In a Ground War, U.S. Lives May Depend More on Human Spies Than High Tech

For all the U.S. reliance on satellites and other high-tech means to gather intelligence, American lives may well depend on the eyes and ears of crack military spies now poised to prowl behind enemy lines just before the invasion of occupied Kuwait begins.

The information they furtively send back to the advancing allied troops also could prove vital in ensuring a short war as well as in minimizing allied casualties.

But gathering information on Iraqi troop deployment will be only one of the many duties of the 1st Infantry Division’s intelligence battalion.

After penetrating enemy lines by land and, perhaps, by parachute, these highly trained soldiers will spread disinformation in hopes of deceiving and confusing the Iraqis--luring them to attack fake allied bunkers and camouflaged plywood tanks in northern Saudi Arabia.

The little-known unit, said Staff Sgt. Victor Quinones, has “a whole arsenal of canvas and plywood toys,” capable of creating an entire battalion-size camp where none exists.

The use of such decoys and deception is not done randomly, added Lt. Col. Bill Moore, head of the intelligence unit. “You have to study the enemy and know what (equipment) he has that you can fool. Our mission covers a lot of disciplines, a lot of territory.”

The battalion’s other duties include interrogation of enemy prisoners, jamming Iraqi military radio transmissions and providing long-range reconnaissance and radar screens for the allied front lines.

The information yielded thus far by Iraqi prisoners--tales of near starvation, deteriorating morale and shellshock from the nonstop bombing--appears to be largely truthful, according to Moore, 43, of Brownsfield, Tex. “I’m convinced they are telling us everything we need to know,” he said. “They are giving us a very accurate view.”

Within the intelligence battalion, the best-trained troops in terms of combat readiness are the Long Range Surveillance Detachments. They are to infiltrate enemy lines ahead of attacking columns and to gather and report back intelligence on the movement of Iraqi troops.

“They are the best infantrymen we can find, the most fit, the most able to stand deprivation,” Moore said. “Their mission will be to go in between two groups of Iraqi forces and give us information on where the next force is coming from--before we fight them.”

At the moment, these elite troops are spread along the Saudi border with Iraq and Kuwait. But they will hardly be without a supporting cast.

Also deployed along the front lines are armored personnel carriers equipped with ground surveillance radar and staffed by crews that also report to Moore. These crews, too, are expected to give early warnings of any Iraqi movement near the border.

Based on such intelligence, for instance, paratroopers from the 82nd Aviation Brigade and their UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters will be able to chart the most strategic routes for advancing allied forces.

But perhaps the intelligence battalion’s least-known function is that of deception and decoy, tactics for which the Iraqis have received much recognition from the allies, however begrudgingly.

“The Iraqis use deception, they have been trained by the Soviets and they were very good at it,” Moore said.

But through a variety of intelligence sources, the allies have been able to sort out such efforts, he said, adding: “Our intelligence-gathering is too robust to be fooled. It only takes a short time to figure it out. We have multiple systems looking at things.”

The allies hope to turn the tables on the Iraqis, with the enemy’s far less sophisticated systems and their now seriously crippled network of communications and intelligence-gathering.

“Our main mission is to make the enemy commit themselves to a place where we are not going to attack, or to disguise a place we are going to attack,” said Quinones, 24, of Junction City, Kan.

Still, neither Quinones nor Moore rests comfortably in the belief that superior intelligence alone will turn the tide during the heat of a ground war.

“The confusion in war is incredible,” Moore said. “I’ve tried to describe to my soldiers what the first day of war will be like--the sounds, the obscuration, the noise. . . . That is why we have multiple systems and intelligence analysts in the rear to put it all together.”

Elsewhere, in recent days around the Persian Gulf, allied troops remained on a high state of alert and maneuvered ever closer toward Saudi Arabia’s border with Kuwait and Iraq.

In the Gulf itself, allied helicopters continued buzzing over a staggering array of naval vessels, furnishing them with last-minute ammunition, food and other supplies as the possibility of the ground war neared.

“It might come at any time. So we’ve been keeping the ships topped off,” explained Navy Capt. Mark Gemmill of the supply ship San Jose. “If the call comes, they can’t just sail back to port and get stocked up again.”

The provisioning took place even as many of the vessels were conducting amphibious exercises for what may be such a landing on the shores of Kuwait.

This story was assembled from pool reports cleared by military censors.