Wings of Fire: A Combat History of the F-15 by Mike Guardia

Author:Mike Guardia [Guardia, Mike]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Military Combat History, Aircraft, F-15
Publisher: Magnum Books
Published: 2020-02-22T00:00:00+00:00

While American F-15Cs and F-15Es destroyed Iraqi targets on the ground and in the air, the Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) made extensive use of their own F-15s. Throughout most of the twentieth century, the Kingdom of Saud had relied on Great Britain for its aircraft imports. However, the Shah’s demise in Iran left Saudi Arabia feeling “distinctly exposed” in the early 1980s.

The RSAF had wanted to purchase the F-14 Tomcat, both for its long-range capabilities and to counter “the fact that the Iranian Shah’s F-14s had potentially fallen into the wrong hands.” Nevertheless, the Saudis ultimately selected the F-15 Eagle along with select deliveries of the F-16 Fighting Falcon and five E-3 AWACS. By this point, however, the Saudi F-15s had seen little action, although two had been credited with downing a pair of Iranian F-4Es that violated Saudi airspace in 1984. By 1990, the RSAF operated more than sixty F-15 airframes.

On January 24, 1991, the RSAF scored its only aerial kill in Desert Storm. Captain Ayehid Salah Al-Shamrani, assigned to the No. 13 Squadron, engaged and destroyed two Iraqi Mirage F-1 fighters over the Persian Gulf. Details of the engagement remain sketchy, but it’s generally accepted that Al-Shamrani was guided onto the Mirages by an American AWACS.

The pilot, however, struggled to complete his intercept.

As the AWACS talked him onto the Mirages’ position, Al-Shamrani fired two AIM-9 Sidewinders at the Iraqi jets before they could vector within striking distance of US naval vessels in the Gulf.

Although the Saudi government and the Western media confirmed the kill, the circumstances surrounding the engagement raised questions in the aviation community. As one American F-15 pilot noted: “There are several very valid questions to ask about these kills. Firstly, why is the pilot of an aircraft designed to kill BVR [from beyond visual range] doing a stern conversion to visual range without firing a shot? Secondly, where was his wingman during all of this? Thirdly, he fired both missiles while they were still ‘caged,’ if I recall correctly.” The term “caged” referred to a heatseeking missile that was still coupled to the radar when fired. Typically, firing a heat-seeker while “caged” was considered a faux pas.

Regardless, the RSAF spent most of Desert Storm doing what was called “Goalie CAPs”—uneventful air patrols that were purposely placed far away from the actual fighting. And while no Saudi F-15s were lost to enemy fire in Desert Storm, one Saudi pilot did defect to Sudan. On February 14, 1991, a Saudi F-15 pilot from No. 5 Squadron departed King Fahad Air Base. It was reported to the coalition’s Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC) that the F-15 had crashed. The CAOC was about to launch a search-and-rescue mission, when a CIA operative monitoring the Khartoum Airport called in and asked:

“What’s this Saudi F-15 doing on the runway here?”

The aircraft was later returned to Saudi Arabia—the pilot stating that he had defected because he “could not fight against his Muslim brothers.”

As the air campaign lumbered into its second month, coalition ground forces began their assault into Iraq on February 24, 1991.

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