No-fly zones: lessons from the 1990s

Air Commodore (retd) Dr Peter Gray assesses the no-fly zones of the 1990s, imposed under UNSCR authority over Iraq and Bosnia, and seeks to draw practical lessons from them.

In Northern Iraq from 1991-2003, the Northern no-fly zone (NFZ) linked Western air policing operations with Kurdish political parties and militias. In combination they deterred Iraqi military action against the Kurds. This enabled the development of a stable, politically sophisticated and economically prosperous Kurdish Autonomous Zone. Its success has endured.

The Iraqi Kurdish area remained relatively peaceful throughout the post-2003 chaos. It is arguable that the Northern NFZ is the most successful single element of the entire UK military engagement with Iraq since 1991. In Southern Iraq from 1992-2003, the Southern NFZ was not imposed until 1992, after the brutal repression of the Shia was effectively complete.

There was no coherent Shia political structure accessible to the West and no appetite to take direct action to prevent Iraq draining the southern marshes on which the Shia depended for survival. It was therefore unable to achieve its humanitarian intent. As a wider policy instrument the Southern NFZ achieved more. In 1994, it was extended from latitude 32N to 33N. To prevent any re-attack on Kuwait, its terms were widened to become the air policing of a no-drive zone for Iraqi mechanised divisions.

In 1998 Operation Desert Fox was launched through the Southern NFZ against sites associated with the development of WMD in central Iraq. The capture of Iraq’s senior commanders in 2003 revealed that Desert Fox persuaded Iraq to abandon its manufacture of WMD.

In Bosnia from 1993-1995, the effectiveness of the Bosnian NFZ was limited by restricted Rules of Engagement preventing action against helicopters and poor coordination between Nato and the UN.

Its political impact was seriously undermined by a bitter dispute between European capitals and the Clinton administration over America’s preference to lift the arms embargo on the Bosnian Muslims and strike the Bosnian Serbs directly.

The experience of conflict in Iraq, Syria and Yugoslavia indicates that air forces equipped with 1970s and 1980s Soviet and French aircraft are comprehensively outmatched by air forces equipped with modern western aircraft and training. Technically and tactically, the US and Nato have also consistently proved their ability to sufficiently suppress ground-based air defence systems dating from the 1980s. Effective air operations do not necessitate the complete destruction of enemy air defence systems – indeed this was never achieved in Iraq or the Balkans.

American and RAF aircraft were regularly engaged by Iraqi surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft guns after December 1998. These were defeated by selfprotection countermeasures carried by all participating aircraft, by aircraft equipped with anti-radiation missiles designed to attack air defence radars, and by airborne jammers. The US remains the only nation with the range of electronic warfare capabilities to support sustained operations against a functioning air defence system.

Clear command and control to prevent the destruction of friendly military or civil aircraft is a prerequisite for any air operations. So are unambiguous Rules of Engagement.

Ambiguities that might allow transport aircraft and helicopters to fly, or civilian aircraft to be used for combat operations, provide obvious points of challenge. The Bosnian NFZ was rendered ineffective by the consistent use of helicopters, particularly by the Bosnian Serbs.

Effective air operations must be designed to affect the surface of the earth and influence protagonists. This necessitates the establishment of relationships with local political entities to link their indigenous military capability with the air forces operating above.

Air Commodore (retd) Dr Peter Gray is senior research fellow in air power studies at the University of Birmingham.

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