Defence Director

An Air Of Optimism

Air Commodore Stuart Atha discusses the decisive role of air power in Afghanistan and how it continues to develop against the backdrop of recent success both in Helmand and the country as a whole

Air Commodore Stuart Atha recently returned to the UK from his role as Air Officer Commanding No 83 Expeditionary Air Group to take up his new role as the Ministry of Defence’s Head of Joint Capability. Along with the Maritime Component Commander, Air Cdre Atha was one of two regional UK commands in the current theatre of operations. His geographical area of responsibility roughly aligned with the US Central Command, encompassing responsibilities from the Horn of Africa, the Gulf of Oman up to Afghanistan, an area of two million square miles, although the latter area is clearly the immediate priority.

“There is an air of definite optimism in theatre,” Air Cdre Atha commented. “There are three things that changed during my time in command. The first was the explicit declaration of political support that we received from a range of leaders in the US, UK and the Coalition. Importantly, this support has been accompanied by increased military muscle. The uplift announced at the beginning of December by President Obama could be, I believe, the tipping point in this campaign. The third crucial change is leadership and primarily General McChrystal’s leadership (I would also highlight General Carter’s leadership of the southern region). McChrystal has delivered a masterclass in leadership through his clear expressions of intent and personal scrutiny, visibility and encouragement.”

The importance of the human element of war in Afghanistan extends down to the level of the individual in the conduct of the air campaign. Air Cdre Atha said: “There is a real danger that one focuses overly on technology rather than on the role of people. The aggregate of the air contribution is not always well understood. There are three main roles that we are employed in: the reconnaissance and surveillance role; air mobility and air lift ranging from a Hercules doing aeromedical evacuation through to Tristars bringing in the troops from the UK; and the third capability is the attack role. In the case of the latter we have technologically made leaps forward in my time deployed. For example we introduced Brimstone, which is the most capable low collateral weapon on any fast air platform in theatre. It is discriminate, it is precise and it is delivered by the crews with great judgment. This judgment is a strength of the UK Armed Forces when employing technology. It is not just about how good the technology is; it is about the man and the judgment he uses when employing the technology. Crucially, one of the principal lessons we have learned from our time in Afghanistan and elsewhere is how civilian casualties can undermine all manner of good efforts.”

Panchai Palang to Moshtarak

Air Cdre Atha was the Air Component Commander during both Operation Panchai Palang in July 2009 and the more recent Operation Moshtarak in February this year. He addresses the parallels and differences between them.

First he believes that Panchai Palang set the condition for this year’s operation: “Moshtarak is a continuation of what we have been doing previously. In terms of the capabilities that we have there and the scheme of manoeuvre, Panchai Palang and Moshtarak were quite different. In Moshtarak, the risks from an air perspective were higher in that it was quite a bold insertion using helicopters. We spent a lot of time, many hours airborne, in the days and weeks prior to the operation using our ISR assets to better understand the challenge we were going to face. The risk was greater in some respects than Panchai Palang because of the number of troops deploying on the ground simultaneously.”

Unlike Operation Panchai Palang, when the US Marine Corp conducted Op Kanjari in parallel, Moshtarak was a single cohesive operation. Air Cdre Atha said: “Brig James Cowan [Commander of Task Force Helmand] wanted to use simultaneity to confuse and to overwhelm the insurgents. Moshtarak was aptly named because its success rested on the togetherness of coalition forces and the Afghan National Security Forces and on civilians working together with the military. Gen Carter’s role, sitting alongside his military and civilian counterparts, has been absolutely pivotal; as the two star commanding the Coalition Task Forces, he ensured that all efforts were properly synchronised.”

To illustrate the integration of Coalition Air Power, Air Cdre Atha cited the example of landing helicopters without moonlight, while avoiding enemy fire. “We came up with a plan using flares to illuminate the battlefield. We put together a plan and then worked with the air staffs in Regional Command (RC) South, in Kabul and in the Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC) to make it work.

“The [resulting] plan for the insertion was intimately supported by Tornado and A10s, flying as a co-ordinated package alongside a USMC C-130 putting out flares. In addition, there was an enormous umbrella of ISR assets sitting above and beyond the operating area, using their wide area sensors to focus other ISR sensors with a narrower field of view on areas of particular interest. For example we used the ASTOR GMTI (Ground Moving Target Indicator) capability to detect the movement of vehicles and Full Motion Video from Reaper to identify them. Unsurprisingly, a lot of the effort was focused on the helicopter landing sites.

“The scale of the ISR support was significant; Moshtarak enjoyed ISR support that was over double that provided in Iraq during the invasion in 2003. ISR is one area where the quantity and quality of support has increased immeasurably from where we were before.”

Air power across the coalition is managed in two main ways: supporting day-to-day operations and, less frequently, for specific set piece operations.

The various task forces will typically place a request for air support and, in the case of the UK, flow through RC South, which will put them in a priority order. The operational priorities are laid out in Kabul and Gen Rodriguez, the three star US Army General who heads up the ISAF Joint Command, works with senior airmen to prioritise the request. Once the request is prioritised, it goes across the CAOC at Al Udeid where they then allocate resources against those tasks.

In addition to theatre asset, the UK and other nations have their organic assets such as the Hermes 450 to be used in specific areas, which in exceptional circumstances can also be used in other areas.

Wide area surveillance

Afghanistan’s large ungoverned places, particularly its sensitive border areas, put the Coalition’s wide surveillance capabilities at a premium, which is an area where the UK provides a leading role. While the UK contributes 5-8% of the Coalition’s overall airpower, in niche areas like GMTI, Air Cdre Atha said that the UK “contributes a good 40% through Sentinel R1/ASTOR and Sea King Airborne Surveillance and Area Control.”

ASTOR is deployed predominantly in the south, a function of its unrefueled time on station, flying in from its base outside Afghanistan. It does deploy elsewhere in the country, notably in the east where it was used in Operation Yukon Recovery to search for a US soldier taken hostage. Air Cdre Atha said: “ASTOR flies much higher than the US equivalent and in mountainous terrain, the higher you can fl y, the better. The US is impressed by ASTOR’s capability and we often work closely with their JSTAR to provide a continuous GMTI presence.”

Air Cdre Atha explained that work is continually undertaken to maximise interoperability between UK and US and other NATO and Coalition allies. He points to one current example, Project BIISTO (British Integrated ISR Support to Operations). “This has a wide-ranging remit to improve the way that ISR is used in theatre, including how we plan, task and exploit it. No longer do you just send a platform out there and exploit it in isolation – seeking synergies from the interaction with all the other platforms is much more important – it is how you work together as a team. Success in Afghanistan will be absolutely dependent on all 43 nations being able to tap into capabilities so that whoever needs information on the ground gets it.”

During Air Cdre Atha’s tour, he has seen the transition from the Harrier to Tornado as well as other enhancements to capabilities. Within that tour, he points to three particular areas: first, the Brimstone missile, described as “the most discrete, low collateral weapons in theatre”; secondly, the RAPTOR pod, which can capture imagery of the entire Moshtarak area in a single sortie, and of which “the quality of the imagery is the best that you will find in theatre”; and the third benefit he has seen is from the Tornado two man as opposed to a one man crew. Air Cdre Atha said: “The thing that worries aircrew most is not the insurgents; it is the risk of hitting another aircraft. In Helmand, we have the most densely congested complex and dynamic airspace in the world. Simply having the extra guy in the cockpit gives you much greater capacity to operate safely.”

Serviceability of the Tornado aircraft has been very high and for extended periods of time – amounting weeks – operational availability has been 100%. There are eight Tornados in theatre: four to six aircraft are fl own each day and two aircraft are at very high readiness on the ground to respond at short notice. Air Cdre Atha said: “They have never been caught short or found wanting in that ability to respond at very short notice.”

Air Cdre Atha sees the speed of Tornado to be a definite advantage: “There remains a need for speed in Afghanistan. It is 1,100 miles from the south-west to the north-east of the country and, while we fly in accordance to a range of priorities, the top priority is when troops are in contact. Our job is to respond as quickly as we can to get attack aircraft overhead the soldiers in danger. We do this time and time again, very quickly.” He points to the example of the Taliban’s large-scale, almost conventional attack on the US FOB Keating in which initially USAF F-15 and A-10 aircraft, subsequently supported by Tornados, were used to defeat the attack. Air Cdre Atha commented: “If the air component had not reacted so quickly we could have seen considerable losses on the ground.” <<

Air Commodore Stuart Atha, Head of Joint Capability at the Ministry of Defence, spoke to Adam Baddeley