AAR: Waking the God of the Dead [spoiler Alert]

A Harpoon Classic scenario

By Brad Leyte

It has been said in recent years that modern warfare clearly favours the attacker. Whether true or not it is true, it is also said that this perception may encourage countries to favour pre-emption. It is certainly clear from recent conflicts that early battles usually determine the success of entire campaigns, and in fact, a highly successful pre-emptive strike may prevent (or at least delay) future war. Israel is no stranger to pre-emption. In the late 1970s, Iraq persuaded France to construct a research reactor near Baghdad. This light water nuclear reactor was named Osiraq by the French, an amalgam of the name of the Egyptian god of the dead, Osiris, with that of Iraq. This expansion of Iraqi nuclear know-how was alarming to Israel, so much so that when Israeli intelligence discovered Baghdad's intent to use Osiraq to produce weapons, the decision was made to attack and destroy the facility before it went hot. In the words of the then Chief of Staff of the Israel Defence Forces: "The alternative is our destruction".

 

On 7 June 1981, the elite pilots of the IDF/AF finally spotted their target after a long low level flight through neighbouring Jordanian and Saudi airspace. In little over a minute, the gleaming dome of the Osiraq reactor had been ruined by a rain of 2,000 lb iron bombs. The attack raised considerable debate over the legitimacy of anticipatory self-defence and the application of international law. Years later, when Desert Storm swept through the Gulf, the Iraqi nuclear site was struck again. But it wasn't until the concluding days of the campaign, after some nine different air strikes, that the ability of the facility to conduct nuclear research or processing was severely degraded.

 

Now, 25 years after the Osiraq raid, Israel once again faces a monumental decision about the value of pre-emption. Iran is pressing ahead with nuclear research despite broad international opposition and concern about it possibly acquiring nuclear weapons. The Iranian leader has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map". It’s time to wake that old god of the dead.

Captain Goldman was re-examining the map for the umpteenth time. Where would be the best points for ingress and egress? It seemed as though any point he chose would likely be covered by one of the numerous airfields dotting the Iranian landscape. "Well, that's why they call it an INTEGRATED Air Defence System," he chided himself as base S-2 walked up to him.

 

Benjamin Dayan asked him what ordnance he planned on using. To which Goldman asked, "What can I have?".

 

"Anything you like. It's been approved by the Prime Minister, himself," replied Dayan.

 

"Well, I'll make it simple for you, then. Load the F-16I Soufa with Spice Mk 83s, the F-15 Thunder with AMRAAM, and the F-15 Baz with Have Nap," said Goldman.

 

Dayan winced at the request and reminded Goldman that there weren't all that many in the entire inventory to which Goldman responded with, "What are you doing? Saving them for a rainy day?"

 

Dayan relented and set about making arrangements for the munitions. In his mind, he agreed with Goldman. If this mission failed, there probably wouldn't be much use for the bombs if Iran got herself an atomic bomb.

 

The entire mission launched at 0103 Lima time in hopes of the darkness giving them an additional cloaking effect. Goldman had decided that they would make their ingress between Basra and Baghdad. He planned the mission in stages. In Stage one, they would open a hole in the IADS and then return through that very same hole multiple times. The place where they would punch their hole was the air base at Dezful.

 

 

The entire group crept in low on the deck. To ease logistics, each aircraft type was accompanied by two tankers. The strike was escorted by Nachshon EW and AEW aircraft that were also at low altitude. Goldman had been hoping to reach the release point without detection, but they accidentally bumped into an Iraqi C-130 flying out of Basra. The plane reported the incident to its ground control and inadvertently notified Iranian command headquarters. Mossad had already warned the IDF that anything the GCC states knew, the Iranians would know, too, because every state bordering Iran had been thoroughly penetrated by Iranian intelligence. Although detected, the strike remained under EmCon [Emissions Control] and immediately changed course in hopes of spoofing the Iranians. With luck, they could be lost again before the Iranians could react.

 

It must have been a factor, as no interceptor radar was reported until the strike was 200nm away from Dezful. The Nachshon hung back, climbed, and activated its radar. Immediately, it detected interceptors drawing a bead on it. However, controllers calculated that they should be able to conduct the strike and escape before more than a few flights would be able to catch them.

 

 

Thunder flight led the way and only had to kill a single pair of F-14 Tomcats before the Falcons and the Eagles reached their launch points. The Falcons aimed all of their weapons at the airfield while the Eagles released theirs at nuclear facility #2. The airfield sustained over fifty hits, but the nuclear plant was unscathed. Dezful would be closed for the duration. The orders said that defences could be suppressed. Although the base was flattened, it still fit Goldman's definition of 'suppression'. The entire strike group fled together. Like the Wild Bunch, they had ridden in, taken their pleasure with the women, shot up the town, and now, were riding out before a posse could form up in pursuit. Their American cousins would have been proud.

 

 

Once re-armed, the strike launched, again, and hoped to make use of their newly created breach in the Iranian IADS. Luck was not on their side this time around. The same(?) Hercules ran into them and, this time, more Tomcat interceptors were waiting. The eight F-15 Thunder were riding shotgun and managed to splash all the Tomcats with deft manoeuvres after exchanging AMRAAM and Phoenix. The Iranian missiles were quite antiquated and scored no hits while the AMRAAM brushed the Tomcats from the sky.

 

 

This time, the Falcons arrived at the Isfahan nuclear facility ahead of the others and were able to release their ordnance before the rest of the strike group. After release, they retired and held open the sides of the breach so that the Iranians were not able to pinch off the penetration behind the strike group. The target was severely damaged, but the F-15 Baz were able to put the nail in the coffin of the nuclear plant. Without further adieu, the strike group withdrew and collected each element as it returned to base.

 

 

The third wave would be the most difficult. The group was going after nuclear facility #3, the most distant of the three possible targets. The group made its ingress through the same gap. However, this time they faced far fewer Tomcat fighters. Evidently, their previous visits had hurt the Iranian air force severely. Many flights of Phantoms were encountered, but they were easily brushed aside by the plentiful Derby AAMs carried by the Soufa Falcons. Although it was the longest mission of the day, the resistance was only moderate as the strikers delivered their high explosive ordnance. Leaving behind a smoking ruin for a facility, the Israeli air force withdrew. The Knesset had demanded that two targets be destroyed and the air force had, once again, risen to the occasion. Hopefully, it would be the last visit of the IAF to Iran, but Goldman knew otherwise in his heart.

 

Thanks for a stimulating scenario.

 

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Herman, remind me to explain the difference between "suppression of enemy air defences" (SEAD) and "destruction of enemy air defences" (DEAD). Just kidding ya.

As the Master Chief says,

A little suppression is a good thing. 

A lot of suppression is a great thing.

I know where you're coming from. In all seriousness, though, it really was my intention that the Israelis avoid bombing the heck out of the Iranian military infrastructure. The focus of the mission is the nuclear plants. Attacking these are dangerous enough in the sense of risking retaliation, but destroying other facilities would risk a wider conflict.

 

When I produce a v2 version of this scenario, fixing some bugs, I will make this element of the ROE more clear in the Orders as well as address issues such as emptying the arsenal of precision guided munitions.

When I produce a v2 version of this scenario, fixing some bugs, I will make this element of the ROE more clear in the Orders as well as address issues such as emptying the arsenal of precision guided munitions.

When I produce a v2 version of this scenario, fixing some bugs, I will make this element of the ROE more clear in the Orders as well as address issues such as emptying the arsenal of precision guided munitions.   

 

It's cool having all the toys but Harp Classic would benefit from some sort of logistical limitation on loadouts. Of course that would lead to UNREP and all kinds of craziness but a guy can dream!

The use of all those PGMs wasn't intentional at the outset. I used them mainly to simplify the re-fuelling situation. Since each tanker can only re-fuel one group/type of a/c I went with only three loadouts so that they could ease that problem.

 

4-6 different loadouts would have been better and preferential, but I used one bug to cancel out another.