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These are snippets from various sources including DOD sources and industry sources.
M1 Abrams
No American M-1 tanks were destroyed outright by enemy weapons. Several were badly damaged, and some of these (the ones that could not move) were destroyed by U.S. troops to prevent advanced equipment falling into the hands of the enemy. The frontal armor of the M-1 continued to be invulnerable to any enemy weapons. But side and rear armor was vulnerable. In a friendly fire incident. An M-2 Bradleys 25mm cannon, firing depleted uranium armor piercing shells, penetrated the rear armor of an M-1 and damaged the engine. RPGs proved useless against the M-1, except in a few cases where they hit a vulnerable component (like a hydraulic line.)
There were no cases of M-1s being fired on by ATGMs (Anti-tank guided missiles.) No Russian Kornet missiles were found in Iraq.
The most useful weapons were the M-1s three machine-guns (a 12.7mm and 7.62mm mounted on the turret and a 7.62mm one mounted next to the 120mm gun.) The Iraqis, when they fought, waited until the M-1s were close (under a hundred meters away) and opened up with machine-guns and RPGs. In these situations, the 12.7mm (.50 caliber) machine-gun was particularly devastating, as it could tear up whatever cover the Iraqis were hiding behind. When the 120mm gun was fired, HEAT (shaped charge) or non-sabot (MPAT) shells were more often used.
The advance was so fast that the supply system could not keep up. Vital spare parts for inoperable tanks were often flown in, otherwise the tank was stripped of spare parts and abandoned. Fuel consumption was underestimated, although the army is not saying by how much. The three day halt during the extended sand storms was apparently used to bring addition fuel forward for the final push on Baghdad.
The crews, as is customary, stored a lot of their personal gear (tents, sleeping bags and the like) on the outside of the turret. In this campaign, with the frequent attacks by enemy troops armed with automatic weapons, a lot of this gear got shot up.
GPS Jammers and Recievers
GPS jammers are somewhat overrated. Iraq used at least four GPS jammers in an attempt to reduce the accuracy of JDAM guided smart bombs. With GPS guidance, JDAM will land within 40 feet of the target. With GPS jammed, it will land within 100 feet. The Iraqi jammers were quickly located and destroyed. While the GPS satellites signal is compared to a 25 watt light bulb viewed from a distance of 17,000 kilometers, that only describes the civilian signal. GPS uses a special military signal that is a thousand times stronger than the civilian one. There are more announced (like G-STAR) and secret anti-jamming technologies being put into service in the next year. There will be more attempts at GPS jamming in future conflicts, but the ability to do that successfully has now been revealed to be more potential than performance.
Crowd Control
Iraq has seen the use of better tactics and training by American military police (MPs). Much of this was the result of recent experience in the Balkans. One of the more useful new tactics developed from this experience was how to "deflate" an angry mob. Most demonstrations that get out of hand are organized and led by a handful of mob leaders. In past times, these guys were called "agitators." That's an apt description. But the agitators don't strictly control the mob, they simply "agitate" it. MPs have learned that a mob can often be "deflated" by having skilled (usually older and more experienced) MPs engage members of the mob in discussion. This can be in the guise of negotiations (about where the mob can go, or about their grievances) or simply friendly discussion. Even when conducted through interpreters, this usually gets the friendly attention of many members of the mob. Special Forces troops are good at this, as they usually speak the local language and already know local leaders. If you keep these discussions going on for an hour or so, the mob losses it's enthusiasm for violent action and starts to break up, or "deflate." If you can't do it with words, you go to plan "B", which means identifying the agitators and plunging in with some burly MPs (in a diamond formation) and arresting these mob leaders. This may inflame the mob momentarily, but once the agitators are gone, so is the agitation, and the mob usually deflates.
Sometimes equipment can be used as well. Helicopters hovering low over a mob, especially in a dry and dusty environment, stirs up a storm of dust, sand, wind and noise. This often works. If you have an M-1 tank, back it up into the mob. The hot gasses coming out of the M-1s 1500 horsepower gas turbine engine forces civilians in its path to get out of the way. The bulk of the advancing tank also makes a fearful impression.
Thermobaric Weapons
AGM-114N uses a thermobaric warhead. The official name is "Metal Augmented Charge," and it's a new application for the fuel air type explosive that Russia has been developing (and selling on the open market) for the last decade. This weapon was developed in less than a year. The warhead dispenses an explosive mist when it hits a target, and then detonates an explosion that will go around corners and into every corner of a building, bunker or cave. Since the Hellfire is accurate enough to be put through a cave entrance, window or bunker opening, it's a much more effective weapon for these types of targets. The blast created is more effective at killing people than destroying structures. But the intense heat created is also useful for destroying chemical and biological weapons. Captured Iraqi soldiers said one of the reasons they surrendered was stories of American weapons "that melted soldiers." A thermobaric weapon will do that.
Anti Aircraft Defenses
Reports of coalition aircraft during the Iraq campaign listed the following actions by Iraqi air defense forces. There were 1224 attacks by anti-aircraft guns, 1660 SAM/Rocket launches, 436 SAM instances of emitters (radars or control radios) being active, and 19 SSM (surface to surface missile) launches were detected. There were about 20,000 combat sorties flown (that would have run into Iraqi air defenses.) It was estimated that the Iraqis had about 210 Surface to Air Missile launchers and some 150 Early Warning Radars. No one had an accurate count on the number of anti-aircraft guns, but there were thought to be more than 2,500 of them.
Body Armor
Medical reports indicate that the new Interceptor protective vest was, indeed, bullet proof. Only nine percent of the combat wounds to 118 army casualties were in the trunk, and these were either by larger caliber weapons or shots that came in at odd angles and got around the Interceptor (like via an armpit.) Autopsies of 154 dead soldiers showed that the single most common area hit was the head (neck and face, the rest is well protected by the Kevlar helmet.) The next largest category is multiple wounds, including ones that sever major in the arms, and most dangerously, in the legs. The marines, who were always more willing to wear the protective vests (in Vietnam, this is thought to have saved the lives of at least a thousand marines), soon discovered that the 16 pound Interceptor, with ceramic plates, did indeed stop bullets. After the first few marines took a bullet in the chest (plate), got knocked down, then got up still full of fight, the word got around real quick
Air Campaign
The air war against Iraq involved 1,801 coalition aircraft. The largest number (863) were from the United States Air Force. The U.S. Navy had 408, the Marine Corps 372, the U.S. Army 20 (not counting attack helicopters), the British 113, Australia 22 and Canada three. The 794 "shooters" comprised fighters and heavy bombers from the U.S. Air Force (344), the U.S. Navy (232), the Marines (130), Britain (66) and Australia (22). The 1991 Gulf War used 2,700 aircraft.
These aircraft flew 20,753 combat sorties and used 18,467 smart bombs and missiles and 9,251 dumb bombs. Most of the smart bombs were JDAM (6,542) and laser guided (8,61 . U.S. Navy ships also fired 802 cruise missiles. There were 153 air launched cruise missiles used, 98 EGBU-27 GPS/Laser Guided bombs and 408 anti-radar missiles. There were 908 guided cluster bombs dropped. Other missiles used include Hellfire (562), Maverick (91 , AGM-130 (4), AGM-84 SLAM ER (3) and AGM-54 JSOW (253).
The dumb bombs were mostly high explosive, but there were also 300 cluster bombs. Cannon were used a lot as well, with 311,597 30mm rounds and 16,901 20mm rounds fired. Thus 68 percent (18,467) of the aircraft weapons use were smart bombs and missiles, versus seven percent (17,000 smart bombs and missiles) during the 1991 Gulf War. But the total number of bombs dropped in 1991 was 227,000, versus only 28,000 in 2003. Total sorties flown (not counting attack helicopters) in 1991 was 108,000, versus 41,404 in 2003. In 1991, 70,000 of the sorties were for combat, versus 20,752 in 2003.
Thus the roughly same number of smart bombs were dropped during the 1991 (17,000) and 2003 (18,467) wars. The big difference was the number of unguided ("dumb") bombs used. In 1991 210,000 dumb bombs were dropped versus only 9,251 in 2003. Fewer bombs were needed in 2003 because of better sensors (UAVs and more JSTARS) and communications (faster and more people connected to the "battlefield Internet"). What didn't work in 1991 (lots of massive dumb bomb attacks) was not used in 2003. The Iraq campaign used a different approach to finding and destroying targets. Everything was done with more accuracy and speed.
About half the combat sorties were used against the six Iraqi Republican Guard divisions, which was the only military force they had that showed any willingness to fight. The Iraqis made the mistake of trying to move these divisions, and discovered that U.S. UAVs and surveillance aircraft (mainly JSTARS) could track their movements 24/7, even during sandstorms. While those storms gave the Iraqis some protection from missiles and laser guided bombs, they were no help against GPS guided high explosive and cluster bombs. The Iraqis quickly realized what was going on, and all but a few dozen of the Republican Guards 3,000 armored vehicles were destroyed (mostly from the air) or abandoned.
There were 15,592 sorties against Iraqi ground forces. In comparison, only 1,799 sorties were flown against command and control targets (headquarters and communications) and only 832 against missile and NBC (Nuclear, Biological, Chemical) targets.
Ground and air commanders made 30,542 requests for targets to be hit, and 25, 240 of these requests were approved and 19,898 of the targets were actually hit. Many of the "target requests" were for bombers to patrol certain areas ("kill boxes") and hit any enemy forces found there.
(This was originally posted by FLTCPT on another web site)
"Trample the wounded, hurdle the dead."
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