Schwarzkopf Says Political Reins Add Risks

Orders from the White House to minimize civilian casualties in Iraq require U.S. commanders to use tactics that increase the risk of American casualties and place some military targets off-limits to allied bombers, a senior U.S. military official said Sunday for the first time.

The official, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the senior allied commander in the Persian Gulf, did not challenge the White House dictum. His comments were intended to defuse Iraqi claims that the allies were targeting civilians, and he praised the “young men who are out there and doing that in order to minimize damage” to civilians and to cultural sites.

But Schwarzkopf’s admission is the first indication to date that the U.S. military is facing political constraints on its operations in the Persian Gulf.

The acknowledgment that political considerations are sometimes overriding military priorities raises questions about President Bush’s ability to keep his pledge that the Gulf War “will not be another Vietnam.” Repeatedly in the days leading up to the war and after shooting began, Bush made references to the acrimonious charges against the civilian leaders who oversaw the Vietnam conflict.

“Never again will our armed forces be sent out to do a job with one hand tied behind their back,” Bush told an audience of Reserve officers.

The Vietnam conflict has left a legacy of bitterness among military leaders, including Schwarzkopf, who have charged that political restrictions imposed on them throughout that war tied their hands and ultimately prevented victory.

Significant differences remain, several historians pointed out. In contrast to Vietnam, the constraints in the gulf are “not so much a case of the civilians imposing political direction, but rather something that’s gone on jointly between the political and the military leadership,” said Harvard University historian Ernest May, who has written extensively about the Vietnam conflict.

Nonetheless, Schwarzkopf said, the concern about civilian casualties means that “we are probably endangering our pilots more than they would otherwise be endangered.”

He added: “There are several almost predominantly civilian facilities right now that I would like very much to attack because I know for a fact that they are being used by the Iraqis, and we are not doing it for that reason.”

Schwarzkopf’s comments came in the wake of mounting concern expressed among military officers that another of the White House’s political priorities--the eradication of Scud launchers that have hurled missiles at Israeli and Saudi targets--has diverted resources from a war plan that had concentrated on targets of greater military significance.

Bush Administration officials and several senior military officers have praised President Bush for allowing Schwarzkopf and his staff exceptional latitude in the planning and operation of the war. The Administration’s policy of setting overall objectives and leaving the details to the military stands in sharp contrast to that of the Lyndon B. Johnson Administration, during which the president actually chose bombing targets.

But while the Bush Administration’s broad policy outlines do not even approach the Johnson-level of involvement, it is becoming increasingly clear that “political” and “military” considerations cannot be neatly separated.

On Sunday, Schwarzkopf was not the only official acknowledging that political considerations had helped dictate at least some aspects of the unfolding campaign.

Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, asked Sunday about diversion of resources, acknowledged that the stepped-up hunt for Scud launchers had become necessary to defuse mounting political pressures on the governments of Israel and Saudi Arabia, where Scud missiles have caused deaths, injuries and damage.

In the case of Israel, rising internal pressures threatened to bring that nation into the war, a move that could cause rifts in the U.S.-Arab alliance.

“For the Saudis and the Israelis to be on the receiving (end) of those terrorist attacks--basically Scuds fired at cities--is obviously a matter of grave concern. (It) has significant ramifications for them certainly in terms of their obligations to protect their populations,” Cheney said.

Schwarzkopf, however, went further in detailing the consequences of what he termed a deliberate U.S. decision “to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties (in Iraq) . . . to avoid destroying these religious shrines and that sort of thing.”

Those include ordering pilots to approach targets from directions and at altitudes that would increase the accuracy with which they deliver ordnance, but also raise their risk of being hit by antiaircraft fire.

“Those pilots are at much more risk than they would be otherwise,” Schwarzkopf said.

Even so, California Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove), a onetime fighter pilot who covered the Vietnam conflict as a news photographer, called the difference between civilian control over Vietnam and the Bush Administration’s handling of the Gulf War “stunning.”

“What Bush is saying is, ‘We’re not going to tie your hands behind your backs,’ ” said Dornan. “He’s not saying, ‘We’re relieving you of your Judeo-Christian responsibility not to hit noncombatants.’

“And most pilots like that,” Dornan said. “You know why? It makes them feel like they’re the good guys.”

In Vietnam, pilots were constrained by a number of restrictions laid down by senior officials of the Lyndon B. Johnson Administration, usually in the “Tuesday lunch” sessions from which senior military officials were barred.

One of those restrictions resembles the current situation: Many air defense batteries could not be hit because they were placed on dikes or other civilian structures whose destruction could drown or otherwise kill large civilian populations.

However, the avoidance of civilian casualties was just one of many constraints placed on the military during Vietnam. For example, some targets could not be struck because they were manned by Soviet advisers whose deaths could spark a U.S.-Soviet confrontation.

In addition, American airmen were not permitted to pursue North Vietnamese aircraft into certain sectors which became known as “MIG sanctuaries” for the Soviet-made planes that fled there. And all of North Vietnam was off-limits to bombers from 1968-1972, when cease-fire negotiations were under way.

Schwarzkopf stopped far short of charging the Bush Administration with placing similar restraints on U.S. forces, and in fact said Americans should be “proud” that their soldiers were willing to run such risks to avoid killing innocent civilians. Yet some analysts said his comments may be an early warning of concerns that could grow as the war progresses, especially if setbacks become numerous and costly.

“There’s some subconscious impulse, at least, on the part of people in the Air Force . . . to say, ‘well, if we just were allowed to do everything, air power alone would do the job,’ ” said historian May. “That’s a matter of doctrine that many people in blue suits (Air Force uniforms) believe.

“Because of that,” May added, “that (reference to) ‘hands tied behind our back’ argument could come up if things start going badly.”

Staff writer David Lauter contributed to this story.