Gulf War
The big news of course is that the war in the Gulf is over as far as U.S. participation is concerned although U.S. units are still on the front lines and our jets are still patrolling in Iraqi air space. In fact on the 22d of April a Navy jet was fired on by two separate AAA batteries. Last issue we talked a bit about the Air War and as we slide into the month of May more information is being released in various source magazines. If anybody has the time to do a real good analysis of the war, write it up and send it in.
Talk about a blitzkrieg ground war! 250 miles in 100 hours with less than 100 casualties (wow!). Twenty some odd Iraqi divisions wiped out and others, including the vaunted Republican Guards, severely decimated. Of course I think the two months of preparatory bombardment by the various air services involved had much to do with that along with inept enemy leadership. Modern airpower has finally vindicated its cost don't you think.
Air Combat Results
Washington reports that USAF fighters accounted for 36 of 41 kills officially confirmed in the war to date. F-15s accounted for 31 fixed wing aircraft and 3 helos, while Navy jets are credited with 2 MiGs and a Helo. Air National Guard A-10s shot down 2 helos as well. The Saudi Air Force is credited with 2 Mirage kills. Of interest, is the fact that the AIM-7 Sparrow was used for 25 kills, and the AIM-9 for 13 while the A-10s used cannons to get their kills.
Unfortunately, the report doesn't indicate the total number of missiles used. This is a first in air combat as the primary killer in the last few jet wars has always been the IR missile.
What this tells me is that a number of things have happened since Vietnam. First, the latest models of the Sparrows must be much more reliable. Second, good AWACs control allowing the fighters to use BVR shots on a regular basis existed. I know that it is generally USAF fighter doctrine to initiate combat with Sparrow shots before the merge as often as possible. In this case, it appears that Iraqi pilots, lacking GCI support were often hit by Sparrows before they even knew they were in a fight. We know that most of the kills achieved from the end of January on were against aircraft fleeing to Iran and in several instances Sparrows were fired from 10,000 feet in look down modes at terrain following targets.
So after 20 odd years of development, even the Sparrow has come of age. The Pentagon has released the following list of confirmed kills:
The Pentagon report also indicated that at least one USAF pilot accumulated 3 kills and several others had two kills. As you can see, the 33rd TFW from Eglin Florida saw the most action.
Current Events
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© Copyright 1991 by J.D. Webster
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