Strategic Air Power in Desert Storm by Olsen John Andreas

Author:Olsen, John Andreas
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis (CAM)

THE IRAQI MILITARY APPARATUS

The third of Saddam’s overarching pillars of power, the Iraqi military system, was similar to its political counterpart in the sense that there was a formal and an informal structure. The Iraqi military organisation, reflecting the society at large, was based on divide-and-rule with the power vested in Saddam, and although Iraqi military officers had reasonable social status, especially after the perceived victory over Iran, the depoliticisation of the armed forces had resulted in their detachment from real political influence.906 Consequently, generals had little say in policy-making and threat assessments. The military system was also hierarchical in the extreme, but with some officers having influential positions in the Party, and others coming from specific tribes, the real power did not relate to the rigidity of the command structure. Thus, through a rigid command structure and crosscutting patterns that only Saddam knew, the centralisation of the military was complete. For example, the Iraqi leader conducted much of the war against Iran from a bunker underneath the presidential palace, getting involved in details from platoon level action to the bombing of concrete targets. High-ranking generals had to defer to the President on even the smallest matters.907 All three military services were heavily infiltrated by Party officials and members of the security and intelligence apparatus to the degree that even small military exercises had to be approved by the Military Bureau.908 According to former Iraqi army officer Colonel Hasan Khafaji, whenever large military movements were to take place, they had to be approved by the Military Bureau, the Ministry of Defence and Military Intelligence.909

Under Saddam Hussein Iraq developed the largest military force in the Arab Middle East: two-and-a-half times the size of the second largest, the Egyptian force. Such size reflected the demands of the war with Iran after 1980, but also at work were the regional aspirations of Saddam Hussein and his predecessor, both of whom recognised that regional preponderance necessitated armed forces to match. The attendant problem, however, was obvious: powerful armed forces presented a threat to the President and his regime. The solution they found was to bring the military under civilian control, by relying on tribe and family members in elite military forces, commanding divisions and army groups, and establishing the Republican Guard and internal security forces. They also feared that a military threat might just as easily come from within, from either Kurds in the north or Shia in the south. Consequently, the security element became predominant in the Iraqi armed forces,910 and the command highly centralised in the person of the President and his ruling clan. At first glance, nevertheless, the Iraqi military structure reflected the traditional tri-service system: the Army, the Air Force and the Navy.911 The Army was by far the most important, but it was complemented by the Republican Guard and the Ba’ath Party’s para-military army, the Popular Army.912 Only the Army, Navy and Air Force reported to the Ministry of Defence: the Popular Army reported to the Military Bureau of

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