The Seductive Allure of Precision Weapons

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POLITICAL AIRPOWER, PART II: THE SEDUCTIVEALLURE OF

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PRECISION WEAPONS
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(HTTP://WARONTHEROCKS.COM/AUTHOR/MIKE-BENITEZ/)MIKE BENITEZ (HTTP://WARONTHEROCKS.COM/AUTHOR/MIKEBENITEZ/) AND MIKE PIETRUCHA (HTTP://WARONTHEROCKS.COM/AUTHOR/MIKE-PIETRUCHA/)
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NOVEMBER 30, 2016
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Editors Note: Please read the irst installment of this series, Say No to the No-Fly Zone (http://warontherocks.com/2016/10/politicalairpower-part-i-say-no-to-the-no-ly-zone/).
I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.
Abraham Maslow, The Psychology of Science (https://books.google.com/books?
id=3_40K8PW6QC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false)
Airpower advocates are oten accused of treating all warghting problems in the same way wielding a hammer
against challenges, even (and especially) when a hammer is not the right tool. Accordingly, a large part of the history
of airpower has encompassed the quest for precision bombing, so that the hammer might be more appropriately
applied with less risk to the wielder. Now that we have nally reached an enviable level of precision, we have found
our arrival at airpower Nirvana postponed indenitely. Unrealistic expectations surrounding the application of force
are making the strategic utility of precision far less than it ought to be ultimately hindering both strategy and
operational utility of the U.S. military. The ubiquitous nature of precision has resulted in the growth of a generation of
policymakers who misunderstand the nature of warfare. These individuals cannot separate the political risk entailed
with employing military force with the physical risk aviators are exposed to while trying to fulll unrealistic demands
for a sanitary and clean conict. The allure of precision weapons has proven too much for policymakers. They have
been seduced into believing that somehow, aerial warfare is not the dirty, dangerous, and destructive child of modern
warfare that it actually is.
In the Beginning
To understand how the U.S. Air Force got here, one must understand how wars necessitate invention in this case,
the evolution and pursuit of precision weapons.
In World War II, precision bombing meant putting a stick of bombs within a quarter mile of the aim-point. An
impressive feat for the time, this still required hundreds of bombers dropping thousands of bombs to achieve the
desired eect a hammer with a head both broad and deep. Still, this would not have been possible without
inventions such as the Norden bombsight (http://www.nationalaviation.org/norden-carl/), then a closely guarded
secret. While more accuracy was sought through both technological improvements and adaptive tactics, new levels of
precision held out the promise of gaining strategic eects with airpower without the mass required in 1943. A new
vision became tantalizingly close with the Lutwafes invention of guided bombs.
The worlds rst operational guided weapon, the German Hs-293 (http://www.ausairpower.net/WW2-PGMs.html)
rocket propelled glide-bomb, used a radio-commanded guidance system and a red are mounted on the tail so the
operator could steer the weapon to the target by looking through a bomb-sight and keeping the cross-hairs on the
target. Developed almost concurrently, its larger 3,000-pound, gravity-dropped cousin, the Fritz X
(http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit/MuseumExhibits/FactSheets/Display/tabid/509/Article/196228/germanfritz-x-guided-bomb.aspx), infamously sank the Italian battleship Roma in 1943. The U.S. equivalent 1,000-pound
VB-1 Azon
+()
(http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Visit/MuseumExhibits/FactSheets/Display/tabid/509/Article/196234/vb-1-azonguided-bomb.aspx) achieved attention by successfully being used to attack bridges in the China-Burma-India theater.
Despite progress, these guided weapons were still complicated, unreliable, and not nearly as precise as one would
believe so they were not widely used.
Throughout the Korean War, U.S. airpower mainly relied on the equipment from World War II. Ater Korea, the U.S.
Navy sought to develop its own munition and elded the AGM-12 Bullpup (http://www.designationsystems.net/dusrm/m-12.html) in 1959. This was the rst mass-produced precision guided weapon. The Bullpup, like
the Hs-293, was equipped with a tail are and was hand steered into the target by a pilot who had dropped the weapon
and was simultaneously ying his own aircrat and the bomb. In the F-4, the Bullpup was steered with the let hand
while the aircrat was own with the right. The weapon needed to hit to work it was designed with a svelte 250pound warhead so it could be carried by the Navys aircrat. The Air Force followed suit in 1965
(http://fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/missile/agm-12.htm), adopting the Bullpup for the F-100, F-105, and its own F-4
aircrat. Still, the weapon was too small to inict damage on larger well-constructed targets.
In 1967, the Navy introduced the larger 1,000-pound AGM-62 Walleye (http://www.designationsystems.net/dusrm/m-62.html) while the Air Force contracted the 2,000-pound HOBOS (http://www.designationsystems.net/dusrm/app5/hobos.html) (homing bomb system). Both weapons had a radio link for control and a TV
seeker in the nose which transmitted its picture to the launching aircrat giving the aircrew the ability to y the
weapon with a bombs eye view. This system achieved new levels of precision when conditions provided a highcontrast target background for the operator to see on the display. Precision guidance still required aircrew to y the
weapon into a target from a distance.
Despite these advances, precision remained a niche capability. The majority of weapons deliveries still required
massed attacks to achieve target destruction. If you wanted accuracy rather than mass, the solution was to get close.
Aerial res in Korea and Vietnam were oten the equivalent of waiting to see the whites of their eyes, with the
attendant risks of dense air defenses. Dropping from high altitude moved the aircrat above the densest gunre but
was correspondingly less accurate. If guided weapons could be employed from altitude where the threat of guns and
terrain was lessened, targets could be hit eectively while reducing the risk to aircrew.
Figure 1: A U.S. Air Force North American F-100D-85-NH Super Sabre aircrat (Tail #563415) makes a low altitude dive pass against an enemy position in South Vietnam in 1967
(U.S. Air Force)
The Advent of Lasers
In 1965, Texas Instruments the company that invented the microchip
(http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2009/06/when_america_rst_met_the_microchip.html) and subsequently
became famous for calculators developed a proof-of-concept low-cost laser-guided weapon for the Air Force. The
weapon would guide on laser energy reected from the target. Now, instead of ying the weapon, the crew only
needed to keep the laser on the target and the bomb would do the rest. The rst combat employment in Vietnam
involved the GBU-1 Bolt-117 (http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app5/paveway-1.html), a 750-pound bomb
with a guidance kit. Introduced in 1967, 50 percent of the weapons scored direct hits a remarkable feat at the time.
The end of Rolling Thunder (http://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/operation-rolling-thunder) in 1968 stopped
air attacks against North Vietnam for four years.
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Figure 2: F-4D 66-7709 of the 433rd TFS sporting PAVE KNIFE and
two 2000-pound LGBs (U.S. Air Force)
When bombing resumed with Operation Linebacker (http://www.ahso.af.mil/topics/factsheets/factsheet.asp?
id=15264) I in 1972, a target was waiting. The Paul Doumer bridge (https://books.google.com/books?
id=97VqVxT6S2oC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=Paul+Doumer+Bridge&source=bl&ots=JT09rq84RK&sig=lOu6MqLXOghYxz_gvRjH17CHwo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwialvDZ6jNAhUEjz4KHUqiDW44ChDoAQgxMAQ#v=onepage&q=Paul%20Doumer%20Bridge&f=false) had been attacked
previously, with little success. Now, the Air Force was ready with new PAVE WAY laser-guided bombs (LGBs) in sizes
up to 3000 pounds. The opening day of the operation saw 16 F-4 Phantoms from the 8 th Tactical Fighter Wing attack
the Paul Doumer bridge (https://books.google.com/books?
id=97VqVxT6S2oC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=Paul+Doumer+Bridge&source=bl&ots=JT09rq84RK&sig=lOu6MqLXOghYxz_gvRjH17CHwo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwialvDZ6jNAhUEjz4KHUqiDW44ChDoAQgxMAQ#v=onepage&q=Paul%20Doumer%20Bridge&f=false) with Walleye bombs

and miss. The following day, 11 May 1972, LGBs would get their chance on the wings of a lone four-ship of F-4s from
the 433 Fighter Squadron. One of the limited PAVE KNIFE targeting pods was installed on the lead aircrat
(http://www.tailsthroughtime.com/2011/01/rst-successful-combat-drops-of-laser.html), which was also equipped
with two GBU-11 3,000-pound LGBs. The remaining aircrat were outtted with two GBU-10 2,000-pound LGBs. All
eight bombs scored direct hits on the bridge, destroying it.
Figure 3: Post-strike image of the Paul Doumer Bridge, 1972. (U.S. Air Force)
Eyes were now on an even more durable target the Thanh Hoa (nicknamed Dragons Jaw) bridge. Unlike the Paul
Doumer bridge, the Thanh Hoa bridge had been on the targeting list since the opening of Operation Rolling Thunder
in 1965. Despite 871 sorties
(http://www.airforcemag.com/MagazineArchive/Documents/2011/August%202011/0811jaw.pd), thousands of
munitions (including hundreds of small Bullpups) and the loss of 11 aircrat, the well-built, well-defended bridge still
stood.
On May 13, 1972, just 48 hours ater the Paul Doumer bridge fell, the same LGB-equipped squadron attacked the
Dragons Jaw bridge and it too fell. A dozen F-4 Phantoms with LGBs
(http://www.ahso.af.mil/shared/media/document/AFD-101013-042.pd) had done in a single morning what three
years of intermittent attacks had failed to do. The success of laser guided bombs which were 10 times more likely to
achieve a direct hit on a point target than gravity bombs were demonstrated the potential of economic precision
munitions. World War II air raids required whole squadrons of bombers to destroy one target (maybe,) and by the end
of Vietnam, we were approaching the ability to destroy a point target with a single ghter. Airpower still provided the
hammer, but we now had one that was capable of some very ne work.
Desert Storm
Fast forward
almost 20 years: In 1991s Operation Desert Storm, the FFacebook http://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/politicalairpowerpartiitheseductiveallureofprecision
111F and F-117A droppedweapons/&t=Political+Airpower%2C+Part+II%3A+The+Seductive+Allure+of+Precision+Weapons
the majority of precision weapons,
(http://www.gao.gov/assets/230/224366.pd)
ranging from the laserTwitter
Figure 4: The Thanh Hoa bridge nally
guided 500-pound GBU-12 and the massiveLinkedIn
4700-pound
GBU-28 to the
http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?
goes down. (Air Force Research Laboratory
datalink-guided GBU-15. In fact, the F-117 was designed around the
Munitions Directorate)
ability to carry a pair of 2000-pound LGBs. The AGM-65 Maverick, an
air-launched antitank missile, was shot in numbers larger than all other
PGMs in the Joint inventory (http://www.ahso.af.mil/shared/media/document/AFD-100927-061.pd) combined. The
routine viewing of weapon impact video on cable news led to the inaccurate public perception that the majority of
weapons were precision-guided and that their application could be precisely managed. They were not and they could
not. What the PGMs did do was reduce risk to the aircrat by increasing the distance from which they could achieve a
hit.
Guided munitions accounted for only eight percent (http://www.ahso.af.mil/shared/media/document/AFD-100927061.pd) of the weapons employed in the conict but accounted for an estimated 75 percent of the eects
(http://www.govexec.com/magazine/2003/08/birth-of-a-bomb/14694/). Precision weapons allowed attacks against
targets that were small or which required very precise weapons placement to achieve the desired eect, provided the
weather was clear enough to see the target. Up to now, the Air Force had to accept that a precision attack was only
possible in conditions of clear visibility. During the Gulf War, one in three laser-guided bomb attacks was canceled
because the lasers could not point out targets through storm clouds, sandstorms, and smoke and haze from oil res.
The F-117 alone reported 400 weather-related misses or no-drops

(http://www.ahso.af.mil/shared/media/document/AFD-100927-061.pd) with LGBs. This set in motion the eort to
produce what became the GPS-aided, inertial measurement unit-guided joint direct attack munition (JDAM).
All-Weather Precision
The JDAM debuted in 1999s Operation Allied Force. Used exclusively by the B2A, over 650 (http://aviationweek.com/awin/six-b-2s-dropped-650-jdamsyugoslavia-operation) 2,000-pound JDAMs were employed with impressive
reliability and hit rates compared to LGBs. Aircrew were directed to prioritize
minimizing risk over hitting the targets and were directed not to stray below
15,0000 feet (https://books.google.com/books?
Figure 5: Precision in clear air. An
AGM-130 from FIAT 91/92, ight
of 2 F-15E, is guided on the
Cortanovci Highway Bridge, 3
April 1999 (NATO)
id=FW_50wm8VnMC&pg=PA33&lpg=PA33&dq=allied+force+15,000&source=bl&ots=ShgQs3thYQ&sig=3SRvXIRMm3HHNOlH-
r7s7HVqnNk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjHx5Ga55fQAhWL24MKHartAH4Q6AEIGzAA#v=onepage&q=allied%20force%2015%2C000
to nd clear air for their lasers under the weather. Collectively, almost a third of all weapons delivered by NATO were
guided but they accounted for 64 percent
(https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1365/MR1365.ch5.pd) of the total points
struck. Dumb bombs were used mostly during periods of bad weather or for attacks on area targets. Free-fall
munitions had their place: Two B-1s unleashed a classic runway attack with two long sticks of Mk-82 500-pound
bombs on Sjenica and Sombor airelds. Trees now grow on both runways.
In Desert Storm only 10 percent of the participating U.S. strike aircrat
were PGM-capable, but only eight years later, it was 90 percent
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Figure 6: There is no substitute for the
Twitter
heavy bomber post-strike imagery of
Sombor aireld, 12 May 1999 (NATO)
(https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1365/MR1365.ch5.pd). In the next few years,

the JDAM would be integrated onto virtually every attack, ghter, and bomber in the inventory. The bombing
paradigm changed from where it had been stuck for 30 years one aircrat, one target at a time. With JDAMs, one
aircrat could now strike multiple targets simultaneously in one pass, thus minimizing exposure. On top of that, they
were no more expensive than the Paveway LGBs.
Ater 9/11, JDAM would continue its success in Afghanistan and later in Iraq. By the turn of the century, the wonder
had become mundane and the expectations of extreme precision routine. But, the unanticipated product of the
precision revolution was the mistaken belief that these weapons could be used to make warfare less messy by limiting
collateral damage. Lost in the discussion were the twin rationales for precision in the rst place greater
eectiveness and lower risk to U.S. forces.
Precision to a Fault
While the advent of precision weapons ushered in an era of one bomb, one target planning, the expectations for
these weapons have outpaced their actual abilities. The use of these weapons does not ensure than only the target will
be hit and nothing else. Precision ensures that there is a high probability that the weapon will land on or near its
desired aimpoint. Two thousand pounds of cosmic catastrophe hitting its target still has eects well beyond the
target. A 2000-pound Mk-84 bomb can throw fragments for thousands of feet. Precision weapons were developed to
ensure that when a strike package dropped on its targets, there was a reasonable expectation that those targets would
be hit, reducing the need to return over and over again and continually expose aircrat and aircrew to risk. Precision
weapons were intended to make the combat application of airpower more ecient and safer in the long run, not to
make them more palatable as a policy option. An airpower tool became a political one another aspect of political
airpower.
Precision strikes became a default policy option ater Operation Desert Storm. Airpower dominated foreign policy in
the 1990s, leading to Operations Desert Strike, Deliberate Force, and Allied Force as we have previously discussed
(http://warontherocks.com/2016/10/political-airpower-part-i-say-no-to-the-no-y-zone/). Cruise missiles were
even easier to employ politically no risk, no video, and only a million dollars a shot with no basing issues or rules of
engagement to negotiate. But, the same forces that made it easy to employ military force made it even easier to blunt
the edge of combat airpower by providing the illusion of control. The term surgical precision entered the lexicon,
implying a level of control that did not exist.
As the focus on precision eects expanded, weaponeering
(https://www.aclu.org/les/dronefoia/dod/drone_dod_jp3_60.pd) became fashionable. Targets were matched with
ordnance and aim-points to achieve the eect desired a function that had long been the purview of the aviators
executing the strike and not the operational planners who tasked it. As the mentality shited from targets to exact
aim-points, sotware programs were developed to meticulously select and analyze targets using mathematical models
to compute percentages of probabilities in order to determine the likelihood of meeting oten-arbitrary damage and
eect criteria. These were used at headquarters to nominate and garner approval from senior leaders, providing
command elements with the illusion that airpower application was strictly controllable, and sanitary questing for
immaculate warfare (https://sites.duke.edu/lawre/2016/10/17/exclusive-hays-parks-on-human-shields-andrestrictive-rules-of-engagement/).
The quest failed. The so-called bug-splat programs were collections of averages and assumptions that bore no
resemblance to the real world. Bombs explode, throwing fragments and debris. Blast-shattered glass causes
gruesome injuries, combustibles burn, and buildings collapse. People who were not nearby when a weapon was
released became victims a mere 30 seconds later when the weapon arrived. Weapons dud, ricochet, or broach in
unintended directions. Collateral damage recurred, and recurred again, and kept on recurring. The controllable use of
force was anything but.
Limiting Precision
The use of precision weapons had dropped unintended casualties to levels unimagined mere decades before but
they had not dropped to zero and anything more than zero became politically unpalatable. And so the handcus
emerged, in the form of increasingly higher levels of approval, oten by individuals with no airpower expertise
hundreds
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thousands of miles from the engagement. Because of the demonstrated ability of a precision weapon to
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limit unintended damage,
particularly against civilian targets, they were wrapped in a semi-impermeable shield of
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that limits
their use.
This manifested itself in increasingly complex rules of engagement that became dicult to negotiate in the real
world. During the height of the 2010 Afghanistan surge (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/afghanistan-
war-strategy-during-the-surge/2012/06/22/gJQAd6eEwV_graphic.html), aircrew were burdened with no less than

three additional layers of multi-page tactical directives and strategic guidance papers from multiple parallel theater
commands, along with monthly tests and mandated group scenario discussions to ensure comprehension and
compliance by operators layered on top of legal rules of engagement and special instructions. By 2014 in Iraq, the
handcus evolved further into an iron maiden, with Army generals mandating an airborne real-time video feed
before personally granting approval for each and every air strike. If one of these generals were away from their desk
(i.e. sleeping or at a meeting), the ISIL target lived to ght another day. And, the potential warghting value of seizing
the initiative was lost.
The guiding philosophy changed: Because we are able to minimize civilian casualties with precision weapons, we
should eliminate them. Our own leadership, historically enamored with the potential for limiting U.S. casualties by
eective use of airpower, has mutated into insisting that we ght only casualty-free conicts, where the umbrella of
protection is extended everywhere. Hays Parks, the key architect of the ocial Department of Defense Law of War
Manual (http://www.defense.gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/Law-of-War-Manual-June-2015.pd), states this in a
bluntly obvious observation (https://sites.duke.edu/lawre/2016/10/17/exclusive-hays-parks-on-human-shields-andrestrictive-rules-of-engagement/): If you wish to assume responsibility for each civilian casualty incidental to a
lawful attack, your enemy and others will let you. Ironically, our warghting capabilities are being held hostage to a
fanciful, sanitized vision of war that has as its overriding goal not to hurt anybody. Our hammer has become a
feather.
Precision Handcus
Do or do not; there is no try
Master Yoda
The quest for enviable levels of precision has stretched over more than half a century, arriving at the point where we
can accurately place weapons within feet of our intended aimpoint, even in bad weather. We have increased stando
distances, allowing accurate weapons delivery to be accomplished without closing to point-blank range. In the
process, we have constructed our own straitjacket, insisting in a level of precision eects that we cannot reliably
deliver. The political airpower aspect of precision is paradoxical: While it was intended to minimize risk to U.S forces
and quickly achieve objectives to end conict, instead it is neutering our elded forces, prolonging conict, and
increasing both the political risk and the risk to warghters who go in harms way and yet cannot accomplish the
mission. The goal of minimizing unintended eects is both moral and necessary, but the expectation that we can
eliminate them is unrealistic. Combat is a nasty, dirty business a violent manifestation of policy options that
cannot be made clean, predictable or nice. If the desired policy is to avoid unnecessary destruction, then avoid the
military option as a policy choice. Precision will not allow policymakers to avoid the ruin inherent in war
destruction is the handmaiden of war, the second horseman. No one should long for war, but if a war is to be had,
there is a responsibility to act switly and decisively to bring about its end and to accept the consequences of that
choice rather than trying to avoid them. Airpower is not an easy way out.
Col. Mike Starbaby Pietrucha was an instructor electronic warfare oicer in the F-4G Wild Weasel and the F-15E Strike Eagle,
amassing 156 combat missions and taking part in 2.5 SAM kills over 10 combat deployments. As an irregular warfare operations
oicer, Colonel Pietrucha has two additional combat deployments in the company of U.S. Army infantry, combat engineer, and military
police units in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Maj. Mike Pako Benitez is an F-15E Strike Eagle Weapons Systems Oicer with over 250 combat missions spanning multiple
deployments in the Air Force and Marine Corps. He is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Weapons School and a former Defense Advanced
Research Agency (DARPA) fellow.
The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily relect the oicial policy or position of the Department of the Air
Force or the U.S. government.
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6 THOUGHTS ON POLITICAL AIRPOWER, PART II: THE SEDUCTIVE ALLURE OF PRECISION WEAPONS
Rick Sinnreich (https://plus.google.com/113666194216616533551) says:
November 30, 2016 at 12:37 pm (http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/political-airpower-part-ii-the-seductive-allure-of-precision-weapons/#comment-852416)
To the tag end of the last paragraph: Amen.
Log in to Reply (http://warontherocks.com/wp-login.php?redirect_to=http%3A%2F%2Fwarontherocks.com%2F2016%2F11%2Fpolitical-airpower-part-ii-the-seductive-allure-ofprecision-weapons%2F)
Digit says:
The authors point out a serious deciency in current political thinking. The relative lack of US personnel casualties coupled with the ability to shit the nancial costs o budget have
combined to allow our wannabe Machiavelli politicians to pursue military actions that have been ill advised both from a practical sense and from a cost-eectiveness standpoint. A
decision for a country to go to war should be founded in necessity, not merely upon the desire to prove (or disprove) some political think tanks most recent theory.
James B. (https://plus.google.com/108071111738301222488) says:

As recounted, precision was not sought to limit collateral damage, but to reduce friendly eort and casualties. However, once precision capabilities were achieved, it appeared possible to
use precision strikes to make wars cleaner and more palatable.
That this was largely a mirage was ignored by politicians (both civilian and uniformed) who wanted to believe the ction; abetted by military leaders who say value in perpetuating the lie.
Because of the mutual
valuehttps://plus.google.com/share?url=http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/politicalairpowerpartiitheseductiveallureofprecisionweapons/
in the myth of precision warfare, I dont expect it to be ever dispelled.
Twittercomfort and
Google+
http://www.linkedin.com/shareArticle?
What we canand mustdo is reprioritize end-to-end strategic planningLinkedIn
in our wars.
For too long, politicians (and I again include senior generals) have used precision bombing to send
messages without dening what the message is to be or who is to receive it, and exactly how that process would work. Very oten, it doesnt work, or we accidentally stumble onto a way to
compel our foe, but even in hindsight our political leaders are oten unclear on how they could haveor didwin the war. Whether our actions are precise and clean or blunt and messy, our
senior political and military leadership should have a umpteen-step chart explaining how every bomb we drop will inuence the enemy leadership to give us what we want.
Kanes says:
December 1, 2016 at 2:26 am (http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/political-airpower-part-ii-the-seductive-allure-of-precision-weapons/#comment-852439)
Another excellent article by men in the know.
We shouldnt in anyway encourage human shields. Wasting too much US defence costs on precision munitions is unwise. The right mix of precision and other ordnance would do.
Chris Carson (https://plus.google.com/116876672174548887899) says:

December 1, 2016 at 5:08 pm (http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/political-airpower-part-ii-the-seductive-allure-of-precision-weapons/#comment-852453)
A ne article. Not a popular view, I would imagine.
John Moughan says:

December 1, 2016 at 5:28 pm (http://warontherocks.com/2016/11/political-airpower-part-ii-the-seductive-allure-of-precision-weapons/#comment-852455)
Was in the service, was in medical. When asked to explain a surgical strike I said it was as if the surgeon did an appendectomy by stepping outside the door and tossing in a grenade.
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POLITICAL AIRPOWER, PART II: THE SEDUCTIVEALLURE OF

id=97VqVxT6S2oC&pg=PA67&lpg=PA67&dq=Paul+Doumer+Bridge&source=bl&ots=JT09rq84RK&sig=lOu6MqLXOghYxz_gvRjH17CHwo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwialvDZ6jNAhUEjz4KHUqiDW44ChDoAQgxMAQ#v=onepage&q=Paul%20Doumer%20Bridge&f=false) with Walleye bombs

The F-117 alone reported 400 weather-related misses or no-drops

(https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1365/MR1365.ch5.pd). In the next few years,

world. During the height of the 2010 Afghanistan surge (https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/afghanistan-

war-strategy-during-the-surge/2012/06/22/gJQAd6eEwV_graphic.html), aircrew were burdened with no less than

LOGISTICAL FRATRICIDE: THE COST OF

OFFSETTING AIR SUPERIORITY WITH

POLITICAL AIRPOWER, PART I: SAY NO

James B. (https://plus.google.com/108071111738301222488) says:

Chris Carson (https://plus.google.com/116876672174548887899) says:

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John Moughan says:

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