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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group

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To: Ilaine who wrote (42393)9/6/2002 3:34:13 PM
From: Bilow  Read Replies (1) of 281500
 
Hi CobaltBlue; Re the big US attack on Iraq involving 100 planes. There is a very significant paragraph in that story:

The paper said that the large numbers involved stemmed from the many support aircraft that took part even though only 12 jets actually dropped precision-guided bombs onto the H3 airfield, 240 miles west of Baghdad and close to Jordan.
foxnews.com

One might question why it is necessary to have ~88 support aircraft for 12 fighter / bombers. The simple explanation is that the aircraft had to fly all the way from the US (and / or Britain) as none of our allies in the area gave permission for us to use more convenient airfields.

To put this into perspective, note that there were 7,000 sorties flown in just the first 4 days of the Gulf War (i.e. Jan 16-19th):
history.navy.mil

In other words, the press isn't making it into a big deal because it wasn't one.

-- Carl
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