Desert Storm’s Fish Stories

The images of the Gulf War fixed most firmly in American minds are bombs and missiles launched by advanced aircraft striking Iraqi targets with remarkable accuracy. That happened, but not with the kind of consistency claimed by the military and the weapons’ producers during and after the fighting. In fact, the costly planes and guided weapons appear to have performed no better than older and cheaper versions. So says the General Ac- counting Office, Congress’ investigating arm, in a critique that the Pentagon tried to suppress.

High-technology weapons--stealth aircraft, laser-guided bombs, sea-launched cruise missiles and the like--were credited with crippling Iraq’s air defenses, command and control systems and power stations, paving the way for the subsequent victory by armor and infantry forces on the ground. This, says the GAO, was overstatement. “The gap between what has been claimed for air power in Desert Storm and what actually occurred was sometimes substantial. Even under the generally favorable tactical and environmental conditions prevalent during Desert Storm, the effectiveness of air power was more limited than initially expected or subsequently claimed.”

The lopsidedness of the victory over Iraq, at a casualty cost to the United States and its coalition partners far below what some had feared, does not excuse the misleading statements made about the successes of U.S. arms. The tight news management imposed by the military in Saudi Arabia and Washington during the conflict made it all but impossible for reporters to independently verify many of the claims that were made. Subsequent classification of most of the data dealing with the performance of American planes and munitions assured that it would be difficult at best to get hard information that might contradict the official version. The GAO report itself was partially censored by the Pentagon.

Secrecy in wartime is often necessary to protect lives and operational security. Continued into peacetime that secrecy can, as the GAO report again shows, work mainly to protect those who have tried to mislead the American people. What was the point of exaggerating the effectiveness of some weapons? Was it to justify their high cost? Was it to protect manufacturers’ future contracts? For Congress to seek answers to these questions in no way reflects on the courage and commitment of those who achieved victory in the Gulf War. The GAO report might not be the whole story. But it certainly provides more of the story than the Pentagon and the arms makers wanted us to have.