Kicking Vietnam Syndrome

This chapter focuses on how the new doctrines and technologies developed after Vietnam were put to the test in Iraq in 1991. Operation Desert Storm was based on extensive use of the technologies and strategies that the Fighter Mafia and the Reformers had opposed. John Boyd and his fellow Reformers had predicted a future war in which large fleets of aircraft battled for air superiority in ferocious dogfights. They argued that this hypothetical scenario demanded smaller, simpler aircraft, relying on the flying skill of the individual pilot. Furthermore, they assumed that the large all-weather radar of the F-15 Eagle was unnecessary and made it vulnerable. The Reformers also assumed that missiles would be useless. However, the skies over Iraq in 1991 debunked these assumptions as radar played a key role in gaining and maintaining air superiority; air-to-air combat did not involve the types of aircraft that the Reformers thought it should; and according to Western intelligence sources, Iraqi fighter pilots were poorly trained and inexperienced. For many observers, the Gulf War proved the Reformers wrong. On the other hand, the Reformers themselves took it as a validation. Most of the Reformers' ideas went untested in the Gulf War. What is clear is that the Reformers' vision was not applicable to all wars.