WASHINGTON, April 23 (UPI) -- Operation Iraqi Freedom provided good news and bad news for advocates of strategic bombing. The good news is that our bombing was more accurate than it has ever been before. The bad news is that, dramatically increased bombing accuracy notwithstanding, strategic bombing once again failed to bring Saddam Hussein's regime to its knees. As was the case 12 years ago, victory required significant fighting on the ground.
As with many other systems, in the immediate aftermath of the first Gulf War, the performance of cruise missiles like the Tomahawk was overrated. At the time, the U.S. military reported that of the 288 Tomahawks launched at the Iraqis, eight malfunctioned after launch, 45 missed their targets, two were shot down and 233 scored hits. However, in the years that followed, serious studies found that the Tomahawk's success rate had been significantly overstated. It is now widely believed that Tomahawks destroyed their targets less than 40 percent of the time.
The Defense Intelligence Agency conducted a bomb damage assessment on 357 strategic targets for which sufficient data was available. Some of these targets were engaged by Tomahawks. Of the 34 Tomahawks launched against these targets, 18 destroyed their targets and 16 failed to do so, about a 53 percent success rate. Of the 16 that failed to destroy their targets, the largest portion (the exact numerical breakdown remains classified) experienced guidance failures on the way to the target.
The Tomahawks, also known as TLAMs -- which stands for tactical land attack missiles -- were guided to their targets in 1991 by topographic maps stored in their electronic brains. The missile scanned the terrain in front of it and compared what it saw against digitally coded topographic information preloaded by the Defense Mapping Agency.
The terrain some Tomahawks had to fly over was so flat and featureless that the missiles were unable to properly guide to their targets. It was later disclosed that in some attacks Central Command solved this problem by flying missiles over the rockier terrain of Iran without the Iranian government's permission. For obvious reasons, this was a tactic that had to be used sparingly. Therefore, many missiles had to fly over less than ideal terrain and were lost on the way to their targets.
In the years before Operation Iraqi Freedom, the guidance problem was largely solved. Tomahawks are now guided by global positioning system satellite signals, not terrain features. Though a few Tomahawks did malfunction, landing in Saudi Arabia or Turkey, it appears that the overwhelming majority hit their targets.
Not only were cruise missile strikes more accurate, they were more common. A total of 333 cruise missiles were launched during Operation Desert Storm (There were 45 air-launched cruise missiles, very similar to the Tomahawk, dropped from B-52s). About 800 cruise missiles were launched 12 years later during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The strategic bombing campaign did not suffer from a lack of resources.
Guided bombs also were more common. In Desert Storm, some 9,500 guided bombs were dropped. In the recent war, around 23,000 were dropped. As with cruise missiles, guided bombs were more accurate in the second Gulf War than in the first. Many of the bombs dropped in Iraqi Freedom were satellite guided. This cut down on some of the problems encountered in the first Gulf War by airmen trying to guide their bombs optically or by laser under combat conditions. Obviously, it is difficult to guide a bomb when you are dodging anti-aircraft missiles.
Of course, combat conditions for Allied air crews were much less intense than they were during Desert Storm. At the beginning of the first Gulf War, Baghdad had the second densest concentration of anti-aircraft weapons in the world, behind Moscow. However, Iraq's anti-aircraft defenses were nearly destroyed during the first Gulf War. They had continued to waste away over the next 12 years as anti-aircraft missile sites were destroyed after trying to engage American aircraft patrolling the No-Fly Zone. The lack of strong air defenses made it possible for pilots to fly at lower altitudes and made delivering non-satellite-guided bombs much easier.
As a result of improvements in guidance and in bombing conditions, it appears that during Operation Iraqi Freedom, guided bombs hit the buildings they were aimed at nearly 100 percent of the time. It should be pointed out that, claims by bombing enthusiasts to the contrary, one cannot sail a bomb through the window of his choice. Guided bombs are not that accurate. However, they will hit within a few meters of their aimpoint, and that is usually accurate enough to destroy a selected structure.
Figuring out which targets to strike and how to destroy them were the world's top experts on strategic bombing. The U.S. Armed Forces have strategic bombing down to a science. Based on information collected from a wide variety of intelligence sources, targeteers select which structures to strike. Once targets are selected, weaponeers determine what type of, and how many, bombs or missiles would be necessary to produce the damage they want on a selected structure.
Coalition targeteers had a much better idea of which buildings to strike than they did in 1991. American and British intelligence agencies had been gathering information about potential targets for 12 years. Satellite coverage over Iraq was far more extensive than it was during the first Gulf War. There had also been tremendous advances in the Coalition's ability to gather Iraqi signals intelligence. Centcom targeteers knew which buildings were being used for what purpose.
Centcom weaponeers had voluminous information on many targeted structures, to include blueprints showing how the structures were built, with what materials, and what areas were vulnerable. The strategic bombing campaign did not suffer from a lack of information.
In Operation Iraqi Freedom, the tools required for successful strategic bombing were closer to perfect than they have ever been. Conditions for strategic bombing could hardly have been better. The coalition had the world's top bombing experts. These planners had more information about their targets than any planners have ever had before. Yet, with all these advantages, strategic bombing failed to produce the paralysis it was designed to produce. As in 1991, the Iraqi command and control system was disrupted, but not paralyzed.
Strategic bombing enthusiasts have claimed that in the future, wars could be won by bombing alone. This war provided further proof that reports of the death of ground fighting have been greatly exaggerated.
--
(Thomas Houlahan is the director of the Military Assessment Program of the William R. Nelson Institute at James Madison University. A veteran of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division and the XVIII Airborne Corps staff, he is the author of "Gulf War: The Complete History," Schrenker Military Publishing, 1999.)
