As an Infantry Jarhead who was told we would take 50% casualties, I appreciated standing on the deck of the LHA at night and watching the over-the-horizon glow of the bombs striking their targets. And was grateful that the casualty predictions were massively overstated.
Casualty estimates were not overstated...We were just alot than what we gave ourselves credit for...ps: I thank the Vietnam veterans that stayed in for that...
@@nelsonzambrano5788there were over 700,000 troops that took part in the entire gulf war and only 13,400 casualties. Yeah that’s wayyyyyyy overstated..
@@stevenschrecengost5607 Nope - Most Commanders were Vietnam Veterans, who had led at the company level (LT's and Captains) - I remember one saying, that it was normal in a pitched battle w/the North Vietnamese Army(NVA) to have 30% of his platoon wounded...1) We didn't fight against the NVA (2) We had alot more training than troops going to Vietnam (3) USAF and coalition army was very systematic in attacking Republican Guard and other Iraqi units. PS: USAF Generals (also Vietnam War veterans) didn't want to have failure pinned on them either.
I stood on top of our 577 that night, and watched the show unfold right in front of me. For me, it was eerily like the “tears in rain” soliloquy from the movie Blade Runner.
Navy might not have gotten the choice CAP duty, but F-14 TARPS provided 90% of the battlefield-level reconnaissance because the AF had no photo recon assets. I still have the letter we received from Gen. Schwarzkopf commending us for the excellent photos we provided him.
...satellites imaging and flights you aren’t cleared to know about were done, there is no way in hell that any special ops units went in blind without recon photos.
@@GBDubstep U-2 flights were used, but only for the purpose for finding mobile scud launchers and other stationery assets, not Battlefield recon during the ground force invasion. Recon satellites also can't provide battlefield-level reconnaissance, they're not in the right spot at the right time every time. Both you and efin dumb (proving his name correct) immediately proved you didn't actually bother to read Ken's comment properly, or don't know enough about military technology to make a reply. He specifically said "90% of battlefield-level recon" i.e. not 100%, and not all recon. Just the majority of battlefield-level recon. Even with RF-4c's deployed, that doesn't mean they were ready to go and operational at the time when they were needed. I see no reason to doubt Ken's account of the AF lacking photo recon assets. It's very much plausible they were not ready to perform recon tasks amongst everything else. It also doesn't mean the RF-4C was being used for battlefield-level intelligence, it might have been occupied with other tasks, like observing troop movements in the reserve.
Ward, Great report & analysis. I am another Veteran from Vietnam who was an advisor/contractor in Saudi Arabia during Desert Shield to Desert Storm. Like many other expats I was less than a couple miles from the RSAF air base in Riyadh in 1990 after Iraq had invaded Kuwait. And remember watching USAF flights landing and taking off 24-7 on the mob up to the land/air assault in 1991... When President George H. Bush pulled the trigger on liberating Kuwait there were many of us who were saying out loud "don't F this up like what happened in Nam"...Well President Bush did not disappoint. He/we liberated Kuwait and even better after wards he stopped going further into Iraq. All we armchair quarterbacks in the rear with the gear could think was a great thanks for his leadership.
Good afternoon, Ward. It's refreshing to hear your accurate information and clear explanations that are easy for people unfamiliar with the subject to understand. I was an Air Force KC-135 driver, deployed to Egypt for Desert Shield, then Saudi Arabia for Desert Storm, then Turkey for the Northern no-fly zone, and finally Southern Watch. About two weeks before Desert Storm, my crew, and several others, were chosen to train with the F-117s to prepare all of us to work together to complete their missions. I credit my outstanding Navigator for our crew being chosen, because the -117s had some very demanding requirements for timing and precise navigation on our part, to get them close to their targets. We learned a couple of things that we didn't expect...we could in fact find them on the radar. Knowing where they were supposed to be helped a lot. But they had some difficulties seeing us. We started out trying to rendezvous with them with no lights on. Didn't work. The geometry of their cockpit, plus some special coatings on their windows, and helmets, made it had for them to see a darkend KC-135. As we always made the rendezvous over Saudi Arabia, and with the tankers headed south, we decided to make the join ups with our lights on. That worked quite a bit better, and then once we were joined up, we turned off the lights, and all other emitters. We got another surprise, the night the war kicked off. My crew, and four others, met in the SKIF and were briefed on our mission for that night. For some 20 years, the KC-135s had been asking for radar warning receivers. The answer was always , "no, you will never be used beyond the Forward Edge of the Battle Area (FEBA), so you won't need them." The same went for chaff and flares. So, night one of Desert Storm, a Major rolled out a chart, showing our route, up to the west of Baghdad, and the F-117s push points. The senior pilot among the five crews, a Lieutenant Colonel, objected...and was overruled. The Major then looked around the room, and (probably because I was the tallest, and caught his eye), said "You, you're lead...this is where you are going." Soon we got another surprise...the F-117s could not fly through clouds, because there was a screen over their engine inlets that would ice up if they flew through any icing conditions. We spent as time looking for clouds as we did for other threats! That first night, the five tankers, and ten F-117s, were escorted by 6 F-15s, and two EF-11s. Everything went like clockwork, because of all the effort to knock out the SAM systems that you explained, as well as one of my receivers taking out the AT&T building downtown, and most of Iraq's communications. We had no problems, so, the second night, we had no escorts. Unfortunately, the AWACS aircraft saw us as five lonely tankers, headed north by themselves, and gave us the secret codeword to turn around and head south, away from Iraq. Our F-117s had to follow, because they were too far from their targets for the gas that they had. Mission scrubbed. The third, and successive nights went like clockwork, for a few weeks. Ultimately, I did that mission 23 times...one of the last finishing up with running away from an SA-2 (unguided.) We got the list and postions of all mobiles SAMs as the last thing we grabbed going out the door. Usually we could find a corridor to avoid them, but that night we were stuck with the big SAM blocking our way home. My boom operator, 'Mikey' spotted the launch, below the clouds, and then flash up through the cloud layer, and coming generally toward us. Then it went above us, and Mike lost sight of it. I couldn't maneuver like an F-14, obviously...all I could do was the Monty Python maneuver. About then we started doing other missions, F-15Es on strike missions, F-4s as Wild Weasels, and F-16s flying CAP. We even took some A-6s up the Gulf, with the dreaded Iron Maiden attached to our refueling boom. That all went well. My crew went home, briefly, because my airplane had been in the Middle East long enough to miss two major scheduled inspections, and it was falling apart. I spent another couple of deployments and several months in theater, until it was time for me either take a desk job I didn't want, or get out. I chose civilian life.
Nice info ! I always wondered if the tankers were equipped with RWR, ECM, or other defensive measure and wondering what if SAMs got fired on tankers and is it possible to jinked the missile. So my view that tankers is less vulnerable apparently wrong
@Russavot I love the Egyptians. Great attitudes, fantastic sense of humor, generous. Unless they are in an airplane. We called them Cowboys; they usually rushed into position behind the tanker with far too much energy. Underrunning the tanker is extremely dangerous for both airplanes. We would call "Breakaway" if they were coming in too fast, but instead of chopping their power and dropping down a thousand feet like they were supposed to, they just kept on coming...forcing me to try to outrun them, until they got the picture. I didn't refuel any Arabs, but I listened to them on the radios. Ever see video of arabs shooting an AK-47 over a wall, just spraying bullets, not looking where they are going? It's the same in the air..or at least it was some 30 years ago. Turks were fine pilots, but then I was shocked to find that while I was protecting Iran's Kurds, I was giving fuel to Turkish F-4s, so they could bomb Turkish Kurds.
As a Desert Shield - Desert Storm Army Vet I remember it very well. We got to Saudi Arabia I think late Oct 1990 (arrived at midnight and it was still 80 degrees F.) and we did not leave until July 1991. I stayed in until 2002 (18 years) - now a disabled veteran.
Sir I have just read your words re Desert Storm. Your very last words touched me deep because I have injuries too. I am a civvy and I am a Complete supporter of our countries general military and Help The Hero’s charity. Also have spent a lot of time by invitation with the pilots of the famous Guinea Pig Club who were injured in WW11. So I have seen a lot of injured great men. So I want and need you to know Sir with the Greatest respect to you, that you are NOT disabled Sir!!! What you and I have is A Problem, not disabled, But a problem, that’s all, a bit of a problem! If we think about it we could say Everyone (and to just use that wrong negative word just this one time disabled ) has Something that they just Cannot do, and what they Cannot do Is A Problem for them! People treated me as disabled for around 4 years, then as I always as a boy had a passion for aircraft, so one day I had a pleasure flight in a Cessna 150. The instructor let me take control and fly the aircraft, WOW that was it, I booked my first lesson, and went on to gain my pilots licence, taught myself basic aerobatics, then flew Bi-planes. Then later invested in and became an owner of a formation aerobatic team called the Skyhawks Aerobatic Team, at Biggin Hill airport Uk. I am not bragging Sir I just wanted to help an Army man, as was my father! I hope this is of help to you Sir and I Wish you All the Very Best and to have All that you want and need. Follow your heart and let NOTHING stop you. Gods Big happy blessings for you. Sincerely JB. Oxted. Surrey. UK.
As a Marine veteran who served in OIF and OEF, including the re invasion of Iraq in 2003, it is very interesting to hear of the events 12 years earlier and correlating that to all the blown out tanks and aircraft we still encountered along the way into Iraq. Thank you for all the stories, please keep it up!!!
Saw a lot of the tanks in 03' as a scout sniper. One of my most interesting memories is when we nested in a scorched T-54 or maybe a T-62. My fella that was spotting for me was much more of a historian than my young ass from Oklahoma and he told me how violently and efficiently Iraq's armor was destroyed. It made all the graveyards of beautiful, classic Soviet tanks make perfect and logical sense lmao
This information is amazing. Thank you. My uncle was a navy pilot in Vietnam. He was shot down in an A- 4e Skyhawk off of the midway. He was MIA for many years and still is as far as we are concerned. Although the navy changed his status to killed in action years ago. It's great to get these stories from real naval officers and pilots who have been there. Awsome channel!
I was an AT3 in Va-87 on INDEPENDENCE. This was the A-7 days before the Golden Warriors went to the F/A-18. I was in the Persian Gulf when Reagan was inaugurated. Interesting times. Loved my Navy days! About to finish a 40+ year career at Delta airlines. FLY NAVY!!!
I was a soldier for the Canadian Army during desert Storm. Although we didnt participate in direct action. I stood a post during that conflict during this time. I will never forget it. It prepared me for what was to come in the future.
Hey Ward, I was an Air Force brat stationed at Hahn AB in Germany during Desert Storm. My dad was a flight surgeon attached to an F16 wing and had many friends who deployed to Saudi Arabia. Thanks for sharing your stories and info. I remember as an 8 year old boy being woken on a Saturday morning in November maybe when the entire wing of F16 squadrons took off to deploy. Crazy memory I will never forget!
Small world. I was a young F-16 crew chief in the 313th at Hahn. A small group of us left a few days before the 10th deployed and we went to Moron AB Spain. A few days later, all the Hahn jets arrived at Moron. They spend about 36 hours there before moving on to the AOR. Goo times.
I was an undergrad studying history when that war broke out. I had a history prof that taught Middle Eastern history at that time. He argued that this war would create an enormous amount of problems for America and that the outcome would be treacherous. This video and your historical summary made me remember his concerns, thanks for bringing this perspective to light.
You have a fascinating channel sir. I served in the U.S. Army from 1987-2008. I was in the 24th Infantry Division during Desert Storm. Desert Storm was a fascinating time to serve. Ironically I drove through the same part of Southern Iraq (Hwy 8) in 2003 during Operation Iraqi Freedom. This time we were going the opposite way!
I was an Army Engineer during Desert Storm, we went in right behind the infantry and to this day my most vivid memories are what our infantry left in their wake for us to see. Brutal. War shouldn't be.
Hello Ward. New to your channel.. I was a Young Marine in the Gulf War. I was stationed at the port of Al-Jubail, Saudi. I was tasked as a young Marine to go out and do a recovery. It was the crash site of Reggie Underwood, a Marine Harrier Pilot that was shot down. We walked around the desert picking up "everything that didnt belong" and putting it into 50 cube boxes. HIs body was already recoverd, as far as i remember. Very sad day.
I'm not sure how many times i've watched that pilot evading 6 SAM's video, but every time i hear the second "stroke 4 status?" It brings a tear to my eye, the pain and desperation is so clear.
Good observation. He sounds like a regular guy talking about his day at work. A guy who loves his job. That's one reason he's very listenable. Once I asked a young VF-11 pilot about the Tomcat's AWG-9 radar. He immediately directed me to his RIO. lol I'm hooked.
I was a US Army ground troop during Desert Shield/Desert Storm. Before the ground war started we were on the border of Saudi Arabia and Iraq well to the west of the western "point" of Kuwait. I remember looking up and watching tankers making big, long oval "race tracks" over the border and watching all manner of aircraft come in for airborne refueling. I'd estimate they were somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 feet elevation... but then I'm not an aircraft guy, so I couldn't be sure. But it was pretty neat.
It’s humorous how many folks “watched” Wolf Blitzer in Baghdad and the SAM trails and AAA and bomb explosions behind his rooftop reporting. But he was never there; he was safe in the States. Peter Arnette and Bernard Shaw were there. I love this channel and happy it popped up yesterday! Hats off to you for your service Ward.
That sucks. I was in a grade 12 history class in Canada, and we essentially studied the conflict as the build up was happening. Probably spent two months on it between Nov - Feb. Who knows what the teacher dumped in the curriculum to get that done? We looked at the weapons and armies involved, the political backdrop of Iraq/Iran and the Saudies, the fact that protecting our oil supply definitely had a hand in us being there in the first place, the danger of a power vaccuum coming into play in the region if we simply wiped Iraq off the map, propaganda using the media, tons of battle footage from nightly broadcasts.... what do kids get taught about these days?
In Tom Clancy's semi-autobiographical book about USAF General Chuck Horner, "Every Man a Tiger," it was also suggested that the Air Force took precedence over the Navy because a carrier-based sortie cost ten times as much to execute as a land-based sortie at the time. Also, I seem to remember reading somewhere that Tomcat crews had to use automotive police radar detectors because the F-14A's RHAW system couldn't detect the SAM radar network.
Literally jaw dropping that carriers in Desert Storm had to physically fly a plane to central command to pick up orders that are by the time they are received hours if not days old, unbelievable!!!
Good morning Ward. I was assigned to VA-155 CVW2 / USS Ranger at the time of Desert Storm. We were already scheduled for WestPac when Kuwait was invaded, so we pretty much knew it wasn't going to be a normal cruise. The first thing I thought was that it was going to be memorable for me, as it was the last cruise of my career, and my oldest brother had gone to Vietnam on the Ranger many years before. As you stated, the first strike packages were low level, and one night after the strike division trapped back aboard, the crews were visible shaken. They said they had never anticipated such heavy fire. A couple nights later, we lost NE 504 along with the crew, Lt. Tom Costen and Lt. Charlie Turner. Shortly after that, it was all high altitude precision delivery. The only low level attack carried out by the end of the war was our "payback" on the Highway to Hell. Thanks for the memories, ad keep up the great work you do Sir!
I can understand that point of view. But operationally if the troops in contact need an A-10 then the interdiction from the rest of the Air Force hasn’t gone to plan.
I was a HAWK missile technician with the 4th LAAM out of Hayward CA during Desert Storm. Based on what I knew about AA missile systems at the time, they were very complex to operate and finicky to maintain. I’m glad you folks ended the war so quickly. I knew we were going back eventually after we left Sadaam in place. I thought it was a huge mistake taking him out. We made it worse than when he was in power.
When Ward mentions Russian tanks, I had a flashback of topping the last hill on the highway leading from KKMC before the intersection with the highway that parallels the Saudi Arabia/Iraq border and seeing a T72 sitting there. We had about 15 seconds of panic before realizing it was an Egyptian MP unit performing traffic control at the intersection.
Thank you for what you did. My older brother older brother was a navy anti submarine pilot in the 50's , he was my hero as kid (he is now 84, I am 75. Because of a vision problem, the military wouldn't take me and Icouldn't get a civilian pilots license. So you navy pilots are still my heroes. Always remember" take offs are optional; landings are mandatory! With respect and admiration C M Shaw
Desert Storm has really become mysterious in a way. It happened so fast and is now been overshadowed by the recent history of the Middle East. I was 18 years old at the time and yeah, I can't believe how long its been now. So cool to hear your stories and perspective about it
I served during Desert Storm as a Royal Navy Operating Theatre Nurse with British 32 Field Hospital in the middle of the Saudi desert near Hafah al Batin. I can remember being on night shift in our tented complex and when my shift finished at 0800 came out of the tents to find the sky was totally black and we couldn't see the sun. We were downwind of the oilwell fires but didn't know it at the time and it is one strong memory of the war that I have!
You can win every battle, and still lose the war. My heart goes out to the little folks. I am proud of my support for the Navy and Marine Corps aviators. The shot of an aviator standing in the hole in the port wing of the Intruder that he and his B/N flew home sort of got me. I believe A/6s were the only self-designators for LG weapons. The Nighthawks cleared the highway for the Dump Trunks of Death.
Years ago Taiwan sent 5 U-2's over China. 4 were shot down. The pilot of the 5th U-2 returned to base and upon hearing the other 4 were shot down commented. "Boy I was sure lucky not to get shot down because I forgot to turn on my ECM jammer." Turns out the missiles were homing in on the ECM jammers.
Also to the Stroke energy management topic. Even though he was mashing the countermeasures button, not a single chaff was released. It had malfunctioned. And they didn’t realize this until he was back on the ground, but he hd kinematically defeated each incoming missile.
@@barryfletcher7136 Actually, no. Wolf Blitzkrieg was inside the Pentagon CNN press office when the shooting started in Desert Storm. The FULL audio is on YT, and he clearly states he's at the Pentagon many times.
@@ALSNewsNow I watched him on CNN broadcasting live from the roof of the Dhahran International Hotel during the period Iraq was launching Scud missiles into Saudi Arabia. it was of interest to me because I had stayed at that hotel. However, you are correct that he was in the USA when Iraq invaded Kuwait.
Every Vietnam War Pilot that flew against N.Vietnam I've met. When asked if they saw SAMs. Always get very wide open eyes while shaking their head up and down. One Marine A-6 pilot told me a story of his SAM near miss. My eyes also opened very wide while listening. Great history Ward Carrol!
Ward Carroll's videos are always valuable to me, a civilian with no military experience, becuase he educates me about the US Navy and about the military folks to whom all US citizens are indebted.
I lived in the Gulf for 25 years (UAE/Kuwait/Saudi Arabia) and was living in Dubai at the time of Desert Shield and Storm. One of my fondest memories was being outside and watching all the aircraft overhead as they headed up to the Kuwait/Iraq region. With their flashing lights, they looked like lightning bugs on a hot summer night. BTW, when you mentioned where U.S. air assets were based, you left out the UAE. Being much further away from the action, I don't think there were fighter aircraft there, but I know there were KC-135 refueling tankers either in Dubai or Sharjah.
Wow! I am a subscriber but for some reason, this just showed up in my suggested videos to watch. I'm glad I did-even if it is 2 years after you posted it. Thank you for posting it. I was at a stateside assignment during Desert Storm. I remember wishing I could be overseas. I had a little bit more involvement with OIF and OEF, however. I am glad to have served. Thank you for your perspective.
Thank you Ward for doing these videos !!! You bypass the BS and get right to the actual facts. Plus, you are the only military aviator who has a Marshall amp in his/her office !!! Thank you for your service !!
Again, I know I am catching up on these old videos, but thank you for your service and your opinion about your efforts in the past and the future of the U.S..
My god 30 years.... time has been a blur... That was my first of many combat deployments. I was with the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, the finest, oldest continously serving calvary regiment in the Army. We spearheaded the ground forces in and main mission was the Republican Guards with the left hook as it had been called and we finished at the battle of the 73 Easting.
My dad’s first deployment was southern watch on the Nimitz. Ten years to the day after 9-11, I was in basic, going on to be a corpsman. It’s hard to fathom how time passes by us, I still try remember that my Dad and I served during the same war, GWOT, he retired a few months before I went in. Let’s not forget these important lessons, let’s keep the bad guys and those thinking to be the next bad guy on their toes. Thank you for all you do sir.
I've never commented on ANY video on here, but, Damn! what an amazing tribute this was! General Chuck is one of the reasons I became a pilot! I'm all choked up...well done Commander!!
Desert Storm. The big little war that directly led to our two big conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. My Marine Corps unit arrived in Saudi Arabia in early September of 1990 and we left in April of 1991. We supported a forward air base near the Kuwait border and the Persian Gulf. I remember Harriers at that base as well as OV-10 Broncos. A lot of helicopter activity there as well as C-130's. I do recall that the Harrier squadrons lost at least one Harrier to combat and there was an OV-10 Bronco shot down as well and the crew taken prisoner.
I was the Weapons Flight Chief for the 421FS (Black Widows) at Hill AFB, Utah.. We deployed to the United Arab Emirates at the end of August 1990. We left Hill in KC-10's with the F-16 along side and went to Seymour Johnson AFB and stayed over night. The next day we left and flew non-stop to the UAE. The F-16's got refueled 16 times and the KC-10 I was on got refueled 3 times. At the time the 421FS was the only F-16 squadron that had the LANTIRN pod and we had had it less than a year. We were the only F-16 squadron that flew at night. We flew the first night of the war (17 Jan 91) and every night until the air war was halted. We flew mostly MK-84 (2000LB) bombs, various CBU anti personnel munitions and AGM-65 Maverick missiles with an ECM jamming pod on the center line station.
When I was a kid there was a training flight path over my house where a couple of A6's would fly by at a couple hundred feet. I always thought the low level stuff would be a rush.
Ward, great video ! Unless I missed it I don’t think you mentioned the Air Force’s EF-111A shared the electronic warfare (jamming) role with the EA-6B. In fact one EF was awarded a kill during the war. Not bad when you consider the aircraft had no offensive weapons other than flying low and fast. I enjoy your channel thanks for sharing.
Another great story Commander. It was cool to hear about the SAM experience from the pilot's perspective. I was an Fire Controlman on the USS Gridley and we were the first ship on station off the coast of Kuwait providing radar coverage and air defense when Southern Watch kicked off. With our SAMs we had the ability to put a large number of them in flight with launch on search, so if a plane was designate a FOE, we could launch a missile when the target was 150 plus NM from the ship. The computer would keep track of the missile, the designated target and would uplink course corrections to the missile as needed. At a point when the missile was about to become terminal, the tracking radar would light up the target with CW and the missile made it final course correction and about 3 seconds later there was a big boom.
A French Jaguar was shot by a missile during Desert Storm and was able to come back. The damaged plane is now exposed in "Musée du Bourget" just north of Paris, with a big hole in the right engine and hull
As an ol’ retired Army grunt of “similar rank and year group to you” I commend your blunt candor for limitations! So many people I meet can only tell of their strengths and capabilities and that is only half of the story. When not compromising OPSEC and safety, it is important to know one’s weaknesses and limitations for the rest of the story. Absolutely commendable sailor!
Interesting stuff. So I went to desert storm and sat in a generator room capturing real-time documents from across the hallway....the black hole. The black hole was where the 'plan' as initially designed by an officer while attending ACSC (Air Command and Staff College) was being modified, poured over, and executed (lots of incoming intel traffic). At the other end of the hall in the basement (this is RSAFHQ) was TACC. This is where your ATOs, elements of marine and army units, an OIC (flag officer), and displays of AWACS, JSTARS, weather and more were located. Busy, noisy room we visited the first time while under SCUD attack. General Horner was upstairs. Back at my duty station inside the Academic circle on Maxwell AFB we directly supported the GWAPS (Gulf War Air Power Survey) which was ongoing when I retrained and reassigned. Lots of cool stuff I got to learn and witness in that environment. Interestingly...all the fan fare about the 117 being first in and still little mention that AFSOC was first in with Pave Low and Apaches to eliminate the border air defenses. A friend I graduated high school with was a door gunner on one of the first ships in. I never could figure why the decision was made to designate the 117 a fighter (and in all the documents I saw....didn't read a reason) when it was virtually defenseless and if not for flying night missions making like a hole in the sky they'd not been nearly as effective as they were. Once blinded...the enemy presented a very target rich environment. Combat camera put together some nice videos I still need to digitize.
Very interesting program. I to spent some time in VF-143 keep our RIO's happy as an AWG-10 radar tech. This was 1971 on a WESPAC cruise and we were flying F-4J Phantoms. I also spent time in VX-4 during the fleet transition from the B model to the J and VF-121 training NAS Memphis graduates on real planes. Thanks for the insights into the Tomcat. I just missed them.
Very interesting perspective on the lessons learned from Desert Storm especially from the Navy Aviation perspective. However, I have always felt that the way it ended helped lead to the second war against Saddam. I think the war should have gone on a another couple of days to finish off the Republican Guard but NOT to go all the way to Baghdad. Second, there is NO way the Iraqi surrender should have been from a lower level Iraqi general. We should have insisted that Saddam himself surrender. Face is very important in the Middle East and that allowed Saddam to later claim he was not personally defeated. We will never know if that approach would have avoided the second war but we certainly know how the approach we took ended.
Well IMO the problem with stopping where we did made it so that Saddam stayed in power and since he controlled ALL of the media source he could tell the vast majority of people there any bullshit that he wanted to. He could easily have said that they actually won and that is why the fighting stopped. How would they know any different than what they were told? I think what we should have done is marched our army across the entire country so there wouldn't have been a single Iraqi citizen that didn't see us there the first time. Not to effect the regime change but just so that they ALL saw us there then leave. That would have done a great deal to eliminate Saddam's ability to bullshit his people.
Gulf War 2 was never needed. GWB wanted regime change and he was out for blood. Saddam didn't have WMDs, he was not linked to Al-Qaeda or any terrorist organisation, nor was he involved in 9/11 in any way. Hate to bring in politics to an amazing recount by the soldiers, pilots, and sailors - US screwed over Saddam by provoking him to attack Iran, double-crossing him on Kuwait, and then sponsoring the Kurds to stir trouble, as extra fodder to invade Iraq. When Saddam was hung, he was hung on the charges of attacking Kurds and nothing else. Sure I love all the games, movies, music, and technology that came out of the war, not to mention Arnie's True Lies. But there could have been other easier paths to achieve the same goals.
Gulf War 2 was never needed. GWB wanted regime change and he was out for blood. Saddam didn't have WMDs, he was not linked to Al-Qaeda or any terrorist organisation, nor was he involved in 9/11 in any way. Hate to bring in politics to an amazing recount by the soldiers, pilots, and sailors - US screwed over Saddam by provoking him to attack Iran, double-crossing him on Kuwait, and then sponsoring the Kurds to stir trouble, as extra fodder to invade Iraq. When Saddam was hung, he was hung on the charges of attacking Kurds and nothing else. Sure I love all the games, movies, music, and technology that came out of the war, not to mention Arnie's True Lies. But there could have been other easier paths to achieve the same goals.
It's always so interesting hearing this man's stories. Sometimes it's cool to have a beer and listen to an episode or two during the weekend. It's almost like hearing an audiobook the way he describes things.
I enjoy your commentary. One thing you do as you are explaining things is you slip in an extra descriptor like "that is a navy plane' or 'remember no stealth on that plane'. Thank you from someone like myself who is short on back ground , but still has a lot or interest.
To me, the fact that boots are still on the ground around M.E. is what i call "The lightning rod effect". Being there attract enemies like a moth is attracted to light, preventing attacks elsewhere ( home ). It is better to fight an incoming fire away from home than waiting it to be at home...
I’ll never forget the first night of Desert Storm. I was the SDO of VA-42. It was pre-cell phone (-ish...I had one but the squadron did not and most people did not) but we had the trusty duty beeper. As such, we had to stay on base. I’ll never forget watchingCNN late into the night with other SDOs in the Q
That was originally an AC-130 mission, I helped with the planning as the wing Electronic Warfare Officer. We quickly concluded we couldn't low level in and climb to firing altitude fast enough and the job was turned over to the helos. The Pave Lows were the pathfinders for the Apaches because of their better navigation systems plus they could self-SAR if anybody got hit.
New sub, enjoyed this and your top gun video on Goose. I grew up (and still live) in San Deigo when they were filming the first Top Gun and witnessed the crew filming the “special effects” of dropping scaled models on fire from cranes on top on the hill behind my house. Tom Cruise was staying at la Valencia hotel in La Jolla and my high school gf served him ice cream at the Haagen-Daz store next door that she worked out. The “Maverick”water rescue scene was filmed off La Jolla Shores and we heard Tom Cruise almost drowned filming that scene as he got tangled in the parachute chords and the diver had to cut him out to save him. Of course growing up in San Diego and now living in North County San Diego, I have many friends from the Navy and Marine Corp and got to fly the F/A18 flight sim at Miramar before they cracked down on outside civilians using it. Wild time for sure.Tried to sim a bomb run on Qualcomm Stadium and fly under Coronado bridge and failed at both! Of course have attended many Air Shows at Miramar and enjoy and respect the men and women that serve our great Country. And the incredible airplanes that our country produces. Big fan of you channel. Thank you again.
I like it very much that you are so meticulous with tech statements so it should also be rectified: stealth aircraft are not even invisible to radar. They are LESS visible, as it was demonstrated in 1999 over Bosnia and their visibility is really sensitive to maintenance and can be impeded by a host of ways e.g. a synchronized radar network. Decreased radar cross section is still essential - just as you said - but this channel I believe should be beyond statements like "invisible to radar" :)
Hello Ward, I'm a civilian aviator (PPL-ASEL) and love your channel. Your an excellent teacher, and speaker. I remember watching that first night of Desert Storm from work (I'm a Satellite Broadcast engineer) and all the worry it brought seeing another war start up. I was so glad it came to a quick end thanks to air power. Can you use your Naval aviator expertise to enlighten us about the Lt. Cmd. MICHAEL SCOTT SPEICHER story? (His KIA, switched to MIA, handheld radio issues, the mysteries that ensued, and all that) GREAT CHANNEL, thanks for your service!
What do you want to know? I was flying nearby when that happened. We heard on the return leg (I was flying D Model Hornets at that time, doing FASTFAC) that we'd lost a Hornet. They didn't say Navy or Marine on air of course. We get back, I learn it was a Navy Hornet, then I learned what unit, then we learned who was downed. They hoped he was able to eject and start evading, but when we did not get his survival PRC transmissions (his survival radio used to communicate with SAR assets) we assumed the worst. I didn't know him personally but I do know folks that did know him and he enjoyed a great reputation.
@@karlchilders5420 Mooch and Hozer just did a very well done talk about Scott Speicher on the channel yesterday. Thanks for educating us on this tragedy and how great a human and aviator he was.
I believe that the name given to that stretch of road was the "Highway of Death", not "Highway of Hell", also wasn't the road shut down initially by a single F-15 with iron bombs and then subsequently ravaged by AH-64 gunships, F-15/16 with cluster bombs and A-10s, just a view additional details I learned from the BBC documentary on the 1991 Gulf War.
The turkey shoot was kicked off by Marine A-6E crews dropping CBU-78s which took out the head and tail of the convoy. Over the next 10 hours Harriers, Hornets and a number of other fixed wing units got cleared onto the target by Marine F/A-18 FASTFACs.
I along with many others, was airborne in and F-14 A+ off the Saratoga when the USS Theodore Roosevelt went booming southbound down the Red Sea. At 25K ft, you could see the wake it made covering the whole width of the Red Sea. Powerful ships....
Gosh, your account takes me back a bit. I was too old to fly DS/DS in the cockpit, but did fly a BMD in the Bunker. The Iranians gave us some hiccups when they lit up every Prick rescue radio they had to screw with our SAR. Back then we thought CNN was worth a damn just for the images.
To hear these stories from a real person who has seen it done it and now telling it to all of us, this guy should have his own TV slot, there would be no shortage of guests and certainly no shortage of viewers, great posts.
So i'd equate the lost art of evading sams to the lost art of a close up guns dogfight like what happened in Vietnam. And that didn't work out do well in the begining. I really do admire the F-16 and F-4G wild weasel crews of the gulf war. Those guys dared the sams to paint them with radar. I just can't imagine the balls to do that! Some unsung heroes for sure. They paved they way for the rest of the strike force. SEAD is a dirty business lol. Great analysis of the Gulf War, I really enjoyed that.
Well the advantage that we enjoyed there was that they were mostly older SAM systems. Ones that you can actually out turn or required a hard lock on the aircraft to persecute. Newer SAM systems are a different animal all together.
On the first night, there were also B-52s launched from Barksdale AFB, Louisiana for this sortie which fired dozens of Conventional Air Launched Cruise Missiles. The B-52s flew roundtrip from Barksdale and back. That, in itself, is quite a story.
Stealth doesn't make you invisible. It reduces the range at which you can be detected which those of us in the EW community knew long before Desert Storm. The Air Force reluctantly had to admit - after previous denials - that some F-117 missions were accompanied by EF-111s and fighter support. The Brits announced - perhaps even in a post DS issue of Proceedings - that they had been tracking F-117s flying out of Saudi Arabia using low band search RADAR aboard RN ships sailing in the Gulf. Stealth is one piece of the puzzle but it isn't the be all end all TACAIR panacea that many - particularly less than honest USAF advocates - claim it is.
All too true. Us in the strictly civilian community learned about stealth from Tom Clancy ( in 1986 ) and Popular Mechanics, other defense industry talks, over the years.
Amazing good show. Anti- ground to air tactics are intriguing. As a non- fighter pilot, when I was age 18, I remember traveling on a bus in Israel with a very young Israeli fighter pilot (3 years older than me) who explained that when you see, while flying at 400 kts, a puff of smoke in your 180 degree periphery vision on the desert, you dive into the puff of surface smoke, to beat and avert the SAM missle threat. He said that he had lost fellow comrade pilots to learn this instinctual reaction to survive. That was 40-plus years ago, but for me it made me realize how this job as fighter pilot is so complex and difficult, learning experimently, and the bravery that all that involves. Keep pushing the envelope!
I was stationed at NAS Norfolk where DS broke out. I could tell that things had gone hot when I drove in to work the morning after, and there was a Marine APC parked inside the base entrance with the 30 MM turret pointed at you. The base seemed almost deserted, almost every single ship gone, and all the E-2’s and Greyhounds absent from the flight line. It is sobering to consider the sheer overwhelming amount of tonnage the US Navy once had and where we are now.
Great commentary as usual... Love the F 14 Tomcat & Always love to see it on the cat and in recovery. Hilo pilot for sure. My personal opinion if they would’ve adopted the F 21 it would’ve filled all the gaps from low and slow ground support to Full out interceptor not to exclude of course prioritize missions. As always thank you for keeping it real 😎 p.s. Now retired and disabled as far as games are concerned for those who have not. Air Combat OL for android and iOS. I have most of the aircraft and I am team leader of the VF - 1 Wolfpack. The F-14 tomcat I have acquired both models in this game. Just a FYI. Keep up the good job. Of course I share as often as possible to our fighter wing especially those that describe such as this one maintaining your energy. Ty God bless
Did not know we were on the same ship until now. I was in VAQ 140 for the 1990 Desert shield cruise and also for the 1991-1992 cruise on the Eisenhower.
The coverage of the air campaign during the Gulf War told me a lot. There was a televised strike on SCUD bunkers and it was impressive that the first bomb blew in the bunker door and the second skidded in to explode in an empty bunker. The lack of secondary explosions was obvious--secondary explosions did in the Arizona and the four Japanese carriers in the Battle of Midway. As for the Ralph Blitzer images, when I saw that the tracers were sweeping the skies at random, that told me that the integrated air defense grid was down. Again, the WW2 experience with AAA over Germany and against naval fleets that featured integrated anti-aircraft fire showed the difference between local control firing at random and radar-guided central coordinated AAA fires from heavy, medium and light flak guns. One additional problem with coming in on the deck is running into power lines and buildings and bumping against hills. That was a problem back in WW2 as well. The Gulf War seemed to be relearning the lessons of the past to me, even though the Gulf War had more terminally guided munitions than all previous wars combined. Situational awareness, jamming systems, but most of all determining the lynchpin target that reduces the enemy's ability to fight the air battle were the same in WW2 as in the Gulf War, only the equipment had changed. The need to adapt to changing circumstances is an eternal lesson relearned every war. Another lesson that needs to be learned is applying enough destruction for long enough to render the enemy system ineffective. Germany in the Battle of Britain didn't keep its eye on the ball and failed to achieve what happened to the Iraqi integrated air defense in the first week of the Gulf War. This video is important and I hope that it isn't forgotten. I accuse the American war machine of institutional Alzheimer's. Forget about "preparing to fight the last war," our war machine doesn't remember the last war!
Good post! 👍🏻 Speaking of the low level hazards, that’s what killed Major Marie Rossi in Desert Storm. She was a Chinook pilot, and the first female pilot in the U.S. Military to fly into combat, as well as first female to command a unit in combat. She flew into a high tension power line or tower and in “brown out” or some kind of low visibility situation, and died.
I might be a bit off-base with my assessment of history, but while it's argued that WWI, the US Civil War, or even the Crimean War was the first "modern" war, I'd say that Desert Storm was the first 21st Century War, despite taking place a decade prior. Technology, FFI, battle trackers, and battle footage were all vastly superior to that we used in Vietnam, and especially to that used by the Soviets in Afghanistan. I was in middle school at the time. In 2003, I was on the ground in Baghdad and watching ADA and SAMs going up and hearing tanks battling in the distance while being a lowly SAW Gunner made me appreciate everyone. We had A-10s alternating with 155 mm howitzer fire to take out the Secretariat. There was no interaction with Navy or Marine assets, but it took a team to do what we did in 2003, just as it did in 1991.
*As we get older and start looking back, time seems to compress. Yeah, it's hard to believe it's 30 years ago. I look back at 80, 70, 60, etc, and it's even harder to accept that these "fresh memories" are 40, 50, 60 years old. It's an interesting phenomenon!*
It's not that interesting when you consider it as proportions. When you're 20, something that happened 10 years ago is half your life ago. When you're 60 something that happened half your life ago is now 30 years, but it'll "feel the same" so to speak as that 10 years did back when you were 20, which is where the perception of it being wierd and compressed comes from.
It was my recollection that the stealth bomber was well known to the public before the Gulf War. In fact, I thought many believed the Batwing in Batman ''89 was modeled after the Stealth Bomber
@@roddeazevedo F-117s were first used in Operation Just Cause in Panama. They dropped some PGMs but didn't play a major role in that short conflict. Desert Storm was the first dedicated use of the platform in large numbers against heavily defended targets where their low observability proved helpful.
I discovered your channel not too long ago. I must say, I'm ecstatic. Being prior service, (USMC) and always have dreamed of being a fighter pilot, and history buff, you tickle all my senses and curiosities.
![Kodak Black - Versatile 4 [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/VcP_1Ua__vY/mqdefault.jpg)
As an Infantry Jarhead who was told we would take 50% casualties, I appreciated standing on the deck of the LHA at night and watching the over-the-horizon glow of the bombs striking their targets. And was grateful that the casualty predictions were massively overstated.
Casualty estimates were not overstated...We were just alot than what we gave ourselves credit for...ps: I thank the Vietnam veterans that stayed in for that...
@@nelsonzambrano5788there were over 700,000 troops that took part in the entire gulf war and only 13,400 casualties. Yeah that’s wayyyyyyy overstated..
@@stevenschrecengost5607less than 300 use casualties in Gulf War 1
@@stevenschrecengost5607 Nope - Most Commanders were Vietnam Veterans, who had led at the company level (LT's and Captains) - I remember one saying, that it was normal in a pitched battle w/the North Vietnamese Army(NVA) to have 30% of his platoon wounded...1) We didn't fight against the NVA (2) We had alot more training than troops going to Vietnam (3) USAF and coalition army was very systematic in attacking Republican Guard and other Iraqi units. PS: USAF Generals (also Vietnam War veterans) didn't want to have failure pinned on them either.
I stood on top of our 577 that night, and watched the show unfold right in front of me. For me, it was eerily like the “tears in rain” soliloquy from the movie Blade Runner.
Navy might not have gotten the choice CAP duty, but F-14 TARPS provided 90% of the battlefield-level reconnaissance because the AF had no photo recon assets. I still have the letter we received from Gen. Schwarzkopf commending us for the excellent photos we provided him.
A limited number of RF-4Cs served in Desert Storm.
...satellites imaging and flights you aren’t cleared to know about were done, there is no way in hell that any special ops units went in blind without recon photos.
@@cturdo 18-RF-4c's were deployed
I’m pretty sure the USAF had the U-2 and photo recon satellites
@@GBDubstep U-2 flights were used, but only for the purpose for finding mobile scud launchers and other stationery assets, not Battlefield recon during the ground force invasion. Recon satellites also can't provide battlefield-level reconnaissance, they're not in the right spot at the right time every time. Both you and efin dumb (proving his name correct) immediately proved you didn't actually bother to read Ken's comment properly, or don't know enough about military technology to make a reply. He specifically said "90% of battlefield-level recon" i.e. not 100%, and not all recon. Just the majority of battlefield-level recon. Even with RF-4c's deployed, that doesn't mean they were ready to go and operational at the time when they were needed. I see no reason to doubt Ken's account of the AF lacking photo recon assets. It's very much plausible they were not ready to perform recon tasks amongst everything else. It also doesn't mean the RF-4C was being used for battlefield-level intelligence, it might have been occupied with other tasks, like observing troop movements in the reserve.
Ward,
Great report & analysis. I am another Veteran from Vietnam who was an advisor/contractor in Saudi Arabia during Desert Shield to Desert Storm. Like many other expats I was less than a couple miles from the RSAF air base in Riyadh in 1990 after Iraq had invaded Kuwait. And remember watching USAF flights landing and taking off 24-7 on the mob up to the land/air assault in 1991... When President George H. Bush pulled the trigger on liberating Kuwait there were many of us who were saying out loud "don't F this up like what happened in Nam"...Well President Bush did not disappoint. He/we liberated Kuwait and even better after wards he stopped going further into Iraq. All we armchair quarterbacks in the rear with the gear could think was a great thanks for his leadership.
Good afternoon, Ward. It's refreshing to hear your accurate information and clear explanations that are easy for people unfamiliar with the subject to understand. I was an Air Force KC-135 driver, deployed to Egypt for Desert Shield, then Saudi Arabia for Desert Storm, then Turkey for the Northern no-fly zone, and finally Southern Watch.
About two weeks before Desert Storm, my crew, and several others, were chosen to train with the F-117s to prepare all of us to work together to complete their missions. I credit my outstanding Navigator for our crew being chosen, because the -117s had some very demanding requirements for timing and precise navigation on our part, to get them close to their targets. We learned a couple of things that we didn't expect...we could in fact find them on the radar. Knowing where they were supposed to be helped a lot. But they had some difficulties seeing us. We started out trying to rendezvous with them with no lights on. Didn't work. The geometry of their cockpit, plus some special coatings on their windows, and helmets, made it had for them to see a darkend KC-135. As we always made the rendezvous over Saudi Arabia, and with the tankers headed south, we decided to make the join ups with our lights on. That worked quite a bit better, and then once we were joined up, we turned off the lights, and all other emitters.
We got another surprise, the night the war kicked off. My crew, and four others, met in the SKIF and were briefed on our mission for that night. For some 20 years, the KC-135s had been asking for radar warning receivers. The answer was always , "no, you will never be used beyond the Forward Edge of the Battle Area (FEBA), so you won't need them." The same went for chaff and flares. So, night one of Desert Storm, a Major rolled out a chart, showing our route, up to the west of Baghdad, and the F-117s push points. The senior pilot among the five crews, a Lieutenant Colonel, objected...and was overruled. The Major then looked around the room, and (probably because I was the tallest, and caught his eye), said "You, you're lead...this is where you are going."
Soon we got another surprise...the F-117s could not fly through clouds, because there was a screen over their engine inlets that would ice up if they flew through any icing conditions. We spent as time looking for clouds as we did for other threats!
That first night, the five tankers, and ten F-117s, were escorted by 6 F-15s, and two EF-11s. Everything went like clockwork, because of all the effort to knock out the SAM systems that you explained, as well as one of my receivers taking out the AT&T building downtown, and most of Iraq's communications. We had no problems, so, the second night, we had no escorts. Unfortunately, the AWACS aircraft saw us as five lonely tankers, headed north by themselves, and gave us the secret codeword to turn around and head south, away from Iraq. Our F-117s had to follow, because they were too far from their targets for the gas that they had. Mission scrubbed.
The third, and successive nights went like clockwork, for a few weeks. Ultimately, I did that mission 23 times...one of the last finishing up with running away from an SA-2 (unguided.) We got the list and postions of all mobiles SAMs as the last thing we grabbed going out the door. Usually we could find a corridor to avoid them, but that night we were stuck with the big SAM blocking our way home. My boom operator, 'Mikey' spotted the launch, below the clouds, and then flash up through the cloud layer, and coming generally toward us. Then it went above us, and Mike lost sight of it. I couldn't maneuver like an F-14, obviously...all I could do was the Monty Python maneuver.
About then we started doing other missions, F-15Es on strike missions, F-4s as Wild Weasels, and F-16s flying CAP. We even took some A-6s up the Gulf, with the dreaded Iron Maiden attached to our refueling boom. That all went well. My crew went home, briefly, because my airplane had been in the Middle East long enough to miss two major scheduled inspections, and it was falling apart. I spent another couple of deployments and several months in theater, until it was time for me either take a desk job I didn't want, or get out. I chose civilian life.
@@larryknudsen1105 Thanks a lot, for that little tidbit! (Now, if I can just remember it...)
What is the Monty Python maneuver?
Nice info ! I always wondered if the tankers were equipped with RWR, ECM, or other defensive measure and wondering what if SAMs got fired on tankers and is it possible to jinked the missile. So my view that tankers is less vulnerable apparently wrong
@@foreverpinkf.7603 "Run AWAY!"
@Russavot I love the Egyptians. Great attitudes, fantastic sense of humor, generous. Unless they are in an airplane. We called them Cowboys; they usually rushed into position behind the tanker with far too much energy. Underrunning the tanker is extremely dangerous for both airplanes. We would call "Breakaway" if they were coming in too fast, but instead of chopping their power and dropping down a thousand feet like they were supposed to, they just kept on coming...forcing me to try to outrun them, until they got the picture. I didn't refuel any Arabs, but I listened to them on the radios. Ever see video of arabs shooting an AK-47 over a wall, just spraying bullets, not looking where they are going? It's the same in the air..or at least it was some 30 years ago. Turks were fine pilots, but then I was shocked to find that while I was protecting Iran's Kurds, I was giving fuel to Turkish F-4s, so they could bomb Turkish Kurds.
As a Desert Shield - Desert Storm Army Vet I remember it very well. We got to Saudi Arabia I think late Oct 1990 (arrived at midnight and it was still 80 degrees F.) and we did not leave until July 1991. I stayed in until 2002 (18 years) - now a disabled veteran.
Thank you for your service.
Cheers mate! 🍻 Thanks. 👍
I am ish I was still in siring this. Unfortunately I discharged in 1981.
Thank you for your service my friend
Sir I have just read your words re Desert Storm. Your very last words touched me deep because I have injuries too. I am a civvy and I am a Complete supporter of our countries general military and Help The Hero’s charity. Also have spent a lot of time by invitation with the pilots of the famous Guinea Pig Club who were injured in WW11. So I have seen a lot of injured great men.
So I want and need you to know Sir with the Greatest respect to you, that you are NOT disabled Sir!!!
What you and I have is A Problem, not disabled, But a problem, that’s all, a bit of a problem! If we think about it we could say Everyone (and to just use that wrong negative word just this one time disabled ) has Something that they just Cannot do, and what they Cannot do Is A Problem for them!
People treated me as disabled for around 4 years, then as I always as a boy had a passion for aircraft, so one day I had a pleasure flight in a Cessna 150. The instructor let me take control and fly the aircraft, WOW that was it,
I booked my first lesson, and went on to gain my pilots licence, taught myself basic aerobatics, then flew Bi-planes.
Then later invested in and became an owner of a formation aerobatic team called the Skyhawks Aerobatic Team,
at Biggin Hill airport Uk.
I am not bragging Sir I just wanted to help an Army man, as was my father!
I hope this is of help to you Sir and I
Wish you All the Very Best and to have All that you want and need.
Follow your heart and let NOTHING stop you.
Gods Big happy blessings for you.
Sincerely JB. Oxted. Surrey. UK.
one thing about the f16 vs 6 sams, his chaff dispensers malfunctioned, he fought them off on aerial manouver alone.
WOW!
I wonder if anyone had a "map" of his maneuvers.
I ended up finding something where a guy recreated it in DCS World with supposedly the same inputs.
hahaha! :))))))))
really a crappy joke!
As a Marine veteran who served in OIF and OEF, including the re invasion of Iraq in 2003, it is very interesting to hear of the events 12 years earlier and correlating that to all the blown out tanks and aircraft we still encountered along the way into Iraq. Thank you for all the stories, please keep it up!!!
Oorah, motivator.
Saw a lot of the tanks in 03' as a scout sniper. One of my most interesting memories is when we nested in a scorched T-54 or maybe a T-62. My fella that was spotting for me was much more of a historian than my young ass from Oklahoma and he told me how violently and efficiently Iraq's armor was destroyed. It made all the graveyards of beautiful, classic Soviet tanks make perfect and logical sense lmao
@@boydrobertson2362 I drove through that area on my way to the right hook.
edit: also the highway of death
This information is amazing. Thank you. My uncle was a navy pilot in Vietnam. He was shot down in an A- 4e Skyhawk off of the midway. He was MIA for many years and still is as far as we are concerned. Although the navy changed his status to killed in action years ago. It's great to get these stories from real naval officers and pilots who have been there. Awsome channel!
I was an AT3 in Va-87 on INDEPENDENCE. This was the A-7 days before the Golden Warriors went to the F/A-18. I was in the Persian Gulf when Reagan was inaugurated. Interesting times. Loved my Navy days! About to finish a 40+ year career at Delta airlines. FLY NAVY!!!
I was a soldier for the Canadian Army during desert Storm. Although we didnt participate in direct action. I stood a post during that conflict during this time. I will never forget it. It prepared me for what was to come in the future.
Were you still in the Army during the war on terror?
Hey Ward, I was an Air Force brat stationed at Hahn AB in Germany during Desert Storm. My dad was a flight surgeon attached to an F16 wing and had many friends who deployed to Saudi Arabia. Thanks for sharing your stories and info. I remember as an 8 year old boy being woken on a Saturday morning in November maybe when the entire wing of F16 squadrons took off to deploy. Crazy memory I will never forget!
Small world. I was a young F-16 crew chief in the 313th at Hahn. A small group of us left a few days before the 10th deployed and we went to Moron AB Spain. A few days later, all the Hahn jets arrived at Moron. They spend about 36 hours there before moving on to the AOR. Goo times.
@@Meyblc70 yep my dad was with the 10th! Always loved that patch.
Ward Carroll thank you for your service to this country. Your presentations about the US role in Desert Storm are terrific
My eyes tear up when I hear the stress in their voices as they fight for their lives, and on my behalf. God bless you all.
Yeah...
That wasn't really on your behalf.
Oil.
@@RawPower7 "muh oil" Sterilize yourself.
@@natowaveenjoyer9862 because of oil? Ok.
I was an undergrad studying history when that war broke out. I had a history prof that taught Middle Eastern history at that time. He argued that this war would create an enormous amount of problems for America and that the outcome would be treacherous. This video and your historical summary made me remember his concerns, thanks for bringing this perspective to light.
A great book just published (2023) is A Stranger in Your Own City, by Ghaith Abdul-Ahad. An Iraqi journalist tells of those after-effects.
You have a fascinating channel sir. I served in the U.S. Army from 1987-2008. I was in the 24th Infantry Division during Desert Storm. Desert Storm was a fascinating time to serve. Ironically I drove through the same part of Southern Iraq (Hwy 8) in 2003 during Operation Iraqi Freedom. This time we were going the opposite way!
I was an Army Engineer during Desert Storm, we went in right behind the infantry and to this day my most vivid memories are what our infantry left in their wake for us to see. Brutal. War shouldn't be.
Hello Ward. New to your channel.. I was a Young Marine in the Gulf War. I was stationed at the port of Al-Jubail, Saudi. I was tasked as a young Marine to go out and do a recovery. It was the crash site of Reggie Underwood, a Marine Harrier Pilot that was shot down. We walked around the desert picking up "everything that didnt belong" and putting it into 50 cube boxes. HIs body was already recoverd, as far as i remember. Very sad day.
I'm not sure how many times i've watched that pilot evading 6 SAM's video, but every time i hear the second "stroke 4 status?" It brings a tear to my eye, the pain and desperation is so clear.
You have a very nuanced way of putting things Ward. Very nuanced.
It’s a breath of fresh air. I love it, and hope you keep it coming. 👍
Good observation. He sounds like a regular guy talking about his day at work. A guy who loves his job. That's one reason he's very listenable. Once I asked a young VF-11 pilot about the Tomcat's AWG-9 radar. He immediately directed me to his RIO. lol I'm hooked.
I was a US Army ground troop during Desert Shield/Desert Storm. Before the ground war started we were on the border of Saudi Arabia and Iraq well to the west of the western "point" of Kuwait. I remember looking up and watching tankers making big, long oval "race tracks" over the border and watching all manner of aircraft come in for airborne refueling. I'd estimate they were somewhere between 10,000 and 20,000 feet elevation... but then I'm not an aircraft guy, so I couldn't be sure. But it was pretty neat.
I remember watching that too! an seeing jet after jet crossing the border, night and day 24/7.
It’s humorous how many folks “watched” Wolf Blitzer in Baghdad and the SAM trails and AAA and bomb explosions behind his rooftop reporting. But he was never there; he was safe in the States. Peter Arnette and Bernard Shaw were there.
I love this channel and happy it popped up yesterday!
Hats off to you for your service Ward.
Good point about Wolf.
I am happy you created this channel. This type of history could never be taught in a class room.
History is now "taught" via Koolaid
As a kid in high school I kept waiting and waiting for a history class dealing with WWII...it never happened.
That sucks. I was in a grade 12 history class in Canada, and we essentially studied the conflict as the build up was happening. Probably spent two months on it between Nov - Feb. Who knows what the teacher dumped in the curriculum to get that done? We looked at the weapons and armies involved, the political backdrop of Iraq/Iran and the Saudies, the fact that protecting our oil supply definitely had a hand in us being there in the first place, the danger of a power vaccuum coming into play in the region if we simply wiped Iraq off the map, propaganda using the media, tons of battle footage from nightly broadcasts.... what do kids get taught about these days?
Try going to college.
@@seeingeyegod That and a better high school helped greatly.
In Tom Clancy's semi-autobiographical book about USAF General Chuck Horner, "Every Man a Tiger," it was also suggested that the Air Force took precedence over the Navy because a carrier-based sortie cost ten times as much to execute as a land-based sortie at the time.
Also, I seem to remember reading somewhere that Tomcat crews had to use automotive police radar detectors because the F-14A's RHAW system couldn't detect the SAM radar network.
Literally jaw dropping that carriers in Desert Storm had to physically fly a plane to central command to pick up orders that are by the time they are received hours if not days old, unbelievable!!!
Communication is #1 biggest issue with all military & not just U.S. hehehe today Russia
Wow. Time flies. I was a U.S. Marine Corps Combat Engineer, runny nose, 1st Lt. during Desert Storm
Time does fly. Thanks, Stephen. S/F.
Good morning Ward. I was assigned to VA-155 CVW2 / USS Ranger at the time of Desert Storm. We were already scheduled for WestPac when Kuwait was invaded, so we pretty much knew it wasn't going to be a normal cruise. The first thing I thought was that it was going to be memorable for me, as it was the last cruise of my career, and my oldest brother had gone to Vietnam on the Ranger many years before.
As you stated, the first strike packages were low level, and one night after the strike division trapped back aboard, the crews were visible shaken. They said they had never anticipated such heavy fire. A couple nights later, we lost NE 504 along with the crew, Lt. Tom Costen and Lt. Charlie Turner. Shortly after that, it was all high altitude precision delivery. The only low level attack carried out by the end of the war was our "payback" on the Highway to Hell. Thanks for the memories, ad keep up the great work you do Sir!
As a someone who was on the ground I only ever wanted to see an A10 above me
I can understand that point of view. But operationally if the troops in contact need an A-10 then the interdiction from the rest of the Air Force hasn’t gone to plan.
Roger that My supposedly clear LZ got hot. Went to arty no effect. A10 about fifteen minutes into solved the issue. 300 prisoners
I was a HAWK missile technician with the 4th LAAM out of Hayward CA during Desert Storm. Based on what I knew about AA missile systems at the time, they were very complex to operate and finicky to maintain. I’m glad you folks ended the war so quickly. I knew we were going back eventually after we left Sadaam in place. I thought it was a huge mistake taking him out. We made it worse than when he was in power.
When Ward mentions Russian tanks, I had a flashback of topping the last hill on the highway leading from KKMC before the intersection with the highway that parallels the Saudi Arabia/Iraq border and seeing a T72 sitting there. We had about 15 seconds of panic before realizing it was an Egyptian MP unit performing traffic control at the intersection.
Thank you for what you did. My older brother older brother was a navy anti submarine pilot in the 50's , he was my hero as kid (he is now 84, I am 75. Because of a vision problem, the military wouldn't take me and Icouldn't get a civilian pilots license. So you navy pilots are still my heroes. Always remember" take offs are optional; landings are mandatory! With respect and admiration C M Shaw
Desert Storm has really become mysterious in a way. It happened so fast and is now been overshadowed by the recent history of the Middle East. I was 18 years old at the time and yeah, I can't believe how long its been now. So cool to hear your stories and perspective about it
I served during Desert Storm as a Royal Navy Operating Theatre Nurse with British 32 Field Hospital in the middle of the Saudi desert near Hafah al Batin. I can remember being on night shift in our tented complex and when my shift finished at 0800 came out of the tents to find the sky was totally black and we couldn't see the sun. We were downwind of the oilwell fires but didn't know it at the time and it is one strong memory of the war that I have!
You can win every battle, and still lose the war. My heart goes out to the little folks. I am proud of my support for the Navy and Marine Corps aviators. The shot of an aviator standing in the hole in the port wing of the Intruder that he and his B/N flew home sort of got me. I believe A/6s were the only self-designators for LG weapons. The Nighthawks cleared the highway for the Dump Trunks of Death.
My dad was a cook on the ground during desert storm, as such I want to learn a lot more about it
It was later known that that F-16 pilot’s countermeasures systems were actually broken when he evaded those SAMs.
Did he spend 2 days sleeping after that? I do not think any astronaut has ever faced such high Gs for so long.
@@1mc568 yeah, he would’ve had a bit of adrenaline in his system for a while.
:)))))) yeah, "broken" - good story for Holywood
@@prokremelskidezolati1426 www.airforcemag.com/PDF/MagazineArchive/Documents/2016/January%202016/0116packageq.pdf
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Years ago Taiwan sent 5 U-2's over China. 4 were shot down. The pilot of the 5th U-2 returned to base and upon hearing the other 4 were shot down commented. "Boy I was sure lucky not to get shot down because I forgot to turn on my ECM jammer." Turns out the missiles were homing in on the ECM jammers.
Also to the Stroke energy management topic. Even though he was mashing the countermeasures button, not a single chaff was released. It had malfunctioned. And they didn’t realize this until he was back on the ground, but he hd kinematically defeated each incoming missile.
Wolf Blitzer wasn't one of the 'CNN boys in Bagdad". They were Peter Arnett, John Holliman and Bernard Shaw.
Blitzer was in Dhahran and broadcasting from the roof of the Dhahran international Hotel at the airport.
@@barryfletcher7136 Actually, no. Wolf Blitzkrieg was inside the Pentagon CNN press office when the shooting started in Desert Storm. The FULL audio is on YT, and he clearly states he's at the Pentagon many times.
@@ALSNewsNow I watched him on CNN broadcasting live from the roof of the Dhahran International Hotel during the period Iraq was launching Scud missiles into Saudi Arabia. it was of interest to me because I had stayed at that hotel. However, you are correct that he was in the USA when Iraq invaded Kuwait.
It's too bad they didn't stay over there...
Apparently, none of you have seen the fake footage from a rooftop in Atlanta. Sad, really.
Every Vietnam War Pilot that flew against N.Vietnam I've met. When asked if they saw SAMs. Always get very wide open eyes while shaking their head up and down. One Marine A-6 pilot told me a story of his SAM near miss. My eyes also opened very wide while listening. Great history Ward Carrol!
The work you do on your channel is gratefully appreciated, as is your military service....thank you.
Ward Carroll's videos are always valuable to me, a civilian with no military experience, becuase he educates me about the US Navy and about the military folks to whom all US citizens are indebted.
I lived in the Gulf for 25 years (UAE/Kuwait/Saudi Arabia) and was living in Dubai at the time of Desert Shield and Storm. One of my fondest memories was being outside and watching all the aircraft overhead as they headed up to the Kuwait/Iraq region. With their flashing lights, they looked like lightning bugs on a hot summer night.
BTW, when you mentioned where U.S. air assets were based, you left out the UAE. Being much further away from the action, I don't think there were fighter aircraft there, but I know there were KC-135 refueling tankers either in Dubai or Sharjah.
can you believe what Dubai has turned into in the last 30 years!
Wow! I am a subscriber but for some reason, this just showed up in my suggested videos to watch. I'm glad I did-even if it is 2 years after you posted it.
Thank you for posting it. I was at a stateside assignment during Desert Storm. I remember wishing I could be overseas. I had a little bit more involvement with OIF and OEF, however. I am glad to have served. Thank you for your perspective.
Thank you Ward for doing these videos !!! You bypass the BS and get right to the actual facts. Plus, you are the only military aviator who has a Marshall amp in his/her office !!! Thank you for your service !!
Again, I know I am catching up on these old videos, but thank you for your service and your opinion about your efforts in the past and the future of the U.S..
My god 30 years.... time has been a blur... That was my first of many combat deployments.
I was with the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, the finest, oldest continously serving calvary regiment in the Army.
We spearheaded the ground forces in and main mission was the Republican Guards with the left hook as it had been called and we finished at the battle of the 73 Easting.
I could listen to your storys all day. Thanks Ward. SGT DOUG, 101ST, RVN 68-69
It's hard to believe that my tour in Vietnam as a Marine platoon commander was over 50 years ago, because it doesn't seem that way to me.
My dad’s first deployment was southern watch on the Nimitz. Ten years to the day after 9-11, I was in basic, going on to be a corpsman. It’s hard to fathom how time passes by us, I still try remember that my Dad and I served during the same war, GWOT, he retired a few months before I went in. Let’s not forget these important lessons, let’s keep the bad guys and those thinking to be the next bad guy on their toes. Thank you for all you do sir.
Was in the Saratoga with VF 74. All of Desert Shield and Desert Storm. Spent all out time in the Red Sea.
I've never commented on ANY video on here, but, Damn! what an amazing tribute this was! General Chuck is one of the reasons I became a pilot! I'm all choked up...well done Commander!!
Desert Storm. The big little war that directly led to our two big conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
My Marine Corps unit arrived in Saudi Arabia in early September of 1990 and we left in April of 1991. We supported a forward air base near the Kuwait border and the Persian Gulf. I remember Harriers at that base as well as OV-10 Broncos. A lot of helicopter activity there as well as C-130's. I do recall that the Harrier squadrons lost at least one Harrier to combat and there was an OV-10 Bronco shot down as well and the crew taken prisoner.
Thank you for sharing your knowledge and understanding of the lessons learned, I learned quite a bit. “More please!”
the last conflict with a battleship in it, time flies
I was the Weapons Flight Chief for the 421FS (Black Widows) at Hill AFB, Utah.. We deployed to the United Arab Emirates at the end of August 1990. We left Hill in KC-10's with the F-16 along side and went to Seymour Johnson AFB and stayed over night. The next day we left and flew non-stop to the UAE. The F-16's got refueled 16 times and the KC-10 I was on got refueled 3 times. At the time the 421FS was the only F-16 squadron that had the LANTIRN pod and we had had it less than a year. We were the only F-16 squadron that flew at night. We flew the first night of the war (17 Jan 91) and every night until the air war was halted. We flew mostly MK-84 (2000LB) bombs, various CBU anti personnel munitions and AGM-65 Maverick missiles with an ECM jamming pod on the center line station.
When I was a kid there was a training flight path over my house where a couple of A6's would fly by at a couple hundred feet. I always thought the low level stuff would be a rush.
It totally is.
Me too!
In the beginning of the war RAF tornados would fly with their TFR at 50-100ft to drop JP-233 runway denial bombs. So cool
Ward, great video ! Unless I missed it I don’t think you mentioned the Air Force’s EF-111A shared the electronic warfare (jamming) role with the EA-6B. In fact one EF was awarded a kill during the war. Not bad when you consider the aircraft had no offensive weapons other than flying low and fast. I enjoy your channel thanks for sharing.
Good story, Greetings from a fellow Pukin' Dog I was a TARPS photographer in VF143 81-85.
Another fantastic video Ward.You had me gripped from start to finish
Another great story Commander. It was cool to hear about the SAM experience from the pilot's perspective. I was an Fire Controlman on the USS Gridley and we were the first ship on station off the coast of Kuwait providing radar coverage and air defense when Southern Watch kicked off. With our SAMs we had the ability to put a large number of them in flight with launch on search, so if a plane was designate a FOE, we could launch a missile when the target was 150 plus NM from the ship. The computer would keep track of the missile, the designated target and would uplink course corrections to the missile as needed. At a point when the missile was about to become terminal, the tracking radar would light up the target with CW and the missile made it final course correction and about 3 seconds later there was a big boom.
Lessons learned in blood are not to be forgotten. Really enjoy your videos.
A French Jaguar was shot by a missile during Desert Storm and was able to come back. The damaged plane is now exposed in "Musée du Bourget" just north of Paris, with a big hole in the right engine and hull
Jaguar A91 at the Musée de l'air et de l'espace for anybody who wants to look that up, thanks for sharing Dangeax.
As an ol’ retired Army grunt of “similar rank and year group to you” I commend your blunt candor for limitations! So many people I meet can only tell of their strengths and capabilities and that is only half of the story. When not compromising OPSEC and safety, it is important to know one’s weaknesses and limitations for the rest of the story. Absolutely commendable sailor!
I'd love to hear that Les Paul through that Marshall one of these days.
Interesting stuff. So I went to desert storm and sat in a generator room capturing real-time documents from across the hallway....the black hole. The black hole was where the 'plan' as initially designed by an officer while attending ACSC (Air Command and Staff College) was being modified, poured over, and executed (lots of incoming intel traffic). At the other end of the hall in the basement (this is RSAFHQ) was TACC. This is where your ATOs, elements of marine and army units, an OIC (flag officer), and displays of AWACS, JSTARS, weather and more were located. Busy, noisy room we visited the first time while under SCUD attack. General Horner was upstairs. Back at my duty station inside the Academic circle on Maxwell AFB we directly supported the GWAPS (Gulf War Air Power Survey) which was ongoing when I retrained and reassigned. Lots of cool stuff I got to learn and witness in that environment.
Interestingly...all the fan fare about the 117 being first in and still little mention that AFSOC was first in with Pave Low and Apaches to eliminate the border air defenses. A friend I graduated high school with was a door gunner on one of the first ships in. I never could figure why the decision was made to designate the 117 a fighter (and in all the documents I saw....didn't read a reason) when it was virtually defenseless and if not for flying night missions making like a hole in the sky they'd not been nearly as effective as they were. Once blinded...the enemy presented a very target rich environment. Combat camera put together some nice videos I still need to digitize.
Very interesting program. I to spent some time in VF-143 keep our RIO's happy as an AWG-10 radar tech. This was 1971 on a WESPAC cruise and we were flying F-4J Phantoms. I also spent time in VX-4 during the fleet transition from the B model to the J and VF-121 training NAS Memphis graduates on real planes. Thanks for the insights into the Tomcat. I just missed them.
Your words brought back all those visuals as a high-school junior watching this on TV. So weird to think of it now, as I rarely watch live TV today.
Very interesting perspective on the lessons learned from Desert Storm especially from the Navy Aviation perspective. However, I have always felt that the way it ended helped lead to the second war against Saddam. I think the war should have gone on a another couple of days to finish off the Republican Guard but NOT to go all the way to Baghdad. Second, there is NO way the Iraqi surrender should have been from a lower level Iraqi general. We should have insisted that Saddam himself surrender. Face is very important in the Middle East and that allowed Saddam to later claim he was not personally defeated. We will never know if that approach would have avoided the second war but we certainly know how the approach we took ended.
Well IMO the problem with stopping where we did made it so that Saddam stayed in power and since he controlled ALL of the media source he could tell the vast majority of people there any bullshit that he wanted to. He could easily have said that they actually won and that is why the fighting stopped. How would they know any different than what they were told?
I think what we should have done is marched our army across the entire country so there wouldn't have been a single Iraqi citizen that didn't see us there the first time. Not to effect the regime change but just so that they ALL saw us there then leave. That would have done a great deal to eliminate Saddam's ability to bullshit his people.
Either fight to win or don't fight at all.
He seemed defeated to me when that rope snapped tight.
Gulf War 2 was never needed. GWB wanted regime change and he was out for blood. Saddam didn't have WMDs, he was not linked to Al-Qaeda or any terrorist organisation, nor was he involved in 9/11 in any way. Hate to bring in politics to an amazing recount by the soldiers, pilots, and sailors - US screwed over Saddam by provoking him to attack Iran, double-crossing him on Kuwait, and then sponsoring the Kurds to stir trouble, as extra fodder to invade Iraq. When Saddam was hung, he was hung on the charges of attacking Kurds and nothing else. Sure I love all the games, movies, music, and technology that came out of the war, not to mention Arnie's True Lies. But there could have been other easier paths to achieve the same goals.
Gulf War 2 was never needed. GWB wanted regime change and he was out for blood. Saddam didn't have WMDs, he was not linked to Al-Qaeda or any terrorist organisation, nor was he involved in 9/11 in any way. Hate to bring in politics to an amazing recount by the soldiers, pilots, and sailors - US screwed over Saddam by provoking him to attack Iran, double-crossing him on Kuwait, and then sponsoring the Kurds to stir trouble, as extra fodder to invade Iraq. When Saddam was hung, he was hung on the charges of attacking Kurds and nothing else. Sure I love all the games, movies, music, and technology that came out of the war, not to mention Arnie's True Lies. But there could have been other easier paths to achieve the same goals.
It's always so interesting hearing this man's stories. Sometimes it's cool to have a beer and listen to an episode or two during the weekend. It's almost like hearing an audiobook the way he describes things.
As a Marine snake eater on witnessing this was an excellent presentation. For us IFF was terrifying. We put panels on our LAVs to ID us
I enjoy your commentary. One thing you do as you are explaining things is you slip in an extra descriptor like "that is a navy plane' or 'remember no stealth on that plane'. Thank you from someone like myself who is short on back ground , but still has a lot or interest.
To me, the fact that boots are still on the ground around M.E. is what i call "The lightning rod effect". Being there attract enemies like a moth is attracted to light, preventing attacks elsewhere ( home ). It is better to fight an incoming fire away from home than waiting it to be at home...
The "fire" is already at home.
You just don't know what the "fire" is to begin with.
Cant have attacks at home if you dont let them come over, dont need to be "over there"
I’ll never forget the first night of Desert Storm. I was the SDO of VA-42. It was pre-cell phone (-ish...I had one but the squadron did not and most people did not) but we had the trusty duty beeper. As such, we had to stay on base. I’ll never forget watchingCNN late into the night with other SDOs in the Q
As I recall, there were some pave lows & AH-64s that did some real crucial damage to the Iraqi IADS in the opening minutes of the air war, too.
That was originally an AC-130 mission, I helped with the planning as the wing Electronic Warfare Officer. We quickly concluded we couldn't low level in and climb to firing altitude fast enough and the job was turned over to the helos. The Pave Lows were the pathfinders for the Apaches because of their better navigation systems plus they could self-SAR if anybody got hit.
A buddy of mine was in shield and storm. M1A1 Tanks.
Was glued to TV to see he was ok.
I just thank God y'all made it home. Pretty tense. 🙏
New sub, enjoyed this and your top gun video on Goose. I grew up (and still live) in San Deigo when they were filming the first Top Gun and witnessed the crew filming the “special effects” of dropping scaled models on fire from cranes on top on the hill behind my house. Tom Cruise was staying at la Valencia hotel in La Jolla and my high school gf served him ice cream at the Haagen-Daz store next door that she worked out. The “Maverick”water rescue scene was filmed off La Jolla Shores and we heard Tom Cruise almost drowned filming that scene as he got tangled in the parachute chords and the diver had to cut him out to save him. Of course growing up in San Diego and now living in North County San Diego, I have many friends from the Navy and Marine Corp and got to fly the F/A18 flight sim at Miramar before they cracked down on outside civilians using it. Wild time for sure.Tried to sim a bomb run on Qualcomm Stadium and fly under Coronado bridge and failed at both! Of course have attended many Air Shows at Miramar and enjoy and respect the men and women that serve our great Country. And the incredible airplanes that our country produces. Big fan of you channel. Thank you again.
Welcome aboard! Thanks for subscribing.
I lived in Rancho Penasquitos from 89-95 VF-1, VF-124 Miramar. I’m moved back home to Houston but miss San Diego.
@@gunsmoke6230 Great town.
1st AD EH-60a 019, I was there also. Seen the same, and more. We were air born when the 'missles' began shelling at midnight. Thank you sir.
I like it very much that you are so meticulous with tech statements so it should also be rectified: stealth aircraft are not even invisible to radar. They are LESS visible, as it was demonstrated in 1999 over Bosnia and their visibility is really sensitive to maintenance and can be impeded by a host of ways e.g. a synchronized radar network. Decreased radar cross section is still essential - just as you said - but this channel I believe should be beyond statements like "invisible to radar" :)
Hello Ward, I'm a civilian aviator (PPL-ASEL) and love your channel. Your an excellent teacher, and speaker. I remember watching that first night of Desert Storm from work (I'm a Satellite Broadcast engineer) and all the worry it brought seeing another war start up. I was so glad it came to a quick end thanks to air power. Can you use your Naval aviator expertise to enlighten us about the Lt. Cmd. MICHAEL SCOTT SPEICHER story? (His KIA, switched to MIA, handheld radio issues, the mysteries that ensued, and all that) GREAT CHANNEL, thanks for your service!
What do you want to know? I was flying nearby when that happened. We heard on the return leg (I was flying D Model Hornets at that time, doing FASTFAC) that we'd lost a Hornet. They didn't say Navy or Marine on air of course. We get back, I learn it was a Navy Hornet, then I learned what unit, then we learned who was downed. They hoped he was able to eject and start evading, but when we did not get his survival PRC transmissions (his survival radio used to communicate with SAR assets) we assumed the worst. I didn't know him personally but I do know folks that did know him and he enjoyed a great reputation.
@@karlchilders5420 Mooch and Hozer just did a very well done talk about Scott Speicher on the channel yesterday. Thanks for educating us on this tragedy and how great a human and aviator he was.
I believe that the name given to that stretch of road was the "Highway of Death", not "Highway of Hell", also wasn't the road shut down initially by a single F-15 with iron bombs and then subsequently ravaged by AH-64 gunships, F-15/16 with cluster bombs and A-10s, just a view additional details I learned from the BBC documentary on the 1991 Gulf War.
Harriers were repeatedly cycled through the attack as well.
The turkey shoot was kicked off by Marine A-6E crews dropping CBU-78s which took out the head and tail of the convoy. Over the next 10 hours Harriers, Hornets and a number of other fixed wing units got cleared onto the target by Marine F/A-18 FASTFACs.
Fantastic VLOG, Mr. Carroll. You're the best channel on YT, in my opinion! Please keep 'em coming.
Best regards, Lloyd in TX
I along with many others, was airborne in and F-14 A+ off the Saratoga when the USS Theodore Roosevelt went booming southbound down the Red Sea. At 25K ft, you could see the wake it made covering the whole width of the Red Sea. Powerful ships....
Thanks Ward, learning seems to always come at a stiff price. Pray we are learning from the current conflict.
Gosh, your account takes me back a bit. I was too old to fly DS/DS in the cockpit, but did fly a BMD in the Bunker. The Iranians gave us some hiccups when they lit up every Prick rescue radio they had to screw with our SAR. Back then we thought CNN was worth a damn just for the images.
Now, that's a trick I hadn't heard of before. Nice little piece of history. :)
To hear these stories from a real person who has seen it done it and now telling it to all of us, this guy should have his own TV slot, there would be no shortage of guests and certainly no shortage of viewers, great posts.
So i'd equate the lost art of evading sams to the lost art of a close up guns dogfight like what happened in Vietnam. And that didn't work out do well in the begining. I really do admire the F-16 and F-4G wild weasel crews of the gulf war. Those guys dared the sams to paint them with radar. I just can't imagine the balls to do that! Some unsung heroes for sure. They paved they way for the rest of the strike force. SEAD is a dirty business lol. Great analysis of the Gulf War, I really enjoyed that.
Thx, Frank.
Well the advantage that we enjoyed there was that they were mostly older SAM systems. Ones that you can actually out turn or required a hard lock on the aircraft to persecute. Newer SAM systems are a different animal all together.
On the first night, there were also B-52s launched from Barksdale AFB, Louisiana for this sortie which fired dozens of Conventional Air Launched Cruise Missiles. The B-52s flew roundtrip from Barksdale and back. That, in itself, is quite a story.
Operation Senior Surprise aka Operation Secret Squirrel.
Stealth doesn't make you invisible. It reduces the range at which you can be detected which those of us in the EW community knew long before Desert Storm. The Air Force reluctantly had to admit - after previous denials - that some F-117 missions were accompanied by EF-111s and fighter support. The Brits announced - perhaps even in a post DS issue of Proceedings - that they had been tracking F-117s flying out of Saudi Arabia using low band search RADAR aboard RN ships sailing in the Gulf. Stealth is one piece of the puzzle but it isn't the be all end all TACAIR panacea that many - particularly less than honest USAF advocates - claim it is.
All too true. Us in the strictly civilian community learned about stealth from Tom Clancy ( in 1986 ) and Popular Mechanics, other defense industry talks, over the years.
Amazing good show. Anti- ground to air tactics are intriguing. As a non- fighter pilot, when I was age 18, I remember traveling on a bus in Israel with a very young Israeli fighter pilot (3 years older than me) who explained that when you see, while flying at 400 kts, a puff of smoke in your 180 degree periphery vision on the desert, you dive into the puff of surface smoke, to beat and avert the SAM missle threat. He said that he had lost fellow comrade pilots to learn this instinctual reaction to survive. That was 40-plus years ago, but for me it made me realize how this job as fighter pilot is so complex and difficult, learning experimently, and the bravery that all that involves. Keep pushing the envelope!
That was an excellent analysis.
I was stationed at NAS Norfolk where DS broke out. I could tell that things had gone hot when I drove in to work the morning after, and there was a Marine APC parked inside the base entrance with the 30 MM turret pointed at you.
The base seemed almost deserted, almost every single ship gone, and all the E-2’s and Greyhounds absent from the flight line.
It is sobering to consider the sheer overwhelming amount of tonnage the US Navy once had and where we are now.
Great commentary as usual... Love the F 14 Tomcat & Always love to see it on the cat and in recovery. Hilo pilot for sure. My personal opinion if they would’ve adopted the F 21 it would’ve filled all the gaps from low and slow ground support to Full out interceptor not to exclude of course prioritize missions. As always thank you for keeping it real 😎 p.s. Now retired and disabled as far as games are concerned for those who have not. Air Combat OL for android and iOS. I have most of the aircraft and I am team leader of the VF - 1 Wolfpack. The F-14 tomcat I have acquired both models in this game. Just a FYI. Keep up the good job. Of course I share as often as possible to our fighter wing especially those that describe such as this one maintaining your energy. Ty God bless
the audio from the viper drivers evading those sam’s is INSANE
"...your first, last ditch move"
I like that
Did not know we were on the same ship until now. I was in VAQ 140 for the 1990 Desert shield cruise and also for the 1991-1992 cruise on the Eisenhower.
Ditto for me, made both deployments...Ship's company, AIMD here
The coverage of the air campaign during the Gulf War told me a lot.
There was a televised strike on SCUD bunkers and it was impressive that the first bomb blew in the bunker door and the second skidded in to explode in an empty bunker. The lack of secondary explosions was obvious--secondary explosions did in the Arizona and the four Japanese carriers in the Battle of Midway.
As for the Ralph Blitzer images, when I saw that the tracers were sweeping the skies at random, that told me that the integrated air defense grid was down. Again, the WW2 experience with AAA over Germany and against naval fleets that featured integrated anti-aircraft fire showed the difference between local control firing at random and radar-guided central coordinated AAA fires from heavy, medium and light flak guns.
One additional problem with coming in on the deck is running into power lines and buildings and bumping against hills. That was a problem back in WW2 as well.
The Gulf War seemed to be relearning the lessons of the past to me, even though the Gulf War had more terminally guided munitions than all previous wars combined. Situational awareness, jamming systems, but most of all determining the lynchpin target that reduces the enemy's ability to fight the air battle were the same in WW2 as in the Gulf War, only the equipment had changed.
The need to adapt to changing circumstances is an eternal lesson relearned every war. Another lesson that needs to be learned is applying enough destruction for long enough to render the enemy system ineffective. Germany in the Battle of Britain didn't keep its eye on the ball and failed to achieve what happened to the Iraqi integrated air defense in the first week of the Gulf War.
This video is important and I hope that it isn't forgotten. I accuse the American war machine of institutional Alzheimer's. Forget about "preparing to fight the last war," our war machine doesn't remember the last war!
Good post! 👍🏻 Speaking of the low level hazards, that’s what killed Major Marie Rossi in Desert Storm. She was a Chinook pilot, and the first female pilot in the U.S. Military to fly into combat, as well as first female to command a unit in combat. She flew into a high tension power line or tower and in “brown out” or some kind of low visibility situation, and died.
I might be a bit off-base with my assessment of history, but while it's argued that WWI, the US Civil War, or even the Crimean War was the first "modern" war, I'd say that Desert Storm was the first 21st Century War, despite taking place a decade prior. Technology, FFI, battle trackers, and battle footage were all vastly superior to that we used in Vietnam, and especially to that used by the Soviets in Afghanistan.
I was in middle school at the time. In 2003, I was on the ground in Baghdad and watching ADA and SAMs going up and hearing tanks battling in the distance while being a lowly SAW Gunner made me appreciate everyone. We had A-10s alternating with 155 mm howitzer fire to take out the Secretariat. There was no interaction with Navy or Marine assets, but it took a team to do what we did in 2003, just as it did in 1991.
*As we get older and start looking back, time seems to compress. Yeah, it's hard to believe it's 30 years ago. I look back at 80, 70, 60, etc, and it's even harder to accept that these "fresh memories" are 40, 50, 60 years old. It's an interesting phenomenon!*
It's not that interesting when you consider it as proportions. When you're 20, something that happened 10 years ago is half your life ago. When you're 60 something that happened half your life ago is now 30 years, but it'll "feel the same" so to speak as that 10 years did back when you were 20, which is where the perception of it being wierd and compressed comes from.
An extremely good report - information on how to evade SAMs and keep one's maneuvering energy, thank you very much.
It was my recollection that the stealth bomber was well known to the public before the Gulf War. In fact, I thought many believed the Batwing in Batman ''89 was modeled after the Stealth Bomber
It was, revealed to the public in '88, a couple of years before GW1 kicked off
Yeah I’d actually flown in one. They were giving free rides at our local mall.
@@roddeazevedo F-117s were first used in Operation Just Cause in Panama. They dropped some PGMs but didn't play a major role in that short conflict. Desert Storm was the first dedicated use of the platform in large numbers against heavily defended targets where their low observability proved helpful.
I discovered your channel not too long ago. I must say, I'm ecstatic. Being prior service, (USMC) and always have dreamed of being a fighter pilot, and history buff, you tickle all my senses and curiosities.