The Courier-Journal, Louisville, KY November 8, 2003
Attack shows need for new U.S. tactic
By James R. Carroll
WASHINGTON The loss of the third American military helicopter in two weeks in Iraq, apparently downed by a rocket-propelled grenade, will require a change in tactics by U.S. forces and their allies, some military analysts said yesterday.
Attacks against helicopters aren't new in Iraq. Small arms fire, occasional surface-to-air missiles and rocket-propelled grenades have been directed at them nearly every day.
"What's new is the relative success the Iraqis are accomplishing rather than their tactics," said Loren Thompson, defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, a military think tank in the Washington suburb of Arlington, Va.
The attack on an Army Blackhawk helicopter yesterday near Tikrit killed all six aboard. It brought to 32 the U.S. death toll for the week, marking the deadliest seven days in Iraq for Americans since the fall of Baghdad.
The helicopter attack is evidence of increasingly better-organized opposition to U.S. forces that is intent on more spectacular attacks, and it underscores the need to improve intelligence-gathering and counterinsurgency efforts against remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime and international terrorists, military experts said.
"This is merely the punctuation mark to a steadily building campaign," said Marcus Corbin, senior analyst with the Center for Defense Information, a Washington-based group.
Exactly what factions are conducting the attacks isn't known, but they "probably are getting their act more together," said Patrick Garrett, associate analyst for globalsecurity.org, an international security organization in Alexandria, Va.
"You had car bombs at checkpoints at the beginning (of the war), and then some harassing operations," he said. "Over time, the attacks have become far more sophisticated and have struck at higher-value targets as well as stuff that is going to make headlines."
Shooting at military aircraft requires training and planning, said retired Army Col. Bill Taylor, a professor of international security affairs at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service.
"Not just anybody in Iraq can pick up a surface-to-air missile or RPG (rocket-propelled grenade) and fire it with precision," Taylor said. "I think we're seeing signs of better and better organized insurgency warfare."
In addition to yesterday's Blackhawk crash, an Army CH-47D Chinook transport helicopter crashed Sunday in Baghdad, apparently after being struck by a shoulder-fired missile. That attack killed 16 of the U.S. soldiers on board.
On Oct. 25, a rocket-propelled grenade hit a Blackhawk near Tikrit, Iraq, wounding one soldier.
"These losses are tragic, but they are a wake-up call for U.S. forces to use different tactics," Thompson said.
The military will need to be more cautious about routine use of helicopters in hostile areas, he said. The aircraft will need to fly more at night and at higher altitudes, and more attention will have to be given to ground security near landing zones, he said.
Taylor said the Army also will have to think more about moving along the ground in vehicles or even on foot.
Thompson disagreed with some analysts that the insurgents in Iraq are showing more organization. In general, he said, they are poorly equipped and trained.
"I don't think the enemy is getting significantly better at this," he said. "They have had a couple of lucky hits."
But others see the attacks on helicopters as a new phase.
"It's an evolution of tactics being employed by the terrorist groups," Garrett said.
Taylor agreed, and said he's encouraged that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other military leaders appear to recognize the need to alter the way U.S. forces are fighting in Iraq, putting more emphasis on gathering intelligence and making forces more suited to the military conditions they face.
New units, lightly equipped but mobile and operating in secret, already are being deployed in the country, he said.
"That's a sign to me that we understand the name of the game has changed and we're going to have to adapt," Taylor said.
Those resisting the American presence may not have much trouble finding weapons to use against aircraft, according to analysts.
For example, of an estimated 5,000 shoulder-fired missiles Iraq was believed to have at the outbreak of the war, only about a third have been accounted for, Thompson said, and some of them could be in the hands of terrorists.
However, the missiles presumably are aging, which means rocket motors become less reliable and the batteries powering the weapons are getting run down, Taylor said.
"The stuff can get old. It has to be maintained properly," he said.
But based on the results of recent attacks, the missiles "certainly seem to have whatever ... operational condition is required to be a serious threat," Corbin said.
In January 2002, Jane's Missiles and Rockets reported that anti-aircraft missiles were spreading among terrorist and guerilla organizations around the world. Most of the weapons being sold on the black market were missiles, known as Grails, that were unaccounted for from the former Soviet Union, Jane's said.
The United States has a shoulder-fired missile known as the Stinger, and the French have produced a similar weapon.
Many military helicopters have a defense against missiles - flares that create multiple targets generating more heat than the helicopter engines, drawing the heat-seeking missiles away from their intended prey.
Rocket-propelled grenades are easy to come by in Iraq, analysts said.
"There's an infinite number of RPGs in the area," Garrett said, adding that they are being fired at tanks and other armored vehicles as well as helicopters.
The only defense is heavier armor, which isn't practical on a helicopter, he said.
© Copyright 2003, The Courier-Journal
