Every Man a Tiger: The Gulf War Air Campaign sic-2

by Tom Clancy

  He agreed.

  Then I took a deep breath, prayed that Schwarzkopf would not kill me when he found out, and asked if General Behery had a couple of bright young officers who could participate in our planning efforts. If we were to be a true coalition, we needed representation from the other nations that would join in the fight to free Kuwait. I assured him that this did not constitute a formal agreement by his government, and added that, though I fully expected them to keep him informed, anyone he gave me would be sworn to secrecy.

  He nodded. Then we turned our conversation to other matters.

  Later that day, Ayeesh and Little Turki reported to my office, and I took them to the Black Hole to meet their new boss, Buster Glosson.

  ★ When I ran into Ayeesh that day in February, I asked him about those opening days back in September, and especially about how the Americans had accepted his presence. I wanted to understand how we treated Coalition members from other nations.

  Breaking into a huge smile, his eyes sparkling, he asked me, “You really want to know?” When I nodded, yes, he bluntly told me, “They treated me like a dumb officer. The moment I walked in, they shunted me to the side.

  “General Glosson was a great boss,” he went on to explain, “and he treated us with respect; but we didn’t work with him. We had to work with our counterparts in your air force; and with them I was reluctant to speak, and they were not interested in what some Arab who had never been to war had to offer.”

  By February, of course, the two Saudis had become full partners in the Black Hole team, but I realized what a high hill they’d had to climb to overcome the inherent prejudices of the Americans.

  I thought back then to the beginning of the war, when Sheikh Mohammed from the United Arab Emirates had flown to Riyadh with his two planners in order to ensure that the largely American staff accepted them. I recalled the first time I had met Colonels Khalid and Faris as they and the Sheikh had nervously ridden down the elevator with me to go meet Buster.[74] Because their Chief of Staff had trusted them to ensure that their fledgling air force was well represented in our councils of power, they were proud, almost arrogant; yet they were also afraid. You could see it in their eyes as they entered this den of Americans — violent, self-assured people who liked to call Arabs “ragheads” behind their backs, and whose movies about terrorism always seemed to feature bad guys who looked very much like they did.

  It was Ayeesh who made me ponder the importance of this coalition and how hard it was to form it and sustain it.

  ★ What set this coalition apart from other military associations of states was not the nobility of their cause. Certainly the mission of the Allies who liberated occupied nations in World War II was measurably more important on that scale. What set this coalition apart was the attitude of the Americans.

  It all started with the President. George Bush instinctively knew the role he had to play, and it was far from the interventionist role that had characterized the attitude of his predecessors in Vietnam. It was not his role to dictate the contribution of others, to tell them how they would fit into an American war. Rather, George Bush’s experience as head of the CIA and Ambassador to China and the United Nations had taught him that Americans did not have all the answers and that others could contribute more than just the lives of their fighting men. For that reason, he had sent Dick Cheney to Jeddah in August to ask King Fahd what he thought we should do after the invasion of Kuwait. And as the days dragged on, the Coalition grew stronger, not weaker, despite the difficulties that countries of such diverse cultures and interests experienced working side by side. In large measure, that was because the American President did not throw his weight around. He listened and sought counsel from the others.

  As a result, the men and women from other Coalition states did not receive secret phone calls from their capitals warning them to watch the Americans, telling them to be careful lest the United States military lead them down the path taken in Vietnam.

  The Americans needed this Coalition as much as those fighting to defend their countries in the Gulf needed us.

  At the end of the Cold War, there remained a single superpower, the United States. How long she will remain so, only God knows, but for now we are it. This is a very dangerous thing. Our economy dominates the economies of other nations. Or as the Saudis (whose riyal is tied to the dollar) say, “When America gets a cold, we get pneumonia.” If the President of the United States decides to bomb another nation, who can stop him? Sure, other nations can condemn our actions, and Russia retains the means to rain thousands of nuclear weapons on North America. But the size, economic strength, and military power of the United States is without equal.

  Therefore, it is incumbent on the American president to walk carefully and to think before acting, as unintended consequences of military action — no matter how noble the cause — can have far-reaching effect.

  This is why the Gulf Coalition and the way it was formed and maintained is so important. The cause was noble — to free Kuwait. The Americans were needed, because of their military power and leadership roles in organizations such as the United Nations. But the Americans needed the other Coalition partners: to provide bases and ports for access; to provide soldiers, sailors, and airmen to confront a huge Iraqi military machine fighting on their own soil; but most of all, to provide counsel and legitimacy for a superpower that, left to its own devices, could fall into a pit of quicksand like Vietnam.

  Because of the divergent cultures, self-interests, and experiences of its partners, the Coalition was hugely difficult to form and maintain. The biggest divergence was between Americans and Arabs.

  The four-decade-plus existence of NATO provided common experience for American, Canadian, French, Italian, and English members of the Coalition. And for airmen, integration was further eased because they all spoke English and (as noted earlier) flight operations are task-organized. Thus, they could fight in the same piece of sky and work as one, using the common Air Tasking Order as guidance while retaining prerogatives appropriate to their national identities.

  By way of contrast, the Gulf Cooperation Council nations did not share an experience like those from NATO. More important, they did not have the combat experience of Korea, Vietnam, and the Cold War. Thus, they entered the fight as an equal partner who did not feel equal. More important still, their air forces were young. If it was troubling to a young USAF pilot to wonder how he would do his first time in combat, consider how troubling it must have been to an Arab fighter pilot to wonder how he would do his first time in combat.

  In fact, the Arabs had nothing to worry about on that score.

  Let’s look at the record.

  In their brief combat in a life-or-death losing cause, the Kuwaiti Air Force did very well. When the Iraqis came across the border that night long ago in August, the air force of Kuwait rose to meet them.

  A key ingredient of the Iraqi plan had been to capture the emir of Kuwait and his family, so the invaders could establish a puppet government and legitimize their theft of the nation and its people. In advance of the attacking tanks, Iraqi special forces, some of Saddam’s best-trained, best-equipped, and most loyal troops, were flying in helicopters to Kuwait City to surround the royal palace, overwhelm the royal guard, and capture the emir.

  It didn’t happen. KAF fighter aircraft and surface-to-air missiles shot down thirty-three of the Iraqi vanguard.

  Though the fight was over quickly, and Kuwaiti air bases were overrun by tanks early the next morning, the KAF had bought the time the emir needed to flee to Saudi Arabia. Having saved their emir, the KAF fighters had to turn themselves and flee to Saudi Arabia. While they were bitterly ashamed of their defeat, they had fought well and now only wanted another chance to avenge the unholy occupation of their land and to liberate their wives and children in occupied Kuwait. Men like Lieutenant Colonel Al-Samdan, who represented his nation in the TACC, had only one fear — that the Coalition would not go to war, that Kuwait would not be
freed, and that they could never go home to their families.

  For the other GCC nations, the choices were less clear.

  The year before, Bahrain had received brand-new F-16s, the world’s premium multirole aircraft, after its pilots and ground crews had operated F-5 fighters for years. Though F-16s are easy jets to fly and maintain, it is difficult to maximize the full capabilities of this amazing aircraft’s avionics suite. In the USAF, years of training are required before pilots are capable of using the F-16 to its fullest. The Bahrainis didn’t have a year, and they didn’t have homegrown leaders who had fought in Vietnam to guide them.

  But they did have “Saint”—the call sign used by an American who had left the USAF and taken a job in Bahrain as an instructor pilot. I cannot use his real name. A typical fighter pilot, Saint loved flying more than anything else. So when the chance came to fly with the Bahrainis — to fly daily, with no paperwork other than filling out grade sheets — he jumped at it.

  When Iraq invaded Kuwait, the emir offered his nation’s squadrons of F-5s and F-16s to the task of aiding Kuwait, and he asked Saint to help.

  This request meant problems for Saint. As an American citizen and not a member of our military forces, it was legally forbidden for him to take part in another nation’s combat operations. So when the Iraqis threatened Bahrain, he should have joined those who fled the region. Instead, he stayed on where he was needed, training pilots.

  After the war began, Major Hamad, the commander of the Bahraini Air Force, was faced with a dilemma: His air force was eager to enter the war; his pilots were well trained; he had some of the best-maintained jets in the world; but he had no one with combat experience — no one with the self-confidence that combat instills. He didn’t have to look far for a solution.

  He went to Saint and asked him to help get them started, and Saint was not only delighted to help, he was overjoyed at the chance to return to combat, and honored that Hamad had asked him.

  Saint flew the first Bahraini combat mission as leader. He flew the next one as number three. Then, as the Bahrainis gained combat experience, he flew as number four.

  He did this fully aware that flying combat for Bahrain was putting him into a legal no-man’s-land. At worst, if he was shot down, he had no status as a prisoner of war and could be executed as a spy. He could also lose his citizenship, as our State Department takes a very dim view of Americans running around the world fighting for other people. But he was a fighter pilot, and such insignificant details couldn’t keep him from strapping on his G suit.

  Saint flew as many missions as he could, but reckoning had to come, and finally, friends in the American embassy warned him that the State Department had heard rumors about his activities and were preparing to investigate.

  Though his combat missions had to stop, Saint’s experience and example had made a significant contribution to the Bahraini pilots’ self-confidence. Day in and out, they flew combat air patrols and bombed targets in Kuwait.

  Were they afraid? Certainly. Was it a huge challenge? Yes. But they did everything asked of them with professionalism and pride.

  After the war, I visited Sheikh Isa Air Base and pinned air medals on the chests of twenty-two extremely proud Bahraini fighter pilots. In the back of the room stood Saint. He had no medals on his chest, yet there was just as much pride on his beaming face.

  Bahrain may have had the smallest air forces to fly combat in the Gulf War, but their record in the war was second to none.

  ★ The United Arab Emirates received new Mirage fighters in late 1990. So getting them into the war was a very near thing.

  When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, Sheikh Zayed had been the first Arab leader to ask for American military assistance. We had deployed two KC-135 tanker aircraft to conduct air refueling exercises with UAEAF aircraft flying defensive air patrols in the Arabian Gulf. Later, Sheikh Zayed’s pilots and their new French fighters joined the Coalition air forces working to free Kuwait. The only problem: his pilots were not trained to operate the new jets, let alone fly them into combat.

  Many people believe Arabs are lazy. I can tell you that when the temperature is over 120 degrees Fahrenheit, no one wants to engage in physical labor out-of-doors. Nonetheless, these men from the UAE had no other options. They worked. They put in eighteen-hour days, in ground school and in the air, learning how to fly their new jets, learning how to use their electronic warfare systems, radar, missiles and bombs, and honing combat skills in air-to-air and air-to-ground combat.

  Young Colonel Abdullah led their first combat sorties. Though these didn’t go perfectly, the pilots got the job done; they got better; and day after day, they joined the stream of Coalition fighters coming out of the air bases in the UAE and going forward to free Kuwait.

  ★ Perhaps the biggest hurdle Coalition airmen had to overcome was the fear of failure.

  Even Saudi pilots had to face such fears — though they are among the most experienced in the world. Their commanding general, Behery, for example, had flown an F-86 on the national acrobatic team, and their Ambassador to the United States, Bandar bin Sultan, had been a skilled F-5 and F-15 pilot before his king assigned him to duties in Washington.

  Even so, young Saudi pilots still had to confront the fear that every fighter pilot faces on his first combat sortie. And for the Saudis, the stakes were higher than normal. After all, the Iraqis were on their border.

  The following story of one young Saudi pilot on his first combat mission is not atypical.

  SOMETIMES IT TAKES A HERO

  Imagine you are a young man who has caught the bug to fly.

  Though you live in a nation that has not known war since its birth in the early days of the century, you join your country’s air force, and they send you off to fly the most wonderful airplanes, sleek F-5s and the awkward but powerful high-tech Tornado. You love the freedom of flight, and you are good at it, so there is the pride that comes from competence, and you are proud to serve your king and country.

  It is not all easy. Some of your mates do not survive the hazards of flying fighters. You are often away from home, attending schools in the United States. And because you are a Type A personality, you put in more hours around the squadron than do some of the others. Still, it is an idyllic existence — until Saddam Hussein decides to rape Kuwait and threaten the safety of your nation, family, and home.

  “Errr,” you think, “maybe being in the Air Force has some drawbacks… Oh what the heck, we’ve been training for this for years… Still, I wonder if I can hack it?”

  Lieutenant Colonel Sultan Farhan Al-Milhim — our young aggressive Tornado pilot — loved flying, his country, his family, his base commander General Turki (who was his role model), and his God. Everything else was down in the noise level.

  After the dust settled in August, the Royal Saudi Air Force got back into a training routine. Flying out of Dhahran’s King Abdullah Aziz Air Base, Sultan prepared to repel the Iraqi Army if it came across the border from occupied Kuwait.

  Later, he planned strikes into Iraq. His target was an airfield, and his sortie on the war’s first night would be part of a major effort involving RSAF Tornadoes, U.S. Navy F-14s, and USAF Wild Weasels.

  Early in January, with things heating up, the overall mission commander for the target Sultan had called a meeting of all the flight leaders aboard the aircraft carrier USS Kennedy. The mission commander was responsible for making sure all the planning bugs were worked out and that everyone understood what needed to be done for a successful strike. Once the mission was initiated, the mission commander could call a change or abort — depending on weather, enemy defenses, or the condition of the target.

  The meeting went well; the U.S. Navy F-14 WSO mission commander and the Saudi Tornado pilot strike leader were on the same wavelength. Because the plans had meshed so quickly, Sultan was able to slip out to take care of the real reason he’d wanted to visit the carrier: to watch takeoffs and landings — among the most difficult operatio
ns performed by any fighter pilot. Though he’d love the challenge of trying that himself, he knew he’d never have the chance. His country didn’t have a carrier.

  On January 16, with no inkling yet that war was only moments away, Lieutenant Colonel Sultan put in a long day at work, mostly going over maps and tactics the squadron aircrews would use to attack a variety of targets in Iraq. He worked well past midnight and then headed for home, a lonely place now, as his wife and children had gone to Jeddah to escape the threat of Iraqi Scuds.

  On the way home, he stopped at a small restaurant in El-Kobar, a nearby town, for a bite to eat. At home, he called his wife to reassure her that all was well, turned on CNN, and slipped off his flying boots.

  The phone rang. It was his squadron commander. “Sultan?”

  “Yes,” he answered. (Who else would be here? he asked himself.)

  “I want you to come back here,” the squadron commander said.

  “Why?” Lieutenant Colonel Sultan asked. “Is there anything wrong?”

  “You need to come back. Something has come up.”

  “What kind of thing?”

  “Maybe we are going to war.”

  “Are you serious? You’re not joking?”

  “No, come to the squadron.”

  The young pilot quickly put his boots back on, turned off the television, and ran to his car. On the way to the base, he drove slowly, thinking about what might be ahead, and as a devout Muslim, his thoughts soon turned to prayer — a prayer shared by all the aircrews that night… not for the protection of his life or forgiveness for the horrible acts he was about to do. It was the universal fighter-pilot prayer: “Please God, don’t let me make a mistake.”

  At the base, everything was quiet. He wondered where everyone had gone, but then he noticed lights in the mission planning room. When he got there, the room was crowded. Everybody was there, from General Turki, the base commander, on down; and everybody was talking, trying to brief Turki on the details of the mission they’d been tasked to fly.