaves.'> As more ground and air forces arrived
in the theater, the D-Day ATO expanded from its defense-only stance to
include more offensive strikes, just as the draft operations plan had
envisioned and the staff had practiced in Internal Look 90. Continually

specific tasks. Although a single day’s ATO does not cxplain an air campaign, the term
ATO is used here as it was often used at the time-as shorthand for the series of daily
orders for air operations that executed a specific plan. The ATO itself is a controversial
subject of the war, and further discussion of this subject is found in Chapter 5.

'4The employment of this ATO seems to have anticipated an Iraqi Scud attack with
chemical weapons. (S/NF) Hq, CENTCOM J-5 Plans Afier Action Report, Vol V1,
Tab A, “U.S. Air Campaign Plan,” Aug 1990, GWAPS, NA 259.

'S(S/NF) Headquarters, CENTCOM J-5 Plans, After Action Report and Supporting
Documents, Volume VI, Tab X, “Combat Analysis Group After Action Rpt,” 21 Mar
1991, GWAPS, NA 259.

34



vulnerable to destruction by precision bombing than Coalition air com-
manders and planners or U.S. intelligence specialists realized before
Desert Storm. The target list on 16 January 1991 contained two nuclear
targets, but after the war, inspectors operating under the United Nations
Special Commission eventually uncovered more than twenty sites in-
volved in the Iraqi nuclear weapon program; sixteen of the sites were
described as “main facilities.”*'

Militarily, there were at least two critical areas of uncertainty con-
cerning Iraq's ballistic missile capabilities in the months preceding Desert
Storm. One concemed the number of mobile launchers and operational
missiles the Iraqis possessed. The other had to do with how the Iraqis
might choose to employ these weapons against Coalition forces.

When Desert Storm began, Coalition planners appear to have assumed
that the Iragis would launch their ballistic missiles initially from fixed or
known launch sites, giving Coalition air power a reasonable chance of
eliminating the Scud threat-or most of it~in the opening hours of the
war.” If the Iraqis did shift to mobile operations under attack, Coalition
planners assumed that their set-up and launch procedures would resemble
those utilized by Soviet Scud units in central Europe. More specifically,
the mobile launchers would not only require several hours to launch a
missile but, in the process, provide distinctive signatures that Coalition
forces could exploit to locate and attack them. Planners also assumed
that decoys or other “background noise” would not greatly complicate the
problem of dealing with Iraqi Scud units. None of these assumptions
proved accurate during the war.

Overall, the United States did not fully understand the target arrays
comprising Iraqi nuclear, biological, chemical, and ballistic missile capa-
bilities before the Gulf War. The Iraqis had, in fact, made these target
systems as elusive and resistant to accurate air attack as possible, with
some success.

Security Council, Rpt $/23215, 7th IAEA on-site inspection (11-22 October 1991),
14 Nov 1991, pp 8 and 63.

*tmtvw, GWAPS with Gen Glosson, 9 Apr 1992. The GWAPS Missions Database
confirms that several hundred sorties were sent against Scud targets during the first four
days of the air campaign.

79


Laser-guided bombs being loaded on A-6Es onboard

the carrier John F. Kennedy.
222



ventured as far south as Baghdad. Compared to the other Coalition air
forces, however, Proven Force had two related handicaps: it had no
stealth aircraft (F-117s) and no aircraft capable of designating targets for
laser-guided bombs. As a result, the hardened Iraqi air defense network
presented Proven Force with a formidable obstacle, one that had to be
overcome before attacks on strategic targets could begin. Similarly,
Proven Force’s attacks against point targets were less successful, required
more aircraft, and necessitated more frequent return visits than the better-
equipped aircraft based in the south.'®

Almost from the beginning, circumstances dictated diversions from
the planned strategic air campaign. The first change occurred on the
second day when the first Scud missiles launched from westerm Iraq
landed in Israel. Iraq’s attempts to split the Coalition by firing Scud
missiles at Israel were anticipated before the war, and for that reason the
fixed Scud sites in western Iraq were targeted on the first night's raid.
These strikes failed to neutralize what became the true Scud threat—
mobile Scud launchers capable of moving from hidden sites, firing, then
hiding again before aircraft could attack them. Intensive combat opera-
tions began in an attempt to find, destroy, or simply suppress the mobile
missiles; these activities continued throughout the war. The Scud hunt
included continuous airbome surveillance of western and southern regions
of Iraq, positioning strike aircraft within the Scud launch areas for more
immediate targeting, attacks on communication links thought to be trans-
mitting Scud launch authorization, attacks of suspected sites, and strikes
against Scud production and storage facilities. By war’s end, nearly
every type of strike and reconnaissance aircraft employed in the war
participated in the attempt to bring this threat under control, but with
scant evidence of success.

A second redirection of targeting involved digging the Iraqi air force
out of its shelters. Subject to almost immediate engagement by Coalition
aircraft ranging over their bases, the Iraqis elected not to contest control
of Iraqi airspace and sought protection in hardened aircraft shelters that
they thought immune from Coalition attack. On 23 January, airfield
attack operations shifted from attacking runways to destroying aircraft

'8(S) CMSgt Jerome E. Schroeder and SMSgt Thomas L. Raab, History of Joint Task
Force Proven Force, Hq USAFE History Office, 1991, pp 45-70.

17



troops and thousands of machines to the area of operations. Moreover,
to leave planning for an air offensive almost entirely to a cell in the air
component would allow for maximum security. In any case,
Schwarzkopf for months remained more comfortable with the work of the
Black Hole than with plans prepared for a ground offensive. Especially
because he was his own ground commander, Schwarzkopf and his Central
Command staff gave much more time to ground planning.”

Once the war began, Horner briefed Schwarzkopf nightly on target
selection, although not on bomb damage assessment. The two command-
ers purposely avoided the bean-counting or body-counting that had
plagued commanders during the Vietnam War, although Schwarzkopf’s
requirement for fifty percent destruction of Iraqi armor and artillery in the
Kuwait theater before the ground offensive sometimes threatened to
degenerate into such an exercise. Schwarzkopf and Horner were of
course interested in whatever the intelligence community could tell them
about bomb damage, using sometimes conflicting reports that came from
Washington and from in-theater organizations. Schwarzkopf reviewed the
planned air operations and changed them on occasion, although for the
most part he consigned the strategic air campaign to Homer and his staff.
Schwarzkopf also served as a conduit for Washington guidance on wag-
ing the war. Such guidance often pertained to escalating the pursuit of
Scud missile launchers capable of firing at the Israelis and to restricting
bombing in Baghdad following the attack on the Al Firdos bunker.’

The story was rather different in the Kuwait theater. Here,
Schwarzkopf directed the JFACC to concentrate initially on second- and
third-echelon Iraqi forces-the heavy divisions and the Republican Guards
making up the operational and strategic reserves of the Iraqi Army. He
also expressed particular concern over the need to prevent Iraqi forces
from escaping the theater. Horner adhered to Schwarzkopf’s priorities,
but corps commanders did not always agree with Schwarzkopf’s choices.
They were more concerned about the forces immediately to their front

"It is noteworthy that Schwarzkopfs memoirs devote relatively few pages to the
air war.

¥4(S) Intvw, USAF historians with Lt Gen Charles A. Homer, Shaw AFB, 4 Mar
1992, GWAPS, NA 303.

152



Ironically, the loss of equipment, a key index of bomb damage as-
sessment used during the war, was not decisive in any direct way. The
Iraqi army did not run out of tanks, armored personnel carriers, or artil-
lery; in fact, much of the equipment remaining intact at the start of the
ground offensive was abandoned, or was at least unoccupied, when the
Coalition ground forces reached it. Reports of AH-64 strikes describing
the attacks on armor columns noted that when firing began on the first
tank, the crews of the other tanks began abandoning their vehicles."'*
The total number and operability of the tanks had less meaning under
those conditions,

Air power had destroyed not only large amounts of equipment. It had
destroyed the confidence of the Iraqi soldiers that the equipment would do
them any good-on the contrary, the equipment was seen as a magnet for
air strikes. Whether or for how long the Iraqi troops could have held on
and for how long, even without a ground attack, are matters for specula-
tion. The demonstrable fact is that the Iragis simply could not react once
the ground attack took place and Coalition forces swept through the
theater. This Survey could not assess possible differences in Iraqi resis-
tance if the Coalition ground forces had Jess air support or had there been
a.shorter air campaign. The survey did determine, however, that air power
made that resistance disorganized and totally ineffective.

Summary

Table 4 lists the Iraqi target sets and conclusions, in abbreviated
form, reached by the Survey regarding the operational-strategic effective-
ness of Coalition air power. For brevity, the table omits much, and the
reader should not overlook the subtleties and reinforcing aspects of the
air campaign that such condensations inevitably submerge. Although
some of the results in the summary table contain quantitative data, the
numbers are intertwined with qualitative judgments providing a needed
context, As noted throughout this chapter, the Survey found few cases
in which quantitive measures alone were sufficient to tell more than a
part of the broader operational-strategic story.

"Comment by the XVII Airborme Corps Aviation Officer, Army Aviation, p 153.

117



What Happened?

Traq invaded Kuwait before dawn on 2 August 1990. During the next
five and one-half months in an operation named Desert Shield, U.S. and
Coalition forces poured into the theater to deter further Iraqi aggression
and to set the stage for offensive actions. Operation Desert Storm, the
combined attack on Iraq, began in the early hours of 17 January 1991
with an independent air campaign and ended on 28 February 1991 after
a four-day combined forces ground and air assault. Coalition forces
evicted Iraqi forces from Kuwait and destroyed much of Baghdad’s
military machine. From the outset, U.S. air power was central to the
accomplishment of United States’ and United Nations’ political and
military objectives; it enabled the Coalition to deploy its forces and
subsequently cripple Iraqi military capabilities, paving the way for
Baghdad's defeat on the battlefield. The following pages briefly describe
air operations from August 1990 through February 1991, set in their
political and military context.

The August 1990 crisis was preceded by increasingly contentious
negotiations between Iraq and Kuwait concerning territorial claims and
financial obligations. Neither the Gulf states nor the United States, howev-
er, anticipated Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. As late as July 1990, the intelli-
gence community assessed the deployment of eight Iraqi Republican Guard
divisions to the Kuwait border as an attempt to pressure Kuwait in the
negotiations, not as a prelude to war. Even when the negotiations foun-
dered on 1 August, Kuwait refrained from placing its military forces on full
alert. Iraqi forces entered Kuwait City hours after the invasion began on
2 August and reached the Kuwait-Saudi Arabian border the next day.
Surprised and overwhelmed, the Kuwaitis offered only sporadic resistance,
and the Kuwaiti air force fled to Saudi Arabia after destroying a number
of Iraqi helicopters and vehicles with their A-4 and Mirage F-1 aircraft.

Most American military and political leaders had also failed to antici-
pate the Iraqi invasion, which occurred on the very day that President
Bush gave an important policy address on the future of American national



coordination with others, would not just neutralize the government but
change it by inducing a coup or revolt that would result in a government
more amenable to Coalition demands. The final Central Command
operations plan did not stress these intentions, which appeared most
forcibly in the CENTAF operations order of September 1990: “When
taken in total, the result of Phase I will be the progressive and systematic
collapse of Saddam Hussein’s entire war machine and regime.”**

Planners hoped that the air campaign would end in the removal of
Saddam Hussein but did not make the death or capture of Saddam
Hussein a specific objective. In fact, Generals Powell and Schwarzkopf
made statements disclaiming such a goal at the beginning of the air
campaign. Before the war, military leaders worried that targeting
Saddam Hussein might contravene Executive Order 12333, which prohib-
its U.S. Government involvement in “assassination.””” In addition, the
United Nations resolutions around which the Coalition had coalesced said
nothing about eliminating Saddam. Explicitly setting goals that went
beyond those of the United Nations would have necessitated complex and
possibly counterproductive negotiations with the allies.” Finally, and
perhaps most important, there was no certainty that strikes aimed at
killing Saddam Hussein would have their intended effect. Officials
remembered the difficulties in tracking down Manuel Noriega during

35(s) COMUSCENTAF Operations Order, 2 Sep 1990, p 4.

Gen Powell, News Brig, 16 Jan 1991 (transcript released by the Office of the
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs), p 5; and Gen Schwarzkopf,
CENTCOM Brig, 18 Jan 1991 (transcript released by the Office of the Secretary for
Public Affairs), p 4,

"Executive Order 12333-United States Intelligence Activities, 4 Dec 1981, in Office
of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration, Codification of
Presidential Proclamations and Executive Orders (Washington, 1989), p 647.

**President Bush, “Remarks on the Nomination of Edward R. Madigan as Secretary
of Agriculture and a-Question and Answer Session With Reporters,” 25 Jan 1991, in
Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, 28 Jan 1991, p 80; Vice President
Quayle, cited in “Quayle on Hussein: ‘He is totally irrational’,” U.S. News & World
Report, 18 Feb 1991, p 27; and Robert Kimmitt, transcript, American Enterprise Institute,
“The Gulf War Conference,” 7 Dec 1991, p 293.

45



night in order to create the impression of continuous bombing, to maxi-
mize the psychological aspects of those attacks (See Figure 33).

Figure 33
Coalition Attack Aircraft Sorties by Time on Target
17 January - 28 February 1991

Time on target
Kuwait local time

The Coalition placed a premium on aircraft with the self-contained
capability to laser-designate targets for laser-guided bombs, and those air-
craft were more valuable than sortie count alone would indicate. They were
the F-117s, F-111Fs (but not the F-111Es), F-15Es, A-6s, French Jaguars,
Saudi F-5s, British Buccaneers, and some British Tomados.” While not a
particularly new capability (laser designation appeared late in the Vietnam
War), many of the newest aircraft, F-16s and F/A-18s, for instance, lacked
it, the F-15Es only received laser-targeting capability after the aircraft had
deployed to the theater. While the Air Force had a surplus of capabilities
in some areas, nearly every aircraft capable of laser designation went to the
theater, and more were needed. The Proven Force wing at Incirlik attempted
to secure at least some capability by bringing in F-4E aircraft from Clark
Air Base in the Philippines, but those aircraft arrived just before the war

37The Buccancers, F-5s, and Jaguars had this capability during daylight only.

201



Figure 26
Chokepoints for Retreating Iraqi Troops in the Kuwait Theater
(Shaded area depicts no-strike areas declared on 27 Feb)

9 9
8 8
/ f/'Hawr Al Hammar, 3
7 Causeway | 7
6 6
5 5
wy
4 4

SAUDI ARABIA} &
an eyes

|

114



The effects on the Iraqi army units, as in other cases, were mixed.
Prisoner of war reports from frontline forces showed a general pattern of
units low on food and water and lacking in resupply capability. At the
same time, there were reports of units having plentiful supplies of water
and hot meals. Prisoners captured at Al Khafji were described as being
in wretched health and malnourished but wearing new uniforms and
boots; in the Republican Guard areas, on the other extreme, U.S. VII
Corps soldiers found trailers of quality foods such as canned mackerel
and crackers." The pattern that emerges from the evidence is not of a
starving army but an organization in which the distribution system had
ceased to function: distributions appeared illogical, and goods were
generally absent, hoarded, or lying unused. The policy of the Iraqi army
not to use radios or telephones, combined with a beleaguered transporta-
tion system, would, of course, accentuate this condition,

While the Coalition undertook to isolate the Iragi army from commu-
nications with Baghdad, in-theater efforts were aimed at preventing divi-
sions and corps from communicating with one another, thereby preventing
the theater and strategic reserves from reacting promptly to the Coalition
ground attack. The communications targets, however, proved difficult to
attack successfully; even when they were hit, the extent of damage was
difficult to assess. Iraqi countermeasures were successful but costly.

Prisoner of war reports often describe Iraqi measures to preserve their
equipment. Measures included using messengers, prohibiting the use of
radios after the start of the air attacks, and even pronouncing death sen-
tences for those who used two-way radios or telephones. Also, the Iraqis
laid extensive wire, buried throughout the theater to preserve emergency
communications, Wire was strung between units, which were sometimes
as far apart as fifty kilometers. Bombing cut the wire at times, but Iraqis
often repaired these lines within a day. Effective communication, howev-
er, required more than the ability to warn another unit of attack; if the
warned unit could not undertake some sort of coordinated action in re-
sponse, the warning was of little value. Here, the system collapsed.
Reports show that once the units tried to move, wire strung between units
no longer sufficed, and the lack of communications became debilitating—
units either tried to talk, unsuccessfully, on radios susceptible to jamming

*1(§) Battlefield Reconstruction Center, Asst Chief of Staff, G2, Hq, VII (U.S.)
Corps, “Battlefield Reconstruction from Enemy Perspective (24-28 Feb 1991),” p 47.

98



sort dropped during Desert Storm by the F-117s and F-111Fs had sub-
stantially higher probabilities of hitting individual point targets than
dozens of unguided Mk-82s. Precision-guided weapon technology had
improved considerably since the Vietnam War, a fact reflected in the
superb performance of the GBU-27 guided bomb dropped by the F-117s.
The success of air defense suppression by specialized aircraft such as the
F-4G, the EF-111, and the EA-6B reinforced this capability, because now
aircraft could fly at medium altitudes and designate their targets with
more care than in the past.

Changes in the Vulnerability of Certain Target Classes

Throughout the history of air warfare, targets have had very different
degrees of vulnerability to air attack. The speed of an attacking aircraft,
the sophistication of its navigation and target identification systems, and
the accuracy of its ordnance determined what aircraft could and could not
do. It would not have occurred to air planners during World War Il, for
example, to think that one might systematically attack an enemy’s entire
telephone system, even if one could, on extraordinary occasions, conduct
isolated precision attacks against pieces of it.

The Gulf War saw at least two classes of difficult targets-armored
vehicles in revetments and very hard aircraft shelters-become vulnerable to
air attack from medium altitude at night. Many experts assumed before
Desert Storm that, save for an occasional lucky bomb, both hardened aircraft
shelters like the Iraqi “Yugos” and main battle tanks in revetments would
be virtually invulnerable to bombing attacks from fixed-wing aircraft. The
integration of forward-looking infrared (FLIR) sensors with laser targeting
devices aboard individual aircraft provided the accuracy and ease of employ-
ment necessary for systematic attacks against both classes of targets. The
combination of the 1-2000 hard-target-penetrating warhead and laser guid-
ance kits meant that bombs could penetrate structures as hard as the Iraqi
“Yugos” and destroy any aircraft inside. Given the degree of air superiority
achieved early in Desert Storm by Coalition air forces and Iraqi reluctance
to risk destruction of the Iraqi air force by contesting control of the air,
Coalition airmen could conduct systematic campaigns of attrition against
hardened Iraqi aircraft shelters and the armored vehicles of Republican
Guard and other Iraqi ground units.

244



A

A-4 1, 15, 183, 198, 199, 200

A-6 15, 21, 23, 81, 183, 190, 195,
199, 200, 201, 227

A-7 183, 196, 199

A-10- 15, 21, 22, 49, 66, 84, 103,
105, 111, 112, 142, 172, 199, 200,
202, 205, 219, 229, 250

ABCCC 192, 193

Abu Dhabi 2

Abu Ghurayb 79, 83

AC-130 20, 199

ad hoc 35, 130-132, 135, 215, 231,
247, 248

ad hoc organization 247

aerial tankers 29, 164, 229

AFHRA 29,°49, 172, 198

AGM-114 104

AGM-65 104

AGM-88 196

AH-1W 104, 113, 199, 204

AH-64 104, 112, 113, 118, 199, 204

AIF 66, 85, 134

air campaign 1, 2, 5-7, 9, 11, 14, 15,
17, 22, 27, 28, 31, 34-42, 44-49,
52, 53, 55, 56, 57, 59, 60, 64, 76,
77, 80, 83, 85, 87, 89, 91-93, 100,
103, 109, 110, 112, 118, 123, 124,
126, 127, 131, 132, 134-137, 140,
141, 143, 145, 147, 149-152, 155,
157, 159, 160, 164, 165, 172, 176,
178, 181, 195, 200, 205, 207, 212,
220-224, 227, 229, 231, 234-236,
240, 242, 245, 248, 249

Air Corps Tactical School 236

air defense 4-6, 8, 12, 13, 17, 31, 32,
36, 40-42, 48, 52, 53, 55-58, 62,
87, 92, 112, 125, 126, 146, 160,
169, 190, 195-198, 216, 222-224,
227, 229, 230, 240, 241, 242, 245,
249

air division 148

Air Force Combat Ammunition Center
213

Air Force Reserve 217, 219

Index

Air Force Special Operations
Command 181

air interdiction 66, 93, 98, 100, 108,
113, 114, 117, 170

Air National Guard 217, 219

air power 1, 2, 15, 22-24, 27-30, 33,
35, 36, 44, 48, 49, 51, 55, 65, 78,
80, 85, 91, 109, 111, 112, 117, 118,
124, 125, 133, 137, 145-147, 151,
154, 156, 157, 159-161, 163, 167,
178, 179, 181-183, 186, 198, 204,
205, 207, 221, 223, 229, 235, 236,
240, 242, 246, 247, 249

air refueling 149, 150, 160, 167, 183,
190, 219, 228, 234

Air Reserve Components 217

Air Staff 6, 35, 36, 49, 129, 131,
136, 137

air superiority 12, 27, 30, 33, 34, 38,
39, 48, 56, 57, 63, 89, 119, 159,
240, 245

air supremacy 13, 28, 57, 250

air tasking order 5, 33, 135, 140, 141,
148, 153, 157, 158, 169, 170, 189,
216, 222, 233

air-to-surface missiles 15, 21, 103,
104, 202-204, 226

Airbome Warning and Control System
3, 60, 166, 178, 192-194, 234, 246,
248

airfields 4, 12, 13, 16, 18, 23, 32, 36,
40-42, 56, 58, 63, 64, 82, 119, 134,
136, 159, 175, 240

Al Asad 63, 245

Al Firdos 22, 68, 69, 152, 221, 251

Al Tagaddum 246

Al Tuwaitha 83

ALARM 229

An Nasiriyah 94, 170

anthrax 79

antiaircraft artillery 16, 56, 61, 62,
92, 229

antiradiation missiles 12, 41, 58, 60,
66, 196, 226

Apache 104, 112, 113, 204

ARCENT 7, 132, 141, 142, 154, 155

area of operation 168

265



Figure 24
Fixed-Site Iraqi Naval Targets

KUWAIT

rm Missile Site

fo)

@ Silkw

100



TIALD

TIS

TLAM

TOT

TPFDD

UAV

UK

UN

USAF

USAFE
USCENTCOM
USCINCCENT

USMC
USN
USNAVCENT

USSOCOM
WRSK

Tactical Fighter Wing

Thermal Imaging and Laser
Designating

Tactical Intelligence Squadron
Tomahawk Land-Attack Missile
Time Over Target

Time-Phased Force Deployment Data
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

United Kingdom

United Nations

United States Air Force

U.S. Air Forces Europe

Central Command

Commander-in-Chief U.S. Central
Command

U.S. Marine Corps
U.S. Navy

U.S. Naval Component, Central
Command

U.S. Special Operations Command

War Readiness Spares Kits

263



place by secure telephone; so too did subsequent coordination on changes
to call signs, times, radio frequencies, and so forth.

The daily air tasking order (ATO) grew to hundreds of pages and was
laboriously transmitted over the Computer Assisted Force Management
System (CAFMS), but most units had already received the ATO informa-
tion that pertained to them via secure telephone from Riyadh long before
the ATO was sent electronically. Some units avoided CAFMS entirely by
arranging for electronic transmission of the ATO from personal computer
to personal computer over the voice network through STU-IIIs. The Black
Hole also used this technique to transmit master attack plans to Checkmate.
The down side of using STU-IIs for data communications was the pressure
put on voice circuits.!*

Although callers (who would have liked more secure phones and lines)
often had trouble “going secure,” the STU-III came to symbolize the as-
pects of computers and telecommunications that worked best. The great
promise of these intertwined technologies was only partly realized in this
war. CAFMS was by no means the only computer-communications system
to prove inadequate under the demands of Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
While the American military led other armed forces in its use of computers,
the rapidity of technical change had left many of its systems out of date
even before they were fully developed. Older mainframe systems were
only beginning to acquire the hardware and software necessary for integrat-
ed databases and distributed processing.

Problems with mainframe systems, exposed immediately at the begin-
ning of the crisis in August 1990, required even more extensive use of
secure phones to overcome efficiency breakdowns. Because the Iraqi
invasion came while CENTCOM was still developing an operations plan for
that contingency, the Joint Operation Planning and Execution System
(JOPES) did not have the necessary data to help commanders schedule the
deployment. JOPES was itself undergoing hardware and software develop-
ment and was not ready to manipulate rapidly changing deployment data
fast enough to meet CENTCOM’s demands. JOPES ran on the Worldwide
Military Command and Control Systems’s old Honeywell mainframe com-
puters acquired in the 1970s; it was supposed to integrate separate databases
for peacetime planning and crisis planning. JOPES’ problems, however,
extended beyond its transitional condition to a shortage of personnel trained
to operate in this evolving system. For weeks, manual calculations, person-

See Chapter 5.

232


33

34

viii

Coalition Attack Aircraft Sorties by Time on Target

17 Jan - 28 Feb91 2... eee 201

Deployment of Selected USAF Assets ......... locees 211
Tables

Internal Look 90 Target Lists .............000 0008 32
Growth of Targets, Aug to Dec 90.1.0... 2.22 ee ee eee 42
Listing of Selected Munitions Employed in Desert Storm

17 Jan - 28 Feb 91 2.2... ee eee 103
Operational-Strategic Summary ............0e20e eee 118
Total Sorties by U.S. Service/Allied Country

by Aircraft Type 2.6... . ee eee ee ee 184
Desert Storm Attack Aircraft... ... 2.0... 00 ee eens 199
Missiles Employed in Desert Storm Strikes ........... 200

Desert Shield/Desert Storm U.S. Weapons Expenditures .. 203



Finally, how close did the bombing of this target category come to
achieving the goal of limiting the fuel and lubricants available to Iraqi
forces for military operations? For the most part, the Iraqi Air Force
chose to stay in its shelters and sit out the war, hence it required little
fuel. Iraqi ground forces in the Kuwait theater had access to Kuwaiti oil
facilities and continued to operate the Kuwaiti refining facilities and use
Kuwaiti stocks. Eventually, Coalition air forces began bombing selected
Kuwaiti oil facilities to limit use of the stocks. Even so, the amount of
diesel fuel available for ground operations at the outset of what turned
out to be a 100-hour ground campaign would probably have sufficed for
weeks, if not months, of combat.” Before that time, most Iraqi forces in
the theater were dug into static positions and had minimal POL (petro-
ileum, oil, lubricants) requirements. Individual units faced local shortages
because of distribution problems to which Coalition air power undoubted-
ly contributed by striking targets such as trucks and bridges. However,
the limited difficulties caused by local shortages were not the result of
Coalition attacks on Iraqi refineries and major petroleum depots.

Was the strategic effort against Iragi oil wasted or unnecessary?
Again, one must recall the uncertainties under which the air planners and
commanders labored at the time. On the evening of 16 January 1991, no
one knew how long the war would last or how well the fourth largest
army in the world would resist Coalition efforts to liberate occupied
Kuwait. If the ground campaign had become protracted, the efforts
against oil might have eventually paid military dividends on the ground.
There were sound military reasons for limiting the availability of refined
fuels and lubricants as a hedge against the possibility that the war would
not proceed as favorably for the Coalition as it did. The effectiveness of
these efforts lay, therefore, mainly in limiting the Iraqis’ ability to wage
a protracted ground campaign. It was prudent to have done so, but
attacking oil refineries and storage in Iraq bore no significant military
tesults due to the swift collapse of the Iragi Army.

4(S/NF/REL MNF) Desert Storm Studies Group, U.S. Army Intelligence and Threat
Analysis Center, “Status of the Iraqi Logistics Systems in the KTO,“ annotated Brfg, 2
Feb 1991, GWAPS, CHST 50-3 & CBDA, Folder 19; also (S/NF) Iraq Regional Task
Force, “Iraq: Sustainment Capabilities for the KTO,” Desert Storm Defense Special
Assessment, DSA 171-91, 20 Feb 1991, p 2). It is not surprising that intelligence esti-
mates varied considerably concerning how many Iragi combat days might be sustained
by on-hand stocks (such as diesel fuel) in the Kuwait theater. While these sorts of
estimates are always asked for and made, they have inevitably been based on rather
speculative methodologies.

77



battlefield for the ground attack, the weight of effort shifted from the
Republican Guard and other heavy divisions in the Iraqi theater reserve
to more direct attacks on the Iraqi frontline divisions. More B-52 sorties
flew against the frontline forces to effect breaching operations. MC-130s
dropped BLU-82 (15,000-pound) bombs to clear mine fields and support
psychological operations. Following the loss of two A-10s 60 nautical
miles north of Kuwait City in mid-February, which prompted Gener-
al Horner to restrict A-10s to targets along the Saudi-Kuwait border in
Kuwait, a greater concentration of A-105 attacked the Iraqi regular army
forces in the front lines. Specific objectives included preparing breaching
sites in Iraqi defenses, destroying artillery in the breach areas, and bomb-
ing the pumps used to fill Iraqi fire-trenches. As air power began to
focus on the upcoming ground campaign, the continuing strategic air
campaign momentarily came to the fore with the attack on the Al Firdos
bunker on the night of 12-13 February. The Coalition did not know that
the bunker, a legitimate military target, had also served as a civilian
shelter when F-117s struck it. The resulting controversy over the deaths
of several hundred civilians resulted in tightened control from Washing-
ton of attacks into downtown Baghdad.

In preparation for the Coalition ground offensive, air and ground units
began rehearsing close air support procedures. As part of these prepara-
tions, General Horner established new rules of engagement to support the
ground campaign. He eliminated minimum-altitude restrictions and in-
structed crews to press their aerial attacks in every way possible to pro-
tect Coalition ground forces while maintaining an appropriate level of
caution for aircrews. General Horner summarized his guidance:

The weather considerations that were valid last week are no longer
valid. There are people’s lives depending on our ability to help them
if help is required. So I want a push put on. I want people feeling
compulsion to. hit a target. I do not want fratricide. So if in doubt
don’t shoot.

?4($) Comments from log of 24 Feb 1991, Hq CENTAF Office of History, Daily
Comments of Lt General Charles A. Horner, 17 January through 28 Feb 1991. GWAPS,
CHP 138.

22



counted rate. The discounting scheme proved a good corrective to pilot
reports and even to what appeared on video as a direct hit on an Iraqi
tank (discussed in the previous chapter). Still, the result was another
manifestation of the bomb damage assessment problem.

Disagreements over what bombing had accomplished were most
manifest in the differences between Washington and theater assessments—
the dispute over estimates of Iraqi equipment attrition, explained in the
previous chapter, being the most notable. Washington intelligence agen-
cies relied on national-level reconnaissance assets to determine what had
been destroyed, while Central Command could, in addition, use its limited
theater reconnaissance assets and pilot reports. These differences in
estimates remained unresolved throughout the war. All the factors com-
bined to make bomb damage assessment one of the most controversial
issues of the war. Reflecting on his experience in Desert Storm,
Maj. Gen. John Corder (CENTAF’s Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations)
argued that people expect too much from bomb damage assessment.

At a ceriain point in time, you’re going to have to stand up based on
your complete understanding of all sources available . . . . If you wait
... until you’re absolutely sure . . . that the bomb damage assessment
problem [is] solved, you might have missed the opportunity.“

In the end, General Schwarzkopf moved away from the search for
Precise assessments and refused to display attrition figures in his daily
briefings, preferring instead color-coded representations based on the
individual enemy division’s estimated overall effectiveness. According
to General Horner, by the time the ground offensive began, Schwarzkopf
was using the number of air strikes against a target, not bomb damage
assessment, as his prime indicator of enemy combat effectiveness.

For example, a 1/3 credit was given an A-10 claim of a kill and a 1/2 credit given
an F-111F claim. (S) Msg, ARCENT/G2, dig 170600Z Feb 1991, GWAPS, CHST 50.

+4(S) Intvw, GWAPS with Maj Gen John A. Corder, Deputy Commander of Opera-
tions, USCENTAF (Nov 1990 to Mar 1991), 18 May 1992, GWAPS, NA 361.

*SConduct of the Persian Gulf War, p 256.

56(S) Intvw, Perry Jamison, et al, AFCHO, with Lt Gen Charles E. Homer, 4 Mar
1992, GWAPS, NA 322.

142



Even the limited data make clear, however, that Iragi forces were
significantly more vulnerable on the move, day or night, than they were
dug in and surrounded by air defenses. The Joint Surveillance Target
Attack Radar System (JSTARS) aircraft, a test aircraft brought to the
theater just before the air war, proved enormously capable of identifying
the path of attacking or retreating columns of Iragi equipment and provid-
ed both battlefield intelligence and targeting information. Moreover,
vehicles out of revetments and on the move were vulnerable to more
weapons, such as aircraft cannon fire and air-delivered mines. It is not
surprising, then, that the success of attacks on moving columns of armor
was substantially greater than those attacks on similar forces protected by
berms, camouflage, and other defensive and deceptive measures.

From 29 through 31 January, the time of the Al Khafji battle, Iraqi
ground movements were a subject of much conjecture. While there was
detection of Iraqi forces moving south in eastern Kuwait, CENTCOM
suspected that the move was a feint for a larger maneuver to the west, at
the triborder area, by perhaps the Republican Guard divisions.” This
suspicion was helped along by pilot reports that the Tawakalna Division
had moved from its previous position (and was unlocated) and that the
Madinah Division was observed moving south.'® In this situation, the
JSTARS capabilities took on tremendous value, to both evaluate the
amount and nature of movement throughout the theater and track the
specific movements of Iraqi forces in southeast Kuwait.

All indications are that the air attacks on the Iraqi Army during the
Al Khafji incursion had a devastating effect. Iraqi equipment attrition as
recorded by Central Command increased fourfold for the period 29 Janu-
ary to 3 February over what it had been for the entire air campaign up to
that point. Even allowing for overcounting of the losses, the impact on
the Iraqis was tremendous. While a number of prisoner of war reports
mention the effects, the most telling one was the comment by a veteran
of the Iran-Iraq War, who remarked that his brigade underwent more
damage in thirty minutes than it had in eight years in the previous war.

%(S) TACC Log, intelligence brfg on 28 and 29 Jan 1991, and a notation of a
telephone call from the CENTCOM J-3, Maj Gen Moore, warning that the Al Kha(ji
attack may have been a feint. GWAPS, microfilm roll 10263.

100¢S) CENTAF Historian Notes of TACC Operations, 29-31 Jan 1991, GWAPS, NA
200.

109



area of responsibility 143

Argentina 181, 189

ARM 241

Amy Air Forces 241]

Army Tactical Missile System 200

Arnold, R. P1173

Arthur, Stanley 153

artillery 8, 9, 16, 21, 22, 49, 56, 61,
62, 82, 92, 98, 102, 103, 106-108,
112, 118, 120, 126, 127, 152, 153,
155, 179, 229, 237, 246

Assistant Secretary of Defense (Public
Affairs) 20

assumptions 80, 89, 140, 229, 236

ATACMS 200

ATC 98

Allantic bridge 163

ATO (see also air tasking order) 5,
34, 33-36, 39, 63, 69, 87, 140,
148-151, 154, 189, 233

AUTODIN 149

AV-8B 15, 49, 103, 111, 154, 172,
199, 200, 229

AWACS (see Airborne Waming and
Control System)

AWS 172

Az Zubayr 100

B-52 4, 12, 15, 22, 23, 30, 51, 81,
93, 104, 112, 145, 148, 155, 159
164, 167, 168, 178, 183, 199, 200,
219, 224, 225

bad weather 156

Bahrain 88, 168, 177, 181, 196-199

Baker, James 46

Baptiste, Sam 129, 130

Basra 24, 32, 47, 77, 94, 96, 98, 100,
114, 116, 167, 170

batule damage 64, 132

battleship battle group 29

BDA (see bomb damage assessment)

beddown 3, 198

Behery, Ahmed Ibrahim 158

Belgium 181

Berlin airlift 186

beyond visual range 60, 245

BGM-71 104

biological warfare 64, 79, 136, 137

266

biological weapons 5, 41, 79, 83,
120, 227

Black Hole 6, 16, 35, 38-40, 43, 48,
52, 55, 64, 66, 68-70, 81, 93,
129-136, 141, 147, 148, 150, 151,
152, 158, 160, 233, 247

BLU-109 63

BLU-82 22

Blue Ridge 153

bomb damage assessment 16, 30, 72,
91, 92, 94, 97, 98, 102, 118, 121,
331, 138-140, 142, 143, 152, 194

Boomer, Walter 154, 155, 175

botulinum 79

breaching 15, 22, 23, 120, 138

bridges 6, 15, 24, 40, 42-44, 51, 64,
66, 76, 78, 92-96, 98, 100, 114,
116, 120, 134, 136, 170, 226, 227,
228, 241, 243

briefing 2, 28, 34, 37-39, 48, 49, 53,
69, 84, 91, 106, 136, 137, 142, 172,
177, 200, 209, 215, 249

Brown outs 73

Bubiyan 102

Buccaneers 199, 201, 202

Bush, George 1, 2, 27, 33, 39, 45,
48, 250

BVR (see beyond visual range)

c

C-5 4, 60, 186, 187

C-130 4, 181, 188, 189, 243

C-141 4, 186, 187

C3 (see command, control, and
communication)

Cable News Network 69, 91, 250

CAFMS 149, 233

Cairo West 164

CALCM 200, 224

Canada 181, 189, 197

carrier battle groups 2, 4, 6, 30, 33

carriers 2, 4, 6, 8, 21, 23, 29, 30, 33,
49, 100, 102, 106, 107, 118, 149,
153, 167, 169, 183, 189, 191, 198,
228, 238

‘Caruana, Patrick P. 148

CAS (see close air support)

casualties 16, 19, 36, 44, 69, 76, 108,
225, 240, 246, 248, 250

CAT 234

CBU-52 103, 104



facilities.” Nearly half of the approximately 1,500 “Scud” strikes deliv-
ered ordnance against either fixed sites or structures such as culverts and
highways overpasses suspected of being potential hiding places for mo-
bile launchers; some 30 percent struck ballistic missile production and
infrastructure; only 15 percent—just over 215 strikes—-were reported to
have involved attacks on mobile launchers.” The last percentage—
particularly when placed alongside the roughly 1,000 “Scud patrol”
sorties that dropped on targets other than Scud-begins to give a quantita-
tive sense of how elusive Iraq’s mobile launchers proved to be. The
numbers also confirm, however, that the diversion of air assets to the
“great Scud chase” was not large relative to over 42,000 strikes recorded
during the war by Coalition fixed-wing aircraft.

Figure 17
Daily Scud Launches during Desert Storm (Riyadh time}

BB Launched at isrnot
EJ Launched at Saudi Arabia

04 Launched at Bahrain
Scuds 87 Scud warhead hits U.S.
Launched barracks in Dhahran, killing
Daily 28 and wounding 87

17 20 23 26 29 1 4 7 WW 13 16 19 22 2 28
January Fabruary 1994

‘Source: Thomas P, Christie, William J. Barlow, at al., “Dasart Storm Scud
Campaign (U)," IDA paper P-2661, Apr 1992, SECRET NF.

“The “AIF” total for Scud strikes/sorties in the GWAPS Mission Database is substan-
tially lower than the roughly 2,500 Scud sorties widely reported after the Gulf War [see,
for example, Richard P. Hallion, Siorm Over Iraq: Air Power and the Gulf War (Washing-
ton, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), p 181]. The principal reason for this
difference stems from “Scud patrol” missions that were Launched to hunt mobile Scuds but,
when unable to locate any, “dropped on” other targets of opportunity. This example also
illustrates the kinds of problems that infected many of the figures concerning the Desert
Storm air campaign that were circulated in the immediate aftermath of the war.

“GWAPS Missions Database, 14 Dec 1992.

84



Figure 8
Chokepoints for Retreating Iraqi Troops
in the Kuwait Theater

9

8 8
/ Hawr Al Hemmer °

7 4 Causeway 7

6 6

5 5

4 SAUDI ARABI 4

ae