As the F-117A was coming out of the Black, the world was emerging from another kind of darkness. During 1989, one by one, like dominoes, Eastern European countries cast off their Communist governments. The Soviet Union became a multiparty democracy. On November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall fell. The world had changed — whatever followed would be far different than the past forty years. Questions arose about what role, if any, the U.S. military would play in this brave new world.
At a press conference, a reporter pointedly asked President Bush, 'Who's the enemy?' As in 1919 and 1945, it was assumed that having defeated one enemy, there would be no more.[495]
Now its descendant, the F-117A, was being dismissed as a useless relic of an era never to return. At Groom Lake, as the afternoon passed, the shadows from the mountains lengthened toward darkness. In the Mideast, it was now 2:00 A.M. August 2, 1990.
Suddenly, three Iraqi armored divisions, backed up with MiGs and helicopters, attacked Kuwait.
Within hours, resistance had collapsed and Kuwait became Iraq's '19th province.' It seemed that Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's ambition would not end there. Soon after the invasion, seven more Iraqi divisions took up positions along the Saudi-Arabian border. This was followed by a series of border incursions. The Saudis concluded that an Iraqi invasion was imminent. The Iraqis could take the Eastern Province in six to twelve hours, and the whole country in three days. This would give Saddam effective control of the world's oil supply and the world's economies.[497]
On August 6, King Fahdibn Abd al-Aziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia invited U.S. troops into the country. Within two days, F-15s and the first elements had arrived to draw 'a line in the sand.' The third great conflict of the twentieth century had begun.
On August 17, Alton Whitley, now a colonel, was named commander of the 37th Fighter Wing. Four hours later, he was ordered to deploy the 415th TFS to Saudi Arabia. On August 20, eighteen F-117As were on their way.
They landed at King Khalid Air Base at noon the next day. The brand-new base was located at the southern tip of Saudi Arabia, outside the range of Iraqi Scud missiles. It had state-of-the-art hardened aircraft shelters and even hardened crew quarters. The base was soon dubbed 'Tonopah East.' [498]
The unit began an intensive training program. Only four of the sixty-five stealth pilots had flown combat, one of them in Panama. The flights exactly simulated the operational missions, right up to the point that the F-117A would head into Iraqi airspace. Three exercises were also held to test the readiness of 'Team Stealth,' as the unit was now called.[499]
To keep up morale, a longtime tradition was revived — nose art. To remain stealthy, it was applied to the bomb bay doors. There were names such as 'Unexpected Guest,' 'Dark Angel,' 'The Toxic Avenger,' 'Habu II,' 'The Overachiever,' 'Once Bitten,' and 'Christine.' The Saudis nicknamed the plane
On November 8, 1990, President Bush ordered a major increase in U.S. forces in the Gulf. As part of this, another twenty F-117As from the 416th TFS flew to Tonopah East, arriving on December 4. The unit was redesignated the 37th Tactical Fighter Wing (Provisional). Both squadrons of combat F-117As had now been deployed. (The 417th TFS was the training unit.)[501]
As the Allied buildup continued in the Gulf, doubts were expressed that the effort would be successful. Since the 1970s, a network of 'military critics' had developed; they depicted the U.S. military as incompetent, as building weapons that were not needed and did not work, and as 'fighting the last war.' A central theme was that airpower was doomed to failure.
Bombing was indiscriminate, they said, hitting civilians, schools, and hospitals, which would only stiffen Iraqi resolve. Dug-in troops could not be dislodged by bombing, nor could airpower cut off supplies to Iraqi troops.
Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith said Americans 'should react with a healthy skepticism to the notion that airpower will decide the outcome of a war in Kuwait and Iraq.' Another voice added, 'The United States relies on the Air Force and the Air Force has never been the decisive factor in the history of war'.
The F-117A was specifically criticized: stealth could be defeated by multiple radars, stealth required too much maintenance time, 'delicate' and 'complex' high-technology systems could not withstand the demands of sustained combat or the desert heat and dust.[502] (In fact, the F-117A had readiness rates in the
The war for Kuwait, it was argued, would not be decided by airpower, but by ground combat with the 'battle-hardened' Iraqi army. The Iraqi use of poison gas in the war with Iran brought back echoes of the mass slaugh-ter of World War I. Estimates of U.S. casualties from such a ground war ran as high as forty-thousand-plus. Politicians warned such casualties would fracture the nation, just as Vietnam had.[504] An 'antiwar' movement had already organized under such slogans as, 'No Blood For Oil,' 'Protest The Oil War,' 'Bury Your Car,' and the ever popular 'Yankee Go Home.'[505] In a real sense, the United States had to fight not only the Iraqis, but also the ghosts of its Vietnam experience.
On January 12, 1991, the Congress approved the use of force to back up a United Nations (UN) resolution calling on the Iraqis to withdraw from Kuwait. It was, in every sense of the term, a declaration of war. The UN deadline expired on January 15, and President Bush ordered combat operations to begin.
On January 16, 1991, the F-117 pilots were told to get a good meal. They began to suspect something was afoot. The maintenance and weapons personnel were ordered to make one simple change in the bomb loading procedures — the arming lanyards were attached to the bombs.[506]
The pilots reported for duty at 3:00 P.M. and were told they would attack Iraq that night. Each pilot was then given his target data. This war would begin over Baghdad and would strike at the heart of Iraqi air defenses and communications facilities. The F-117As would strike the National Air Defense Operations Center in Baghdad, the regional Sector Operation Centers (SOCs), and the local Intercept Operation Centers (IOCs). This air-defense network controlled some five hundred radars, the SA-2, SA-3, SA-6, SA-8, and Roland SAMs, and some eight thousand antiaircraft guns. Baghdad alone was protected by about four thousand antiaircraft guns and SAM launchers.[507] The complete system provided a thicker air defense than any in Vietnam or Eastern Europe, while the defenses of Baghdad rivaled that of Moscow or Vladivostok.[508] And the F-117 pilots would have to face it all alone.
Ironically, the senior commanders and the F-117 pilots had very different images of the plane. The commanders had great faith in stealth, but due to the flawed Panama attack, there were questions about the plane's bombing accuracy. The F-117 pilots, on the other hand, had absolute faith in their ability to hit the targets. The plane's stealthiness was the unknown factor to them. As they suited up for the first night's attacks, several pilots were heard to say under their breath, 'I sure hope this stealth shit works!'[509]
At the briefing, Colonel Whitley tried to prepare them for what was ahead. He explained what it would be like when the whole world seemed to be firing at them. He recalled, 'I told them there would be hormones that would flow that they'd never tapped before. I told them they would know what I meant after they came back.'
The pilots arrived at their planes about 10:30 P.M. and began the preflight inspection. When this was
