Unrestricted Warfare Unrestricted Warfare -- Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui -- Chapter 3: A Classic That Deviates From the Classics

Unrestricted Warfare

Qiao Liang and Wang Xiangsui

Chapter 3: A Classic That Deviates From the Classics

[pp. 60-86 in original]

"Did the special nature of the Gulf War...trigger 'a revolution in military affairs' or not? This is ultimately a question of perspective." -- Anthony H. Cordesman, Abraham R. Wagner.

Compared to any war in history, the Gulf War can be considered a major war. More than 300 warships from six carrier groups, 4,000 aircraft, 12,000 tanks and 12,000 armored vehicles, and nearly two million soldiers from more than 30 nations took part in the war. Of the 42-day war, 38 days were air strikes, while the ground war lasted only 100 hours. The U.S.-led multinational force crushed 42 Iraqi divisions, and the Iraqi forces suffered 30,000 casualties and 80,000 prisoners; 3,847 tanks, 1,450 armored vehicles, and 2,917 artillery pieces were destroyed, while the U.S. forces only lost 184 people, but incurred the enormous cost of $61 billion. [1]

Perhaps because victory was achieved so easily, to this day there are very few people in Uncle Sam's wildly jubilant group that have accurately evaluated the significance of the war. Some hotheads used this to ceaselessly fabricate the myth that the United States was invincible, while some who could still be considered cool-headed -- most of whom were commentators and generals unable to take part in "Desert Storm" in a complex and subtle frame of mind -- believed that "Desert Storm" was not a typical war [2] and that a war conducted under such ideal conditions cannot serve as a model. When one listens to such talk it smacks somewhat of sour grapes. Actually, viewed from a traditional perspective, "Desert Storm" was not a classic war in the typical sense but [since it was a war conducted just as the greatest revolution in military affairs in the history of man to date was arriving it cannot be measured with traditional or even outmoded standards. At a time when new warfare required a new classic, the U.S.-led allied forces created it right on time in the Gulf, and only those who were fettered by the old conventions could not see its classic significance for future warfare. This is because the classics for future warfare can only be born by departing from traditional models. We have no intention of helping the Americans create a myth, but when "Desert Storm" unfolded and concluded for all to see, with its many combatant countries, enormous scale, short duration, small number of casualties, and glorious results startling the whole world, who could say that a classic war heralding the arrival of warfare in the age of technical integration-globalization had not opened wide the main front door to the mysterious and strange history of warfare - even though it was still just a classic created by U.S. technology and the U.S. style of fighting?

When we attempt to use wars that have already occurred to discuss what constitutes war in the age of technical integration-globalization, only "Desert Storm" can provide ready-made examples. At present, in any sense it is still not just the only [example], but the classic [example], and therefore it is the only apple that is worthy of our close analysis [the author returns to the analysis of analyzing an apple later in the chapter].

The "Overnight" Alliance

From Saddam's perspective, annexing Kuwait seemed more like a household matter in the extended Arab family compared to the taking of American hostages during the Iranian revolution, and besides, he had given notice ahead of time. However, he overlooked the differences between the two. When Iran took the hostages, it was certainly a slap in the Americans' face, but Iraq had seized the entire West by the throat. Lifelines are naturally more important than face, and the United States had no choice but to take it seriously, while other countries which felt threatened by Iraq also had to take it seriously. In their alliance with the United States, what most of the Arab countries had in mind was rooting out the Islamic heresy represented by Saddam to keep him from damaging their own interests were he to grow stronger unopposed, and it is very difficult to really say that they wanted to extend justice to Kuwait. [3]

The common concerns about their interests enabled the United States to weave an allied network to catch Iraq very quickly. The Western powers are already thoroughly familiar with modern international political skills, and the anti-Iraq alliance was assembled under the United Nations banner. The halo of justice successfully dispelled the Arab people's religious complex, so that Saddam was playing the role of a modern-day Saladin, whose plan to launch a "holy war" against the Christians fell through. Numerous countries volunteered to be responsible nodes in this alliance network. Although they were unwilling, Germany and Japan finally seemed actually happy to open their purses, and what was more important than providing money was that neither of them lost the opportunity to send their own military personnel, thereby taking a stealthy and symbolic step toward again becoming global powers. Egypt persuaded Libya and Jordan to be neutral in the war and no longer support Iraq, so that Saddam became thoroughly isolated. Even Gorbachev, who wanted to get the Americans' support for his weak position domestically, ultimately tacitly recognized the military strikes of the multinational forces against his old ally.

Even powers such as the United States must similarly rely on the support of its allies, and this support was primarily manifested in providing legitimacy for its actions and in logistical support, not in adding so many troops. The reason that President Bush's policies were able to get widespread approval from the American public was to a great extent due to the fact that he had established an international alliance, thereby getting the people to believe that this was not a case of pulling someone else's chestnuts out of the fire, and it was not just the Americans who were funding the war and preparing to have their blood spilled. They went so far as to send the VII Corps from Germany to Saudi Arabia, mobilizing 465 trains, 312 barges, and 119 fleets from four NATO countries. At the same time, Japan also provided the electronics parts urgently needed by U.S. military equipment, and this further demonstrated the increasing reliance of the United States on its allies. In the new age, "going it alone" is not only unwise, it is also not a realistic option. [4] For example, the alliance formed a kind of common need. From the Security Council's Resolution 660 calling for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait to Resolution 678 which authorized the member countries to take any actions, international society broadly identified itself with the alliance which was temporarily cobbled together. One hundred and ten countries took part in the embargo against Iraq, and more than 30 countries took part in the use of force, including numerous Arab countries! Obviously, every country had fully estimated where its interests were prior to this action.

The full-scale intervention of the United Nations was not sufficient to make it possible for this fragile and dew-laden spider-web like alliance, which was formed in a very short period of time, to easily withstand the impact of a war. It can be said that, as far as the politicians were concerned, the alliance was only a single high-level meeting following a careful weighing of interests, a single contract signing, or even a verbal promise via a hot-line. However, for the troops carrying out the allied warfare, no detail could be overlooked. To avoid having U.S. soldiers violate Muslim commandments, in addition to stipulating that they must abide strictly by the customs of the country in which they were stationed, the U.S. military even leased a "Cunard Princess" yacht and anchored it at sea to provide Western-style amusements for the U.S troops.

To prevent the Israelis from retaliating against the "Scud" missile attacks and throwing the camp which was assaulting Iraq into disorder, the United States made a tremendous effort to provide the Israelis with air support, taking great pains to look after the alliance network.

More profoundly, the appearance of the "overnight" alliance brought an era to a close. That is, the age of fixed-form alliances which had begun with the signing of the military alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary in 1879. Following the Cold War, the period in which alliances were formed on the basis of ideology faded away, while the approach in which alliances are built on interests rose to primacy. Under the general banner of realpolitik, in which national interests are paramount, any alliance can only be focused more nakedly on interests, and at times they don't even feel like raising the banner of morality. Without a doubt, the alliance phenomenon will continue to exist, but in more cases they will be loose and short-term interest coalitions. Which is also to say that there will no longer be any alliances where only morality, not interests, are involved. Different periods have different interests and goals, and that will be what determines whether there are alliances or not. Increasingly pragmatic and unconstrained by any moral fetters, this is the characteristic feature of modern alliances. All forces are united by a network of interests, and they may be very short-lived but extremely effective. The interest relationships of modern states, as well as among trans-national organizations and even among regional forces have thus begun to be increasingly transitory. As the rock and roll singer Cui Jian sings, "It's not that I don't understand, it is that this world is rapidly changing." Today's mode of ever-changing combinations of force, along with the age of ever-changing technological integration and globalization, has given rise to certain tacit alliances which are by no means fortuitous. Therefore, the "overnight" alliance that was formed by the Gulf War formally opened the curtain to a new alliance era.

Timely "Reorganization Act"

The supercilious Americans often engage in actions which cause them to reflect on their mistakes, and this disposition, which would seem to be a contradiction, time and again amazes those who want to witness the presumptuous Americans suffering. At the same time it also enables the Americans to time and again reap considerable benefits. It truly seems as if the Americans are always able to find the key to open the door of the next military action among the lessons of each military action. Struggles between the views and interests of factions in the armed services have been around for a long time, and this is so in every country. The competition by the various armed services in the U.S. military to protect their own interests and strive for glory is well known to all, and they are not equaled in this respect. In this regard, what leaves a particular deep impression is that sixty years ago in combat with Japan, to emphasize the roles of their own service arms, MacArthur and Nimitz each came up with a Pacific strategy.

Even President Roosevelt, who was circumspect and farsighted, had trouble balancing between the two. Another thing that demonstrates this point is that the U.S. aircraft which bombed Vietnam 30 years ago actually had to listen to commands from four different headquarters at the same time, which is truly hard to believe. Up until about 15 years ago, there were separate and independent command systems and it was not clear who was in authority, and this had disastrous consequences for U.S. troops stationed in Beirut, as it led directly to approximately 200 Marines losing their lives. However, even after he was made commander-in-chief of the allied forces during "Desert Storm," the problem that was exposed in Grenada was still fresh in the memory of General Norman Schwarzkopf. When he was deputy commander of the joint task force during the "Grenada" action, each of the service arms of the U.S. forces taking part in the action went its own way. The question [raised by this action] was, during joint operations, just who listens to whose commands?

It is somewhat ironic that this problem, which had troubled the U.S military for several decades, was not overcome by generals who had experienced extensive combat or experts who were steeped in statecraft, but was resolved by two congressmen named Goldwater and Nichols. The "DOD Reorganization Act" [5] proposed by these two which was passed by Congress in 1986, used the legislative approach to resolve the problem of unified command of the various armed services during joint combat.

Next, there were issues left over which required a war. Neither too soon nor too late but just at this time, Saddam foolishly launched his invasion of Kuwait and this was simply a heaven-sent opportunity for the Americans who were anxious to test whether or not the "Reorganization Act" would work. In that sense, rather than saying that the "Reorganization Act" was timely, it would be better to say that the arrival of the Gulf War was timely.

Powell and Schwarzkopf were the lucky earliest beneficiaries of the "Reorganization Act" and at the same time they also became the two most powerful generals in the history of American warfare. As the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), Powell for the first time had clearly attained the position of the President's chief military adviser, which enabled him to take orders directly from the President and the Secretary of Defense, as well as issue orders to the three services based on that; and he no longer had to serve as the coordinator for the endless wrangling that took place among the chiefs of staff of the armed services. As the battlefield commander, Schwarzkopf was spared the nagging and held the real power in his hands. As for the incessant chatter coming from the Pentagon, he was free to choose what to listen to and to do what he wanted to do with the air of a general who is outside the country and somewhat beyond the command of the monarch, while the great army swarming over the Gulf, as well as the satellites in space and the frogmen under the water, all the way to each roll-on roll-off ship, had to submit to his orders. This made it possible for him to exercise the trans-service authority granted to the commander of the joint headquarters by the "DOD Reorganization Act" without any hesitation when necessary. For example, when the front line Marine commanders urgently requested to carry out an amphibious landing on the shores of Kuwait, he looked at the overall situation and resolutely exercised his veto power, continuing to concentrate on operation "Left Hook," the well thought-out plan he had from the start.

That a law which had not been in effect for five years could be implemented so thoroughly in a war that came along at the same time must be attributed to the contractual mentality of the people in the legal society represented by the United States. Furthermore, the new pattern of command which was derived from this became the most successful and fitting application of military command since the services were divided. Its direct result was to reduce the levels of command, implementing true entrusted command and causing the old deeply-rooted tree-structure command system to start to evolve toward a network structure; and a side effect of this evolution was to enable more combat units to share first-time battlefield information.

If the "Reorganization Act" is considered against the wider backdrop of the age, it is not difficult to discover that this reorganization of the U.S. military was by no means a chance coincidence, but was timely and in conformity with the natural demands the new age posed for the old military command relations, that is, by recombining the service arm authority which was originally dispersed, then on that basis generating a super-authority that overrode the authority of all the service arms and which was concentrated on certain temporary goals, it became possible to be more than equal to the task in any battlefield contest. The emergence of the "Reorganization Act" in the United States and the effects it produced in the U.S. military are food for thought, and any country which hopes to win a war in the 21st century must inevitably face the option of either "reorganizing" or being defeated. There is no other way.

Going Further Than Air-Land Battle

"Air-land battle" was originally a strategy devised by the U.S. military to stymie the enemy when dealing with the masses of Warsaw Pact tanks that could come pouring out like a flood at any time onto the plains of Europe, but the military suffered from never having a chance to show what it could do. The Gulf War provided a stage for a full performance by those in the U.S. military, who were full of creativity and bloodlust, but the actual battlefield conditions were quite a bit different from what people had envisioned beforehand. "Desert Storm" was basically an "all-air," no-"ground" campaign that lasted several dozen days, and they barely got to use "Desert Sword," which was displayed at the last moment, including that beautiful "left hook," for only 100 hours before wrapping things up in a huff. The ground war did not become the next-to-last item on the program as hoped for by the Army, but was like a concerto which winds up hastily after the first movement is played. [6] Douhet's prediction that "the battlefield in the air will be the decisive one" seems to have achieved belated confirmation. However, everything that happened in the air over the Gulf far exceeded the imagination of this proponent of achieving victory through the air. Whether in Kuwait or Iraq, none of the air combat involved gallant duels for air supremacy, but represented an integrated air campaign that blended all the combat operations, such as reconnaissance, early-warning, bombing, dogfights, communications, electronic strikes, and command and control, etc., together, and it also included the struggle for and occupation of outer space and cyberspace.

At this point, the Americans who proposed the "Air-land battle" concept have already gone quite a bit further than Douhet, but even so, they will still have to wait several years before they understand that, once they resort to the theory of integrated operations in real combat, the scope will go far beyond what they initially envisioned, extending over a broad and all-inclusive range that covers the ground, sea, air, space, and cyber realms. Although it will still require some time to assimilate the results of the Gulf War, it is already destined to become the starting point for the theory of "omni-dimensional" combat proposed by the elite of the U.S Army when they suddenly woke up.

The interesting thing is that, while one may believe that the Americans' insight came somewhat late, this actually had no effect on their early acquisition of the key to "omni-dimensional combat." This is the famous "air tasking order." [7] The "air tasking order," which ran up to 300 pages every day, was drafted jointly by the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force and enabled Schwarzkopf, the supreme commander of the allied forces who was from the Army himself, to issue commands to the entire allied air force. It was the soul of the air campaign, and every day selected the optimum strike targets for all the aircraft in keeping with the overall operational strike plan. Everyday upwards of 1000 aircraft took off from the Arabian Peninsula, Spain, England, and Turkey and, in keeping with the computer-processed "air tasking order," launched trans-service, trans-border, precise and coordinated air strikes. Although in the eyes of the Navy this command program was overly "Air Force-oriented" -- and because of this they even took the petty approach of stealthily keeping behind some of their aircraft so they could be put to good use when an opportunity for the Navy to shine presented itself (even though it never came) -- ultimately this program successfully organized the most massive and most complex air campaign in the history of warfare.

Not only that, but the "air tasking order" also provided a model for a kind of organizational command for all subsequent combat operations. One "order" represented an optimal scheme for combining the combat forces among the service arms, and the complexity and success of its trans-national combinations was where it really shone. In this respect alone, it was already far beyond the range of what was envisioned by the architects of the "Air-land battle" theory. This is to say that the U.S. soldiers unintentionally ushered the God of War into an open area in which she had never set foot.

 Who is the King of Land Warfare?

Isoroku Yamamoto was doubtless the most innovative and "extraordinarily talented" military man of his age, and the use of aircraft carriers in the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor and the great victory he achieved represent the stroke of genius he left on the history of naval combat. What is hard to understand is that the same Yamamoto actually was unable to grasp the epoch-making significance of his own creative tactics. After commanding the combined fleet in dealing a severe blow to the U.S. Navy, he still held to the belief that only battleships were the main decisive force at sea, once again throwing the key that would open the door to victory and that was already in his grasp back into the vast waves of the Pacific ocean. While the first person to make a mistake can still be an object of pity, the second person to make the same mistake is simply incredibly stupid, particularly those people who make mistakes which have already been made but which they are just unable to anticipate. What is regrettable is that in the history of war there are frequent examples like this in which thinking lags behind acting. Just as with Isoroku Yamamoto at that time, although the U.S. Army used helicopters to smash the Iraqi armored and mechanized units, once the gunsmoke in the Gulf cleared it inexplicably reverted to its pre-war level of thinking, shunting aside the helicopters which by all rights should have been the new favorites in the war. It is said that during the entire ground war, other than one desperate fight put up by the "Medina" armored division of the Republican Guard when it was surrounded south of Basra by the U.S. VII Corps, there was hardly any tank warfare worthy of the name. However, the Americans, who had clearly already used helicopters to inaugurate a new age in ground warfare, [proceeded to] increase development outlays for other weapons, including tanks, while appropriations for helicopters was the only thing cut back. Sticking to their outmoded ways, they are still treating tanks as the decisive weapon in future ground warfare. [8]

Actually, as early as the Vietnam war, helicopters had begun to display their abilities in the hands of the Americans, and soon afterward, the Soviet Union let helicopters show their exceptional skills in the hilly regions of Afghanistan, as did the British in the Falkland Islands.

However, because their opponents were mainly guerrillas and non-armored infantry, it delayed the challenge that helicopters would pose to tanks a full 20 years. The Gulf War finally gave helicopters an opportunity to show what they could do. This time, not counting the helicopter units of the allied forces, the U.S. military alone deployed 1,600 helicopters of various models to the Gulf, and this enormous group of helicopters was sufficient to form one complete helicopter army. However, at this time the Americans, who had all along boasted of their innovative spirit, showed no originality at all, but just like the French who in World War II dispersed their tanks and assigned them to the infantry, they had the helicopters serve as a force attached to the armored and mechanized units and other troops. Fortunately, the helicopters, which were destined to establish their name in this war, did not allow this to mask their royal demeanor.

Just as the Americans were praising the "Patriot", the F-117, the "Tomahawk" missiles, and other battlefield stars to the skies via CNN, the helicopters were unfairly given the cold shoulder (with just the "Apache," which was a favorite, getting passing marks). Other than the "Final Report to Congress" written by the Department of Defense after the war, very few people still recall that it was the helicopters, not some of the other favorite new weapons, that performed first-rate service in "Desert Storm." In the 20 minutes preceding the start of the continuous bombing, which lasted more than a month, following a ground-hugging flight of several hours, the MH-53J and AH-64 helicopters used "Hellfire" missiles to carry out advance destruction of Iraqi early-warning radar, opening a safe passage for the bomber groups and showing the incomparable penetration capabilities of helicopters. As the most flexible flying platform on the battlefield, they also undertook a large number of the supply transport, medical evacuation, search and rescue, battlefield reconnaissance, and electronic countermeasures missions, etc., and during the battle of Khafji, the main force which rapidly checked the Iraqi offensive and finally drove back the Iraqi military was again helicopters. During the war, the thing which truly left a deep impression and demonstrated the deep potential of the helicopters was "Operation Cobra." The 101st [Airborne] Division used more than 300 helicopters to perform the single most far-reaching "leapfrog" operation in the history of war, establishing the "Cobra" forward operations base more than 100 kilometers inside Iraq. Subsequently they relied on the base in cutting off the only escape route for the Iraqi military scattered behind the Euphrates River valley, as well as intercepting the Iraqi troops fleeing along the Hamal [as published] dike road. This was definitely the most deeply significant tactical operation of the ground war during the war. It proclaimed that, from this point, helicopters were perfectly capable of conducting large-scale operations independently.

When the throngs of Iraqi soldiers ran from the fortifications destroyed by the helicopters and knelt to beg to surrender, they were in turn herded into a group by the helicopters just like a cattle drive on the Western plains, and the view that "only the infantry can ultimately resolve a battle" has now been radically shaken by these American "flying cowboys." Originally, however, the initial intent of the leapfrog operation by the helicopters was just to provide support for the armored units that were to handle the main offensive, but the unexpected success of the helicopter units caused the plan to fall far behind the developments in the battle situation.

Because of this, Schwarzkopf had to order the VII Corps to attack 15 hours ahead of time, and although under the command of General Franks the speed of the advance of the VII Corps through the desert was far faster than that of Gudarian, who became famous at the time for launching tank blitzkriegs, he [Franks] did not win the good "blitzkrieg" reputation that the previous generation did, but actually was rebuked for "moving forward slowly, one step at a time, like an old lady." Following the war, General Franks refuted the criticism that came from the allied headquarters in Riyadh, based on the reason that the Iraqi military still had fighting capabilities. [9] In reality, however, neither the critics nor those who refuted them had grasped the essence of the problem. The reason that the mobility of the tanks under General Franks' command was criticized was precisely because of the comparison with the helicopters. To this day, there has still been no example of combat which has demonstrated that any kind of tanks can keep up with the combat pace of helicopters.

Actually, this did not just involve mobility. As the former "kings of land warfare," the tanks are being challenged by the helicopters on all fronts. Compared to the tanks, which have to constantly labor to overcome the coefficient of friction of the earth's surface, the helicopters' battlespace is at treetop level, so they are totally unaffected by any surface obstacles and their excellent mobility is sufficient to cancel out the flaw of not having heavy armor. Similarly, as mobile weapons platforms, their firepower is by no means inferior to that of the tanks, and this represents the greatest crisis encountered by tanks since they ascended the stage of warfare with the nickname of "tanks." What is even tougher for the tanks is the energy required to organize a sizable tank group assault (transporting a given number of tanks to a staging area alone is a massive headache) and the risks one runs (when tanks are massed, they are extremely vulnerable to preemptive strikes by the enemy), so they really have no advantages to speak of when compared to helicopters, which are good at dispersed deployment and concentrated strikes, and which can be massed to engage in conventional warfare or dispersed to fight guerrilla warfare. In fact, tanks and helicopters are natural enemies, but the former is far from a match for the latter, and even the outmoded AH-1 "Cobra" helicopters, not to mention the AH-64 "tank-killer" helicopters, destroyed upwards of 100 tanks during the Gulf War while sustaining no casualties at all of their own. Faced with the powerful strike capabilities of the helicopters, who can still maintain that "the best weapon to deal with tanks are tanks?" [10]

We can now say that helicopters are the true tank terminators. This new star, which rose gradually over the waves of the Gulf, is in the process of achieving its own coronation through the illustrious battle achievements during the Gulf War, and there is no doubt that it is just a question of time before it drives the tank from the battlefield. It may not take very long before "winning a land battle from the air" is no longer an over-dramatized slogan, and more and more ground force commanders are reaching a consensus on this point. Furthermore, the new concepts of a "flying army" and "flying ground warfare" in which the helicopter is the main battle weapon may become standard military jargon and appear in every military dictionary.

Another Player Hidden Behind the Victory

Leaving aside the point that as commander in chief of the three services Bush certainly knew the time the attack was to begin, when viewed simply in terms of the CNN television broadcasts, the whole world was the same as the U.S. president in that they saw at the same time the soul-stirring start of the war. In the information-sharing age, a president doesn't really have much more in the way of special privileges than an ordinary citizen. This is where modern warfare differs from any wars of the past, with real-time or near real-time reports turning warfare into a new program that ordinary people can monitor directly via the media, and thus the media has become an immediate and integral part of warfare, and no longer merely provides information coming from the battlefield.

Unlike a direct broadcast of a World Cup soccer match, everything that people saw, other than that which was first limited by the subjective perspective of the television reporters (the 1300 reporters sent to the front lines were all aware of the "Revised Regulations Regarding Gulf War News Reports" that had just been issued by the Pentagon, so each person in his own mind exercised restraint about what could and could not be reported), also had to go through the security reviews at the joint news offices set up in Dhahran and Riyadh. Perhaps U.S. military circles and the media had both learned the lesson during the Vietnam war when the discord between the two was so great, but this time the news agencies and the military got along very well. There is one figure that perhaps can illustrate this issue very well. Of the more than 1300 news items released throughout the entire period of the war, only five were sent to Washington for review, and of these four received approval within several hours, while the remaining item was canceled by the press unit itself. With the concerted assistance of the news reporters, the battlefield commanders successfully influenced the eyes and ears of the entire world, getting people to see everything that the military wanted them to see, while no one was able to see anything that they did not want people to know. The U.S. press uniformly abandoned its vaunted neutrality, enthusiastically joining the anti-Iraq camp and coordinating with the U.S. military just like an outstanding two-man comic act, quite tacitly and energetically arriving at the same script for the war, with the force of the media and that of the allied army forming a joint force regarding the attack on Iraq. [11] Not long after Iraq invaded Kuwait, reports quickly appeared in the various media that a massive U.S. force was streaming into Saudi Arabia, causing the Iraqi military on the Kuwait-Saudi Arabia border to flinch and quietly creating the momentum for a "hobbling" operation. The day before the start of "Desert Storm," the Western media again trumpeted the news of a U.S. carrier fleet passing through the Suez Canal, which served to confuse Saddam and have him believe that, with disaster looming, the U.S. forces had still not completed their deployment. Similarly, without the support of the embellishment by the media, none of the so-called high-tech weapons sent to be used in the Gulf War would have been as awesome as people believed. In the upwards of 98 press conferences held throughout the entire course of the war, people saw images of how the precision-guided missiles could penetrate the air vents in a building and explode, of "Patriots" intercepting "Scuds," and numerous other shots that left a profound impression. All these things represented an intense visual shock to the entire world, including the Iraqis, and it was from this that the myth about the unusual powers of the U.S.-made weapons was born, and it was here that the belief was formed that "Iraq would inevitably lose, and the U.S. was bound to win." Obviously, the media helped the Americans enormously. We might as well say that, intentionally or otherwise, the U.S. military and the Western media joined hands to form a noose to hang Saddam's Iraq from the gallows. In the "Operational Outline" that was revised after the war, the Americans took pains to suggest that "the force of the media reports was able to have a dramatic effect on the strategic direction and the scope of the military operations," while the newly-drafted field manual FM100-6 (Information Operations) goes even farther in using the example of the media war during the Gulf War. It would appear that, in all future wars, in addition to the basic method of military strikes, the force of the media will increasingly be another player in the war and will play a role comparable to that of military strikes in promoting the course of the war.

Unlike battlefield propaganda, which has an excessively subjective tinge and is easily rejected by an opponent or neutral individuals, because it is cleverly cloaked as objective reporting the media has a quiet impact that is hard to gauge. In the Gulf, in the same manner that the U.S.-led allied forces deprived Iraq of its right to speak militarily, the powerful Western media deprived it politically of its right to speak, to defend itself, and even of its right to sympathy and support, and compared to the weak voice of Iraqi propaganda, which portrayed Bush as the "great Satan" who was wicked beyond redemption, the image of Saddam as a war-crazed aggressor was played up in a much more convincing fashion. It was precisely the lopsided media force together with the lopsided military force that dealt a vicious one-two blow to Iraq on the battlefield and morally, and this sealed Saddam's defeat.

However, the effects of the media have always been a two-edged sword. This means that, while it is directed at the enemy, at the same time on another front it can similarly be a sharp sword directed at oneself. Based on information that was disclosed following the war, the reason that the ground war abruptly came to a halt after 100 hours was actually because Bush, influenced by a hasty assessment of the course of the war that was issued on television by a battlefield news release officer, later came to a similarly hasty decision of his own, "dramatically shortening the time from strategic decision-making to concluding the war." [12] As a result, Saddam, whose days were numbered, escaped certain death, and it also left a string of "desert thunder" operations, which were ultimately duds, for Clinton, who came to power later. The impact of the media on warfare is becoming increasingly widespread and increasingly direct, to the point where even major decisions by the president of a superpower such as this one involving the cessation of hostilities are to a very great extent rooted in the reaction to a single television program. From this, one can perceive a bit of the significance that the media carries in social life today. One can say entirely without exaggeration that an uncrowned king has now become the major force to win any battle. After "Desert Storm" swept over the Gulf, no longer would it be possible to rely on military force alone without the involvement of the media to achieve victory in a war.

An Apple With Numerous Sections

As a war characterized by the integration of technology that concluded the old era and inaugurated the new one, "Desert Storm" is a classic war that can provide all-encompassing inspiration to those in the military in every country. Any person who enjoys delving into military issues can invariably draw some enlightenment or lessons from this war, regardless of which corner of the war one focuses on. Based on that, we are terming this war, which has multiple meanings with regard to its experiences and lessons, a multi-section apple. Furthermore, the sectional views of this apple are far from being limited to those that we have already discussed, and it is only necessary for one to approach it with a well-honed intellect to have an unexpected sectional view appear before one's eyes at any moment:

When President Bush spoke with righteous indignation to the United States and the whole world about the moral responsibility being undertaken for Kuwait, no responsible economist could have predicted that, to provide for the military outlays of this war, the United States would propose a typical A-A "shared responsibility" program, thereby launching a new form for sharing the costs of international war -- fighting together and splitting the bill. Even if you aren't a businessman, you have to admire this kind of Wall Street spirit. [13]

Psychological warfare is really not a new tactic, but what was novel about the psychological warfare in "Desert Storm" was its creativity. After dropping an extremely powerful bomb, they would then have the airplanes drop propaganda leaflets, warning the Iraqi soldiers several kilometers away who were quaking in their boots from the bombing that the next bomb would be their turn! This move alone was sufficient to cause the Iraqi units which were organized in divisions to collapse. In the prisoner of war camp, one Iraqi division commander admitted that the impact of the psychological war on Iraqi morale was second only to the bombing by the allied forces. [14]

When the war began, the A-10 was viewed by the Americans as an outmoded ground attack aircraft, but after forming what was dubbed a "lethal union" with the "Apache" helicopter, by eliminating Iraqi tanks on a large scale it staved off its own elimination, reaching the point where it became one of the myriad dazzling stars in the air over the Gulf. By matching a weapon that was far from advanced with other weapons, they actually achieved miraculous results like this, and the design and use of these weapons can be an inspiration that is hard to express in a few words.

With regard to General McPeak, who was hastily given the job of the Air Force chief of staff not long before the war started, the toothmarks he left in "this apple" were during the war, when he was able to achieve his dream of breaking down the barriers between the strategic and tactical air forces and establish mixed air force wings, as well as his use of the "subtract seven and add four" approach following the war to bring about the most richly original reform of the Air Force command structure in its history. That is, following the elimination of seven Air Force commands, including the strategic, tactical, transport, logistics, systems, communications, and security commands, he organized them into the four air combat, mobility, material and intelligence commands. [15] It is hard to imagine how General McPeak's colleagues would have taken such a bold innovation had there been no Gulf War. [16] However, those of us who were outsiders during the Gulf War have no way of achieving enlightenment and lessons from it, et cetera, et cetera.

If we pursue this to the limit, we will see that there are even more aspects to this apple, but not all of them are by any means things that can be pointed out or circled everywhere. To tell the truth, its flaws and questionable aspects are nearly as numerous as its strengths, but nonetheless this cannot cause us to treat it with the slightest contempt. Although this was a war that is rich with implications, it still cannot be treated as the encyclopedia of modern warfare, at least it does not provide us with any completely ready-made answers regarding future warfare. However, after all, it does represent the first and most concentrated use of a large number of new and advanced weapons since their appearance, as well as a testing ground for the revolution in military affairs triggered by this, and this point is sufficient to earn it the position of a classic in the history of warfare, as well as providing a completely new hotbed for our budding thoughts.

Footnotes

[1] See "The Gulf War -- Final Report of the Department of Defense to Congress," "Defense in the New Age: Experiences and Lessons from the Gulf War," and other research reports.

[2] The first chapter ("A Unique War") in the research report Military Experiences and Lessons of the Gulf War put out by the U.S. Center for Strategic and International Studies holds that "Actually, the uniqueness of the Gulf War to a very great extent keeps us from being able to draw lessons and experiences from it...in fact, just how much in the way of important, long-term experiences and lessons can be drawn from the Gulf War is a major issue." (The Gulf War, Vol 2, Military Science Publishing House, 1992 internal publication, p 155).

Following the Gulf War, people in the Chinese military, who had been shaken intensely, from the very beginning accepted the views of Western military circles almost completely, and at this point there are quite a few of them who are beginning to rethink the lessons and experiences of the Gulf War. (Conmilit, Nov 1998, No 262).

[3] The anti-Saddam alliance in the Arab world was centered around Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Syria. According to General Khalid, who was a commander of the allied forces in "Desert Storm," Iraq posed an enormous threat to them, so "we have no other choice but to ask for the assistance of friendly forces, particularly the United States." (see Desert Warrior, Military Translations Publishing House, p 227)

The Americans also took the alliance very seriously. For details, see "Attachments to the Final Report of the Department of Defense to Congress," No 9, "Alliance Construction, Coordination, and Combat".

[4] Chapter 2 ("U.S. Military Reliance") of the research report Military Experiences and Lessons of the Gulf War put out by the U.S. Center for Strategic and International Studies points out that "this war demonstrated without a doubt that, whether with regard to politics or logistical support, the U.S. military must rely on friendly states and allies. Without the considerable help of other countries, the United States has no way to carry out any major emergency operation. Other than in small operations, the option of 'going it alone' is basically unworkable, and all diplomatic and defense policy decisions must be based on this understanding." (Ibid.).

[5] In the research report on the Gulf War done for the House of Representatives by L. Aspin and W. Dickinson, there is high praise for the "Goldwater - Nichols DOD Reorganization Act," writing that "the Goldwater - Nichols DOD Reorganization Act ensured that the three military services would pull together to fight the same war." The report also quoted Secretary of Defense Cheney, saying that the said act "is the legislation with the most far-reaching impact on the Department of Defense since the 'National Security Act.'" The generals in the military also had high praise for it, with Navy Admiral Owens, who was formerly vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff terming the "Goldwater - Nichols DOD Reorganization Act" "one of the three great revolutions in military affairs in the United States," and "this act stipulated that in all conflicts, the fight would be conducted using a joint force, and it also clarified that chiefs of staff of the services are no longer combat commanders. The combat commanders are the five theater commanders in chief." (Journal of the National Defense University, No 11, 1998, pp 46-47; Conmilit, No 12, 1998, p 24).

[6] General Merrill McPeak, who was Air Force chief of staff during the Gulf War, stated that this was "a war which involved the massive use of air power and a victory achieved by the U.S. and multinational air force units," and "it was also the first war in history in which air power was used to defeat ground forces" (Air Force Journal (U.S.), May 1991). In a statement prior to the war, his predecessor Michael J. Dugan noted that "the only way to avoid much bloodshed in a ground war is to use the Air Force." Although Dugan was seen to have overstepped his authority and was removed from his post, his views were not at all mistaken.

[7] Whether it is the report from the DOD or L. Aspin's report to the House of Representatives, both give a high assessment of the "air tasking order," holding that "the air tasking order orchestrated a precisely-planned, integrated air battle."

[8] According to predictions by Russian and Western military specialists, "today, the lifespan of a tank as an individual target on the battlefield does not exceed 2-3 minutes, and its lifespan in the open as part of a battalion/company formation is 30-50 minutes." This kind of estimate by the experts notwithstanding, most countries still have tanks serving as a main weapon (Soldier (Russia), No 2, 1996). In an article entitled "The Future of Armored Warfare," Ralph Peter states that "'Flying tanks' are something that people have wanted for a long time, but when one considers the rational use of fuel and the physical and psychological factors during battle, the future need is still for ground systems. Seeing that attack helicopters are already a concentration of the various features that we envisioned for flying tanks, we believe that attack helicopters can complement armored vehicles, but cannot replace them." (Parameters, Fall, 1997).

[9] Into the Storm: A Study in Command is the book that General Franks wrote after retiring. In it he mentions that the speed with which the VII Corps crossed the desert was not a mistake, and that the criticism from Riyadh was unreasonable. (See Army Times (U.S.), 18 August 1997).

[10] See "Appendix to the Final Report of the Department of Defense to Congress," p 522.

[11] See "Appendix to the Final Report of the Department of Defense to Congress," Section 19, "News Reports."

[12] U.S. Army Field Manual FM100-6, Information Operations, discloses the details of this dramatic event (See pp 68-69). The television news reports on the "expressway of death" also had an effect on the overly-early conclusion of the war. (Joint Force Quarterly, Fall-Winter edition, 1997-98).

[13] Section 16 of the "Appendix to the Final Report of the Department of Defense to Congress" has a special discussion of the issue of "shared responsibility." Contrary to the general belief, the main reason for the U.S. to get their allies to share the costs of the war was not the economic factor, but rather political considerations. In 21st Century Rivalries, Lester Thurow notes that, with regard to the $61 billion that the war cost, "compared to its annual GDP of six trillion dollars, this expense was hardly worth mentioning. The reason that they wanted those countries which did not send combat personnel to the war to provide fiscal assistance was entirely to convince the U.S. public that the war was not America's alone, but was a joint operation."

[14] In the magazine Special Operations, Major Jake Sam [as published] reviews the circumstances of the psychological warfare conducted by the 4th Psyops Group during the Gulf War. (See Special Operations, October 1992). In the December 1991 issue of the U.S. military's Journal of Eastern Europe and Middle Eastern Military Affairs there is also an article devoted to psychological warfare during the Gulf War.

[15] Air Force chief of staff McPeak advocated the use of "mixed wings" made up of several kinds of aircraft to replace the wings made up of just one kind of aircraft. He said that "if we were to do something else in Saudi Arabia today, we would no longer use wings outfitted with 72 F-16s, but rather a wing made up of some attack airplanes, air defense fighters, jamming aircraft flying outside the air defense zone, "Wild Weasels," and refueling aircraft, etc.... This tactic may be of use when an armed conflict breaks out in some region of the world." (Air Force (U.S. journal), February 1991.

[16] Secretary of the Air Force Donald Rice held that "the Gulf War explained this point (experience) very thoroughly: Air power can make the greatest contribution during the unified and integrated planning and implementation of combat operations." General Michael Lowe [as published], commander of the Tactical Air Command, pointed out that "using various terminology such as 'strategy' and 'tactics' to limit the types and missions of aircraft is impeding the efforts to develop air power, and at this point, we must carry out organizational and structural reforms." (See Air Force Manual AFM1-1 Basic Aerospace Theories of the U.S. Air Force, p 329, footnote 8). Deputy Chief of Staff for programs and operations Jenny V. Adams [as published] believes that the lesson to be drawn from the Gulf War is "to modify, not review, our combat regulations." USAF Deputy Chief of Staff for logistics and engineering Henry Weiqiliao [as published] also approves of carrying out reforms to reduce the weak links in the support area. See Jane's Defense Weekly, 9 March 1991.

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