The Real Iraqi Airforce(Saddam Era and before)

[silko]

The first gulf war, I wouldn't call 03 a war, By that time US of A and NATO already have broken back bone of Iraq and the so called "war" was nothing more than an excuse to officially step inside their land. Also i am talking about conventional air warfare here, we all know what happened when guerrilla war fare started there.

well, they just had a war with Iran for several years, they must have been exhausted. and a lot of planes and army vehicles where probably lost. and they didnt have the best equipped air force at that time, mainly because of sanctions.

 

[VelocuR]

Surprisingly, these Iraq Airforces was very advanced many resources availables than Pakistan currently today. How come they defeated by USA easily during wars? What jets they used during US invasion in 2003?

 

[TARIQ BN ZIYAAD]

they were under almost 13 years sanctions and u think with only these equipment they could face u.s , u.k , france etc

TARIQ

 

[gambit]

Saddam's airforce never did raised any serious fight against USAF right? looking at their hardware they should had been able to give atleast 1% fight? without flaming can we discuss what went wrong? morals?

You asked a very legitimate question and one that after Desert Storm many air force commanders asked themselves of the air forces under their commands. After all, the Iraqi Air Force was their peer. We are not talking about matching precisely hardware per hardware or exact numbers of pilots. We are talking about the overall status of the Iraqi Air Force in terms of experience, education, training, and hardware as compared to Iraq's neighbors. If YOU think the Iraqi Air Force should have given at least %1 of a fight, these commanders probably believed their air forces would have given the USAF much more casualties, part of that belief would be out of sheer national pride. So imagine their shock when the Iraqi Air Force basically crumbled on the FIRST day of Desert Storm.

What went wrong? Personally, and you call me bias if you wish and I will not object, it is NOT so much what the Iraqi Air Force did wrong as it was the Iraqi Air Force could not do anything else. If 'fortune favor the prepared' as the old saying goes, then there was nothing the Iraqi Air Force could have done because the USAF is the most prepared in the world. In my ten years in the USAF, I have been to several countries working with many foreign air forces and every one of them welcomed US because we bring the best training aids wherever we go. We can play the 'bad guys' all the time if they asked and we will be the best 'Red Force' any air force will find. And when you have that much of experience at playing war games that are just short of live shooting at live targets, when the time comes to shooting live ammo at live targets, it will pay off.

 

[Chogy]

Inventory of Saddams Iraqi AirForce(according to Roy Braybrook on operation desert storm)
-200 MIG-21(Including Chinese F-7)
-50-100 MiG-23MS (some with in-flight refuling capability)
-28 Mig-25 (8 were used for High altitude Reconnaissance)
-48+ MiG-29
-328 Mirage F1
-100 SU-7
-100 Mig-23BN
-60 Su-25
-50 MiG-19
-24 L-39
-50 Gazelle Helicopters
-50 Mi-24 Helicopters
-100 Mi-8
-6 An-12
-18 IL-76
-3 IL-76 modified for AEW role

I was active duty when 91 kicked off. My old squadron was deployed to KSA, and I knew those men... I knew what they were capable of in their brand-new F-15's. At the end of the 1980's, the USAF was at the absolute peak of its strength. Never before or since had the USAF been as potent in numbers and training. All of this came about because Reagan wanted to spend the Soviets into oblivion... So we had all the jets, parts, and fuel we'd ever have dreamed of for training.

If we could have an imaginary war of the 1990 USAF vs. the 2011 USAF, I'd take the 1990 force, purely based upon numbers and training.

Facing the USAF was a bit of a paper tiger. They had some hardware, but we knew they did not have the training and tactics to match. When the Air War kicked off, I told my wife, "If the Iraqis put up a fight, we'll have new jet aces inside of a week." What happened, as we now know, is that they put up a fight for maybe 3 days, and the losses were extraordinary. Nothing will kill a squadron morale worse than seeing 4 take off, and only one (or none) return. Soon, it became (for the Iraqis) "If we fly, we die." They stood down, then decided to run for Iran. We called them "Taco Bell missions" as in "Run for the border", an old Taco bell restaurant advertisement. The Taco Bell missions were all run, no fight, and while a lot of jets made it to Iran, a lot more were shot down enroute.

So in a nutshell, we had both training AND technology on our side, and the air war was very lopsided. That takes nothing away from the Iraqi pilots. It was out of their hands. Without excellent training, there is little they could have done. Kind of like trying to run a marathon but not training for it. You're going to get smoked by the guy who is in shape.

 

[silko]

so you where in active duty in the skies above Iraq?

if so, a fanboy question. DID YOU OR SOMEONE FROM YOUR SQUAD SHOT DOWN A PLANE!

a stupid question, but why didn't you follow the Iraqi planes even when they went inside the Irani airspace. you did that plenty of times in North-Korea. when the North-Korean jets flew inn to Chinese airspace.

 

[Chogy]

I did not fly in GW1. I had moved on to become an instructor pilot. It was painful not to be with them.

My old squadron - when they deployed, I knew them all and had trained some of them. I am friends with several who did score a victory. My wingman from B-flight shot down 2 Sukhois on a Taco Bell run. They all said "training was harder." Iraqi C & C was gone. No AWACS, no radar. We were able to follow them from the moment they took off.

It all goes to show that an air war is SO much more than the jets... just as important is training, communications, early warning, C & C, etc etc.

---------- Post added at 12:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:01 PM ----------

As for pursuit into Iran - there were issues with both sovereignty and fuel. There was enough Iraqi SAMS still in existence to make a tanker a fat target, and the tankers could not follow that far, thus the Eagles were at the extremes of their fuel to pursue very far. They all flew with three external fuel tanks, despite the performance penalty.

 

[silko]

I did not fly in GW1. I had moved on to become an instructor pilot. It was painful not to be with them.

My old squadron - when they deployed, I knew them all and had trained some of them. I am friends with several who did score a victory. My wingman from B-flight shot down 2 Sukhois on a Taco Bell run. They all said "training was harder." Iraqi C & C was gone. No AWACS, no radar. We were able to follow them from the moment they took off.

It all goes to show that an air war is SO much more than the jets... just as important is training, communications, early warning, C & C, etc etc.

---------- Post added at 12:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:01 PM ----------

As for pursuit into Iran - there were issues with both sovereignty and fuel. There was enough Iraqi SAMS still in existence to make a tanker a fat target, and the tankers could not follow that far, thus the Eagles were at the extremes of their fuel to pursue very far. They all flew with three external fuel tanks, despite the performance penalty.

I LOVE YOU

 

[longbrained]

An airforce not capable of fighting and always depending on foreign aids and pilots is no air force at all. I have more respect for Vietnamese airforce which put up a fight against American air force and despite heavy losses it produced several aces and inflicted heavy losses on US air force downing many fighter jets and even a B-52 bomber. Iraqi air force was only good when Yugoslavian fighter pilots and French and East German instructors/advisors were running it in 1980's. When they were gone after Kuwaiti invasion, it just became a national airline over night.

And by 2003, sanctions on a country with no industrial base had taken its toll. But the real reasons why there was no fight at all, was because morals were so low that no one wanted to put up their life for Saddam and his sons. And CIA had already bought Iraqi airforce general who just a week before the war had ordered all the aircrafts to be buried under tonnes of sand and gravel in essence destroying them. Second Death of IrAF

 

[longbrained]

Taking out foreign advisers and Soviet and European technologies out of the picture, the real indigenous technological capability of Saddam was nil. So he was just another joke on planet earth who had been propped up by funding of Gulf countries and thriving on French and East German advisers. After he fell out of favor with his masters, this was his real level of technology:

 

[baqai]

Chogy thanks a lot for taking out time and answering in detail, Just wondering in your opinion would PAF/IAF be a walk in the park for USAF too and would missions be Taco Bell or you think PAF/IAF would be able to give a 1% hard time?

Did you ever had a chance of watching one of our boys flying the Viper's, Okay i shall put my flame suit on again but do you think our pilots are really good as we like to claim? I just want your opinion on the level of training and professionalism you might have seen with our Pilots and Crew during your service.

 

[Chogy]

Baqai, I've been out of the loop too long, and I have no current real information. An effective air force combines modern hardware with so many things that are intangible, like the human element, and also stuff that is simply classified.

I don't believe Pakistan has built a paper Air Force. A lot of nations like to put on a show to deter enemies. If I've got $500 million, I could buy 10 F-16's, but have nothing left for spares and training. My enemy might see those jets and be deterred. But if I was smart, I'd buy 6 F-16's and use the remainder to keep them (and the pilots) at peak performance.

A paper Air Force will crumble under any real pressure. A real Air Force will put up a stiff fight, and in that case, it becomes a numbers game. If devoted to defensive operations, the scenario is more favorable. Almost all U.S. air to air losses in Vietnam were bomb-haulers like F-105's and F-100's shot down by defensive fighters. So if the posture is one of defense, a proportionally greater toll can be taken. If jets are sent on bombing and interdiction missions, it swings the other way.

To answer your main question, I don't know... I'm not just trying to be civil, I don't have enough information to form an opinion. But under no circumstances do I think the PAF would be anything like Iraq. The 1991 Iraq was a military and system ready to implode under its own incompetence.

 

[GHOST RIDER]

http://z3.invisionfree.com/Iraqi_Militaria_IMF/index.php?act=Attach&type=post&id=3328537

 

[GHOST RIDER]

Iraqi pilots in France for Mirage F1 training

 

[GHOST RIDER]