months. The job of USMTM was to administer the various foreign military sales contracts the United States had established with Saudi Arabia. There were Army, Navy, and Air Force sections, each with staffs ranging up to two hundred people, including those who instructed the Saudi military in the use of the equipment or in setting up the training programs they had purchased from the United States. For example, at the AWACS wing, there was a USAF cadre who lived in Saudi Arabia for a year or two and trained their Saudi counterparts in the operation and maintenance of the E-3 AWACS. The two-star commander of USMTM worked for the commander in chief of Central Command.
A few blocks down from the USMTM compound was the beautiful brown-and-blue marble headquarters of the Royal Saudi Air Force. Horner would make his office here after General Schwarzkopf arrived. Along the way were hotels and upscale shops, including a Holiday Inn just past Suicide Circle, the roundabout immediately south of the RSAF headquarters, and so called because to enter it was to take one’s life in one’s hands, and many old buildings in the process of being torn down. Farther down Airport Boulevard were the buildings that housed the Royal Saudi Land Forces (RSLF) and the Royal Saudi Naval Forces (RSNF). At last, the gleaming white MODA facility rose up on the right, about two and a half miles from the air base. It was a seven-story office building, with a high wall around it and a single square tower rising up in front. A much larger, three-winged building extended back from the street, and was backed by a five-tiered parking lot.
At about 3:00 P.M., the car carrying the American party turned in past the guards and into the parking garage in the rear. From there, they were escorted to General Hamad’s office, where Hamad and the Saudi chiefs of services — land, sea, air, and air defense — were waiting.
During the walk through the lovely, spacious MODA complex, Don Kaufman offered a few suggestions:
First: the MODA building would be a good place for CENTCOM Headquarters.
A terrific idea, it instantly flashed on Horner. In that way, CENTCOM could be collocated with the Saudi JCS equivalent… and in so doing they’d be going a long way toward avoiding some of the major mistakes of Vietnam, where — except for some showcase “combined headquarters” and “liaison groups”—the Americans had remained apart from the South Vietnamese. Horner wanted everyone acting as one team: all equals, no “big brother come to save your ass” act.
Second: there was a newly completed underground command center at MODA; Horner should ask General Hamad to let CENTCOM use it.
Third: Horner would be welcome to use USMTM staff ’s small suite of rooms at MODA for his advance headquarters.
All three sounded so right to Horner that he enlisted Kaufman on the spot as his chief of staff.[33]
A few moments later, they were shown into Hamad’s conference room. Since the start of the crisis, Hamad had been meeting daily with his service chiefs; the Americans were now to be part of such a meeting. Around the large table sat Horner’s closest Saudi friend, Lieutenant General Behery, head of the Royal Saudi Air Force. Next to him sat the Saudi land force commander, Lieutenant General Josuf Rashid, and the commander of the Saudi naval forces, Vice Admiral Talil Salem Al-Mofadhi. Also present was the head of MODA Plans and Operations, Major General Jousif Madani. And finally, to General Hamad’s left, was a man Horner didn’t yet know, Lieutenant General Khaled bin Sultan, who at the time was the commander of the Royal Saudi Air Defense Forces, and was soon to become the Saudi military commander and Schwarzkopf ’s coalition equal.
Khaled, another, older son of Prince Sultan, was a big man, well over six feet tall and weighing two hundred-plus pounds, with a black mustache and dark hair combed straight back. He’d attended Sandhurst, Great Britain’s West Point, and spoke English and French fluently.
Khaled (as Horner was to learn very shortly) was a forceful man — probably due to his Sandhurst training. Instead of the bobbing-and-weaving style of most Arabs — who were so polite you couldn’t tell what they were for or against — he was direct. With Khaled, you knew where you stood, which made it much easier to work with him than with most Arabs.
Everyone shook hands all around, and after some polite remarks, got down to business. Two or three people on the USMTM staff gave the group the same briefings Cheney had given the King, including intelligence photos. There wasn’t much new there: the Iraqis were in Kuwait, much of Kuwait was in Saudi Arabia, and there were scarcely any serious military forces to stop the twenty-seven Iraqi divisions then in Kuwait from swinging south. For now, however, these seemed to be digging in on the border. The implication was that they weren’t planning an immediate attack. On the other hand, a military person plans to counter capability and takes little solace in intent. The military has been fooled too often.
Horner then gave to the assembled Saudis a brief rundown of the visit to Jeddah — the reason for it, Bush’s instruction to find out the King’s needs and wishes, as well as some insight into what had taken place at the meeting with Sultan that morning and what was likely to happen during the next few weeks:
As a result of the King’s invitation to U.S. military forces, U.S. Marines from the 7th Marine Expeditionary Brigade would soon be arriving in Jubail; meanwhile, the 82d Airborne would be moving into Dhahran, followed by the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division and the 101st Air Assault Division. Fighter squadrons would be going to every major Saudi air base. The 1st TFW F-15Cs and 552d AWCW E-3 AWACS aircraft were already en route. The Kingdom was about to receive hundreds of thousands of Americans: an urgent response to the military threat, but also an unwanted disruption to a culture vastly different from that of the United States.
Most of these generals had attended U.S. higher military schools at Fort Leavenworth or Maxwell AFB, so they understood the enormity of this deployment. However, none of them there — including Chuck Horner — had ever experienced such a movement in real life. He was ready for mass confusion, and he was not surprised when it hit full force.
At that point, the
“Chuck, you’re not going to deploy women, are you?”
It was more a plea than a question.
“General Hamad,” Horner answered, “you know our services are totally integrated, that women make up ten to twenty percent of the units, and that even if we decided to prevent women from coming to the Kingdom, we couldn’t do it because it would make our units combat-ineffective.”
Hamad knew all this, and Horner knew he knew. They had worked this issue for the past ten years, as women assigned to AWACS had deployed to Saudi Arabia.
“Well, Chuck,” General Hamad pleaded earnestly, “I know you are not going to let your women drive.”
Here he was also well aware that women assigned to AWACS drove when they were on duty, in uniform, if their job required it. Sure, there were occasions when women drove while off duty or not in a uniform, but Horner had never heard about it, and therefore, in the logic of the Saudis, it didn’t happen.
“General Hamad,” Horner spoke softly, “these women will be leaving their homes, and in many cases their children, to come to the aid of your nation. Some of them may very well shed their blood, give up their lives in the defense of the Kingdom. If their military duties require them to drive, then of course they will drive.”
For a time they were at an impasse, until the Land Force Commander, Josuf Rashid, came to the rescue. He asked some questions, his face stern but not angry. It was no time for warmth. There was too much to be done and too little time.
“Chuck, let me get this straight. You intend to deploy women as part of your forces?”
“Yes, sir,” Horner replied.
“These women may have military duties that require them to drive cars and trucks?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Will these women drive cars and trucks when off duty?”
Seeing where he was going, Horner replied immediately, “Of course not! Your laws and customs do not permit women to drive in the Kingdom, and we are sworn to obey your laws and respect your customs.”
“Will these women wear uniforms when on duty?” he continued, apparently satisfied.
“Of course they will.”
He smiled broadly. It was as if a curtain had parted. “General Hamad,” he said, “you don’t have a problem. Chuck is going to deploy women with the American units. They will respect our laws about driving. During the military duties, they may have to drive; but they will be in uniform, so they are not women, they are
