1991 Persian Gulf War longer and deadlier.

The Iraqi Air Force is going to be destroyed one way or the other, whether it is in the air or on the ground. If it takes to the air and fights it out, they will at least take a few Coalition aircraft with them. Even assuming a 5-1 kill ratio in favor of the Coalition (and that's probably being generous to the Iraqis), that's a fair number of American and Allied jets being shot down. And for the few days it takes for the air battle to be won, Coalition aircraft will not be able to focus their efforts on ground attack, which buys the Iraqis a little more time.

I think 5 or 6 to 1 is reasonable enough since it would include attack aircraft and helicopters as well as fighters. I doubt many (probably none) F15s and F14s would be lost but a army blackhawks aren`t quite so superlative in air to air combat.
 
Guys why are we talking about a direct engagement against the USA?
Why fight in the desert in the South where the Americans can use their technological superiority to the at most? Why not fight in the cities and river valleys of Iraq where there are plenty of cover , civilians, and most importantly to the coalition oil infrastructure? Have Iraq hide it's air force in hangers, under camouflage nets, or in the North as a reserve: the coalition can only maintain a high tempo aerial campaign for so long and every amateur historian knows how the air force is constantly overestimating damages inflicted. Stock up and dig in the cities and wait it out, the bloodiest battles in history are done in cities. The Coalition will find it much harder to overrun the Iraqi army in the city before shortages and causalities taint any quick victory.
 
Guys why are we talking about a direct engagement against the USA?
Why fight in the desert in the South where the Americans can use their technological superiority to the at most? Why not fight in the cities and river valleys of Iraq where there are plenty of cover , civilians, and most importantly to the coalition oil infrastructure? Have Iraq hide it's air force in hangers, under camouflage nets, or in the North as a reserve: the coalition can only maintain a high tempo aerial campaign for so long and every amateur historian knows how the air force is constantly overestimating damages inflicted. Stock up and dig in the cities and wait it out, the bloodiest battles in history are done in cities. The Coalition will find it much harder to overrun the Iraqi army in the city before shortages and causalities taint any quick victory.

They did hide their air force in hangars and under cam nets, that`s why 230 planes were destroyed on the ground. Hiding planes is not effective, concrete piercing guided bombs were used on HASs thought impregnable. Also the USAF put together a composite wing that operated out of Turkey once the air war started, which put pressure on the north of Iraq.
 
Is there massive refining capacity in SA? I thought they shipped out their crude for others to refine, especially the lighter fractions.
 
Saddam fortifies Baghdad and has most of the army make its stand there rather than out in the desert where it gets outmanuevered and strafed to pieces.

Baghdad falls after a long, bloody urban battle in which there are several thousand Coalition casualties and many times that number of Iraqi losses.
 
Is there massive refining capacity in SA? I thought they shipped out their crude for others to refine, especially the lighter fractions.

Not these days. The Saudis have been refining their own oil for quite a while. That is where the big money is after all.
 
Saddam fortifies Baghdad and has most of the army make its stand there rather than out in the desert where it gets outmanuevered and strafed to pieces.

Which results in the coalition overrunning Kuwait and going home. The coalition never went near Baghdad in OTL.
 
The major POD with this would have to be Saddam's initial planning; anything from the actual invasion onwards would have negligible butterflies and still end in a serious curbstomping. He tried to fight it like Iran-Iraq II, but months of entrenching can only do so much if you have zilch air superiority. The thing to remember here is that Saddam was gambling that no one would actually step in once he took control of Kuwait; all he really wanted was nullification of his war debts with Iran, some quick cash from the Kuwaiti coffers and a firmer grip on oil output and price control to help refill his own depleted treasury. Once the pressure from the UN began to step up to get him out, he began playing for time with delaying tactics such as solving the issue through an Arabs only summit, or offering to pull out only once the Palestinian question was settled. He always figured he'd have enough time to intimidate his neighbors while he resettled enough Kuwaiti's to skew their demographics in favor of his "19th Province" plan.

I like the idea of him just expanding the operation to simply include Kuwait as part of a larger sweep into Saudi Arabia. It'd serve as a spoiler to U.S. defensive plans and limit Coalition responses for the immediate future to an amphibious assault or a more limited buildup in Bahrain or Qatar. Certainly not the lengthy, overwhelming buildup Coalition forces were able to do OTL. There's certainly pontential for some bloodier engagements if we increase the operations area by that magnitude, and it opens up a whole slew of possible strategic responses.

The downside to this is that the logistics buildup needed for an operation of this scale would be easily spotted on the border by both U.S. and Soviet satellites, possibly throwing a kink into things. We wouldn't have pre-emptive U.S. naval airstrikes ('03, yes. '90, hell no.) to disrupt the columns, but it could help speed along U.S.-Saudi negotiations to get military assistance into the country.
 
Top