America At War - Concise Histories Of U.S. Military Conflicts From Lexington To Afghanistan (39 page)

The approach Schwarzkopf adopted was the third option. He decided to have his most powerful strike force, VII Corps and XVIII Corps, at the last minute redeploy several hundred miles west, move into Iraq, and strike to the east. This was the now famous “Left Hook,” which the general revealed to his commanders at a meeting in Riyadh on November 14. The plan was audacious, although the inability of Iraqi forces to conduct reconnaissance meant Saddam’s troops were unaware that Schwarzkopf had repositioned his troops.

Given the boldness of the plan and the size and experience of the Iraqi army, Coalition casualties in Desert Storm were expected to be heavy. Estimates on the high side numbered 7,000 dead and 13,000 wounded. To accommodate the latter, Central Command had established several hospitals and had made available, according to an official U.S. Army history, 13,350 beds for medical use. The U.S. Navy also prepared for casualties. At the time, the American naval service possessed two hospital ships, the
Mercy
and the
Comfort
. Both were sent to the Gulf.

Prior to the ground attack, Schwarzkopf’s plan called for an extensive aerial assault. This was to strike strategic targets throughout Iraq, gain control of the skies above the battlefield, and pound the enemy troops in Kuwait. Saddam and his generals had no idea how destructive this assault was to be.

***

The first aircraft, six U.S. Army Apache helicopters, lifted off in the early morning hours of January 17 (in Washington, D.C., it was mid-afternoon of the 16th). They struck Iraqi air defense radars just inside the border, thereby creating a corridor through which Coalition planes could safely enter Iraqi airspace. More than six hundred planes took part in this first day of the attacks. They struck targets throughout Iraq, hitting the enemy’s command posts, its communications network, and suspected nuclear, biological, and chemical facilities. Among the American aircraft employed were the F-117 Nighthawks. These aeronautical marvels flew to downtown Baghdad and dropped their bombs on target, neither detected by Iraqi radar nor hit by the erratic gunfire the defenders threw up into the night sky.

Only four Coalition aircraft were lost that first night. Throughout the air campaign—which lasted forty-four days—losses were slight. In total, fewer than forty planes were downed by enemy action. Given that Coalition air forces flew 44,145 combat sorties during the war, the number of aircraft lost was minimal.

One reason for the air campaign’s success was the dismal performance of Saddam’s air force. Though well equipped and by no means small, the Iraqi air arm was outmatched by its counterparts from Great Britain, the United States, and Saudi Arabia. Air forces of the latter two countries flew the F-15 Eagle, then the world’s premier fighter aircraft. The Eagles accounted for nearly all of the thirty-four Iraqi machines downed in combat. However, most of Saddam’s pilots declined to fight, and more than 120 flew their planes to Iran, where they and their aircraft were interned.

Coalition aircraft controlled the skies above both Iraq and Kuwait. One attack on the former received much publicity as a large number of civilians inadvertently were killed. The target was a reinforced concrete bunker in Baghdad the Iraqis used as a military command center. An F-117 destroyed it with two 2,000-pound “smart bombs.” Regrettably, the night of the attack, and unbeknownst to the Americans, Iraqi civilians were inside using the facility as an air raid shelter. Some four hundred individuals, including children, lost their lives. Saddam’s propaganda ministry made certain the world knew of the incident.

The use of these smart bombs was a hallmark of the Gulf War. These were bombs that were able to strike their targets with great accuracy. In previous wars bombing strikes were hit-and-miss affairs. Collateral damage often was heavy, because many of the bombs would miss their intended targets. Technology changed that. Targeting systems and the bombs themselves became precision weapons. They now could hit what they were aimed at. This meant not only that nearby buildings and people were left untouched, but also that fewer planes needed to be involved in the attack, thereby reducing the risk to the attacking force.

In the 1990–1991 war against Iraq, smart bombs received their baptism of fire. They also gained considerable public attention as television audiences in the United States and elsewhere became accustomed to viewing Iraqi targets being blown apart by a single bomb. In fact, while smart bombs were employed in the battle against Saddam, their number was limited. Most of the destruction from the air came from old-fashioned, unguided “iron bombs.”

One of the new precision weapons first employed in the Gulf War was the Tomahawk cruise missile. Essentially, this was a flying bomb. Launched from a ship it flew at subsonic speed over a long distance and, with a sophisticated guidance system, exploded directly on its target.

During the first night of the air campaign, January 17, six Tomahawks were fired by the battleship
Missouri
, which was positioned in the Gulf several miles southeast of Kuwait. Across the Arabian Peninsula, in the Red Sea, the USS
San Jacinto
, an American cruiser, launched Tomahawks as well. Surface ships were not alone in using the missile. On January 19, 1991, an American attack submarine fired a Tomahawk at a target in Iraq. This was the first time in history that a submerged warship had sent off a cruise missile in wartime.

On that first day of air strikes, 122 Tomahawks descended on enemy targets. In total, 282 of the sea-based cruise missiles were dispatched during Desert Storm. Each Tomahawk cost approximately $1.2 million. Several were shot down by the Iraqis. To save money and to not deplete the navy’s supply of the weapon, General Powell ordered Schwarzkopf to halt their use, which he did. More than one admiral believed Colin Powell, an army officer, did so because of the favorable media coverage the U.S. Navy received from the success of the Tomahawk.

Cruise missiles were not part of Saddam’s navy. Less favored by the Iraqi leader than his army and air force, the Iraqi sea service consisted mainly of small missile boats. The boats were well armed and posed a threat to Coalition warships operating in the Gulf, so they drew the attention of British and American naval commanders. On January 29, near the Kuwaiti island of Bubiyan, aircraft from American and British ships destroyed a large number of the Iraqi boats. The action has been given the name “the Bubiyan Turkey Shoot” for it was a lopsided affair. All the Iraqi missile boats were put out of action, as were thirteen other Iraqi vessels. With Saddam’s surface ships no longer a concern, Coalition maritime commanders could breathe easy. But the Iraqi minefields remained a problem. On February 18, they scored a success. Two American warships struck Iraqi mines. Damage was such that both vessels had to withdraw from the battle zone.

One additional naval action deserves mention. To protect Coalition warships, Dutch, Australian, and British ships were assigned air defense duties. This they did well, especially the Royal Navy destroyer HMS
Gloucester
. On February 25, the Iraqis fired two Iranian-built Silkworm missiles at American warships that were shelling Iraqi positions ashore. One of the American vessels was the
Missouri
.
As the missiles closed on the battleship and its escorts, one of them fell into the sea, causing no damage. The other proceeded on course.
Gloucester
then fired two Sea Dart missiles, one of which destroyed the remaining Silkworm. The postscript to this episode is that the
Missouri
then located the Silkworm’s launch battery and, with its big guns, blew it apart.

***

As the air strikes continued, Iraqi military assets inside Kuwait increasingly were targeted. The goal was to reduce their combat effectiveness by half, especially the T-72 tanks, which the Iraqis possessed in great number. Whether the air strikes accomplished that goal remains in dispute, although no doubt exists that the Iraqi army’s inventory of fighting vehicles was greatly reduced.

Pounded from the air, Saddam responded in kind, but with a weapon far different than what Coalition forces were using. This was the Scud, a crude ballistic missile that carried a very small warhead and was not terribly accurate. As a military device the Scud was little more than a nuisance. But when launched at cities, it became a weapon of political terror, with great psychological impact.

The first Scuds were fired on January 18. They struck the Israeli cities of Haifa and Tel Aviv. By targeting the Jewish state, Saddam hoped to have the Israelis retaliate. Were they to do so, Arab nations in the Coalition would be seen as allied with Israel in a war against another Arab state. This would be unacceptable in the Arab world and would necessitate a withdrawal from the Coalition. Egypt and Saudi Arabia especially could not be seen as partnering with Israel.

Saddam’s strategy was clever, but it did not work. At the urging of President Bush and Secretary Baker, Israeli leaders refrained from responding. This represented a significant change in policy, as the Israeli position was to always strike back when attacked. Helping the Israelis exercise restraint was the immediate deployment of U.S. Army Patriot missiles to Israel. These were intended to shoot down any incoming Scuds. An additional incentive to the Israelis was the promise of additional military aid from the United States.

In total, Saddam launched eighty-six Scuds during the war. They caused very little physical damage, save for one strike. This took place on February 25, when a Scud hit a U.S. army barracks in Dhahran. Twenty-eight Americans were killed, and almost a hundred were wounded.

Numerous Patriots were fired in attempts to destroy the incoming Scuds. At the time, the American missiles were seen to be successful. In fact, they were not. Often the Scud broke apart as it nosed down on the target, and the Patriot might hit one of the pieces, with the rest, including the warhead, landing on the city below. The Patriot’s value lay less in its actual ability to intercept the Scud than in the belief, at the time, that it was able to do so.

The best way to stop the Scuds was to prevent their launch. British and American Special Forces, therefore, operated inside Iraq trying to destroy their launch sites. Stationary Scud batteries were put out of commission. But mobile facilities (essentially trucks with Scuds) proved difficult to locate, so many remained untouched.

Political pressure to halt the Scud attacks was immense. Coalition aircraft devoted considerable resources to hunting the missiles, with results far from satisfactory. Despite the large number of warplanes allocated to finding them, the Scuds never were put out of action.

As Coalition planes each day struck targets in Kuwait and Iraq, diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis continued. One last such effort was made by Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader, who dispatched a special envoy to Baghdad. This, like other diplomatic initiatives, failed. Days later, when Saddam rejected President Bush’s final ultimatum to withdraw from Kuwait, the time had arrived for Coalition ground forces to enter the fray. They attacked on February 24, 1991.

Schwarzkopf had deployed forces along the Saudi border with Kuwait. Adjacent to the Persian Gulf were troops belonging to Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Farther west was a second group of Arab soldiers. In between were two divisions of United States marines, supplemented by a U.S. Army armored brigade. Still farther west was Schwarzkopf’s “iron fist,” VII Corps and XVIII Corps, which included the British and French armored units. In its totality, the Coalition’s army—some 620,000 soldiers—was one of the most powerful military forces ever assembled.

Early on the 24th, across a 270-mile front, Coalition troops went on the offensive. Tanks plowed through sand berms, troops carved pathways through the minefields, helicopters flew low firing rockets, artillery lit up the sky (the U.S. 1st Infantry’s artillery delivered more than six hundred thousand bomblets within a period of thirty minutes). At the receiving end of this massive firepower were the Iraqi defenders. Poor souls, they were overwhelmed. Some chose to fight and they were killed. Many more simply gave up, and lived. On that first day of combat, some thirteen thousand surrendered.

Along the coast, Egyptian and Saudi troops (and a few Kuwaiti soldiers who had escaped from the Iraqis) made good progress. Supported by naval gunfire, these troops engaged their foe and beat them back. They would be the first Coalition units to enter Kuwait City.

To their left, the U.S. marines also made good progress. By the second day, after beating off Iraqi counterattacks, they were but ten miles from the Kuwaiti capital. Unusual for the marines, they had fought several tank battles, taking on the Iraqi T-72s. By the time the marines had secured Kuwait’s international airport, more than three hundred enemy tanks no longer were in service.

To help convince Saddam’s generals that the main thrust of the Coalition forces would be a northward strike into southern Kuwait from Saudi Arabia, Schwarzkopf had directed that those U.S. troops in the west not part of the Left Hook also attack the Iraqis directly opposite them. This took place and was carried out by the American 1st Infantry Division. Its commander, Major General Thomas Rhame, wanted to win quickly and with, he joked, “enough of us left to have a reunion.” The division accomplished the former and no doubt later enjoyed the latter.

The most striking element of Norman Schwarzkopf’s plan of battle—and the most risky—was the flanking maneuver required of his two most powerful units. They were to charge into the southern Iraqi desert then turn ninety degrees and hit the Republican Guards from the west. The two units, VII Corps and XVIII Corps, were well equipped for the job. As has been noted, they were armed with tanks, helicopters, and artillery, all of which were high-tech and deadly.

The role of XVIII Corps, and its 118,000 soldiers, was to race north from a point 350 miles inland to the Euphrates River and, once there, to (1) block the retreat of Republican Guard forces from Kuwait, and (2) then alter course and join the assault toward Kuwait City. With considerable skill and speed, the corps did both. One of its component units, the 101st Airborne Division, conducted the largest combat air assault in history when three hundred of its helicopters transported two thousand of its soldiers into battle.