THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, September 22, 1996 TAG: 9609220040
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A19 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: ABOARD THE ENTERPRISE LENGTH: 59 lines
U.S. warplanes roared off the deck of this Norfolk-based aircraft carrier to patrol the skies over Iraq on Saturday, armed and ready to retaliate if they're fired at.
Cmdr. Alex Hnarakis, chief of the Enterprise's squadron of F-14B Tomcat jet fighters, said pilots are scoping out potential targets in case Iraq fires at U.S. planes again or takes other offensive action.
The Enterprise's planes joined others - some from a second carrier in the gulf, the Carl Vinson - in patrolling the no-fly zones in Iraq. The zones, where Iraq may not fly aircraft, were set up by Washington and its 1991 Persian Gulf War allies to protect Iraqi Kurds in the north and Shiite Muslims in the south from Saddam Hussein's troops.
Iraq has an array of radar-guided surface-to-air missiles and MiG fighter planes and is capable of downing a plane.
Helicopter-borne search-and-rescue teams are ready in Kuwait to retrieve any downed Americans. Washington also is deploying a Patriot missile battery, eight radar-evading F-117 Stealth fighter-bombers and 3,000 U.S. troops to the emirate. About 300 troops arrived in Kuwait on Saturday.
Cmdr. Peter Frano, leader of the ship's A-6 Intruder squadron and a Gulf War veteran, believes the show of force is needed to warn the Iraqi leader.
``You have to be careful with this man,'' said Frano, of Huntington, N.Y. ``We don't know if he's planning something else. That's why we're here.''
As the Enterprise's Tomcat pilots broke up a mission briefing, strapped on survival gear and headed to their planes, Hnarakis told a reporter that retaliating against Iraqi missile launchers would be insufficient.
``Frankly, shooting at anti-air is like shooting at the arrow, not at the archer,'' the Alexandria, Va., native said. ``Command bunkers, air defense operations centers - the places where the people who gather the raw information and do the decision-making - you'd certainly want to be hitting stuff like that.''
He noted that the F-14B planes, normally used in air-to-air combat, have been equipped for the first time to strike targets on land with laser-guided bombs. The mission also marks one of the last times A-6 Intruder planes, which are being phased out, will be used in military missions.
The Enterprise had been in the Adriatic, its planes patroling no-fly zones in former Yugoslavia. It arrived in the gulf on Thursday. ILLUSTRATION: ASSOCIATED PRESS photos
A flight deck officer gives an A-6E Intruder pilot the signal to
launch from the deck of the aircraft carrier Enterprise on
Saturday. The Iraqi mission marks one of the last times the
Intruders, which are being phased out, will be used in a military
mission.
U.S. Airman Ryan Witschen of Southern Pines, N.C., cleans the
canopy of an F-14B Tomcat on the Enterprise on Saturday. The carrier
is one of two now patrolling Iraq.
KEYWORDS: IRAQ U.S.S. ENTERPRISE U.S. NAVY
PERSIAN GULF by CNB