US officials: US prepares for sea-based missile launch against Libyan air defenses

[highplainsdem]

Source: Associated Press

US officials: US prepares to for sea-based missile launch against Libyan air defenses

By Associated Press, Saturday, March 19, 1:01 PM

WASHINGTON — The U.S. prepared to a launch a missile attack on Libyan air defenses, but American ships and aircraft stationed in and around the Mediterranean Sea did not participate in initial French air missions Saturday, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the unfolding intervention.

One official said the U.S. intends to limit its involvement — at least in the initial stages — to helping protect French and other air missions by taking out Libyan air defenses.

An attack against those defenses with Navy sea-launched Tomahawk cruise missiles was planned for later Saturday, one official said. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of military operations.

The official said that depending on how Libyan forces responded to initial intervention by the French and others, the U.S. could launch additional attacks in support of allied forces. The intention was to leave it to other nations to patrol a no-fly zone over Libya once air defenses are silenced, the official said.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/us-officials-us-not-involved-in-first-action-over-libya-but-plan-sea-launched-missile-attack/2011/03/19/AB8Tlav_story.html

[faz]

1. To quote Reagan

"Here we go again!"

No war, no profit.

No blood, no revenue.

I thought W Bush is still in the White House.

[Angry Dragon]

2. As another poster on DU brought up

That Congress has to declare war and any missile launch is declaring war.
So now we can go to war without declaring it??

[David__77]

4. Indeed. Many here called for impeaching Bush for such a thing.

...

[ixion]

6. That is the Bush Doctrine

apparently still in effect. It's called a "pre-emptive" strike.

[Incitatus]

7. Doesn't the War Powers Resolution give him the authority for 60 days? nt

[14thColony]

21. Yes, but shhhhhhhhhhh! It slows their roll when you bring up the law. nt

[AlphaCentauri]

3. Lybia will become a practice target for everybody n/t

[Maine_Nurse]

5. WTF are we doing pissing away multi-million dollar missiles? Its Libya for chrissake...

If they are targeting fixed targets, a freakin B52 that has been paid for for decades and good old fashioned cheap iron bombs will do just fine.

[plumbob]

8. Time for those who build those missiles to cash in!

They've waited patiently while Halliburton and Blackwater and Accenture have made all that money on the ground in the current two money-making wars, and now it's their turn for some cash with the water based platforms.

Got to spread it around; wouldn't want any of the little merchants of death going hungry now, would we?

Why do you think it takes 50,000 rounds of ammo to kill one "enemy" soldier? Look at the training about spraying like a hose, and you'll why the ammo business is great!

[Posteritatis]

9. The cost probably actually is cheaper this way

The bomb itself is only a few thousand dollars, but if you're hitting air defenses the cost of the whole strike package - aircraft to suppress point defenses, possibly screens against any fighters the Libyans do put up, refueling aircraft if needed, other support aircraft if needed, and so on and so forth - can involve quite a few vehicles and an enormous sum of money. (And that's before going into fuel, maintenance, and so on for each plane - an hour's flight often involves several hours' work on the ground.)

Something like that doesn't just involve a single F-18 or B-52 (which would be hugely more vulnerable to air defense by now - they're usually standoff critters) dropping a couple of bombs; things like that can involve five, ten, twenty aircraft of various types at various locations to support putting those weapons on target, mainly to make sure the pilot actually flying through or near the flak at the end gets there alright.

In strictly financial terms it might actually be cheaper to toss a few multi-million dollar missiles than to put together a whole strike package like that; when you add into that the fact that it would put fewer American (or British, French, Canadian, etc) lives at risk it's a more obvious choice.

[Maine_Nurse]

13. You're probably right, but maybe not in this case...

Libyan air defenses are pretty much limited to 15k feet and below. B52's have no problem dropping from far higher than that. And they really only need to tank a couple times. We tank most round trip missions from here in Maine. Spent most of the cold war doing so for the B52's out of Loring. So perhaps we'd be looking at a couple of naval controller aircraft on station, a token set of fighters from a carrier. I really don't know for sure, I was infantry, but many of my high school buddies served in the AF at Bangor and Loring and they used to do plenty of long-haul missions and bombing practice from high altitude.

[Adsos Letter]

16. I wonder if cruise missles might be less likely to inflict civilian casualties than B-52 strikes

and I mean less likely, not entirely likely.

My experience was strictly artillery, and from the early 1970's, so I admit to not being up-to-date on the capabilities involved; however, B-52 strikes with plain old iron GB units seem like more of an area weapon.

[Posteritatis]

17. Even their missiles?

Genuinely curious here - I have no idea about their SAM capabilities, but I do remember hearing that as far back as Vietnam air defenses could engage aircraft up to forty or fifty thousand feet, if not terribly well by that point.

A few fighters on patrol, some controller aircraft, and a round trip from Maine would still have a pretty hefty price tag, though - and that's assuming you're just dropping iron bombs. I was under the impression that B-52s these days are generally used for standoff weapons (at which point we're back to the original cost-per-shot problem on top of the strike package), aren't they?

[Maine_Nurse]

22. I think they primarily have shoulder-fired missiles not real SAM's...

as I understand it, and not many at that. Mostly their air defense is anti-aircraft guns. Again, I'm no expert, but modern bomb targeting equipment is fairly accurate even with unguided weapons, especially against well-documented locations. I think you are correct that their primary missions use standoffs now, but I know as recently as a few years ago they still trained up on good old fashioned carpet bombing. Its a wild ass guess, but I'd think that a bomber strike with 4-6 Strats probably costs around the same as a handful of cruise missiles missiles with many times more destructive force and number of targets.

[Posteritatis]

25. And my just stumbled over an answer to my question

The US strikes going on right now are apparently being aimed at SA-5 sites; the current version of those have a pretty impressive range, so the standoff attacks definitely make sense.

[14thColony]

27. OK, for the record...

1. Libya has one of the longest-ranged and highest-altitude SAMs ever made in its inventory, a system specifically designed to kill B-52s (and XB-70s bit that another story); they bought six battalions, and at least four are still thought to be in service. Even two battalions of S-200 could cover the entire Libyan coastline. I would assume the French air force would have already dealt with them, but no idea.

2. Libya probably has a few batteries of 2K12 SAMs in operation, which can reach to 50,000 feet and are highly mobile. As demonstrated in Bosnia & Serbia/Kosovo, they can be a pain in the ass to find and kill.

3. Libya has scores of fighters of various types left in service. They're nothing fantastic, but they would still have to be dealt with.

4. High altitude bombing with B-52s of the type you describe hasn't been in vogue for years. B-52s are primarily JDAM carriers now - GPS guided 500 or 1000lb GP bombs. Very precise, and they can glide a ways, but you still have to get fairly close to your target.

5. The problem is, even IF 4-6 sorties of B-52s are cheaper than 4-6 cruise missiles (which I doubt when you factor in all the support that has to go into protecting and provisioning those 4-6 aircraft), taking down an air defense system of this size requires hundreds of sorties over several days. And it's not like we have a) a lot of B-52 (less than 100 now) and b) they sure aren't all available. So I ferry the B-52s over to the UK, load them up, launch the tankers out ahead of them, along with the AWACS that will now be necessary, launch the BUFFs, have then rendezvous with their fighter cover, then ingress to hit the targets after tanking up (or tank outbound, either way). For all that I could've just fired a couple of cruise missiles from the cruiser offshore and done the same thing. So it's not as simple as comparing the price of a Tomahawk to the price of 10 JDAMs or something.

6. Finally, to knock out precise targets in close proximity to both friendly forces (rebels) and innocent lives, the last thing you want is "many more times (the) destructive force." You want the least amount of force necessary applied as precisely as possible.

[14thColony]

23. You might want to read up a bit on Libyan air defense forces

Libyan has 6 battalions of S-200s, which can reach out 180 miles and up almost 100,000ft. Until those things are neutralized nobody's going to be super excited about sending lumbering B-52s into the area. And actually the best way to neutralize an S-200 launch facility is to use a half dozen or so cruise missiles to shred the search and fire control radars, rendering to whole battalion useless.

[Maine_Nurse]

29. Good info, thank you.

[Incitatus]

10. x

[Poll_Blind]

12. +1

PB

[SkyDaddy7]

19. B-52s with old iron bombs would be a sitting duck...

from Gaddafi's ground based missiles. That & to reduce collateral damage is why they use cruise missiles.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

20. I believe Tomahawk cruise missiles are somewhere in the neighborhood of $570k each.

I'm pretty sure that's close, but feel free to double check the figure.

[BenzoDia]

11. Sounds expensive. Hopefully the French prove themselves competent so we don't have to step it up.

Though I fear the world will be waiting for us to step in and they'll call it another "US-led" invasion.

No thank you.

[newblewtoo]

15. If they had stepped up

to the plate in 1986 during operation El Dorado Canyon this might not even be necessary. That is the sad truth. Of course that was before the French rejoined NATO or got their derrière handed to them on the Ivory Coast.

[isuphighyeah]

24. Amen. Should have been done a long time ago. n/t

[14thColony]

28. "Handed to them on the Ivory Coast"?

You mean like when they wiped out the entire Ivorian air force on the ground in about 10 minutes and then took their air base from them to boot? Yep, the Ivorians sure showed them.

[indimuse]

14. ..hmmm...nice CHANGE! n/t

[Uncle Joe]

18. The Administration should get Congressional approval first.

Thanks for the thread, highplainsdem.

[plumbob]

26. Oh good, yet another war I can be against.

We've ALWAYS got $$$$$$ for military shit. Taking care of our own citizens' health needs? Jobs? Education? Not so much.