War in Iraq: Shock and awe?

Army, May 2003 by Atkeson, Edward B

Conceivably, a successful decapitation could have rendered the war unnecessary. With or without that, however, the extraordinary precision of subsequent strikes at specific targets throughout the city emphasized the selectivity and vigor with which the weapons could be applied. On-site reporters, in direct television reports to the United States, marveled at the preservation of public services, particularly electricity, water and transportation, while bone-crushing blows were being delivered to government and Baath party installations. Virtually every strike was delivered by smart bomb or missile.

However, it has been the attempted decapitation strike which, as much as anything, has raised speculation regarding the wisdom of Shock and Awe theory. If the strike had been successful in eliminating the top echelons of the Iraqi command, the action might well have been interpreted as a master blow. On the other hand, successful or not-and it seems not to have been-the strike may have triggered the beginning of the campaign before the ground forces were prepared to move. While the U.S. commitment entailed a large number of troops, only one Army ground maneuver division, the 3rd Infantry (Mechanized)-Rock of the Marne-appeared ready for action. The 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), present in the theater, was still unloading its helicopters. Even assisted by Army Special Forces troops, a large U.S. Marine Corps contingent and a U.K. armored division, the single ready division would seem to be thin gruel to take on the Iraqi army.

The U.S. 3rd Infantry Division crossed the border from Kuwait into Iraq, and troops of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, along with British forces, headed north and east toward Basra and the port town of Umm Qasr. The latter was particularly important as an additional site for offloading supplies both for U.S. units and humanitarian assistance to captured communities.

The Iraqis ignited some oil wells, but the coalition units moved rapidly enough that damage was held to a minimum.

The greatest disappointment was a Turkish decision to prohibit the transit of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division (Mechanized) through its territory into northern Iraq. The equipment for the division had been afloat off the Turkish coast for a number of weeks awaiting landing approval, but the permission never came. The division was obliged to wait until its equipment could be shipped out of the Mediterranean Sea, through the Suez Canal, around the Arabian Peninsula and up to the head of the Persian Gulf. There the soldiers and their equipment would be reunited.

As the ground war progressed, the concept of Shock and Awe appears to have faded as a central theme of the conflict-not that all of those conversant with it interpreted its impact the same way. In a timely op-ed piece in the Washington Post, Col. Ralph Peters suggested that "like blitzkrieg before it, [the concept] would work superbly against Belgium. No matter how shocked and awed the Iraqi leadership may be, surrender is not, never was and never will be an option for Hussein and his inner circle."