Arabian Peninsula/Persian Gulf D+22 (31 July, 1987) Part I

Author’s Note: I ran out of time with this post, so I’ll wrap it up on Sunday night with Part II. Apologies. –Mike

At approximately 0245 hours local time, the first wave of US air missions against targets in Iraq began. The primary targets were suspected SCUD and FROG launch sites in central Iraq. USAF F-16s made up the lion’s share of attack aircraft used in these strikes with F-15C Eagles flying cover and a small number of EW planes in support. Between 0245 and 0500 thirteen missions were conducted with mixed results. Six launchers were confirmed destroyed with several other reports telling of other launchers and support vehicles either damaged or destroyed. These remained unconfirmed until later in the morning when films were analyzed, and post-mission bomb damage assessment missions returned. At 1200 the number of SCUD and FROG launchers confirmed destroyed was raised to eight and four were marked as damaged. Daybreak brought an end to the SCUD/FROG hunt. Most squadrons in Saudi Arabia shifted gears and prepared to conduct BAI strikes and close air support missions through the next twelve hours. Concurrently, CENTAF planners went to work on the ATO for the next morning. The priority was in pressing for more aircraft. Specifically, the F-111s in Turkey. General Chuck Horner handled this. With CINC-CENT’s blessing, he went directly to the Air Force chief of staff General Larry Welch with the request, explaining in clear, succinct terms why it was critical to add more all-weather and night capable fighter-bombers to the effort. Welch was understanding but stopped short of a commitment to grant Horner’s veiled demand for at least some F-111s.

East of Basra, fighting continued through most of the day, its intensity rising in the late afternoon hours as the Iranians committed two fresh brigades to the action. This was not a yet a direct advance aimed at Basra or potentially the Kuwaiti border, though the situation was certainly beginning to point in that direction. Iraqi military commanders received many reports of additional Iranian army formations massing and preparing for movement southeast of Abadan. Later in the day, Iraqi reconnaissance aircraft undertook a handful of risky missions over this space of land, returning with film that revealed the reports were authentic. By initial estimates it appeared the Iranians were moving an entire armored division with supporting engineers into the area.

Iraqi military and political leadership projected that a major Iranian attack was likely to fall southeast of Basra with the objective of flanking the city and cutting it off from Iraqi Republican Guard units in northern Kuwait. This course of action was simply unacceptable to Iraq. The question now was whether to fashion an offensive or defensive response. The military favored the later opinion, but Saddam Hussein was of a different mind. He felt betrayed by Tehran’s violation of the ceasefire and attempt to multiply Iraq’s troubles at the worst possible time. Instinctively, the Iraqi strongman wanted to lash out with ferocity and decisiveness. The problem was that his military’s attention was divided between Iraq’s eastern border and the ongoing standoff with US and Saudi forces along the Saudi-Kuwait border.