Wide Range of Military Paths Open to Bush

During a war-games exercise at the the Naval War College in Newport, R.I., last month, participants were asked to determine the most effective American response to a hypothetical invasion of Kuwait by Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein.

Their solution: a surgical air strike designed to decapitate Iraq’s heavily armed, 1-million-man war machine by killing the dictator himself.

Such a raid--while it would take liberties with a publicly espoused U.S. policy against assassination--would follow from the model established four years ago, when carrier-based jets and Air Force FB-111s based in England went after Libya’s Moammar Kadafi, using electronic “smart bombs” in a nighttime raid on his Tripoli headquarters.

With reality now chillingly echoing rehearsal, this approach stands in a wide range of scenarios for possible military action if President Bush decides to apply deadly force. But experts emphasize that--although it could become necessary--projecting military power is always an uncertain business, and the remote desert wastes extending from the Persian Gulf present one of the most difficult challenges the Pentagon could be asked to face.

Kadafi survived the 1986 air attack, and in some ways such a strike aimed at Hussein would be even more difficult because Baghdad’s high-tech arsenal includes sophisticated air defenses around the capital.

Given such problems, the fact that tacticians at the Naval War College still ended up choosing such a mission only underlines how difficult the choices are in bringing U.S. force to bear in the huge new gulf crisis.

If the economic and political sanctions now being put in place fail and Hussein moves on Saudi oil fields, analysts say, the United States theoretically has a broad range of military options, each involving an elaborate scenario for projecting and supporting military power. The realistic options fall into three basic categories, experts say:

* An attempt to remove Hussein himself in hopes that, absent the brutally repressive dictator who has welded a fragmented population into an obedient whole, Iraq would no longer constitute a menace to its neighbors.

* Punitive raids on such economically vital targets as refineries, pipelines and power plants, with a goal of making Hussein reconsider the ultimate cost of his expansionism.

* Committing ground troops, with massive close air support from Navy carriers and possibly land-based planes, to the Arabian peninsula in an effort to prevent Iraqi capture of Saudi oil.

Bush Administration officials and military analysts interviewed Saturday said the most likely course of military action is a buildup of air power to deter an Iraqi move on Saudi Arabia.

But in implementing that scenario, the Administration and the Pentagon are not only handicapped by the vast distances separating major American air, naval and ground forces from the crisis but they also face the possibility of having to operate without access to bases in Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries.

Aircraft carriers, already steaming toward the region, would see their effectiveness severely curtailed because the Persian Gulf is too small and too shallow for them to operate. Instead, they would stand off the coast of Oman in the Arabian Sea. Their planes would have to be refueled to reach targets in Iraq.

If no Arab bases were available for big KC-135 aerial tankers to refuel them, fighter-bombers would have to be used in “buddy packages.” Instead of munitions, one plane would carry fuel to refuel another plane of the same type. This would effectively cut air strikes in half.

“Under such circumstances, air strikes wouldn’t resolve anything,” said retired Rear Adm. Eugene Carroll of the Center for Defense Information. “Without fighter escorts, the bombing would be from high altitude. In the end, it would be harassment more than anything else--and incite a man who requires no inciting.”

Under such conditions, predicted sources who declined to be identified, the Administration may move giant B-52 bombers from Guam and F-16 fighter-bombers from Europe to the U.S. base on the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

The B-52, developed to carry nuclear weapons to targets in the Soviet Union, was pressed into service as a conventional bomber during the Vietnam War, carrying out massive raids against targets in North Vietnam.

Diego Garcia is about 2,000 miles from the Persian Gulf, but with tankers based there it could make possible not only B-52 strikes but also operations by F-16s.

Although there has been no request for help from Saudi Arabia, nor any invitation from the Turkish government to use its bases, Administration sources said the U.S. effort to bring its air power into the equation could get some help from Oman, which cooperated with the United states during the Iran-Iraq War when it escorted Kuwaiti tankers in the gulf.

The United Arab Emirates offers another possibility of help. Indeed, two U.S. Air Force aerial tankers arrived there a few days ago to conduct refueling exercises, according to Pentagon sources.

The scenario for the projection of air power into the crisis would be drastically altered, however, with the availability of bases in Saudi Arabia or Turkey.

If the Defense Department is called upon to deploy ground troops quickly on the Arabian mainland, close air support would be critical to the scenario.

Given the time required to move American tanks into Saudi Arabia, any American presence on the ground would depend heavily upon fighter aircraft moved from Europe plus helicopters armed with anti-tank rockets.

“This is a way in which a small force can try to blunt a much larger attacking force,” said Michael Dunn, a Washington-based military consultant.

With access to Saudi bases, the United States could not only dispose of its refueling problem but also could use its F-15s in conjunction with the Saudis’ U.S.-manufactured airborne warning and control system (AWACS) planes to prevent Iraq from gaining air superiority. That would expose any Iraqi advance by armor and infantry to punishing attacks by American planes.

In sequence behind the arrival of as many as three carrier battle groups in the region and the possible buildup of land-based fighters and bombers, the Pentagon is expected to begin moving tens of thousands of troops toward the Persian Gulf in case the President finds it necessary to defend Saudi oil fields.

The U.S. Central Command at McDill Air Force Base, Fla., has available to it quick reaction units numbering about 400,000 personnel.

Floating warehouses with equipment to outfit two Marine expeditionary brigades have long been positioned in Guam and Diego Garcia, and they were understood to be moving Saturday, although it will be about two weeks before they arrive in the gulf area.

Among scenarios for deploying troops that was being discussed in military circles Saturday, one envisions rushing the 85,000-strong U.S. XVIII Airborne Corps to the gulf to blunt an Iraqi armor advance into eastern Saudi Arabia.

Some analysts studying the options before Hussein concluded that if he decides to make a move on Saudi territory he would send tanks from Kuwait south on a high-speed route along the coast of the gulf.

If so, the landscape could offer U.S. forces an opportunity:

About 40 miles south of the border, the terrain would force Iraqi armor to move into extended columns in which they would be vulnerable to attack.

But any plan for using American troops on the ground in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait or Iraq chills military experts.

Where the suggestion of using American troops to defend Saudi oil fields is concerned, Hussein’s aggression produced rare agreement between the sharpest critics of military force and ranking officers who have championed military preparedness.

“This is not a place where we could put in a token force,” said Adm. Carroll, a well-known critic of Pentagon policy. “It isn’t Panama. We are talking about weeks--five to eight weeks--before you could get a serious force on the ground, and that would be with the full cooperation of the Saudis.”

Two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff agreed.

“I wouldn’t look at defending Saudi Arabia,” said retired Gen. John W. Vessey, who chaired the Joint Chiefs from 1982 to 1985. “I would look at a broader range of options to deter Iraq.”

The strongest warning against sending American troops into Saudi Arabia came from retired Adm. Thomas H. Moorer Jr., who was the United States’ top military officer at the peak of the Vietnam War and was considered to be among the more hawkish members of the U.S. military establishment.

Moorer pointed out the problems caused by operating in punishing desert heat at the end of a supply line stretching for thousands of miles and warned that using American troops to blunt the Iraqi army would produce unacceptable numbers of casualties.

“We did that in Vietnam,” he declared, “and we made a mistake.”

Although he said he could endorse a surgical strike designed to eliminate Hussein, he said a more promising strategy would be an extension of the economic sanctions the Bush Administration has already put in motion.

He recommended going further and ordering the Navy to embargo Iraqi oil, blockading not only the Iraqi port of Basra and its Al Faw oil depot at the head of the gulf but also the Saudi port of Yanbu on the Red Sea. Staff writers Douglas Jehl and Ronald J. Ostrow contributed to this story.

U.S. Military Options in the Persian Gulf Strategy: Experts believe the U.S. would respond to an Iraqi attack on Saudi Arabia by increasing the number of aircraft carriers stationed just outside the Persian Gulf. It would move B-52 bombers and FB-111 fighters from Guam to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean and F-16 fighters from bases in Europe to Diego Garcia or to bases in the territories of cooperating countries such as T1970432869 Option 1: If Saudi Arabia invited the U.S. to operate from its bases, U.S. F-15 warplane could join Saudi F-15s working with Saudi AWACS planes against the Iraqi air force. Option 2: If Saudi Arabia or Turkey did not invite the U.S. to operate from its bases, then during the early phases at least, the U.S. would be dependent on carrier-based planes, backed up by F-111s and1110258994 Option 3: If ground forces were needed, the U.S. Central Command at McDill Air Force Base, Fla. has 400,000 personnel available to its quick reaction units. In addition, Marine Expeditionary Brigades co1970037792