Jane's

18 September 2001

The surgical strike is a myth

An American military operation is not in doubt; it will come sooner or later, and it will be fairly spectacular. However, President George W Bush is aware that an ill-conceived, botched military attempt will be worse than no action at all. He cannot repeat Bill Clinton’s tactics when, in response to the destruction of two of his embassies in Africa, he fired off a large quantity of cruise missiles at Afghanistan, only to discover that these managed to destroy a mosque and kill a few goats.

The pain in America is so deep that any similar failure would not only destroy the Bush presidency but could also humiliate the American military machine. Contrary to popular expectations, which predicted a similar knee-jerk reaction, the administration is carefully evaluating its strategies and is adopting small, measured and incremental moves.

The calculation at each stage is that the operation must be regarded as a success not only by ordinary Americans but by the world at large. Bush’s fight is for credibility at home and abroad, in almost equal measures.

What kind of retaliation? Everybody’s favourite is the so-called surgical strike, a single missile that miraculously pulverises an enemy thousands of miles away seconds after a button is pressed by a general in Washington. The Defence Department encouraged this idea during the Gulf War a decade ago, but most Washington planners know it is a myth. Missile strikes can cause havoc to military installations and concentrations of troops; they are useless against scattered groups of terrorists

Assuming that Osama bin Laden and his acolytes in Afghanistan are the targets now, Washington strategists will choose their targets with care. Afghanistan has been bombed for over two decades by the Soviet Union and every conceivable band of local marauders to little avail. It was invaded at different times by British and Soviet imperialists who subsequently withdrew. So what are President Bush’s options? The United States now distinguishes between short-term and long-term objectives, and hopes to dampen down unrealisable expectations.

Since the end of the Cold War, intelligence agencies have devoted a greater share of their resources to following individuals, be they drug barons or terrorists. Their targets often left a ‘footprint’ — the transmission of a mobile telephone, the operation of a computer, or the tracing of an e-mail. Over the last few years, Israel managed to eliminate many Palestinian leaders because they left such footprints behind; in some cases the mobile telephones they used actually guided the missiles that curtailed their lives. Bin Laden’s followers do not make this mistake.

To catch Bin Laden, it is not necessary to identify the particular cave in Afghanistan where he may be spending a night in order to mount an operation. A bigger slice of territory can be seized by American special forces commandos for a short period of time while they hunt for and detain Bin Laden and his people — provided there are solid indications that he is somewhere in that zone. True, there will be casualties, but 50,000 US special forces routinely train for such operations, and the American public may well tolerate the price. This is an operation that is regarded by ordinary Americans as essential to their survival; provided it is crowned with success and the number of casualties is not vast, the old ‘body bags syndrome’ is unlikely to hamper an American operation.

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-- Anonymous, September 20, 2001