PERSPECTIVE ON THE GULF WAR : ‘One Way or Another, They Will Die’

Deception and strategic surprise are said to be so much a part of the allied ground war plan that it’s being spoken of as “the land version of Normandy,” where allied forces kept Germany totally confused about where they would come ashore in France in World War II. Similarly, allied forces in Saudi Arabia have begun major movements along the Kuwaiti border to mask the point where a major thrust into enemy territory will take place. Some Pentagon sources say the primary thrust will “almost certainly” be from the west into Kuwait and Iraq, rather than across Kuwait’s southern border, but this may be disinformation.

“There will be major tank battles,” one official said. Several thrusts will be made into Iraqi lines, and there may be amphibious landings and paratroop drops, but the basic strategy is for the allies to pour through a main hole in Iraqi lines and then “very quickly” attack entrenched defensive positions from the flank and rear. The advance will be preceded by waves of B-52 bombers dropping concussion bombs to explode enemy mine fields. A-10 and Harrier jets, plus helicopters, are to clear the enemy away from the edges of the U.S. wedge.

U.S. planners are said to be worried about two particular Iraqi strengths: their elite combat engineers and their artillery. Contrary to some reports, officials say, Iraq does not fight according to Soviet military doctrine, but according to its own, developed during the war with Iran. The Iraqis invited Iranian forces to advance toward heavily fortified positions, and when they were stopped, pulverized them with long-range artillery. They also built extensive road networks behind their dug-in tank positions to allow combat engineers and artillery to move quickly to the Iranian attack point.

Iraqi engineers now are equipped with huge, half-block-long earth-moving machines to construct roads and create small sand mountains in front of advancing allied forces, and they have South African long-range artillery to rain down on attacking forces.

A key target remains Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guards, which are widely dispersed in heavily fortified positions in southern Iraq. “The guard has three choices,” one official said. “It can sit and wait. It can retreat to Baghdad. Or it can come out and engage. . . . If they sit, we can go after them one at a time. We think they’ll have to regroup to counter our attack, and then we’ll hit them from the air. They can choose the way they want to die, but one way or another, they will die.”