Armored Cav by Tom Clancy

Author:Tom Clancy [Clancy, Tom]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Technology & Engineering, General, United States, Armored Vehicles; Military, Military, Military Science, History
ISBN: 9780425158364
Google: aku_V8GmABwC
Amazon: 0425158365
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 1994-11-02T00:00:00+00:00

A cutaway of the Bell Helicopter-Textron OH-58D Kiowa Warrior scout/attack helicopter.

JACK RYAN ENTERPRISES LTD., BY LAURA ALPHER

Unfortunately, because it had to carry out other urgent commitments, the Army recalled its tiny fleet of AH-6s (and their special-ops crews). At the same time, the Army realized that an aircraft was needed to replace the AH-6s in the Persian Gulf, one that could be operated by regular Army Aviation troops.

In a little while they concluded that an OH-58D, modified to fire air-to-surface weapons, would do very nicely. In September of 1987, under a “black” program (the very existence of the program was secret) code-named PRIME CHANCE, the Joint Chiefs of Staff directed Bell Helicopter-Textron to convert fifteen OH-58Ds to an armed configuration. Completing prototyping, testing, and fabrication, the contractor delivered the first two aircraft to the Army less than one hundred days after go-ahead. Within seven months, fifteen PRIME CHANCE aircraft were delivered to the 1st Battalion of the 18th Aviation Brigade (assigned to XVIII Airborne Corps). The modifications to the basic OH-58D included:

• The installation of weapons pylons capable of taking AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, air-to-air Stingers, 2.75” Hydra-70 rockets, and a .50-caliber machine-gun pod.

• Uprating of the maximum continuous power of the engines and transmission from 455 to 510 shp, as well as use of a different lube oil to handle the high temperatures of the Persian Gulf.

• Installation of a mission equipment package consisting of an ARN-118 TACAN navigational receiver, a video recorder for use with the MMS, and some new avionics (an MIL STD 1553 data bus was already standard on the aircraft).

• An electronic-countermeasure suite consisting of an AN/APR- 39/44 RWR, and AN/ALQ-144 IR jammer.

• Ladders for overwater crew rescue.

• Shielding for the expected electromagnetic interference from the radars of the Navy ships that TF-118 would operate from.

Operated under the code name of TF-118, the PRIME CHANCE OH-58Ds rapidly swept the Persian Gulf of the Iranian forces harassing the tanker trade. After only a few engagements, the Iranian boghammers and mining vessels apparently decided not to mix it up anymore with the TF-118/Navy team. Shortly afterwards, the Iranians and Iraqis reverted to firing SCUD missiles on each other’s cities—while negotiating an armistice. In 1989, as the last convoy escorted by the U.S. Navy left the Persian Gulf, the last U.S. asset in the Gulf was an airborne PRIME CHANCE OH-58D watching the back door. So effective was the performance of the PRIME CHANCE OH-58Ds, in early 1990 the Secretary of the Army ordered that all 243 of the Army’s OH-58Ds be armed like the PRIME CHANCE aircraft, and that another eighty-one more be bought to meet the demand for the little helicopter with the big eye.

The dust from the Kuwait tanker escort operation had hardly settled when Saddam Hussein’s forces invaded Kuwait in August of 1990. Immediately, the fifteen PRIME CHANCE aircraft (now assigned to the 4th Squadron of the 17th Cavalry, XVIII Airborne Corps), as well as the rest of the OH-58D population, were sent to the Persian Gulf to serve in Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.

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