Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 3, 1991 TAG: 9102030081
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Baltimore Sun
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Unlike the air war, however, the land campaign is expected to suffer high casualties at the outset as allied armor and infantry clear Iraqi minefields, breach fortifications and penetrate enemy lines on probably multiple fronts.
The ground thrust would be closely coordinated with aerial bombing and missile strikes, using advanced Army helicopter-borne weapons as well as those employed since the start of the air campaign.
"If the Iraqis think the B-52 bomber is tough," said Rep. Dave McCurdy, D-Okla., "wait until they feel the Multiple Launch Rocket System."
Mounted on a tracked vehicle, a single MLRS can shoot from one to 12 rockets at a time to a distance of about 20 miles. Each of the rockets can spew 644 half-pound "bomblets" on enemy troops, vehicles or air defenses.
McCurdy, a member of the House Armed Services and Intelligence committees, estimated the Army had "probably 100,000" of the artillery rockets in Saudi Arabia.
The MLRS, developed to counter the Soviet Union's rocket artillery in Europe, is just one of the advanced weapons to be brought to bear on Iraqi forces if a combined air-ground assault is ordered.
The Army's primary land weapon - with very large numbers now deployed for battle - is the M1A1 Abrams tank, mounting a 120mm cannon that can shoot while the tank is moving at high speed. It can pick out targets at night with a thermal-imaging sight.
Operating overhead would be the new missile-armed Apache helicopter, also fitted with night-vision devices for round-the-clock operations. Itsanti-tank Hellfire missile is laser guided, riding toward a laser beam focused on targets by ground teams, other aircraft or the Apache itself.
The Apache has had development problems, but, McCurdy said, "Its problems are not going to keep it out of the sky. It is well-suited to this war."
The latest ground force weapon reported to be deployed in Saudi Arabia is the Army Tactical Missile System, called ATACMS.
There is not yet a large arsenal of these weapons, and their use might come under the heading of realistic operational testing.
W. Seth Carus, a missile authority at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the ATACMS has a range of about 90 miles. He described it as semi-ballistic - capable of maneuvering around air defense sites instead of flying a predictable ballistic course.
The missile is fired from the Multiple Launch Rocket System used for the artillery rockets. Army sources said the present version can have its computer-stored target information updated seconds before launching, but cannot yet be given mid-course directions to moving targets.
It has been reported that an ATACMS warhead can discharge 1,000 "bomblets" against enemy troops or equipment.
Another advanced military system getting its first tryout in the gulf war is the Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar System, JSTARS.
If it lives up to its design goals, it is likely to become as familiar as the AWACS - the Airborne Warning and Control System - that detects enemy aircraft and controls air battles, and is often dispatched to trouble spots to show the flag.
The JSTARS is a 707 airplane, like the AWACS, but is crammed with electronic equipment to detect ground movements rather than air operations. There is only one in existence, and there was apparently some controversy in the Pentagon about sending it to the gulf before testing was complete.
Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, the U.S. commander in the gulf, has spoken well of the JSTARS' ability to detect and follow enemy troop movements.
Ideally, the plane can tell commanders exactly where ground targets are and what movements they make so that they can be struck almost immediately.
For all the sophisticated new arms, however, one huge obstacle, said Michael Eisenstadt of the Washington Institute, must be overcome "more by technique than by technology."
That is the minefields laid by the Iraqis around the Kuwaiti border. They "have had plenty of time" since August to spread the treacherous devices, an Army source pointed out.
He said the allies have doubtless been reviewing all the techniques for "a quick breach" of the fields to clear corridors for advancing armor and mechanized infantry.
The Army source and Eisenstadt both said combat engineers would shoot rope-like lines of explosives out over a minefield to explode the mines over a wide enough path for tank columns.
by CNB