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Some U.S. commanders say there will be no attack on the ground until the fighting power of the Republican Guards has been reduced 30% to 50%. So far, allied air attacks have made only limited progress toward that goal. A senior U.S. official says the Iraqis are well dug in and so far seem to be riding out the bombing. "These are first-rate troops," he says. "We're seeing that they know how to disperse and protect themselves." Adds Michael Dewar, deputy director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London: "There is a massive amount of Iraqi firepower. Heavy bombing and artillery fire will destroy some of it but not all. There will be tough fighting."
The central question is not how much punishment the allies can inflict but how much the Iraqis are ready to absorb. Saddam claims that Iraq can accept large numbers of casualties but the U.S. cannot because public opinion will quickly turn against the war. His Foreign Minister, Tariq Aziz, told U.S. Secretary of State James Baker that Iraq could hold out for a year or even two. Both Iraqis have probably miscalculated again.
In due course, Saddam will get his wish. An allied ground assault will be needed, if only to mop up the remaining Iraqi force in Kuwait. But when the U.S.-led onslaught begins, it will not be an assault of the Iranian variety. To begin with, it will come in more than one place: a broad flanking movement far to the west, for example, possibly accompanied by a Marine amphibious landing in Kuwait and multiple feints at the fortified front as well. Because the Iraqis have no reconnaissance planes in the air and no battlefield intelligence aside from what they can see over their sand walls, they will not know which thrust is the main one. They are also blinded by a shortage of night-fighting equipment and their inability to communicate with each other under electronic jamming.
The U.S. and its allies do not have the 3-to-1 superiority in manpower that classic military theory says the attacker should have to be confident of victory. They do hold the great advantage of choosing the point at which they will aim their assault and massing great local superiority there. Using artillery and air attacks with cluster bombs, they will try to knock out Iraqi guns and troop emplacements.
Iraq's artillery is modern and highly capable. Among other things, its arsenal includes hundreds of South African G-5s, probably the best field guns in the world, with a range of more than 20 miles. The artillery force has serious weaknesses, though. First, Iraq has no spotter planes in the air, and its artillerymen will be unable to shoot at anything they cannot see in front of them. Second, almost all the Iraqi guns have to be towed around by trucks. That means they can be pinpointed by allied artillery and aircraft, and the huge quantities of shells piled behind them will make for mighty explosions when hit. If the Iraqis try to move the guns, they will become an inviting target for air attack.