CHAPTER 5

THE GULF CONFLICT – ‘GULF WAR ONE’

Cold War warriors like me, brought up on a diet of deterrence in the European theatre, rarely thought about the possibility of actual combat. True, we would have done our duty if things had come to that, but even following the UK’s unlikely involvement in the Falklands in 1982 we didn’t really expect to get into a shooting war. And nor, I hazard a guess, did those who specified, designed and procured the Tornado really expect it to go into combat. But it did, with the Gulf Conflict very much marking the ‘end of chapter one’ for the Tornado force and the initiation of a new era. Nothing would be the same again, so let’s now hear from one of the squadron commanders from what came to be known as ‘Gulf War One’. He is the man who won a DSO for his leadership of the Dhahran Tornado detachment, Jerry Witts.

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AIR COMMODORE JERRY WITTS (RETD)

“Got the offset. Correction’s in. Take it,” says AJ. The aircraft lurches left as I reselect track hold on the autopilot. It all seems very unreal, creaming along at 500 knots through the thick, velvety darkness. The HUD tells me we are 180 feet above the desert but it could just as well be 18,000, because I can’t see a thing ahead, just the unwinding time-to-weapon-release circle on the symbology. Thank goodness it’s flat – at least we think it is. Perhaps I should have put the night vision goggles on after all? Too late now.

“Five miles. I’m happy. Radar off.”

“MASS. Late arm. Stick top live.”

We recite the litany of checks just as we have done a thousand times before. But never like this. This time it’s for real, and just thirty seconds ahead lies an Iraqi airfield. It’s shortly after midnight GMT on 17 January 1991 and we’re on our way to war.

“Twenty seconds. Fifteen. Five.”

“Committing.”

There they go. The aircraft vibrates rapidly as our JP233s dispense their loads. There’s a pulsing glow from beneath the aircraft. Then suddenly, two massive thumps as the empty canisters are jettisoned. A quick thought: ‘So that’s what it’s like.’ Then, alarms sound, the autopilot drops out, we lurch sharply upwards and my heart rate increases to about 400 a second as I fight to get back down to low level. “What are those flashing lights, AJ?”

“AAA, you idiot!”

“Jesus!”

The flashing lights become white stair rods arcing over and around us. Away to the right the sky erupts in orange flames, quickly followed by a curtain of incandescent white lights as more and more AAA (anti-aircraft artillery) fires into the darkness. A hundred fleeting experiences, too rapid to recall in any detail. We rush onward. Homeward. I haven’t touched the throttles or moved them from their max dry power setting, but I see we’re now doing close to 540 knots as we jink left and right of track to avoid the threats illuminating our radar warning system. Let’s try max wing sweep to see if we can get a few more knots out of her. I don’t want to use reheat; it lights us up like a beacon, and anyway we can’t afford the fuel. Check the rest of my formation in on the r/t. All there, thankfully.

The chart that amused them all during Gulf War One.

Time seems to stand still, and the brown line that marks the international border creeps so slowly down the moving map display. I suppress the irrational desire to laugh as we pass over a printed notice on the map: ‘WARNING: Flight in Iraq outside controlled airspace is STRICTLY PROHIBITED.’Then, just as suddenly, we’re over the line. We’re safe! We’re alive! My God, we’ve done it! Now, where’s that tanker?

Whenever I think of the Gulf, these are amongst my most vivid memories. But that is not where it all started. It was in November 1990 that my station commander told me to start getting a new detachment ready to go to the Gulf. We might be going to Bahrain, or it could be Tabuk; or even some other location. There was no firm date for moving, but mid-December looked about right. Such were the times and, in any case, at RAF Brüggen we prided ourselves on our ability to do anything, anywhere – any time. The station already had one detachment at Bahrain and we had plenty of experience to draw on. So we set to work.

The basics were easy. I was to command the detachment, which would comprise twelve aircraft with twenty-four crews and a war establishment of ground crew. The majority of crews were to come from my own 31 Squadron, with the remainder from numbers IX(B), 14 and 17(F) Squadrons, who were even now together as a composite team because their ‘other halves’ were already in the Gulf. I would take all my ground crew and engineering management, again topped up from other Brüggen units and from elsewhere. Training was the priority, and by now we had the benefit of an Operation Granby work-up syllabus to guide us. The station was marvellous and nothing was too much trouble as we made increasing demands on all sections in our drive to get ready and packed. As mid-December approached with no sign of an order to move, or a destination to move to, we managed to stand most people down for a bit of leave. Four of my officers took the plunge and opted for early weddings, and life seemed to become one long round of ground defence training, night air-to-air refuelling, writing will forms, and ceaseless speculation.

Undoubtedly, the families had the hardest time as plans changed, then changed again. The festive season would serve only to add poignancy to the prospect of six months unaccompanied service in the Middle East, together with the possibility of going to war. Then, just a few days before Christmas, we were told at last. We were off to Dhahran in eastern Saudi Arabia, and our advance party was to move out on 27 December. Not everyone was pleased about the location, especially those who enjoy a tipple, but at least it would give us the opportunity to do things ‘our way’; although, with only two weeks to go to the UN deadline, it was going to be very tight.

So it proved to be. Through no fault of the RAF, the situation at Dhahran was even less prepared than we had hoped for. Coming so late into theatre we were very definitely at the back of the logistics queue, and our operational accommodation, comprising a rather sorry set of portakabins on what was to become one of the world’s busiest airfields, left quite a lot to be desired. But this was no time for carping, and my team set to with a will to make the best of things.

Not least among our new experiences was learning to deal with our host nation. “Inshallah” (‘if Allah wills it’, the translation implying an element of ‘we hope, or assume, that it will happen’) quickly became one of our stock expressions, but it was surprising how often, just when my SEngO was about to rip out the last of his rather sparse hair covering, that all that had been promised would arrive. Money was the thing that made things move, so it was local purchase to the rescue, and in no time at all we had computers, colour copiers, vehicles and all the paraphernalia necessary to get things going. We started in-theatre flying training on 3 January to familiarise crews with the desert by day and by night and to hone our newly learned air-to-air refuelling skills. Day by day, the detachment grew as new personnel arrived via increasingly exotic routes: from Hannover on a British Airways Jumbo; from Gatwick via Athens and Al Jubayl on the flight deck of a decrepit Boeing 707; or from Frankfurt in the hold of a USAF C-5. But arrive they did and we were pleased to see them, as our intelligence and mission planning organisation blossomed from a bare room with a telephone into the hub of a semi-hardened operations centre with attached chemical-proof air raid shelters. All mod cons and with room for future expansion, all set in a rather fetching car park.

It was just as well that we had some spare capacity, for soon after I arrived I learned that six Tornado GR1A reconnaissance aircraft with nine crews were to be integrated into my detachment. SEngO (by now, totally bald!) took the news rather well I thought, and the reconnaissance intelligence centre (RIC), housed in several mobile containers, certainly filled that annoying space at the back of the car park.

My major concerns as the UN deadline approached were still aircrew training, the spares supply situation and, most importantly if war was to start, the whereabouts of the Atlantic Conveyor II which had most of my weapon stocks on board. However, by 14 January, Al Threadgould’s II(AC) Squadron recce team had arrived, the ship was off-loading at Al Jubayl and my ‘bombers’ had completed their in-theatre work-up. Best of all, things seemed to be coming together in all departments, and people were working well together, which was always a concern with aircrew from four stations and seven squadrons (XIII Squadron having now joined, while a crew from 27 Squadron would later), and ground crew and support personnel from a host more. Even the tragic loss of one of my crews in a training accident did little to slow our momentum. Indeed, if anything it steeled our resolve to see this thing through if called upon.

By now a few of us had been briefed on the overall plan and on our specific targets if UN Resolution 678 was to be implemented by force. It didn’t take the brains of a rocket scientist to figure out that we would be going against airfields. And, as the deadline ticked past at 0800 hours local on 16 January and we were ordered to cease flying training, load the aircraft and stand at several hours readiness, there was a definite air of tension about the place. Were we ready? Had we done enough training? How would we cope? But time passed quietly, and by 1730 hours it looked as though nothing was going to happen that day. I drove back to the quarters I shared with OC IX Squadron (Wing Commander Ivor Evans) and settled down with one of his cold beers (alcohol-free, of course!) to watch CNN for an update on the political situation. ‘Our man in Baghdad’ seemed happy enough and, indulging in what now was clearly wishful thinking, I speculated that Saddam was obviously going to start pulling out of Kuwait now that he had faced it out past the deadline. Ivor, however, was less optimistic. Almost as he had finished speaking, the telephone rang and my operations officer told me to come straight to work. He didn’t need to tell me why, and I’ve never doubted Ivor’s judgement since.

The drive to the airfield was interesting. I thought there was something wrong with the petrol until I realised that my accelerator foot seemed to have a life of its own. Group Captain Cliff Spink, the RAF detachment commander, met me with a top secret signal which, in very few words, told us to go to war. A quick check of the plan showed that we would have to take off at about 0130 hours local, some time before the official ‘off’, so that we would reach our target on time. This gave us three or four hours to get everything buttoned up and ready to go. By now the rest of my formation had arrived and, after I had broken the news to them, we busied ourselves with our preparations. We were apprehensive but there was no time to brood about it. We filled the time by briefing ourselves to death: radio procedures; tanking procedures; route details; target details; enemy (for that’s what they had now become) defences; friendly forces; escape and evasion; and so on. It was a strange atmosphere because many of those around us didn’t know what we were about to go and do – and we couldn’t tell anyone who didn’t need to know. Thus, there were amusing comments like, “If the boss is going night flying does he want the weapons taken off the aircraft?”

But then it was time to go; predictably, we went to our aircraft far too early and sat there in strained silence waiting for the minutes to tick by to our take-off time. As soon as we were airborne things were a lot better. We were busy and there was no time to worry. We just got on with the job.

The sky was full of aircraft, the AWACS radio channels nearly jammed with mission after mission checking in. This was history in the making and there we were, right in the middle. It was all very exciting and, on top of everything, I think we sensed that, whatever the outcome, things would never be the same again. All too soon it was down to low level, lights off, across the border and …

We had all hoped, of course, that Saddam would get the message very quickly and that he would soon be scuttling out of Kuwait. After a few hours sleep, I was back at the squadron to see how things were going and to brief the next formations on our experiences. From here on it became a bit of a juggling act to make sure we spread the load evenly amongst the aircrew, getting the missions flown and ensuring that there was sufficient rest for all. The ‘reccies’ were off to a very good start and found a Scud launcher on their first sortie, which was magnificent, but we were all concerned as Tornado losses started to mount. These were friends and colleagues, and it mattered not which squadron or detachment they came from.

Thankfully, we ourselves were obviously having a lot of luck, and despite a few bullet holes the team kept coming back. We were definitely not amused when SEngO said he was glad that the battle damage repair teams now had something to do! Most of the nights were punctuated by Scud alarms and we all got very good at sleeping with our gas masks on. Our GDT instructors would have been proud of us. We were certainly very proud of Dhahran’s resident US Army Patriot batteries, and we all became life members of the Patriot fan club. Perhaps Raytheon could now develop a quiet version that doesn’t give you a heart attack every time it’s fired.

The Iraqi air force was not taking part in the war so we soon found we could operate more freely than had been expected. After not a little discussion and heart searching it was decided that we should start to move up to medium level, around 20,000 feet. This allowed us to integrate ourselves more closely with the defence-suppression forces and with the available fighter escorts. It was remarkable how easily we all worked together, and on a typical mission we would be supported by two EF-111 Ravens and four F-4 Wild Weasels from the USAF, and by F-14s, F-15s, F-16s or F-18s from the USN, USMC, USAF, Canadians or the Royal Saudi Air Force. On every sortie we were refuelled by RAF TriStar, Victor or VC10K tankers, who quickly established a reputation for reliability and to whom we owed a great debt. Our targets were changing too. Gradually, we moved away from the airfields and started to attack industrial targets such as oil refineries, oil storage facilities and power stations, as well as ammunition dumps.

No one, least of all those who have flown in war, exults in destruction, but it would be true to say that there is some cold satisfaction in seeing a target blow sky high, having beaten the defences to get there. I’ve always believed that the job of the military is to exhibit a capability to one’s potential enemies such that they are deterred and war is avoided. Actually having to fight, although the ultimate expression of our determination, is in some sense a source of deep disappointment. But even with this in mind there was satisfaction from the results we were achieving. We took great heart from General Schwarzkopf’s attitude that “if we had to fight we were going to go in hard and decisively”. That was the way it seemed to be going, although I don’t think anyone at my level was expecting the air war to go on for quite so long. Now, of course, we know that this had to do with the time it was taking for our ground forces to get into position, but then my concerns centred on sustainability. We were using up our bombs at a fair old rate and the aircrew were getting pretty tired. The aircraft were standing up magnificently, but not without a great deal of hard work from our ground crew.

As the war progressed the ‘reccies’ stayed on night operations but the ‘bombers’ moved to daylight sorties, carrying out most attacks with laser-guided bombs, designation being performed by the worthy Buccaneers. This addressed the problem of weapons usage; we just didn’t need to drop so many to achieve the required accuracy. The rate of sortie tasking had also reduced so that I could introduce a fairly settled routine for the aircrew.

I came to recognise that there were two distinct types of fatigue: the normal, short-term result of physical exhaustion and a longer-term, more insidious tiredness which is perhaps the result of sustained pressure and stress. However, with regular routine this seemed manageable and, certainly, the aircrew could probably have gone on for some time long after it all finished. But no-one was disappointed when the land campaign started and achieved such rapid and spectacular results. It was a very happy wing commander who woke up one morning to find Ivor Evans’s note pinned to my door: ‘Bush declares cessation of offensive action. Last one back at Brüggen’s a sissy!’

The six weeks of war now blur in the memory. Twenty-one Scud attacks and as many false alarms. The losses. The POWs. The hits and, not too often, the misses. The fatigue, frustration and fear. The exhilaration and excitement. Mission by mission, target by target, we were part of a massive, unstoppable force. Old myths were dispelled and new tactics evolved. Long-held beliefs were dismissed in a moment as the situation changed, like so many sacred cows slaughtered without a thought. All to be replaced by new truths and the fundamental rule that ‘if it works and it keeps you alive, it’s good’.

A GR1 of 617 Squadron armed with two JP233s on the fuselage stations.

Through all the ups and the downs – and there were plenty of both – there was a constant feeling of massive support from home. Hundreds, thousands of letters from the whole spectrum of society. From the USA, Canada, France, Australia, Italy, South America; from all over the world people sent their best wishes and their appreciation for what we were doing. It was very gratifying, not to say humbling, to know that people cared.

So, for us all, a whole host of memories. My own will always include the simple bravery and fortitude of our families back at home. The sheer guts of the ‘plumbers’ loading bombs as bits of Scud rained down. Watching young, inexperienced aircrew grow quickly into seasoned campaigners. The sheer professionalism of everyone and, most of all, the feeling of immense personal privilege to have shared such company and to have commanded such people. All that and, of course, the fact that AJ, my flight lieutenant navigator, once called me an idiot!