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By infinite moonlight, US readies for
war
By David Isenberg
Reasonable people might be forgiven for being
confused by media coverage of the so-called debate about
whether or not the US will invade Iraq. Much of the
coverage has been based on two assumptions: first, that
the administration has yet to make a decision to go to
war with Iraq; second, that if it does decide in favor
of war, there will be a measurable deployment of forces
to the theater a la Desert Shield in 1990.
Both assumptions are wrong.
First, what exactly do
people think the US military has been doing during the
past decade? It has been conducting a war, albeit an
aerial one with significant political limitations, over
the northern and southern Iraqi no-fly zones. All told,
nearly 300,000 flights have been flown in the zones,
including about 265,000 in the south since 1992 and
33,000 in the north since 1997. This year alone, Iraqi
air-defense facilities have been bombed eight times in
the north and 19 times in the south.
The
northern arm of this operation is Operation Northern
Watch (ONW), the successor to Operation Provide Comfort,
which officially ended in December 1996. ONW is now the
longest active combat operation in US European Command
history. Provide Comfort originally set up the northern
no-fly zone, which bans Iraqi flights north of the 36th
parallel, to ensure that Saddam’s aircraft did not
harass Kurds and other minorities in the north near the
Turkish border after the Gulf War. It is based out of
Incirlik Air Base in south-central Turkey and has 45 or
so planes assigned to the mission. Operation Northern
Watch began January 1, 1997, with an initial mandate of
six months.
The Turkish parliament reviews and
renews the ONW mandate semi-annually, in June and
December, and maintains fairly strict control over ONW
activities, much to the irritation of the United States.
Turkish rules of engagement are strict. The Turks allow
ONW planes to fly 50 hours per month, but no more than
three hours per day and three days per week, according
to a spokesman at Turkey’s defense ministry. ONW planes
are limited to 18 flying days per month, and ONW
commanders can base no more than 48 aircraft at
Incirlik.
Still, ONW has a considerable amount
of firepower, though the exact number of aircraft is
classified, and the mission provides a glimpse of what
to expect if the United States goes to war against
Saddam Hussein. A standard ONW "package" - the groups of
planes flying into northern Iraq - includes air-defense
suppression planes such as Navy EA-6Bs and Air Force
F-16CJ Wild Weasels, Air Force strike fighters such as
F-16Cs and F-15Es, refuelers, and AWACs battle
management aircraft, according to Air Force documents.
With regular flights, US and British crews
electronically eavesdrop on communications and watch how
the pieces of Saddam’s air-defense network communicate
and function.
Operation Southern Watch flights,
which fly from a number of bases and aircraft carriers
in the Persian Gulf region, began in August 1992 in
response to Iraqi efforts to pursue and kill refugees,
mostly Shi'ites, fleeing persecution from the Iraqi
government. Southern Watch established a southern no-fly
zone over Iraq and extends to the borders to just south
of Baghdad.
As for the second assumption, that a
decision for war would require a major deployment of
forces and materiel, that's not necessarily true. The
forces already in place in the region are substantial
and have been that way for the past decade.
It
is a little noted fact that the prospect of fighting
another war with Iraq has been driving US military
planning since the end of Desert Storm, and has served
as a force-sizing contingency in such high level reviews
as the 1997 and 2001 Quadrennial Defense Review and the
Pentagon’s annual Defense Planning Guidance. In fact,
the oil fires were not even out in Kuwait when
then-secretary of defense Richard Cheney arrived in
Riyadh in May 1991 seeking permission to store military
equipment in Saudi Arabia. That same year, the Pentagon
confirmed that the United States and Kuwait had reached
agreement on a 10-year security pact which reportedly
provided for the stockpiling of military equipment.
The United States and Bahrain also signed a
defense cooperation agreement regarding the
prepositioning of material. Central Command's Naval
Component Commander (NAVCENT) for all naval forces in
the region is based in Bahrain. The 5th Fleet
headquarters is in Manama, Bahrain. Retained in the Gulf
are some surface escorts, operating as Task Force 50,
conducting maritime interception operations and
enforcing UN sanctions against Iraq. The force includes
destroyers, frigates and at least one submarine.
The Allied marine fleet in the area includes:
the USS George Washington carrier battle group and its
associated air wing, escorts and support ships, along
with many allied naval ships from numerous countries.
The Belleau Wood amphibious ready group (2,200 Marines)
is also in the region. The USS Abraham Lincoln carrier
battle group left the San Diego area in late July
heading for the Arabian Sea area and would be available
for operations. The Lincoln’s battle group, includes the
carrier itself, Carrier Air Wing 14, USS Shiloh (CG 67),
USS Mobile Bay (CG 53), USS Fletcher (DD 992), USS Paul
Hamilton (DDG 60) and USS Reuben James (FFG 57) the
attack submarine USS Honolulu (SSN 718), and the USS
Camden, a combat support ship. The Lincoln’s air wing
includes VFA-115, the first F-18E/F Super Hornet
squadron to deploy in the Navy.
In addition, at
Shaikh Isa Air Base, 20 miles south of the Bahrain
capital of Manama, the US Air Force has bombers,
tactical fighters and air-refueling tankers in place,
with an Air Expeditionary Force (AEF) also likely to be
sent there. The AEF might consist of six B-1 bombers, 12
F-15s and 24 F-16s, of which 12 would be F-16CJs,
specially equipped with radar-seeking HARM missiles
designed to neutralize Iraqi air defenses. The United
Kingdom’s RAF Tri-Star refueling tankers are based at
the Bahrain airport in support of Southern Watch
aircraft.
Contingency plans for an operation in
Iraq call for up to 200,000 tons of heavy weapons,
support equipment and other supplies afloat in the
region on prepositioned ships and 350,000 tons
prepositioned ashore throughout the region.
Since 1993 the US has pre-positioned weapons,
supplies and vehicles in Kuwait and Qatar and on vessels
in the region to equip at least three brigades of
troops, roughly 9,000 to 15,000 soldiers who would fly
there from the US. These troops could be airlifted and
ready for action in 96 hours. The 3rd Infantry Division
(Mechanized) from Fort Stewart, Georgia, is now rotating
its three brigades through tours of duty in Kuwait,
utilizing prepositioned combat equipment capable of
fully supporting a three-battalion brigade based at Camp
Doha, just west of Kuwait City.
At the moment,
the 3rd Brigade from Fort Benning is deployed, using
this materiel, and current plans call for a hand over to
the 2nd Brigade, from Fort Stewart, likely around
September. The force also includes a number of combat
support and logistics units which support ongoing
exercises to rehearse the unloading of tanks and
equipment from prepositioned ships and the manning of
Patriot missile batteries. It has been reported that
these exercises have recently involved several thousand
more personnel and that the total number of US military
in Kuwait has increased to over 10,000.
The
armaments in this area are stored in 37 warehouses, each
averaging 60,000 square feet, in Kuwait and Qatar. Each
of those countries holds in storage about 115 M-1A1
Abrams tanks, 60 M-2A2 Bradley fighting vehicles, 100
armored personnel carriers, 25 mortars and 20
155-millimeter howitzers. Ammunition is stored in both
countries, with field artillery rounds in Kuwait. The
Kuwait warehouses also hold 30 days' worth of food and
fuel. In all, about 9,000 members of the American
military are based in Kuwait, including crews for the
planes that enforce the no-flight zone over southern
Iraq.
The US Army has
stockpiled enough equipment in Qatar for at least 5,000 troops of a
brigade set, with one mechanized and two armored battalions,
as well as equipment for combat service support
units. Equipment for another armored brigade from the army
and one from the Marine Corps - another 9,000 troops - is
afloat on ships in the region.
In early August
it was reported that the US Navy was seeking to charter
a large roll-on-roll-off ship to carry military
helicopters and ammunition from the United States to two
ports in the Red Sea. It reportedly would carry about
48,000 square feet of helicopters, ammo and assorted
rolling stock. The Military Sealift Command, the agency
responsible for shipping the bulk of equipment used
during the 1991 Gulf war, also asked for a
roll-on-roll-off vessel to discharge at two ports in the
Red Sea in late August. It did not reveal which ports,
but brokers said that they were most likely to be in
Saudi Arabia or Yemen.
The request followed an
order for a vessel to carry military hardware covering
an area of 38,000 square feet from Europe to the Middle
East. The heaviest pieces, at 50 tons each, were
probably tanks and armored vehicles. That shipment was
also due for discharge in late August at an unspecified
Gulf port. Together, the cargo of these ships total
approximately 80,000 tons.
Separately, the
Military Sealift Command recently awarded a US$219
million contract to Maersk Line Ltd of Norfolk,
Virginia, for its personnel to operate and maintain
eight large medium-speed navy-owned ships that remain
afloat as part of the Pentagon's pre-positioned force in
the Gulf region. The vessels are used to carry tracked
and wheeled vehicles, such as tanks, cargo and utility
trucks, ambulances and tanker trucks for operations in
the vicinity of the British island Diego Garcia in the
Indian Ocean. The contract period runs through November
2007.
As Saudi Arabia has refused to be a launch
pad for strikes on Baghdad, Washington has poured money
and labor into expanding its $1.4 billion Al Udeid air
base in Qatar, about 28 miles west of the Qatari capital
Doha, which officials say will be finished by December.
Diplomats say that the Al Udeid base, equipped with
command facilities and satellite links that can control
thousands of air strikes daily, offers Washington an
alternative to its Combined Air Operations Center at the
Prince Sultan base in Saudi Arabia.
Since last
November, US forces have transformed Al Udeid into a
state-of-the-art facility with one of the longest
runways in the Middle East, at 14,760 feet, and a base
that can accommodate up to 120 fighter jets. It is now
home to the 319th Air Expeditionary Group.
Fighter/bomber aircraft and air-to-air refueling KC-10
and KC-135 tankers and JSTARS reconnaissance aircraft
currently operate there in support of Operation Enduring
Freedom and Southern Watch. It also has air force
construction engineers and a smattering of army
personnel.
The air base has three hardened
concrete underground shelters that can each hold 40
aircraft capable of operating even if the base came
under biological or chemical attack. Al Udeid stands
next to a sprawling arms warehouse, where Central
Command has stored tanks, armored personnel carriers and
enough weapons to equip a whole brigade. Al Udeid
currently hosts about 3,000 US troops and 50 planes.
Officials say that, once complete, it will be home to
10,000 troops. The United States also has the option of
repairing three airfields capable of landing C-130
transports in Kurd-controlled Northern Iraq.
According to the Washington DC-based Center for
Defense Information (CDI), currently there are about
8,000 American troops in Afghanistan, with several
thousand more aboard ships in the Arabian Sea or
stationed in neighboring countries like Pakistan and
Uzbekistan. More than 20,000 additional soldiers,
sailors, airmen and Marines are in the Persian Gulf
area.
Unlike the slow buildup of 1990, the US
Central Command is now able to move at warp speed. It is
able to deploy 10 tactical air wing equivalents within
five days, and a minimum of two US Army divisions within
two weeks. These forces would be followed by a
five-division US Army Corps, Marine Expeditionary forces
and supporting air wings in the weeks to follow.
A recent analysis by CDI notes that more than
1,000 war planners, logistics experts and support
specialists are now at all of the command posts in the
region. The command and control capabilities at the
component commanders’ headquarters throughout the
southern Gulf states are continuing to be fine-tuned by
the ongoing Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan
and in preparation for offensive action against Iraq.
The video teleconferencing, satellite imagery and
communications capabilities are fused by an extremely
robust computer network that has enabled a level of
operational situational awareness never before achieved
for any commander-in-chief.
Although Jordan has
publicly been very vocal that it is opposed to any
military action against Iraq, currently the 22nd Marine
Expeditionary Unit is exercising with Jordanian forces
in a long-scheduled series of maneuvers. Some sources
have reported that this exercise, Infinite Moonlight, is
also a cover for prepositioning forces at well-sited
forward staging posts. There are two airbases that could
well be part of US contingency plans: Ruwayshid, on the
road from Rutbah in Iraq to Turayf in Saudi Arabia, and
Wadi al-Murbah further north. Both are very close to the
Iraqi border, about 100 miles from the H3 complex of
airfields that harbor several potential Iraqi missile
launch points.
In Oman, an airbase at a
Musnana’h, approximately 120 kilometers west of the
capital Muscat, is under construction through US
funding. It will have a 14,000-foot runway and will be a
major enhancement to air operations for US forces.
Airlift hubs at Seeb, Thumrait and Masirah Islands in
the Arabian Sea are currently providing substantial
support. (Masirah, a former RAF base, is also a major
supply depot.) The B-1 force in the area, with the 405th
Air Expeditionary Wing, is probably now located in Oman,
possibly at Musnana'h. The British Royal Air Force has
additional air refueling assets at Seeb to support the
no-fly zone in Iraq.
(©2002 Asia Times Online Co
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