Unformatted text preview: SADDAM’S GENERALS Perspectives of the Iran-Iraq War Kevin M. Woods, Williamson Murray, Elizabeth A. Nathan, Laila Sabara, Ana M. Venegas SADDAM’S GENERALS SADDAM’S GENERALS
Perspectives of the Iran-Iraq War Kevin M. Woods, Williamson Murray, Elizabeth A. Nathan, Laila Sabara, Ana M. Venegas Institute for Defense Analyses
2011 Final
July 2010
IDA Document D-4121
Log: H 10-000765/1
Copy This work was conducted under contract DASW01-04-C-003, Task
ET-8-2579, “Study on Military History (Project 1946—Phase II)” for
the National Intelligence Council. The publication of this IDA
document does not indicate endorsement by the Department of
Defense, nor should the contents be construed as reflecting the
official position of the Agency.
© 2010 Institute for Defense Analyses, 4850 Mark Center Drive,
Alexandria, Virginia 22311-1882 • (703) 845-2000.
This material may be reproduced by or for the U.S. Government
pursuant to the copyright license under the clause at DFARS
252.227-7013 (November 1995). Contents
Foreword............................................................................................................................................ vii Introduction.......................................................................................................................................... 1 Summary and Analysis ........................................................................................................................ 5 Background ................................................................................................................................... 6 Origins and Planning for War ....................................................................................................... 7 Saddam’s Education in War........................................................................................................ 13 The Adaptation of Iraqi Military Forces to the Reality of War................................................... 15 Technology, Intelligence, and the War ....................................................................................... 19 Final Comments .......................................................................................................................... 22 Historical Context and Timeline........................................................................................................ 25
Interview: Lieutenant General Ra’ad Majid Rashid al-Hamdani ...................................................... 29
Section 1: Senior Leadership Foreign Assistance Officer Corps Saddam’s Personality First Gulf War .................................................................................................................... 29
Section 2: Chemical Weapons Conditions and Events Leading to the Iran-Iraq War Military Training................................................................................................................ 45
Section 3: Personal Interactions with Saddam Senior Leadership ........................................... 57
Section 4: Officer Corps Loss of Fao (1986) Recovery of Fao (1988) Intelligence
Capabilities Fourth Battle of Basra (1986) Fifth Battle of Basra (1987) ......................... 67
Section 5: Expansion of Iraqi Military Military Training End of Iran-Iraq War................... 76
Interview: Major General Mizher Rashid al-Tarfa al-Ubaydi ........................................................... 87
Section 6: Personal Background Attitudes toward Iran Expansion of Iraqi Intelligence ...... 87
Section 7: Loss of Fao (1986) General Military Intelligence Directorate Iranian
Intelligence Capabilities Deception Operations .................................................................. 93
Section 8: Senior Leadership SIGINT Foreign Assistance Attitudes toward Iran ........... 100
Interview: Major General (ret) Aladdin Hussein Makki Khamas ................................................... 111
Section 9: Personal Background Saddam’s Personality Senior Leadership Events
Leading to Iran-Iraq War Preparations for Iran-Iraq War ................................................. 111
Section 10: Battle of Allahu Akbar Hill First Battle of Basra (1982) Battle at al-Amara Second Battle of Basra (1984) Battles at Abadan and Ahvaz (1980) Battle
at Susangard (1980) ............................................................................................................. 119
Section 11: Adaptation in Iraqi Military Combat Development Directorate Military Training.............................................................................................................. 133
Section 12: Chemical Weapons NCO Corps Iranian Operations and Tactics Saddam’s Personality ........................................................................................................ 145 v Interview: Lieutenant General Abid Mohammed al-Kabi ............................................................... 151
Section 13: Personal Background History of Iraqi Navy Expansion of Naval
Involvement in Iran-Iraq War Preparation for Iran-Iraq War Foreign Technology ....... 151
Section 14: Defensive Naval Operations (1980–82) Offensive Naval Operations (1982–86) Naval Operations after the Loss of Fao (1986–88) Intelligence Capabilities
and Bombing of USS Stark .................................................................................................. 159
Section 15: Shatt al-Arab Attacks on Iranian Oil Terminals Loss of Fao (1986) Bombing of USS Stark Recovery of Fao (1988) ........................................................... 160
Section 16: Intelligence Capabilities Development of Navy and Naval Operations Significance of Iranian Operations Saddam and Senior Leadership ............................. 177
Interview: Major General ‘Alwan Hassoun ‘Alwan al-Abousi ....................................................... 185 Section 17: Personal Background State of Iraqi Air Force Readiness Initial Air Strikes
(Fall 1980) Planning and Training Foreign Technology Saddam’s Personality Intelligence and the Bombing of Osirak Reactor ................................................................. 185 Section 18: Long-range Strikes Military Cooperation Foreign Technology Chemical
Weapons Intelligence ........................................................................................................ 199 Section 19: Attitudes toward the Air Force Air Defense Systems Bombing of USS
Stark ..................................................................................................................................... 204 Section 20: Senior Leadership Foreign Assistance Iraqi F–1s Shot Down by Saudi F–
15s during First Gulf War Evacuation of Iraqi Fighters to Iran during First Gulf War War of the Cities .................................................................................................................. 207 Appendix A: References ..................................................................................................................A-1
Appendix B: Place Names Index and Reference Maps ................................................................... B-1
Map 1. Iraq, with North, Central and South regions outlined. .................................................. B-2
Map 2A. Southern Iraq. Iraqi offensives, 1980. ........................................................................ B-3
Map 2B. Southern Iraq. Extent of Iraqi advances, 1981–82; Iranian offensives;
Extent of Iranian advances during the war; Basra defenses 1982–87. ................................. B-4
Map 2C. Southern Iraq. Iraqi offensives, 1988. ........................................................................ B-5
Map 3A. Central Iraq. Iraqi offensives, 1980............................................................................ B-6
Map 3B. Central Iraq. Extent of Iraqi advances, 1981–82; Iranian offensives;
Extent of Iranian advances during the war........................................................................... B-7
Map 3C. Central Iraq. Iraqi offensives, 1988. ........................................................................... B-8
Map 4A. Northern Iraq. Iraqi offensives, 1980. ........................................................................ B-9
Map 4B. Northern Iraq. Extent of Iraqi advances, 1981–82; Iranian offensives;
Extent of Iranian advances during the war......................................................................... B-10
Map 5. Persian Gulf, Tanker War ........................................................................................... B-11
Map 6. Persian Gulf, Air raids on Iranian islands. .................................................................. B-12
Map 7. Persian Gulf, Attack on Larak Island with mid-air refueling...................................... B-13
Appendix C: Index of Themes ......................................................................................................... C-1
Bibliography .................................................................................................................................... C-2 vi Foreword
Perhaps the only thing less insightful than the history of a war written solely by its winner is
one written exclusively by nonparticipants. The complex mix of drivers, decisions, and
perspectives that animate a war’s senior leaders are often lost or obscured under the best of
circumstances. This problem is exacerbated when examining a war between closed regimes
such as occurred with Iran and Iraq in the 1980s. While the perspectives of former senior Iraqi
leaders contained in this monograph are not without biases and should be judged in light of
other sources, they offer an important glimpse into a previously closed world. The study of
the Iran-Iraq War based on the perspective of senior Iraqi participants offers valuable
historical insights and will serve as a useful resource for analysts and scholars seeking to
understand distant conflicts.
This study was inspired by post–World War II efforts of U.S. Army historians and
intelligence officers to gather and preserve insights and perspectives of the German General
Staff. This is the second volume in a series of studies, sponsored by the National Intelligence
Council, designed to cast light on issues involving Saddam’s Iraq by interviewing former
Iraqi officials. The first volume, Saddam’s War: An Iraqi Military Perspective of the IranIraq War, contained interviews with Lieutenant General Ra’ad Hamdani, a former Iraqi
Republican Guard Corps commander. This second volume includes an additional interview
with Hamdani, along with four additional senior officers who discuss issues including Iraqi
naval operations, airpower, military intelligence, and capability development.
I am encouraged that these interviews, along with captured records from Saddam’s regime in
the Conflict Records Research Center, Institute for National Strategic Studies, at the National
Defense University are beginning to break open the “black box” of Iraqi decisionmaking
under Saddam. It is important that this material be made available in a way that can help
inform a rising generation of policymakers, analysts, and scholars.
—Major General John R. Landry, USA (Ret.)
National Intelligence Officer for Military Issues
National Intelligence Council vii Introduction
The following is the second volume in the Project 1946 series. The project title refers to the
efforts of a team of U.S. Army historians and intelligence officers who, in the wake of World
War II sought to understand what had occurred on the “other side of the hill.” Their partners in
this effort were a select group of former German generals. Through the use of personal,
organizational, and campaign histories, as well as the review of captured German records, these
researchers forever changed the world’s
understanding of the war. In over a decade of
work, the German program produced more than
500 monographs, covering an array of strategic,
operational, and tactical issues. In 1961, a key
participant in the program, former Colonel-General
Franz Halder, was presented an award in the name
of President Kennedy for “lasting contributions to
the tactical and strategic thinking of the United
States Armed Forces.”2 The program’s diverse
utility and lasting impact is evident in such projects
as the acclaimed official histories of World War II
(the Green Books), the development of early Cold
War doctrines, and the regional studies that
informed U.S. operations in the Balkans late into
the 1990s.
Franz Halder (left) briefing General Despite the generally positive legacy of the Brauchitsch on the Poland campaign in
1
German example, the program affords some October 1939.
1 2 Franz Halder, former chief of the General Staff of the German Army led a series of research programs with
his former colleagues in support of various US Army military history projects and foreign military studies
programs in the decade following World War II. Image courtesy of the Deutsches Bundesarchiv, Bild 183H27722.
Cited in James A. Wood, “Captive Historians, Captivated Audience: The German Military History Program,
1945–1961,” The Journal of Military History 69, no. 1 (2005), 124. 1 important cautions that are applicable to Project 1946. The motivations of the individual
participants ranged from noble to base. Some of the former German officers saw cooperating
with the Americans as a way to bolster Germany’s defense from the its historic and now
growing menace to the east. Halder wrote as much to his American sponsor soon after accepting
his task, “I have undertaken this task because I am of the opinion, that…we will be in a position
to make an intellectual contribution to the defensive potential of the West.”3 Other officers
sought to solidify the myth of the apolitical Wehrmacht or to draw a distinction between
themselves and the crimes of the regime they served. In addition to deliberate bias, there are, no
doubt, inadvertent gaps in the telling. On topics large and small, and as is the case with all
memoirs, the participants in Project 1946 suffer to some degree from “selective memory
syndrome.”4
Despite these limitations, the value of this and related efforts should be judged on its
ability to fill gaps in an otherwise limited collection of primary sources material on the IranIraq War. With the conclusion of decades of mistrust and more than a dozen years of conflict
between the United States and the Ba’ath regime in Iraq, a rare opportunity exists to develop a
deeper understanding of recent military history from the point of view of former adversaries.
If continued interest can be taken as a metric of value then this and related research efforts—
such as the U.S. Joint Forces Command’s Iraqi Perspectives Project (IPP) and the Department
of Defense’s Conflict Records Research Center (CRRC)—indicate healthy and continuing
institutional desire to learn from history.5 3 4 5 Cited in Ronald M. Smelser, Edward J. Davies, The Myth of the Eastern Front: The Nazi-Soviet War in
American Popular Culture (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 70.
Wood, “Captive Historians, Captivated Audiance: The German Military History Program, 1945–1961,” 126.
For additional information on the strengths and limitations of this approach, see Kevin Soutor, “To Stem the
Red Tide: The German Report Series and Its Efforts on American Defense Doctrine,” The Journal of
American Military History 57, no. 4 (1993), 653–88; Wolfram Wette, The Wehrmacht: History, Myth,
Reality, trans. Deborah Lucas Schneider (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2006); Russel A. Hart,
Guderian: Panzer Pioneer or Myth Maker?, ed. Dennis E. Showalter, Military Profiles (Washington:
Potomac Books, Inc., 2006).
Related research includes Kevin M. Woods, Williamson Murray, Thomas Holaday, Saddam’s War: An Iraqi
Perspective of the Iran-Iraq War, McNair Paper 70 (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press,
2009); Kevin M. Woods, Michael Pease, Mark E. Stout, Williamson Murray, James G. Lacey, The Iraqi
Perspectives Report: Saddam’s Senior Leadership on Operation Iraqi Freedom from the Official U.S. Joint
Forces Command Report (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2006); Kevin M. Woods, James Lacey, Williamson
Murray, “Saddam’s Delusions: The View from the Inside,” Foreign Affairs 85, no. 3 (2006); Kevin M. Woods,
The Mother of All Battles: Saddam Hussein’s Strategic Plan for the Persian Gulf War, Official U.S. Joint
Forces Command Report (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2008); Kevin M. Woods, Mark E. Stout, “Saddam’s
Perceptions and Misperceptions: The Case of ‘Desert Storm’,” Journal of Strategic Studies 33, no. 1 (2010). 2 Members of the Project 1946 research team interview former Iraqi Major General
Aladdin Makki (center) about his experiences as an Iraqi Army Corps Chief of Staff,
Director of Developments, and Commandant of the Iraqi War College during the
Iran-Iraq War (Cairo, Egypt, November 2009) The focus of the interviews in this Project 1946 monograph, as with the first, is the IranIraq War (1980–88). This conflict is relevant more than 20 years after its conclusion for
numerous reasons, but four are prominent.
First, given the totalitarian nature of both participants, available data on one of the
bloodiest conventional wars of the 20th century remains limited and heavily biased. While
primary sources from within Iran remain almost non-existent, the opportunity to fully develop
the Iraqi point-of-view will go a long way to illuminating this blind spot.
Second, many of the factors that precipitated the war in 1980—longstanding border
disputes, regional ambitions, local religious and ethnic strife, and geopolitical tensions—
remain in various forms. Anyone remotely familiar with the history of the Middle East can
hope, but not be assured, that tensions between neighboring states will not spark a future war.
The political and military history of past wars, to paraphrase Mark Twain, may not repeat, but
sometimes, they do rhyme.
Third, the Iran-Iraq War saw the development and extensive use of weapons of mass
destruction in a regional war. Iraq’s experience as a regional power that developed and
deployed chemical weapons, improved delivery methods, and strove to develop a nuclear
weapons program, may provide a richer source of insights into proliferation than the Cold
War experience of the West. 3 Finally, the context and character of warfare in this region have always been something
of an enigma to outsiders. The debates in the West over changes in modern war, questions of
whether there is such a thing as an Arab “way-of-war,” understanding the modalities of
warfare in this politically and physically challenging region will all benefit from an in-depth
study of the Iraqi perspective.
With the assistance of General Ra’ad Hamdani (the subject of the first Project 1946
monograph), the project’s researchers interviewed Iraqi veterans of that long and bloody
campaign. Those interviewed offered perspectives ranging from general strategy, the
Republican Guard, air force, navy, and intelligence, to operations and combat developments.
In each case, the interviewees worked with the research team by providing background
information on their particular experiences and, in several cases, detailed personal histories.
Each officer brought his own perspective to the questions and issues raised by the research
team. Some were more comfortable discussing controversial topics than others, but each
added significantly to our general understanding and opened the door to new lines of inquiry.
*****
This monograph is composed of two parts. First is an overview essay that summarizes the
major insights derived from the totality of discussion contained in the second part. The second
part contains five interviews conducted during a seven-day period in three countries. The
interviews were conducted in both Arabic and English. The transcribed and translated
recordi...
View
Full Document
