F-117 goes to war

Rarely has any aircraft untested in battle had such an impact on a war as the F-117 Nighthawk Stealth Fighter in Operation Desert Storm. Operating only at night, it destroyed some of the world's most heavily defended targets. It repeated this feat night after night and was never touched by Iraqi antiaircraft fire. On January 17, 1991, the first night of combat, the F-117s from the 37th Tactical Fighter Wing attacked 31 percent of the assigned targets for "Day 1," yet they possessed only 2.5 percent of the Coalition's total aircraft. They were also the only aircraft to bomb the world's most heavily defended city: Baghdad.

As the preparation for the war-Operation Desert Shield-- was winding down, all the Coalition forces knew they would be going head to head with the fourth largest army in the world-one that reportedly supported the use of chemical and biological weapons. Iraq possessed more than 15,000 missiles of all types, 7,000 antiaircraft guns and approximately 800 fighter aircraft. Many of the larger airfields and the city of Baghdad itself were ringed with defenses that were stronger than those found in Eastern Europe at the height of the Cold War! Saddam Hussein's prediction that the upcoming confrontation would be the "Mother of all Battles" could easily have become a reality.

The F-117 has never been invisible. The secret of its success is precision mission planning, which, to this elite group, has become a science. Every combat mission was planned to the last, minute detail. At least four factors led to the successful deployment of the Nighthawk during the Gulf War: intelligence reports, electronic warfare (EWO), expertise and timing. An attack on a heavily defended target demanded knowledge of the location of the enemy's radar units (mobile and stationary) and antiaircraft guns. The EWO used this knowledge to determine the safest route to and from the target, based on the types of radar units along the way. Once this information had been programmed into computers, the aircraft literally flew itself to the target. Everything was timed to the second, and with the pilots' high level of experience, this was not a problem. From the time the F-117s topped off their fuel tanks at the border until they returned, their antennas were retracted and they were out of radio contact.

Each target assigned to the Stealth Fighter had its own particular problems, and this is what made many of them so vivid in the pilots' memories. Although the F-117 is remembered as the only manned aircraft to hit targets in the city of Baghdad, it was tasked against a wide variety of targets all over Iraq, including those close to the Turkish border. On missions involving the latter, tankers had to fly into Iraqi airspace to top off the F-117s' tanks to ensure that they would have enough fuel for the return trip. This was extremely risky for the fuel-laden tankers, which were very visible to enemy radar.

The Nighthawk flew more than 1,250 sorties over Iraq and Kuwait and delivered, with precision, more than 2,000 tons of bombs. The planners in the 37th Wing's mission-- planning cell spent hundreds of hours working out details. Each pilot was given a packet of data, photos, etc., of his targets) for the night-a time-consuming procedure that went on every night for the duration of the war. But, in certain circumstances, new orders with new targets came down after the pilots had been briefed. Some targets were canceled and new ones added-top priority! A lot of this was the result of the command center's receiving updates from the intelligence people, so the orders were cut. This did not mesh with the meticulous planning that was considered vital to mission success, and such changes of plan were known as "re-roll missions."

One re-roll in particular had a lasting impact on all of its planners and pilots. High Command at Riyadh had intelligence that a critical situation was developing at El Taqaddum Airfield. They determined that four Soviet-built Tu-16 Badger bombers had been loaded with chemical weapons and would probably take off at dawn. Col. Alton Whitley, commanding officer of the 37th Wing, recalls that night: "I received a fax of a single photograph from Gen. Glosson. He explained that he had just received information that indicated four bomber aircraft had been detected at an airfield and were suspected of being prepared to deliver chemical or biological agents on Coalition ground forces that were massing for the ground invasion. Two F-117s had already started to taxi out for their briefed mission, so I had to rush out and stop them. When I got out to the aircraft, I had them shut down their left engines so I could hand them the photos, target coordinates and target elevation. The two aircraft were carrying a total of four bombs that would handle the targets. Both pilots scored direct hits and took out all four aircraft, and the threat was eliminated. "Another type of re-roll was when we planned an attack on a certain target and, for some reason, came back and hit it again. These were not common because we usually destroyed the targets we were fragged against the first time. However, the two major attacks against the Balad Southeast airfield are an excellent example of this. The first time we were fragged against this heavily defended airfield, we went with the wrong ordnance (GBU-10s with nose plugs), and we knew it. We argued vehemently with the intel planners at HQ, but they told us to salute and go! And we did. We found and bombed the targets, and we didn't lose anybody. Unfortunately, the ordnance wasn't adequate, and all we did was rattle their cages and dust off the tops of their hardened aircraft shelters (HAS). However, we returned to these targets later with GBU-27s, and we destroyed everything that was inside of the HAS."