Air University Review, July-August 1978

Defense Suppression

mission or tactic?

The Middle East War in October 1973 caused a military controversy that continues today unabated. The enormous losses suffered by Israeli armoured and air force units at the hands of Arab soldiers equipped with missiles indicated to many military experts that the advantage of war had conclusively shifted from offensive to defensive forces. ¹ Particularly, the lessons drawn from those battles seemed to challenge the effectiveness of tactical air power over the battlefield.² With the superbly demonstrated effectiveness of modern defensive weapons, argued the pundits, the United States Air Force will need to reconsider its whole concept of air superiority and its ability to counter the threat of modern battlefield defenses.³ In light of the lessons learned from the Yom Kippur War, defense suppression must now be elevated to rank with air superiority, interdiction, and close air support as one of the basic missions of tactical air forces. The acceptance of the short war philosophy influenced by the events of Yom Kippur has kept this problem at the forefront of military debate.⁴ This article discusses the validity of defense suppression as a basic mission for tactical air power.

The principles for the employment of air power were developed and proved through two world wars and other conflicts. The intrinsic nature of air power allows its user to concentrate forces rapidly and exploit the element of surprise. Above all, aerospace forces possess the greatest capability to seize the initiative and strike at an enemy at any desired place and location.⁵ The basic missions of tactical air forces were developed from these capabilities. Within this framework these missions are defined as:

·Counter air operations to gain air superiority,

·Air interdiction to seal off the battlefield,

·Close air support involving the integration of air forces with the fire and maneuver of ground forces,

·Air defense,

·Air surveillance and reconnaissance,

·Airlift, and

·Special operations.⁶

Their successful execution depends on combat support operations, including aerial refueling and electronic countermeasures.⁷

The first four missions involve offensive operations by tactical aircraft. By definition, each of these tasks involves attack on an enemy's offensive capability. For example, counter air operations are accomplished by destroying, or at least neutralizing, an enemy's air offensive and defensive capability. ⁸ If the freedom of action of friendly air forces is challenged by enemy air defenses, suppression of the latter becomes part of the counter air battle. This means neutralization of enemy antiaircraft gun and missile defenses and the destruction of his radar and communications network. In similar manner, air interdiction operations aim to reduce an enemy's capability to mount an offensive, to reduce his freedom of action, and to prevent counteraction against concentrations of friendly ground forces.⁹ Similar arguments can be applied to close air support and indeed to the concept of the air defense mission. In each case the aim is the neutralization of an offensive capability that a prospective enemy may bring to bear on bur own forces. Concomitantly, each of these missions has in the past involved defense suppression ranging from the suppression of area defenses in the counter air battle to neutralizing the defensive reaction of enemy troops during close air support operations. Consequently, two factors common to all basic offensive missions of tactical air power are its direction at an enemy's offensive capability and the intrinsic nature of defense suppression. This view is presently under challenge, and to assess the validity of the challenge requires an examination of the growth of battlefield defenses.

The employment of tactical air power was largely developed and refined during World War II. The use of tactical air forces in support of ground forces was the basic task of the Luftwaffe. On the Allied side, the doctrine of tactical air operations was developed initially in the fighting over the North African desert. The concept of air superiority over the battlefield allowed the side that possessed it to use its armoured forces with impunity. With time, mobile defenses mounting cannons and machine guns on half tracks or tank chassis were developed by both sides. Fixed installations were ringed with antiaircraft guns; German tactical airfields in France, for instance, featured redoubtable flak towers.

The tactics and techniques of defense suppression developed during World War II were applied in Korea and, with little alteration, in the several conventional conflicts on the Indian subcontinent. The wars between India and Pakistan in 1965 and 1971 were fought largely with conventional air and armoured forces. The latter war provided a classic example of the importance of air defense; at Longewala, Indian forces destroyed 51 tanks, 37 of them with the use of aircraft, when Pakistan's armour was deployed without protection.¹⁰ The Vietnam War did not pose a threat to air power although surface-to-air missiles were deployed. It showed that SAM could be countered by a combination of electronic countermeasures (ECM) and carefully developed tactics. One sign for the future was the limited deployment of the SA-7 Strela, hand-held missile at the end of the war.

Over the past decade, the major arena of aerial conflict, involving large-scale tactical employment of air power, has been the Middle East. Arab and Israeli doctrine and tactics have been studied by virtually all nations. The conflict of l967showedthe Israeli Air Force supreme in all areas and brilliantly employed to counter the Arab threat both in the air and on the ground.¹¹ In all cases, Israeli armour operated under the protective umbrella of tactical air power. Yet, defense suppression proved essential in the Golan Heights in 1967, where some 200 Syrian antiaircraft guns had to be neutralized before the Israeli Air Force could operate with impunity.¹² Although the Arabs possessed SAM, this weapon did not play any significant part in the war.

The same cannot be said for the Yom Kippur conflict. This war witnessed not only a change in Arab strategy but also the employment of a new family of weapons; the battlefield or tactical guided missile.¹³ These missiles, backed by radar controlled antiaircraft guns, challenged the air superiority that the Israeli Air Force had traditionally enjoyed.¹⁴ Not only did they inflict heavy losses in the Israeli Air Force but they denied tactical air power the freedom of battlefield interdiction, at least in the Sinai. In addition, the Air Force required the assistance of ground forces in the suppression of missile air defenses on the Suez Canal.¹⁵ On the Egyptian side, deployment of troops and armour had been carefully planned to proceed under the air defense umbrella of the SA-6 and portable SA-7 missile systems.¹⁶ These systems were backed by the conventional S-60 light antiaircraft gun and the quadruple barreled ZSU-23-4 cannons of Vietnam experience. The lesson of this war is significant: the Israeli Air Force was denied air superiority, not by the Arab Air Forces but by enemy antiaircraft ground defenses. This experience provided a new perspective on the efficacy of tactical air forces.

At the beginning of the 1973 war, both Egypt and Syria had highly integrated air defense systems, comprising SA-2 and SA-3 launchers supplemented by antiaircraft guns from 20mm to l00 mm calibre. These and the MiG-21 fighter defenses were coordinated through a warning and command network. On the battlefield the air defense system was extended through SA-6 and SA-7 deployment while the new Sagger missiles proved an excellent antiarmour weapon. Clearly, the development of both static and mobile air defense systems had developed apace during the previous decade, and the implications for tactical air forces on the European battlefield are not too difficult to surmise. Today the ground-based antiaircraft defenses deployed by a Soviet army group in eastern Europe number more than 400 antiaircraft guns of 23mm and 57mm calibre and over 100 SA-2, SA-4, SA-6 missile launchers,¹⁷ a formidable array supplemented by organic weapons and theatre air power. Penetration of these defenses is a far cry from the experiences of Vietnam. The counter air and interdiction battles assume a new dimension under the impact of modern technology.

This advent was predicted widely twenty years ago. A British defence white paper in the mid-1950s postulated the demise of the manned fighter and the strategic bomber, overtaken by the guided missile. The Lightning was to be the Royal Air Force's last manned fighter, and confidence in missile technology was so great that both the Lightning and the Phantom were designed without an internal cannon.

Today, the prophesy of twenty years ago appears to be nearing reality. The rapid growth of missiles of all kinds over the. past decade has created a tremendous technological impact.¹⁸ This impact has extended from surface-to-air missiles to antishipping weapons and precision-guided munitions. The Soviet Union has made remarkable progress in all these fields, and their present development and production are highly advanced. The technological surprise achieved by missile employment in the Yom Kippur War almost proved the undoing of the Israeli Air Force. However, their success, even in the Sinai, was temporary, indicating that they could be counteracted.

In an address to the Joint Tactical Missile Conference of the ADPA at Costa Mesa, California, Dr. Malcolm Currie (then Director of Defense Research and Engineering) described the development of tactical missiles.¹⁹ He postulated that developments in all areas were proceeding at a pace that would soon exert an impact on traditional military doctrine. Although the Soviet Union is considerably advanced in the development and production of all types of tactical missiles, American research and development of precision-guided munitions offered an excellent opportunity to counteract the newly deployed Soviet weaponry.

The new dimension encountered in battlefield defenses, based on the demonstrable effectiveness of tactical missiles, makes a tremendous impact on air doctrine and the employment of tactical air power. In broad terms, the new generation of tactical missiles has concentrated ever more firepower and greater accuracy in the hands of ground forces. These missiles are relatively inexpensive to produce in mass, certainly when compared to modern attack aircraft and crews, and they are achieving ever higher single shot kill probabilities.²⁰ Without doubt the technological surprise achieved by the Arabs in 1973 greatly reduced the effectiveness of the Israeli Air Force, at least during the initial stages of the conflict and caused heavy aircraft losses.²¹ The war was concluded before effective countermeasures were fully developed and applied.

Obviously, the challenge posed by these new weapons will require a response that includes not only the products of the new technology but involves a basic review of air power doctrine. The availability of precision-guided munitions, which possess accuracies of several orders of magnitude over the old weapons, is relatively simple and inexpensive to achieve; that these munitions can be launched from safe positions places a new perspective on battlefield interdiction.

On even a cursory examination of the problem, the suggestion to elevate defense suppression to one of the basic missions of tactical air forces is too glib an answer. It sidesteps the real problem that is the impact of the new technology. The tactical missile may, in the long run, make an impact on modern warfare comparable to the development of nuclear power; such an impact involves in the very least a total reassessment of all the basic missions of tactical air power.

1. General A. Merglen, "Military Lessons of the October War," Adelphi Paper No. 114 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1975), p. 27.

2. Major Donald J. Alberts, "A Call from the Wilderness," Air University Review, November-December 1976, p. 36.

3. Ibid., pp. 36, 37.

4. General James H. Polk, USA (Ret.), "The New Short War Strategy," Strategic Review, Summer 1975, pp. 52-56.

5. AFM 1-1, USAF Basic Doctrine, 15 January 1975, ch. 2, para 2-3 (b).

6. Ibid., ch. 3, para 3-5 (b-h).

7. Ibid., ch. 3, para 3-5.

8. Ibid., ch. 3, para 3-5(b).

9. Ibid., ch 3, para 3-5(c).

10. K. R. Singh, "Ground Attack vs Anti Aircraft Defense, " India Quarterly, April-June 1975.

11. Alberts, p. 38.

12. Ibid., p. 39.

13. Singh, p. 343.

14. Ibid.

15. Alberts, p. 39.

16. General Chaim Herzog, "The Middle East War, 1973," RUSH Journal, March 1975, p. 15.

17. Elizabeth Monroe and A. H. Farrer-Hockley, "The Arab Israel War October 1973, Background and Events," Adelphi Paper No. 111 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, Winter 1974/75), pp.14-17.

18. R. Meller, "Europe’s New generation of Combat Aircraft," International Defense Review, April 1975, pp. 175-86.

19. Malcolm R. Currie, "Future Tactical Missiles," National Defense, July-August 1976, pp. 32-35. Dr. Currie suggested that the single dominant threat in weapon development today was the increasing accuracy and destructive capacity of tactical missiles.

20. Ibid., p. 33.

21. John H. Morse, "Advanced Technology in Modern War," RUSH Journal (London), June 1976, p. 11.

Wing Commander Hans F. Roser, Royal Australian Air Force, (M.P.A., Auburn University) is assigned to the Department of Defence (Air Office) Canberra, Australia. A graduate of the RAAF Academy, he has held flying assignments in fighter aircraft. He completed a tour of duty in Vietnam with the USAF, flying the F-4D, and later served as the commander of an RAAF Mirage Squadron in Malaysia. Wing Commander Roser is a graduate of the RAAF Staff College and the USAF Air War College.

Disclaimer

The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.

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