A-10s over Kosovo

NATO’s attack missions, which helped terminate Serb ethnic cleansing and defeat the Serbian Third Army in the field—one of Slobodan Milosevic’s main centers of gravity. In OAF’s charged international environment, combat operations were complicated by many diverse political concerns, which led to our units’ being constrained by numerous and ever-changing operational limitations. In spite of that, skilled and experienced A-10 pilots—with hundreds of hours spent looking at the ground—demonstrated their ability to discern what was actually going on in the hills, trees, and villages of Kosovo. We are convinced that the A-10 made a significant contribution to defeating the Serbs on the ground in Kosovo.

The level of tactical information available to the operational and strategic decision makers reached an all- time high in OAF. This book recounted a few of the countless times the CAOC actively participated in the decision to attack individual targets. On some of those occasions, AFACs found and positively identified groups of moving targets and requested CAOC approval to attack. All too often, by the time the approval came, the targets had found sanctuary in the forests or villages. The increasing use of data links and unmanned air and space reconnaissance vehicles (such as Predator) has made much real-time information available to command-level staffs and has fueled the temptation to direct even individual attacks. One last OAF story follows as an example.

The operator of a Predator on station over Kosovo located a tank and simultaneously transmitted its video image to the CAOC at Vicenza, Italy, and to SHAPE headquarters in Mons, Belgium. Both Lt Gen Mike Short and Gen Wesley Clark were able to watch this tank in real time while personnel in the CAOC attempted to help the AFAC visually acquire the tank by relaying directions through the ABCCC.

General Short’s son, Capt Chris “Junior” Short, was an 81st FS flight commander and the AFAC on duty at that location. The Predator’s optics provided a highly magnified image of the tank, but one with a very narrow field of view—similar to what one would see through a soda straw. Unfortunately, Junior had a very wide field of view from his ROE altitude. The officer in the CAOC had difficulty relating the Predator image to what Junior could see. Junior could not find the tank. General Clark called the CAOC to make sure they understood that he wanted the tank killed. The CAOC called ABCCC to ensure that Junior understood that the CAOC wanted the tank dead. Junior still couldn’t find it. Finally, to put more pressure on Junior, ABCCC transmitted, “[General Short’s call sign] really wants you to find and kill that tank.” Junior replied, “Tell Dad I can’t find the [expletive deleted] tank!”

The ability to prevail and achieve a favorable political outcome in future warfare is critical. In a highly integrated joint and coalition environment, success in asymmetric warfare will likely depend on the ability of flexible and capable offensive airpower to control the ground situation from the air. One of the command and control difficulties in that environment will be the development and application of appropriate ROEs in the rapidly changing tactical, strategic, and political environment. While many of these factors contributed to the complexity of the air campaign over Kosovo, OAF was not the most problematic of possible scenarios. Its complexity would have been greatly exacerbated had friendly troops been mixed with civilians in contact with the Serb Third Army and in need of air support. In future conflicts, these and other considerations could combine with real-time battlefield reconnaissance and lead to an increased desire by higher echelons of command to inappropriately control fluid tactical situations. Our hope is that future air and space leaders will resist that temptation and choose to provide clear, centralized guidance that will enable the tactical war fighters to achieve our political leaders’ objectives through decentralized execution.

Hog folks remain a humble breed of fighter jocks and wrenchturners in a high-tech Air Force where standoff munitions, computer-released weapons, laser- and GPS-guided munitions, advanced medium range air-to-air missiles (AMRAAM), drones, and sophisticated electronic warfare are the norm. They don’t mind hearing the thousandth joke about the lack of speed and sophistication of the A-10; they just quietly go out and make a difference in the air and on the ground. We believe that the A-10 Warthog and its highly trained professionals offer the nation a robust ground-attack capability that can rapidly adapt to the challenges, threats, and objectives in a joint and coalition combat environment. We hope that Air Force leaders remain committed to such a capability and support regular and appropriate weapon-system upgrades for this aircraft. The nation needs warriors—like those who fly the A-10—warriors who are able to search the battlefield with the Mk-1 eyeball, locate the aggressor and the victims, go toe-to-toe with the enemy, look him squarely in the eye, and shoot with malice.

APPENDIX

History of Attacking Fielded Forces: Post-Vietnam to Kosovo Lt Col Phil “Goldie” Haun

From World War I, through our Vietnam experience, and up to our recent past, the idea of interdiction has remained fairly consistent and is reflected in the latest version of Air Force Doctrine Document (AFDD) 1, Air Force Basic Doctrine, 1 September 1997, which defines interdiction as “operations to divert, disrupt, delay, or destroy the enemy’s surface military potential before it can be used effectively against friendly forces.”[3] An amended definition of air interdiction has evolved in the USAF as an outcome of the combat experience of Operation Allied Force over Kosovo in 1999; that evolution is reflected in AFDD 2-1.3, Counterland, 27 August 1999, which expands the scope to include both lethal and nonlethal systems, stating that “air interdiction… is employed to destroy, disrupt, divert, or delay the enemy’s surface military potential before it can effectively engage friendly forces, or otherwise achieve its objectives [emphasis added].”[4] The phrase “or otherwise achieve its objectives” acknowledges that airpower, as demonstrated over Kosovo, can be used in the “direct attack” of an army without the presence or foreseeable presence of friendly ground forces. The attack of fielded enemy ground forces by airpower is an old concept, but the idea that airpower can achieve military objectives in lieu of ground action is a new and highly controversial idea.

This appendix will first review the USAF’s post-Vietnam experience in the direct attack of enemy fielded forces as envisioned in the AirLand Battle doctrine developed during the 1980s, and as experienced by the USAF in attacking the Iraqi Republican Guard in the Gulf War. It will then examine the events leading to the use of A-10 AFACs over Kosovo in directly attacking the Serbian Third Army. Finally, this appendix will give a brief history of A- 10 operations in Operation Allie Force, which the reader can use along with the chronology, at the front, to provide context to this book’s various stories.

As with the Korean War, many of the lessons learned about air interdiction in Vietnam were lost, including the evolution of the Misty FAC’s Fast-FAC mission. The focus of the US military turned once again towards Europe and the continuing threat of invasion by the Soviet Union. From the late ’70s and through the ’80s, the US Army and Air Force worked to develop systems such as the Apache, air tactical missile systems (ATACMS), A-10, and JSTARS in preparation to defeat the Red Army. Air-Land Battle doctrine provided the joint vision for integrating air and land operations. Air interdiction was an essential element of AirLand Battle and a NATO term, battlefield air interdiction (BAI), was adopted to emphasize the interdiction of second-echelon ground forces moving towards, but not yet engaged with, friendly ground forces.[5] The high-threat environment of Central Europe and the plethora of targets that would arise from a massive land battle limited the potential effectiveness of Fast FACs. The detection of rear-echelon forces would be the responsibility of such systems as JSTARS—not a difficult task, considering the wave of Soviet armor anticipated to thunder down the Fulda Gap. NATO aircrews studied X-ray, Yankee, and Zulu folders containing imagery and maps of the routes the Red Army would need to use.[6] They likewise flew missions over West Germany, up to the inter-German border, to become familiar with the terrain over which they would have to fight.

The fall of the Berlin Wall in November of 1989 and the end of the Cold War left the United States victorious but lacking a Soviet threat on which to base its military force structure and Air-Land Battle doctrine. As the United States began to dismantle its forces in Europe, the focus shifted abruptly to Southwest Asia and the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait on 2 August 1990.