The Gulf War: Before and After

Sadaam Hussein began the 1991 Gulf War with the world's fifth largest armed forces, fielding some 950,000 troops, over 5,000 tanks (and twice as many other armored vehicles), and almost 4,000 artillery pieces. ²   By the war's end, his armed forces were militarily devastated (having been heavily defeated if not totally destroyed) and, just one year later, were estimated to number around 382,500. ³  

Despite such prodigious losses, Saddam managed to stay in power, and made some headway in reconstituting his shattered military. As recently as 1996, for instance, the factory established to build the "Lion of Babylon" Main Battle Tank (as Iraq's domestic version of its most sophisticated tank - the Russian T-72, is designated), while producing few of the vehicles, was making enough spare parts to keep remaining Iraqi T-72s running. ⁴   Nonetheless, Iraq's Army, Air Force and Navy (the latter never a significant force), remain much smaller than their pre-Gulf War levels; a situation that has been compounded by UN sanctions; coalition air attacks in support of the post-war "no-fly" zones; and the periodic purges of Saddam himself, ever fearful that his armed forces might be tempted to stage a coup.

Today, the Iraqi armed forces number approximately 389,000. ⁵   Moreover, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), while half of Iraqi divisions are 8,000 strong (and in a "fair state of readiness") out of average authorized strengths of 10,000 men, at least half of the regular Army is at 70 percent or less of its authorized strength, with some infantry units badly undermanned and very dependent on conscripts. CSIS also notes that Republican Guard divisions average at least 80 percent of an authorized strength of 8,000-10,000, with brigades averaging the size of a large U.S. battalion of 2,500 men. ⁶  In addition, all Iraqi divisions (except those of the Republican Guard) are estimated by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) to be at 50 percent combat effectiveness, with half of all Army equipment lacking spare parts.

IISS also cites the serviceability of the Iraqi fixed wing aircraft at around 55 percent, with serviceability of helicopters 'poor.' Further, according to IISS, senior pilots are averaging only 90-120 flying hours per year, with junior pilots having as little as 20 hours of flight time. ⁷  

These figures, while an indispensable adjunct to any listing of the Iraqi order of battle, still paint an insufficient picture of the likely future performance of the Iraqi armed forces when opposing a modern Western force such as that which defeated them in 1991, and such as they will again face should U.S. military action against Iraq be forthcoming. A fuller appreciation of this capability only begins to emerge when some of the factors that have shaped and continue to influence the Iraqi armed forces are considered.

 
Doctrine

For instance, the performance of the Iraqi armed forces, in common with militaries worldwide, is affected by their military doctrine. In Iraq's case, military doctrine is often assumed to be adapted from that of the former Soviet Union, which emerged as the main military patron of the Iraqis during the Cold War. This is partly true. However, as Michael Eisenstadt and Kenneth M. Pollack relate, Soviet military influence in Iraq was never as extensive as it was in other Arab states such as Egypt or Syria. Rather, Iraq, while equipping its armed forces with Russian arms and equipment, adopted a doctrine that was a mix of Soviet, French, American and British precepts. The latter's influence was particularly pervasive due to Britain's former role as the colonial power in Iraq, with many of the manuals captured after the 1991 war actually Iraqi translations of World War II British military handbooks. ⁸  

The application of all these influences was peculiarly Iraqi in nature however. The individual elements of Iraqi doctrine were often also incompatible with each other and inappropriate to Iraq's military goals. This was apparent during the Gulf War when, the predominantly infantry-based Iraqi Army planned to absorb coalition thrusts before counterattacking with Regular Army heavy divisions and Republican Guard formations. A strategic and operational concept that owed much to Soviet military thought, the Iraqi plan would have been sufficient to overpower weaker opponents such as the Iranians and Kuwaitis. It was, however, totally inappropriate for countering the maneuver, speed and violence employed by a qualitatively superior U.S.-led coalition force that, while enjoying a technological advantage over its opponents, would likely still have prevailed had equipment levels been evenly matched.

Attempts to adopt British and French tactics were similarly unsuccessful, with the Iraqis relying on a limited and inelastic repertoire of doctrinaire battlefield skills and techniques that were learned through repetition and easily countered by their more adaptive, fluid and better-trained Western adversaries. ⁹  

 
Culture

This misapplication of imported doctrine is compounded by Arab cultural traits antithetical to the training and maintenance (and therefore fighting ability) of a modern fighting force. According to Norvell B. Atkine, a retired U.S. Army colonel with much experience training with Arab militaries, these cultural traits manifest themselves in many areas. For instance, in Arab militaries generally, information is viewed as power, U.S trainers noting that much of the knowledge they imparted did not percolate through the ranks. Often, individuals refuse to pass on what they have learned lest their own value and importance diminish. Open competition is also shunned to avoid the prospect of losing parties feeling humiliated, particularly when mixed ranks are involved, with education heavily dependant on memorization techniques and therefore discouraging "thinking outside the box."

Moreover, possibly reinforced by the attitude often ascribed to the Soviet officer class, Arab officers enjoy very poor relations with other ranks. Arab armies further lack the solid non-commissioned officer corps that is the backbone of successful modern armies in the West. Finally, virtually all military information is classified in an atmosphere of suspicion, paranoia and secrecy, with battalion level decisions referred to the defense ministry for approval - a habit estimated to leave an Arab colonel with about as much authority as a U.S. Army sergeant first class. ¹⁰  Such factors, detrimental to the efficiency of any military, are probably particularly prominent in the Iraqi armed forces given the extremely autocratic nature of Saddam himself, and compounded by the periodic purges to which he has submitted them. ¹¹  

 
Experience

In addition, Iraq's prior military record does not bode well for their armed forces' prospects in any future war with Western troops. Historically, the Iraqi Army has been used mainly for internal security. Indeed, apart from what amounted to little more than token deployments (militarily if not numerically) during the 1948 , 1967, and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars, the Army's only action against a foreign force up until the 1980-1988 war with Iran was in May 1941, when it was routed in 17 days by a small British invasion force that landed at Basra.  ¹²   his lackluster showing was little improved upon in 1948, 1967, or 1973, with the performance of the Iraqi Army against its ill-trained and ill-equipped Iranian adversaries in the 1980s similarly unimpressive.  ¹³   While technically, Iraq won this conflict, the victory was much more Pyrrhic than Iraqi military advantages over Iran should have allowed. The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 was also militarily mediocre; its success due to numerical and material superiority and predicated on an inflexible attack plan that had to be learnt by repetition and would have been inadequate against a more prepared and proactive enemy. As with their other wars, the Iraqi performance revealed a far from high level of strategic, operational and tactical prowess. Finally, as the subsequent U.S.-led operation to liberate Kuwait showed, Iraq's armed forces, while strong regionally, are incapable of standing up to a modern Western military force.

Similarly, the Iraqi military's long and bloody experience in internal security operations does not equate to the professionalism and enhanced effectiveness that Western armed forces (most notably the British in Northern Ireland) have found to be forged by the difficulties inherent in such operations. Internal security duties in liberal democracies require adherence to a democratically instigated rule of law and therefore necessitate sophisticated and demanding operational measures. By comparison, the internal security duties of Saddam's military were undertaken virtually without restrictions (apart from those imposed by the fixed-wing 'no-fly' zones). The planning and execution of the armed helicopter, armor, and chemical weapons attacks on largely defenseless and unarmed civilians that typified such operations added little to the effectiveness of Iraq's armed forces that would assist them in fighting a world-class military. Indeed the nature of these operations may have detrimentally affected Iraq's ability to face such a foe by inuring them to the challenges this entails.

 
Conclusions

All these considerations, along with the huge technological advances made by the American military in the last 10 years, suggest that, should a confrontation with the United States occur, Iraq's armed forces will put up even less of a fight than in 1991. Similarly, while it is true that certain elite units such as the Republican Guard can be expected to fight harder than the Iraqi Regular Army, "elite" is a relative term. As its poor performance in 1991 showed, the Republican Guard, while perhaps Iraq's best fighting formation, can be expected to be heavily outclassed by any American opponents. Nonetheless, the obvious weaknesses of the Iraqi armed forces does not detract from the dangers of underestimating the enemy. Should an American invasion of Iraq occur --while many Iraqi units can be expected to perform poorly, or even to defect -- the possibility of some demonstrating an increased fighting spirit against a foreign invasion force on home soil cannot be discounted. As Kenneth Pollack reminds us, while 150,000 - 250,000 Iraqi troops deserted during the Coalition air campaign in 1991 -- with another 80,000 surrendering virtually without a fight during the subsequent ground war -- another 250, 000 remained at their posts - some of them putting up a hard, if futile fight.  ¹⁴  

Similarly, the possibility that shortcomings in his conventional military capabilities will lead Saddam to deploy chemical, biological or (should he possess them) radiological or nuclear weapons in defense of his regime is a distinct one. That said, the Iraqi armed forces will still be unlikely to prevail, not least because U.S. troops, and their likely allies, have long trained to fight in such an environment. The same can be said for urban warfare, even if the higher potential for friendly and non-combatant casualties this entails would increase the political risks of U.S. military action against Iraq. Such scenarios would undoubtedly make defeating Iraq a more difficult undertaking as well as a more costly one in blood and treasure, but it would not prevent it.

As such, while "Desert Storm II" may not quite be the "walk in the park" predicted by some in the United States  ¹⁵, the indications are that an American military victory against Iraq is imminently achievable. The only question remains: at what cost?

Endnotes

¹  CDI Primers are not intended to give anything more than an overview of a given topic. As such, for a more comprehensive treatment of the subject of Iraqi Military Effectiveness readers are directed to the sources listed in the notes below, in particular Kenneth Pollack's recent book Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness, 1948-1991, and Norvell B. De Atkine's article "Why Arabs Lose Wars: Fighting As You Train, and the Impact of Culture on Arab Military Effectiveness."

²  International Institute for Strategic Studies, Strategic Survey 1990-91, Brassey's, London, 1991, p. 105.

³   International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 1991-92, Brassey's, London, 1991, p. 107.

⁴   Sean Boyne, "How Saddam Rebuilt," Jane's Intelligence Review, November 1996, pp. 506-509, p. 507.

⁵  International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 2002-2003, Brassey's, London, 2002, p. 105.

⁶   Anthony Cordesman, "Iraqi War Fighting Capabilities: A Dynamic Net Assessment," Revised July 31, 2002, p. 3. Online at: http://www.csis.org/burke/mb/iraq_dynamic.pdf

⁷  International Institute for Strategic Studies, The Military Balance 2001-2002, Brassey's, London, 2002, p. 105-106.

⁸  Michael Eisenstadt and Kenneth M. Pollack, "Armies of Snow and Armies of Sand: The Impact of Soviet Military Doctrine on Arab Militaries," Middle East Journal, Volume 55. No. 4, Autumn 2001.

⁹  Ibid.

¹⁰  Norvell B. De Atkine, "Why Arabs Lose Wars: Fighting As You Train, and the Impact of Culture on Arab Military Effectiveness," Middle East Quarterly, Volume 6, No. 2, December 1999.

¹¹  For a succinct character profile of Saddam Hussein see, Mark Bowden, "Tales of the Tyrant," The Atlantic Monthly, May 2002.

¹²  Samir al-Khalil, "Republic of Fear," University of California Press, Berkeley, 1998, pp. 21 -29 & p. 312.

¹³  For a detailed analysis of this conflict see, Anthony H. Cordesman, and Abraham R. Wagner, "The Lessons of Modern War, Volume II: The Iran-Iraq War," Westview Press, Boulder, 1990.

¹⁴  Kenneth M. Pollack, Arabs at War: Military Effectiveness, 1948-1991 (Studies in War, Society, and the Military) , 2002, p.150.

¹⁵   Kenneth Adelman, "Desert Storm II Would Be a Walk in the Park," London Times, August 29, 2002.

Mark Burgess CDI Research Analyst mburgess@cdi.org

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