Despite these problems, the explosions caused the desired confusion.
Initial reports spoke of PDF soldiers running around in their underwear, while others threw down their weapons. Several Rangers were killed in the subsequent firefight, but the airfield was taken and U.S. aircraft were landing within two hours.[490] In the confusion the miss was not immediately noticed. Defense Secretary Richard B. Cheney was advised both bombs hit their targets. He later spoke of the attack's pinpoint accuracy.
"Operation Just Cause," as the invasion was code-named, was effectively completed by the afternoon of December 20. The following days saw the running down of scattered snipers and a prolonged hunt for Noriega. The controversy over the invasion was more prolonged. Representative Charles B. Rangel (D-New York) said, "I strongly believe the invasion was totally illegal."[491] Former Attorney General Ramsey Clark claimed two thousand to four thousand Panamanians had been killed and secretly buried. His unsubstantiated claims were later repeated on 60 Minutes.[492]
Particularly vitriolic attacks were directed against the use of the F-117A.
Time carried a diatribe titled "Bombing Run on Congress." It claimed the "supersecret" F-117A had only been used "to wage a public relations assault on the U.S. Congress." It quoted a "congressional defense expert" as calling the mission "pure pap — a gimmick." He said the mission "could have been flown with an Aero Commander, or let Mathias Rust [a West German teen-ager who landed a Cessna in Red Square] do it." The article dismissed the plane's accuracy by saying, "Some Air Force pilots consider the plane so unstable in flight that they call it the Wobbly Goblin." It concluded, "The real objective was to save Stealth technology from the congressional budget ax… The Air Force unleashed its F-117As not to scare Manuel Noriega but to build a case that high-tech aircraft have a role even in a low-tech war."[493]
It was not until April 1990 that word was published about the miss.
Headlines such as "Stealth error kept under wraps" and "General didn't report Stealth flaws in Panama" were used.[494] The press had its "cover-up" story, and the usefulness of the F-117A was further questioned.
"THE END OF HISTORY"
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] Time asked "Who Needs the Marines?"
Newsweek predicted U.S. military forces would be cut in half by the turn of the century.[496] Academics began to talk about "the End of History." "National security" would be defined in terms of education, cultural enrichment, and environmental enhancement. In parallel with "demilitarization" was "denationalization" — in an "interdependent world" nothing could be achieved along only national lines.100 Mankind had evolved; in the bright future, there would be no need for the use of force. But Communism was only one form […] August 1, 1990 was the thirty fifth anniversary of the U-2's first "hop."
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.
LINE IN THE SAND
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 Shaba, Arabic for "ghost."[500]
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". […] Saddam Hussein.
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 Gulf higher than the peacetime standard.) The Iraqis tried to encourage such beliefs, with such statements by Saddam as, "[The F-117A] will be seen by a shepherd in the desert as well as by Iraqi technology, and they will see how their Stealth falls just like… any [other] aggressor aircraft."[503]
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 figh
t 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 complete, they boarded the aircraft. The ground crews then handed them the paperwork for the mission — target photos, maps, checklists, and locations of emergency airfields. Each pilot also carried a protective suit against chemical attack, a rescue radio beacon, a "blood chit" (in English and Arabic), which promised a large reward for helping a pilot escape, and a 9mm Berreta automatic.
The first wave was made up of 415th TFS pilots; they had been at Tonopah East since August, so Colonel Whitley felt they should have the honor of being first. One pilot almost missed his chance; Capt. Marcel Kerdavid discovered he could not start his plane's port engine. He grabbed his paperwork and the tape cartridge that held the mission data and was driven to the spare F-117A. He did a fast preflight and was ready to go.
Just before midnight the F-117AS were towed out of the hangars and began moving down the taxiway. The day shift had just come off duty, and the taxiway was lined with maintenance personnel. They saluted as the planes went past. Just after midnight, the first F-117A took off; by 12:22 A.M., January 17, the last was gone.
The F-117As flew in pairs to the tankers. The first refueling occurred soon after takeoff. The second was completed thirty-five nautical miles from the Iraqi border. So far, everything was exactly the same as the training missions.
The first pair completed their refueling, left the tankers, and slipped undetected into Iraqi airspace, and the unknown.[510]
A NIGHT OF THUNDER
At home, the day of January 16, 1991, had passed slowly. It was clear that war was inevitable. People gathered around their televisions, waiting for news. At 6:35 P.M. EST (2:35 A.M. in Baghdad), CNN's David French was interviewing former defense secretary Casper Weinberger. He stopped and said, "We're going to Bernard Shaw in Baghdad." Shaw began his report: "This is — something is happening outside… The skies over Baghdad have been illuminated. We're seeing bright flashes going off all over the sky."[511]
The sky above Baghdad had erupted with antiaircraft fire, but, as yet, there were no U.S. aircraft over Baghdad. At 2:39 A.M., only minutes after CNN began broadcasting from Baghdad, army Apache helicopters blasted two Iraqi early warning radar sites. This opened a gap in radar coverage, and F-15Es flew through it to strike Scud missile sites in western Iraq.
Two F-117As had already crossed into Iraq. They were followed by six more. Unlike the F-15Es, they did not have support from EF-111A jamming aircraft. It was one of these follow-on F-117As that opened the Black Jet's war.
The target was the Nukhayb IOC in western Iraq. Located in a hardened bunker, it could coordinate attacks on the incoming F-15Es and the follow-on strikes. The pilot was Major Feest, the lead pilot for the Panama strike.
He located the target and released the bomb at 2:51 A. M. He saw the bomb penetrate the bunker's roof and blow off its doors. He turned toward his second target, an SOC at the H2 Air Base. When he looked back, Feest saw the night sky was filled with antiaircraft fire, triggered by the bomb's explosion. When he looked toward the second target, he saw the whole sky was alive with ground fire.
As the other F-117As closed on Baghdad, antiaircraft fire seemed suspended above the city. Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Getchell, 415th TFS commander and leader of the first wave, likened it to Washington, D.C., on the Fourth of July. The firing at the empty sky had been going on for a full twenty minutes, but at 2:56 A.M., a cease-fire order was issued. A stillness fell over the city. From their cockpits, the pilots could see the eerie glow suddenly disappear. Through the IR displays, individual buildings took shape. Baghdad was still brightly lit, and car headlights could be seen stream-ing out of the city.[512]
As the Dark Eagles moved unseen and unheard above, CNN reporters Bernard Shaw and Peter Arnett were discussing what had happened. As they spoke, Capt. Paul Dolson placed the cross hairs of the targeting system on the fourteen-story Al-Karak telephone and telegraph center. The plane's bomb door opened and a GBU-27 LGB fell free. Millions of people gathered around television sets heard this exchange:
Shaw: "We have not heard any jet planes yet, Peter."
Arnett: "Now the sirens are sounding for the first time. The Iraqis have informed us — [static]."[513]
At that instant, the GBU-27 punched through the Al-Karak's roof and destroyed the communications equipment, cutting off CNN. Within five minutes of the 3:00 A.M. H hour, Marcel Kerdavid had destroyed the Al-Kark communications tower, Capt. Mark Lindstrom dropped an LGB through a roof vent on the new Iraqi air force headquarters, while Ralph Getchell struck the National Air Defense Operations Center, and Lee Gustin bombed Saddam Hussein's lakeside palace-command center. As the first bombs exploded, the F-117 pilots saw antiaircraft fire rise above the city.
Major Jerry Leatherman, following one minute behind Dolson, dropped his two GBU-10 LGBs through the hole blasted by the first bomb. Unlike the GBU-27, which was designed for attacking hard targets, the GBU-10 had a thin casing and a greater blast effect. The two bombs gutted the building. As his plane cleared the area, he looked back and beheld the wall of fire he and the other pilots had flown through. He said later, "There were greens, reds, some yellows, and you could see little white flashes all over — the airbursts… [The SAMs] move[d] around as they were trying to guide on something, whereas the tracers would just move in a straight line. The 23mm… looked like pinwheels the way the Iraqis were using them… it looked like they'd just start firing them and spin 'em around."
The F-117As sped away from Baghdad. Some, with both bombs expended, headed home. Others headed for their second target; Kerdavid bombed the deep National Command alternate bunker at the North Taji military complex. Its thirty-feet-thick roof proved too much even for a GBU-27, and it remained intact.
More successful were attacks on a communications facility at Ar-Ramadi, the SOCs at Taji and Tallil, and an IOC at Salman Pak.[514]
Between 3:06 and 3:11 A.M., as the F-117As left Baghdad, Tomahawk cruise missiles began striking leadership targets, such as Ba'th party headquarters, the presidential palace, electrical power generation stations, and chemical facilities in and around Baghdad. The Tomahawks directed against the electrical plants shorted out power lines, and all over Baghdad, power went out, not to be restored for the rest of the war.
At 3:30 A.M., the disrupted air-defense network began picking up a huge attack force heading directly toward Baghdad. Comments by air force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael J. Dugan in September 1990 had indicated there would be a raid on Baghdad by nonstealthy aircraft between F-117A strikes.
General Dugan was fired for the comments, but the Iraqis still expected such an attack. As the planes neared, the radars came on and the SAMs were prepared to fire.
But they were not airplanes; they were decoy drones. And behind them were navy A-7s and F/A-18s and air force F-4Gs with HARM (high-speed antiradiation) missiles. The HARMs both destroyed radar sites and intimidated Iraqi air defense radar operators to stay off the air.[515] Even as the Iraqis were attempting to deal with this, the second F-117A wave was closing on Baghdad. It was led by Colonel Whitley. The flight toward Baghdad was a "sobering experience." He later recalled, "At 100 miles plus, you could look out there following the horizon of Baghdad, and it looked like a charcoal grill on the 4th of July." The glow was the continuous firing of nearly four thousand antiaircraft guns.[516]
At 4:00 A.M., the second F-117A wave restruck the air force headquarters and the National Air Defense Operations Center. Other targets hit were the IOCs at Al-Taqaddum Air Base and Ar-Rutba as well as leadership and communications facilities from the Jordan border to Kuwait.[517] In all, the two waves had dropped thirty-three bombs and scored twenty-three hits.
Dark Eagles: A History of the Top Secret U.S. Aircraft Page 26