Every Man a Tiger: The Gulf War Air Campaign

Though it was not an issue with Walter Boomer, a few Marine officers did have a hidden agenda during the Gulf War: some Marines do not like functional commands — especially when another service will be commanding Marine forces. Since they are in essence a land force, and since the U.S. Army usually provides the major portion of the land forces, the Marines almost always work for the Army, and they don’t like that. For that reason, they resist any efforts to strip off their forces — aircraft working for the JFACC, for instance.

And for that reason, in the part of the Internal Look briefing in which he discussed airspace management, Horner made clear to the CINC that U.S. efforts should be integrated with the in-place system of the host nation, and that all airspace should then be coordinated under JFACC, who knew how to do that better than anyone else, and who would not anger the host nation (which would have been the CINC’s problem, but Horner’s undoing).

Schwarzkopf agreed.

Though some Marines were not happy with this decision (as had been the case in every previous exercise), he had confidence in Horner, and little further came of this problem. (During Desert Shield/Desert Storm there were attempts by Marine officers to go their own way, but Walter Boomer set these people straight.)

Push CAS

Land forces require close air support.

But how much do they need? And when? Is air best used here and now, striking enemy tanks and artillery, or somewhere else — say, striking his fuel depots and tanker trucks? These questions aren’t always easy to answer, unless enemy tanks are about to overrun friendly positions.

As a young pilot, both in war and in countless exercises, Horner had watched airpower’s potential squandered by assigning it to support the Army. He was determined not to let that happen again.

Airmen and landmen see CAS from different perspectives.

The airman sees it as answering the question, “How do I keep from hurting my guys on the ground?” In other words, he sees CAS as a system to hit the enemy in close proximity to friendly ground forces. His worry is not so much about hitting the enemy as about not hitting his own troops on the ground.

Through the eyes of the soldier on the ground, however, “CAS is airpower attacking the enemy that is killing me.” He sees it as powerful artillery. Sure, there must be measures to keep it from killing his own people, but the real issue is, “How do I get those jets to hit what is bothering me?”

These twin issues have been traditionally handled by means of the tactical air control party (TACP) — which is usually composed of a forward air controller (historically a fighter pilot in a helmet, with a rifle) and a radio operator who also drives the Air Force vehicle containing their radios and fixes broken equipment (radios, Humvees, or tents). The role of these two is to be assigned to a battalion (at the brigade and corps level, FACs are called ALOs, air liaison officers). The Army uses the FAC/ALO teams to communicate what it wants airpower to do, by means of preplanned processes. For example, the FAC/ALO may transmit a tasking directly to the TACC/AOC: “We need to hit the enemy machine gun bunker at 0300 two days from now in conjunction with an attack planned for 0330.” That tasking would go into the ATO as a “preplanned CAS sortie,” and forces would be assigned against that task.

Since the Army rarely knows what kind of air support they will need within the ATO cycle (two days), they put their requests for CAS in terms of “I will need ten CAS sorties sometime between 0300 and 0600 hours two days from now.” And this is translated into “air or ground alert CAS sorties.” Sometimes an aircraft that was intended to strike another target is diverted to support the ground forces because of a dire situation or an opportunity to do greater damage to the enemy. This is called “CAS Divert.” There will also be a CAS CAP, if the fighters must come from a great distance or if the need for the air is expected to be sudden and dire.

“Push CAS” is a planned concept wherein the sorties are spaced so as to fly over the friendly ground forces throughout the twenty-four-hour period. Meanwhile, there is in place a command-and-control lash-up that can access any of these sorties if it is reasonable to do so.

There are several ways for the aircraft to be sent into a particular area: the pilot may have been tasked to go there before takeoff, or he may have been sent there by Joint STARS, AWACS, or, in the past, a system called Air Borne Command Control Communications (ABCCC[38]).

Once the aircraft arrives in the area of the FAC, the FAC tells the flight leader what needs to be attacked, where the friendly ground forces are located (including himself), and special information, such as enemy defenses in the area and perhaps a required attack heading, in which he amplifies target location data: “Look 100 meters to the north of the bombed-out schoolhouse at the crossroads east of the small hill in the bend in the river.” This information is called a nine-line report, for it consists of nine items that must be briefed by the FAC (even if some elements are not required).[39]

Airpower must be used to support land forces — this is an absolute — but only when appropriate. In Chuck Horner’s view, land forces have too often confused trust with ownership. Trust is the knowledge that they will get the support they need. Ownership is the conviction that they are guaranteed the support they believe they need.

Before Push CAS, the system used to provide CAS was both arcane and obsolete. In theory, the CINC apportioned a percentage of the air effort to the land commander, who would then parcel it out to the various subordinate commanders. They would then use this as an element of their planning for the fight that was to take place in the future. Unfortunately, the subordinates rarely needed what they asked for (having been trained to “ask for too much” in order to ensure they’d get something close to their actual needs). Likewise, land commanders have often been unwilling to turn back air they didn’t need (unless a friend in dire straits needed it more). Few land commanders willingly part from anything they own.

Not all land commanders fell into this school. Some belonged to what Chuck Horner calls the “trust school”: “If we need it, it will come to us. If we don’t need it, let it be used efficiently against our common enemy.”

In the April 1990 briefing, Horner convinced Schwarzkopf of that position. And Push CAS was its expression: “We’ll provide CAS where and when it’s needed.”

Chuck Horner takes up the story:

In this briefing, I had two advantages: First, John Yeosock agreed with the Push CAS concept; and second, the land component commander knew he was responsible for all land forces and would have no problems apportioning the air effort to where it was needed. If lots of CAS was needed, he, Schwarzkopf (the JFLCC), would be able to convince the CINC (Schwarzkopf) to give him what he needed.

I was also sure he was confident that his JFACC could work out for him how much airpower to place in the CAS role, because he, Schwarzkopf (the CINC), had no idea how to determine how much airpower should be apportioned to CAS and how much to other roles, such as, say, Air Superiority or Air Interdiction. If Horner got it wrong, he could have him shot and find someone else. That way, if anything went wrong, Horner would get the blame. If things went well, then the man Horner worked for would get the glory.

Trust

Other issues raised at that briefing let the CINC know that Horner was thinking about fighting Schwarzkopf ’s war in Horner’s part of the world and that he could have confidence that Horner was a team player working Schwarzkopf’s concerns. For this reason, Horner showed him how he planned to work with the host nations (by merging air defense forces, by providing CAS to Arabs who didn’t have tactical air control parties and didn’t speak English, and by operating the Civil Airspace Control during time of war), and how he was ready to provide his air forces with sufficient logistical support and to take care of his people (with food, shelter, beds, and water).

Trust between and among commanders is essential. And it has to be earned. Horner earned Schwarzkopf’s trust.

In Horner’s words:

The bottom line was that I was telling him, “I know you are in charge. I am not going to be an Air Force prick, but I know more about airpower than you ever will, and you need to trust me and let me do my thing, so you will be a hero.”

In air-to-air engagements, if you can “lead-turn” a jet flying directly toward you, and he fails to see what you are doing, you will have an advantage when you pass, in that you have already started to turn toward his tail. If he discerns you have started a lead turn, he can negate it by passing as close to your jet as possible. Then each of you has to make up the 180-degree offset in the ensuing maneuvers. If he doesn’t and you have similar-performing jets, then the one who lead-turns wins.