TBM... i wouldn't be tooo surprised if one didn't show up round here in the next week or two 8^) you can burn the signs in the harvest bonfire
Posted on 11/12/2004 3:30:48 PM PST by NCjim
The skies over Fallujah are so crowded with U.S. military aircraft that they are layered in stacks above the city, from low-flying helicopters and swooping attack jets to a jet-powered unmanned spy drone that flies above 60,000 feet.
Much of the focus has been on the massive U.S. ground assault to reclaim the insurgent stronghold, but the complex air war is an indication of the effort and equipment the United States has invested in winning the battle for Fallujah.
No fewer than 20 types of aircraft have been thrown into the fight, including 10 fixed-wing planes, three types of helicopters and seven kinds of unmanned drones.
"We call it the wedding cake. It's layered all the way up," said Air Force Lt. Col. David Staven, who leads the ground targeting effort on a U.S. base outside Fallujah.
Much of the air war is being directed by 10 teams of ground controllers, who moved into the city with Army and Marine fighters. The controllers call down bombing raids or rocket attacks on insurgent positions in the city, said Staven, who leads the 9th Expeditionary Air Support Operations Squadron.
"You take out the threat from the air so you don't have to get soldiers into the building to clear it on foot," said Staven. "It's better to take the enemy out from a distance than to go face to face with him."
American warplanes relentlessly pounded Fallujah over the past three days, pouring cannon fire, rockets and bombs onto the city, sometimes just blocks ahead of advancing U.S. troops.
A pair of AC-130 gunships fired their entire arsenal of ammunition on Fallujah during Monday night's assault - launching dozens of 105mm shells, hundreds of 25mm rounds and more than a hundred 40mm rounds.
"They'd just walk rounds down the street in front of the Bradley teams," said Staven, 43, of Great Falls, Mont. "They sent two gunships home with no rounds left."
On Wednesday, an Apache gunship sank five boats in the Euphrates River that the military said were used to resupply guerrillas with rocket-propelled grenades and mortar shells.
The front line strikes are directed by Air Force or Marine tactical air control teams, who carry computers and laser target designator gear in backpacks, climbing to rooftops of Fallujah and pointing out targets for Air Force, Marine and Navy attack jets.
The teams' laptop computers allow them to glean targeting coordinates from live video transmissions from unmanned spy planes droning above Fallujah.
Some teams are paired with Army or Navy special forces teams or snipers, working on the front lines and calling airstrikes within two blocks of their own positions.
The crowded airspace meant that attack jets bombarding the city Wednesday had a three-minute window to scream down and demolish targets - and then clear out - before another followed on its tail.
Strike jets fly in high-altitude "holding areas" until they are given bombing coordinates, Staven said. U.S. warplanes bombing the city include Marine F-18s and AV-8 Harriers.
The city is also being pummeled by Army Apache and Kiowa helicopters and Marine Super Cobra gunships, as well as the unmanned Predator spy plane, armed with Hellfire missiles.
There are also a slew of unmanned spy planes - including the Hunters and Pioneers - that relay targeting imagery to controllers, as well as a manned Air Force Joint STARS craft monitoring ground traffic and an observation plane that the military requested be unidentified.
At least two aircraft outfitted with "electronic warfare" equipment have flown in the battle of Fallujah, jamming cellular telephones and other communications signals, some of which can be used to remotely detonate insurgents' bombs.
On this Army base outside Fallujah, Staven leads a four-man team watching spy plane video to find mortar teams or rocket launchers and then feeding their positions to pilots flying over the city, or via chat rooms to the nearby Marine air operations center.
"This is how we're controlling the air war," Staven said, pointing to a bank of five computer screens in the dusty, crowded nerve center of the 1st Cavalry Division's base.
The constant air and artillery bombardment has to be demoralizing for Fallujah's guerrilla defenders, Staven said.
"Suddenly you see that mortar team disappear. You never heard it coming. That's got to weigh heavily on their minds," he said.
Awesome!!!!!!
Some many people seem to think Americans are soft and weak. HAH! We have an easy life which gives us plenty of time to think up new and interesting ways to kick the @#*& out of people.
Lucky! During my time in the Navy we occasionally got to go do observation out at the range in Fallon NV. we would watch the F-18's and A-6's do there bombing and gun runs... what a beautiful sight it was... I can only imagine that some of weapons we test there are falling in Fallujah today...
There is nothing better the watching the blast and feeling the ground shake from a 1000lb JDAM bomb on target. :)
I thought they had moved those units to Iraq?
Just awesome!
I wonder what the real jihadi death toll is. I would bet at least 2500.
TBM... i wouldn't be tooo surprised if one didn't show up round here in the next week or two 8^) you can burn the signs in the harvest bonfire
What, no A-10s?
What would happen if we had to fight a real war? Like China? If we are having so many problems against a bunch of rag heads, what would it be like? That's scary.
It'd be too risky..but can you imagine sending an F-14, at Mach 3..over Faluja at about 200 feet..the sonic boom would immobilize them all..and probably collapse 50% of the building in the city..
Arabs in this Iraqi city full of terrorists, eh?
better kill them there than here.
that is so cool!!!
A-10's... don't know, could be, but there weren't any listed in the article yesterday where i got this list
"We have an easy life which gives us plenty of time to think up new and interesting ways to kick the @#*& out of people."
ROTFLMAO!
As a Cold War veteran, I appreciate that comment on so many levels!
May God watch over our troops and keep them alive.
What they do is in my name,for my sake,and in my place and I thank them all.
Tell your son, thank you from the Brown family. God bless him.
Perhaps you meant Global Hawk, which has a 65,000 ft ceiling?
one... hell yeah, send a whole squadron over them like that, line abreast, and they'd prolly turn the whole town into dust!!! Haji'd think he'd been touched by God... and i DON'T mean allah!!!
How could you possibly have air to ground cover and not have a warthog in the action?
That would make a great tagline.
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