Barrel of a Gun

by Al Venter

  Covering a 60-square-mile block, the images brought up on the aircraft’s monitors could be split into eight grid areas. These were electronically scanned in azimuth with a rapid revisit rate of seconds. Or it could be narrowed down to search an area of a bit more than a square mile.

  Depending on earlier intel reports – or something spotted on the screen – potential targets might have been subjected to intensive repetitive sector searches. Movement detection involved a Doppler shift system coupled to phased array radar.

  For example, the system was sensitive enough to differentiate (but not specifically identify) between wheeled and tracked vehicles, picking up a reading bounced off the tracks of a moving tank or APC. This appeared on the monitor as a yellow dot: in the area over which we were orbiting there were stacks of them. What happened was that the MTI displayed moving vehicles or amour as moving imagery (dots) and SAR as still photos. Also, as we could see, MTI could be displayed on a variety of backgrounds from SARs to military maps to slope-shaded maps.

  Much of the technology was space-age stuff. For instance, rudimentary analysis was provided by Joint-STARS’ Synthetic Aperture Radar/Fixed Target Indicator (SAR/FTI), which produced area images almost comparable to the negative of a photo, complete with shadows off surrounding mountains. In some areas the effect was almost 3-D.

  By pushing out energy bursts in a succession of small grids (which, in turn, sent back images) it was able to identify clearly features such as runways, buildings, and aircraft on the ground, or even rail tracks. In turn, the system sounded out reflective energy, or, in the argot, ‘fine imagery’.

  Another revolutionary development, and one more pointer to the future, was that each set of images could be automatically stored in electronic target folders and immediately downloaded into the aircraft’s database. Ground activity on a particular day might be called up on the aircraft’s computers an hour or a month later to examine before-andafter anomalies. Thus, our Joint-STARS platform had the ability to indicate immediately whether there had been any new troop arrivals, or, possibly, fresh construction sites in the area of operations.

  In another area it might pinpoint repairs surreptitiously being made to a bridge that had been bombed a day or three months before. SAR data maps of Kosovo contained the precise locations of critical nonmoving targets such as bridges, secreted motor pools, harbours, factories, airports, buildings or camouflaged vehicles as well as armour.

  Obviously, anything new-fangled always has detractors. From my own observations, the system appeared to be cumbersome. Following some serious tactical blunders that left innocents dead, follow-through instructions for any attack were always very carefully assessed (and sometimes re-assessed). Any strike needed to be filtered through half a dozen or more commands, having first been cleared from above. It could be a time-consuming process. Also, targets needed to be cleared by all NATO member nations, of which there were 19 at the time. That implied very specifically that this was the first war fought by ‘committee’. Even the original Korean War of the 1950s, a UN campaign from beginning to end, wasn’t hampered by anywhere near as much bureaucracy or obfuscation.

  There are also those who reckon that the Joint-STARS system might have been too complex for the job, though this would be ignoring the basics of a quite remarkable system that was regarded as impractical a couple of decades ago. From personal observation, it was clear that there were time-delays in acquiring information and processing detail for a strike, which sometimes took a while. The sighting, for instance, of a tank or an enemy convoy on the ground, followed by a command to a fighter strike element nearby, might involve a ten-minute time lapse, sometimes longer. Independent verification, often from intelligence elements on the ground (an essential adjunct), involved still more time. By then the target might have disappeared into a mountain hideaway.

  In an article titled ‘Too Much Data, Too Little Intelligence?’ the role of Joint-STARS in peacekeeping operations in Bosnia was analyzed by Lieutenant Colonel Colin Agee, deputy commander of an Airborne Military Intelligence Brigade out of Fort Bragg.

  While conceding that Joint-STARS was lauded as a ‘star performer’ in Desert Storm, he wrote in Jane’s IDR Extra (May 1997) that as the IFOR mission proceeded, ‘the use of Joint-STARS to track military movement became harder’, in particular because of the difficult terrain. He went on:

  Perhaps the biggest challenge to effective use of the system was data overload: the inability to distinguish significant MTIs from the voluminous data stream… The screen would quickly fill with MTIs, making it difficult to determine those of military significance.’ From personal observation (last May), it appeared to this observer that the system still needed some fine-tuning and on the face of it, still worked best with a good pair of eyes on the ground.

  As he pointed out, during the first month of operations over the Balkans, the aircraft seemed to be hampered by a variety of technological problems, particularly in a flying electronic platform with so much potential for glitches. Any operational Joint-STARS flight has two electronics technicians onboard, but even then things happen.

  In an early flight, one of the workstations had to be shut down because of smoke fumes detected by a crew member. Another report in Aviation Week (3 May 1999) said that their aircraft operated with a poor satellite communications antenna and a faulty vapour-cycle cooling system, which made for a cold working environment.

  Also, trying to keep the aircraft in the air needs about 60 ground maintenance personnel and they seem to have done well. In the first month of Kosovo operations, the unit missed only one flight, significant because both planes were deployed over the Balkans every day. It was accepted logic that to be truly effective, three such aircraft were needed to provide NATO with around-the-clock surveillance.

  The role of the Joint-STARS unit in southern Europe, we were initially briefed, was threefold.

  In the Balkans war, Joint-STARS provided indications and warnings of friendly and enemy movement on the ground.

  Its surveillance system allowed for intelligence assessment and, as a consequence, intensive preparation for future battlefield activities.

  The system is totally uninhibited by cloud cover. A welldefined and powerful line-of-sight communications system, once on-station (and in conjunction with E-3 Sentry AWACS elements) becomes a factor in the further deployment of other airborne elements of the Theater Air Control Systems (AETACS). These can include assets such as the Air Force RC-135V/W River Joint (Sigint), an occasional U2, the Navy’s EP3, the Royal Navy’s Nimrod Electronic Intelligence Gathering aircraft, France’s RC12 surveillance system, Airborne Forward Air Control (ABFAC) as well as ABCCC along with ground TACS units.

  Operating in a region as rugged and mountainous as the Balkans presents its own peculiar set of problems. Since the system is line-ofsight, the high, broken Balkan terrain tended to influence surveillance coverage through screening and disrupting communications. I was to observe that shadows caused by the mountainous terrain could be seen clearly on the SARs. Also, the shadow effect tended to assist the adversary in concealing assets.

  Clearly, this affected radar images as much as it did contact with clandestine units on the ground – London sources indicated to this writer that ‘some’ British SBS (Special Boat Service) personnel were active inside Kosovo at the time and that American SEALS might have infiltrated Kosovo in small groups and were liaising with KLA forces active inside the disputed territory.

  The SAR and FTI capability used in conjunction with MTI and MTIhistory displays allowed a limited post-attack assessment to be made by operators following a strike on hostile targets. Significantly, major advanced elements of the programme included software-intensive radar with several operating modes; the unique antenna with three receive ports; four high-speed processors capable of performing more than 600 million operations per second, as well as associated software.

  In effect, though, while Joint-STARS is the magic bullet of the future and tends to
reduce the need for visual armed reconnaissance sorties to locate targets, keeping friendly casualties to a minimum, it could never dispense with the human element altogether. The system works as follows.

  While possibly monitoring a number of frequencies simultaneously, Joint-STARS – in conjunction with Combined Air Operations Centre – spots a convoy of vehicles moving somewhere within the target area of the future. First the specific area is electronically isolated. It is analyzed and assessed by ground staff at CAOC as well as by Joint-STARS personnel. Finally, the potential target is referenced to previous electronic imagery in the onboard database and graded according to priority. If the subject is confirmed hostile by other theatre assets, ABCCC might then order in a strike wing.

  Prior to leaving Frankfurt, the pilot would receive pre-flight briefings that included details of up to 20 priority targets. All would have been pre-located by a combination of UAVs or the activity of infiltrated agents or something spotted on the ground by previous Joint-STARS flights.

  Once in orbit I was shown the day’s target list that had been numbered according to priority. Meanwhile, the Mission Crew Commander (MCC) would start at the top and try to work his way down – in conjunction with a variety of strike assets that would do the actual hits – though the system was flexible. If something else of significance came up in the interim, it would have been targeted. Ultimately, the objective was that the Joint-STARS MCC would be working indirectly with AH-64 Apaches, though that concept still needed a measure of streamlining.

  The choice of using sixties-vintage Boeing 707s as vehicles for the E-8C Joint-STARS programme – many of them acquired abroad from a variety of commercial airlines – was unusual. Most of the pilots complained about these Boeing 707s being underpowered. Others would have preferred more altitude.

  Several factors for the choice prevailed, including budget constraints. Another was safety; the 707 passenger jet still holds the best commercial safety record. One of the officers involved disclosed that once the decision to proceed had been made, they scoured the world for them.

  Size was of paramount importance. The 707 has the advantage of holding more of the operator workstations that are essential for onboard battle management. The need for more additional workstations has been seen in AWACS, simply because they influence the span of both intelligence and control, which, in the words of a spokesman for the manufacturers of the system, ‘are key factors in J-STARS’ ability to target large numbers of dynamic [moving] targets’.

  The contract to deliver – initially at a cost of about $225m per machine, but these days, a good deal more – was awarded to the Northrop Grumman Corporation. The first four systems had an 11-hour endurance (22-hour flights with in-flight refuelling were routine).

  The electronics on board any one of these aircraft were formidable and, since those early sorties in the Balkans, have been supplemented by a good deal more. Even then it was stressed that a single Joint-STARS Boeing 707 platform had a greater computer capacity than all the combined assets of America’s E-3 Sentry (AWACS) together: the USAF had 33 AWACS in its inventory at the time.

  The main computers on board at that stage were 6 Mil Vax 866 mainframe computers. Two were systems monitoring, one was a hot spare. Three more were general-purpose computers, one of which handled local area network (LAN), another radar and the last was also a spare. Each of the 18 operational workstations on board was a Digital Equipment Corporation machine with a 133 Mhz processor, 512 MBs of RAM and two multi-GB hard drives (obviously this would be much advanced at the end of the first decade of the new millennium).

  A point made by a technician on board was that they are prohibited from switching on the system over developed areas. The power activates every electronic garage door below the aircraft track.

  Operating in the crowded air lanes over Southern Europe presented other problems. Balkan airspace was sometimes so crowded that it could be harrowing. Our own flight had a narrow miss with a fighter while onstation. A day later a Joint-STARS Boeing 707 en route to the Adriatic avoided a head-on collision with a passenger jet by going into a dive, pulling four or five Gs. Wrong data had apparently been given to the oncoming plane. Later the same day, there was another near miss in cloudy conditions when two of the escort fighters had to take evasive action within a couple of hundred yards of the Joint-STARS aircraft.

  Several observers were of the opinion that allied aircraft proved to be a greater threat than any fighters that the Yugoslav Air Force might have been able to muster. Also, there was a lot of adverse comment about the ability of military ATC personnel to control the air movement associated with the campaign, which is possibly a lesson for the future about working over densely populated areas. Air traffic control was so bad sometimes that Joint-STARS aircrews were frequently ordered to operate under the ‘see and avoid’ rule.

  As for the threat of enemy fighters, which anywhere else might have caused problems, the US Air Force had not yet funded a self-protection suite for Joint-STARS. NATO intelligence was only too well aware that a number of Yugoslav Air Force MiG-21s were stationed at Pristina, only minutes’ flying time from where we were airborne. They apparently resisted attack because all were secreted in deep mountainside hangers that made conventional attack impossible for the duration of the war.

  It was interesting that the one time that Belgrade attempted to put Yugoslav Air Force MiGs in the air – possibly in a bid to stymie Joint-STARS activity – it took a handful of Coalition planes only 39 seconds to shoot down three of them.

  CHAPTER TWENTY - EIGHT

  Helicopter Drug Raids in Zululand

  One of the interesting asides made in Parliament in Cape Town recently was that marijuana is still the biggest cash crop in South Africa’s KwaZulu/Natal.

  THE HELICOPTER ORIENTATED OPERATION along the Tugela River in the KwaZulu/Natal Midlands in the winter of 2006 lasted three weeks. Though conditions were tough, we ended up destroying the equivalent of about 20 tons of what some people like to call ‘wacky backy’. Others know it as marijuana, pot, cannabis, grass, widow, ganga, weed or, more colloquially to Amsterdam’s coffee shop imbibers, Durban Gold.

  On this trip to KwaZulu/Natal (still called Zululand by the majority of people who live there), I joined a group of cops searching for the drug in a huge inland part of the country that adjoins the Indian Ocean.

  Because of the season, it wasn’t the plants that we targeted. There were many of them, of course, sprouting early in just about every little valley, cranny and secluded canyon, but it was the seeds we were after.

  Backed by a combined paramilitary police and army contingent, armed elements were dropped at short notice by chopper into some of the most remote corners of the region. The men would go in and without formality, knock down doors and, on several occasions, walls. The search was basic: a hunt to find the secreted little kernels that were perhaps a quarter the size of the average match-head. In places they were found bundled together in tins, 44-gallon fuel containers and plastic bottles, sometimes millions of seeds in a single hideaway.

  Most were hidden in drums, sometimes a hundredweight of seeds at a time. Others were wrapped in plastic and covered in sack-cloth to keep the damp out. Still more were stashed under beds, in cupboards or buried in the ground. One batch that must have weighed 50 pounds was discovered under an old bath that had been turned upside down in the back yard of a school.

  There was a lot of money invested in the business, especially when you consider that a lone marijuana seed can fetch anything between $2 and $8 dollars on the clandestine London market. Much depends on supply and demand and, obviously, when the time is right, a bagful might easily be worth a fortune. One South African visitor who smuggled the dried, seed-rich bud of a single marijuana plant to London recently and boasted about it afterwards, said that he sold his little pile – that probably wouldn’t have filled a matchbox – for almost $300.

  Drums of seed were recovered, worth millions of dollars on the open market. A
single seed sells for several dollars on the British market and there are millions of seeds in this can alone. (Louis de Waal)

  At one stage while working with the police out of Winterton, a small town in the foothills of the Drakensberg Mountains, I had a drum of the stuff in my hotel room and it stayed there for a week. Under appropriate conditions and with the right contacts, the pile (that could have weighed about 60 pounds) might easily have bought me a comfortable home somewhere outside London.

  Finding the stuff wasn’t easy. Marijuana seeds are an extremely valuable commodity in societies where money is scarce. The narcotic is composed largely of a dry, shredded, green-brown mix of flowers, stems, leaves and seeds and is more commonly called dagga in South Africa. It is said to be regularly used by about four per cent of the world’s population and, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, about 0.6 per cent daily. While it is not the most potent mind-altering substance, its major biologically active chemical compound is tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), commonly referred to as THC,1 and today it is acknowledged by the experts to be about a dozen times stronger than the same weed passed around by some parents and grandparents during the 1960s and 1970s.

  What is immediately obvious to those involved, on both sides of the law, is that like cocaine and heroin, the sale and export of marijuana has become a hugely lucrative business. Also, the ramifications are thoroughly international. One of the chief suppliers of pot – specifically to the European market – is Southern Africa.

  Intrinsically, our role was to remove – by force, if necessary and invariably backed by firepower – what was sometimes the only source of income for a community. In some places it was the sole means of support for entire groups of families. It was tough work, hard on the body and on emotions in an environment where many people hardly have enough cash to put bread on the table for their kids.