Eagle, I don't want to form an alliance anymore.

The Warsaw Pact coalition forces are on high alert, with several divisions deployed directly to the Lebanese and Syrian borders to prevent a surprise attack by Israel.

The Soviet Union had made its best efforts, but on the fourth night, two more Scud missiles were launched from western Iraq. One landed in a residential area south of Tel Aviv, and the other veered off course and landed in the sea.

If they won't listen to reason, they'll have to suffer the consequences. For the greater good, we have no choice but to take action against Iraq.

An hour later, on a secret line that had existed for decades but had never been publicly acknowledged, connecting the two intelligence agencies, a set of coordinates was transmitted from Moscow to Washington, containing detailed coordinates of many Iraqi military bases.

Less than six hours after the U.S. military obtained these coordinates, F-15E Strike Eagles took off from their base in Saudi Arabia and headed to western Iraq.

On January 29, no more Scud helicopters took to the skies.

Saddam had almost no missiles left to launch, and the skies over Israel finally fell silent.

On the afternoon of the 29th, Director Nian made a phone call to Baker.

"We have succeeded in containing Iraq, and Israel can now cease hostilities."

Baker paused for a moment on the other end of the phone: "Just to confirm, has Iraq officially committed to stopping the launches?"

"There has been no formal commitment. But with no missiles launched in the past twelve hours, we have achieved a de facto halt."

Baker had indeed noticed. He also had intelligence—a CIA analysis report stated that Scud missile sites in western Iraq had suffered heavy losses from precision strikes over the past two days.

As for how those precision strikes were accomplished, people on Defense Secretary Dick Cheney's side asked the CIA:

"When did we get such good intelligence on targets in western Iraq?"

The CIA's response was: "It's just an improvement to the satellite reconnaissance system."

No one asked any further questions.

"And what about Israel?"

"Israel has received our notification. They will reduce the intensity of their operations, but a complete halt requires confirmation that Iraq will not launch any more missiles."

"Give them a 72-hour observation period. If no new missiles are launched within 72 hours, Israel will cease its retaliatory actions."

“Yes, you must now also withdraw the Warsaw Pact troops stationed in Lebanon and on the Syrian-Israeli border back into Syria,” Baker said.

On January 30, the United States deployed Patriot missile defense systems in Israel. Israel announced that its retaliatory actions had achieved the desired results and suspended its attacks. Iraq, on the other hand, announced that the Palestinian issue had been brought back into focus and that there was no need to continue launching missiles.

The following day, Israel announced that it would send volunteer troops to the United States and join the Gulf War.

On February 1st, the largest air strike in the history of the Middle East wars began, codenamed:

"Epic Fury"

Chapter 117 A disgrace...

Both the US and the Soviet Union believed that this full-scale air strike would quickly destroy most of Iraq's military facilities. At present, the Iraqi Air Force is basically not deployed, and ground radars are facing attacks from F-117 stealth fighter-bombers as soon as they are turned on. Theoretically, Iraq should have no ability to resist.

To everyone's surprise, Operation Epic Fury in the United States turned into Operation Epici Fury in just a few days.

On February 3, two of the U.S. military's most advanced F-117 stealth fighter-bombers were shot down by Iraq's outdated air defense system.

The core design logic of the F-117 is completely different from traditional penetration strategies. Traditional non-stealth aircraft do rely heavily on SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defenses) when performing missions—first using anti-radiation missiles to attack radar stations, or using electronic jammers to suppress radar signals, creating a corridor for subsequent aircraft. However, the F-117 does not require this process. Its multifaceted shape and radar-absorbing coating compress the radar cross-section to about the size of a ping-pong ball.

In theory, even if Iraq's Soviet-made radar system at the time were turned on and scanned at full power, it would be difficult to capture a stable echo within the effective range.

On the first night of the Gulf War, F-117s flew directly into Baghdad to carry out strikes while Iraq's entire air defense network was intact and all radars were online. Throughout the Gulf War, F-117s flew approximately 1300 missions with zero casualties!

However, the F117 is not invincible. Its stealth technology is mainly aimed at the high-frequency band commonly used by fire control radar. Its stealth effect against low-frequency radars such as meter-wave and decimeter-wave radars will be reduced because the scattering characteristics will change when the radar wavelength is close to or exceeds the details of the aircraft skin.

Although low-frequency radar has poor accuracy, weak tracking and fire control capabilities, and can usually only provide early warning and cannot directly guide weapon strikes, Iraq's static air defense system has a tradition of box-type firing.

It doesn't pursue precision guidance, but relies on dense missile and anti-aircraft artillery barrages to kill targets.

PS: Historically, Yugoslavia successfully shot down an F-117 using meter-wave radar when facing bombing by the US military.

In previous transactions with Iran, Iraq acquired a large amount of older equipment from Iran's stockpile, including many meter-wave and decimeter-wave radars and anti-aircraft missiles. After a large number of advanced radars were destroyed by Iraq's air defense forces in the days before the start of the war, Iraq began to deploy these older radars for air defense.

On the evening of February 3, a squadron of F-117s headed to attack a military base near Baghdad. At the time, Iraqi air defense positions happened to be located in the flight corridor and were kept on continuous alert to defend Baghdad. The waveforms read by the old radar were interpreted as targets, and the air defense forces hastily launched a large number of anti-aircraft missiles.

Two F117 formations were preparing to drop bombs when they were caught off guard by a swarm of anti-aircraft missiles and anti-aircraft guns! Although the F117 has strong stealth capabilities, infrared-guided missiles can still track it. After hastily dropping a large number of decoy flares, the two F117s were caught up by the missile swarm and subsequently crashed.

And so, one of the most advanced aircraft in the U.S. military was shot down by Iraq by sheer luck.

The destruction of their decisive weapons by the backward barbarians was a huge shock to the US military. To this day, the US military still does not know how Iraq did it. Before finding the reason, the Pentagon will not send F117s into Baghdad's air defense network as originally planned - no one dares to explain to Congress and the media that "our stealth myth has been penetrated by Iraq's old radar and we still have to send them".

On February 4th, the alternative was immediately implemented, at the cost of increased efficiency and risk: the US military replaced the F-117 with Tomahawk cruise missiles to engage the most dangerous targets, and paired non-stealth aircraft such as the F-15E and F-111 with heavier electronic warfare escorts for penetration.

It's like bringing back the tactics used in the Vietnam War in the 70s.

The news of the F-117 being shot down was suppressed by the US military, while the Soviet Union publicized Iraq's success in shooting down a new US warplane. Iraq, in an effort to boost domestic morale, also broadcast their success to the Arab world. As the news continued to spread, the truth could no longer be concealed, and Congress convened a hearing on the 14th.

On the 11th, anti-war sentiment fueled by the opposition was rising. The US military, having just emerged from the shadow of the Vietnam War, relied heavily on the myth of zero casualties as a key narrative pillar to appease domestic public opinion. The shattering of this myth, coupled with economic recession, strengthened anti-war and pro-negotiation political forces.

The Ghephat government was caught in a dilemma: either escalate the situation to demonstrate its resolve and quickly resolve the Kuwaiti crisis, or take the opportunity to back down and slink away, leaving behind the myth that Iraq forced NATO to withdraw a million troops from the Middle East simply by shooting down two of the most advanced US aircraft.

The answer is obvious.

On the 12th, the coalition launched its largest bombing campaign yet. The U.S. military deployed a large number of B-52 bombers to bomb Iraqi front-line positions. These behemoths, with wingspans of nearly 60 meters and designed for nuclear bombing during the Cold War, took off from bases on Diego Garcia and in northern Saudi Arabia and flew in formation toward Kuwait.

They flew over the Iraqi infantry positions and opened the bomb bay doors. Dozens of bombs detached from their racks one after another, like a string of black seeds falling to the ground from thousands of meters above.

A single bombing run by a B-52 can cover an area approximately one kilometer long and several hundred meters wide. Within that rectangular area, bombs fall one after another, exploding less than a second apart.

For those few seconds, the entire ground seemed to be repeatedly hammered by an invisible giant hand. Sand, gravel, shrapnel, and fragments of human bodies churned within that rectangle, mixed with the shockwave.

This is carpet bombing.

A single B-52 bomber can cover an area the size of a football field. After several waves of B-52 bombing, only God knows how many Iraqi infantry brigade soldiers, crammed into trenches and bunkers in the desert, will still be combat-ready.

Following the bombing raids came the A-10 Warthog attack aircraft, the ugliest yet deadliest tank killer in the world. It was armed with a seven-barreled 30mm Gatling gun on its nose, firing nearly four thousand depleted uranium armor-piercing rounds per minute. The depleted uranium core was two and a half times denser than steel, allowing it to penetrate the top armor of a T-72 tank when fired from the air.

"Buzz—Boom!"

The A-10 flew low over Iraqi armored positions, its cannons roaring as depleted uranium rounds streaked across the tanks, leaving a glowing trajectory. The tanks' top armor was penetrated, and the rounds, once inside, shattered and burned, triggering a secondary explosion.

Tanks exploded from the inside, their turrets blown off, and flames spewed out from every seam.

There were also AC-130 gunships, which operated at night, equipped with 105mm howitzers, 40mm Bofors cannons, and 25mm Gatling guns. They circled over targets, using thermal imaging systems to search for heat sources on the ground in the dark—truck engines, tank exhaust pipes, even a campfire surrounded by a group of soldiers—before picking them off one by one with their artillery.

On the AC130's thermal imaging screen, Iraqi soldiers appeared as white, humanoid blobs. These blobs moved, and then disappeared when a shell landed.

This is not Vietnam; there are no vast jungles and mountains to defend the area, and Iraqi troops have virtually nowhere to hide in the desert.

Infrared signatures are extremely clear against the desert background—during the day, the metal vehicle body is hotter than the sand under the sunlight; at night, the residual heat of the engine shines like a lamp in thermal imaging.

Iraq's camouflage and evacuation measures were largely ineffective against the US reconnaissance system. Some Iraqi units attempted to bury their tanks in sand dunes, leaving only the turrets exposed; others created decoys; and still others tried to maneuver at night, but all these efforts were unsuccessful.

After abandoning the F-117's stealth penetration and surgical strike capabilities, the US military feels it has reverted to the Korean and Vietnam model. Back then, the US used Van Fleet ammunition in the Battle of Shangganling in Korea and Operation Rolling Mine in Vietnam; now, in the Middle East, the coalition has flown over 5 sorties in just half a month of airstrikes!

On average, more than 3,000 planes fly over Iraq and Kuwait every day, more than 100 every hour. From day to night, from dawn to dusk, there are always planes overhead, always the roar of engines, and always the possibility of bombs falling on our heads at any moment!

By the 15th, the Iraqi infantry divisions stationed along the southern Kuwaiti defense line had lost approximately 50% of their combat effectiveness. Many divisions were on the verge of collapse in terms of both actual combat capability and organization, making it difficult to mount a proper counterattack.

The soldiers were psychologically broken after weeks of bombing. They were hungry and thirsty, their supply lines were cut off by air raids, and trucks carrying food were destroyed on the roads.

Large numbers of Iraqi soldiers began to desert. They slipped away from their positions, abandoning their weapons and uniforms, attempting to blend in with Kuwaiti civilians. Some even went to the coalition lines, waving white flags and leaflets—the coalition had airdropped a large number of Arabic leaflets before the battle, informing Iraqi soldiers of the surrender procedures and guarantees.

The Republican Guard, Saddam's most elite force, remained unmoved in the rear. This force was deployed by Saddam within Iraq to protect his rule.

The ground battle began in the early hours of February 16.

Allied commander Schwarzkopf's plan—later known as "the left hook":

The coalition forces launched a feint attack on the front. On the eastern front, troops advanced from Kuwait's southern border, tasked with recapturing Kuwait City. On the central front, two US Marine Corps divisions and one Army armored brigade broke through the defenses from southwest Kuwait. These two directions served as a diversionary tactic—making Iraq believe the main attack was concentrated there.

The real main attack is on the west side.

The U.S. Seventh Army's 1st Armored Division, 3rd Armored Division, 1st Infantry Division, and the British 1st Armored Division departed from northwestern Saudi Arabia, crossed the Iraqi border, and made a large-scale eastward detour, with the aim of outflanking the Republican Guard's flanks and rear.

Further west, the French 6th Light Armored Division and the US 82nd Airborne Division and 101st Airborne Division were responsible for protecting the left flank of the flanking maneuver, while cutting off the highway from Baghdad to Basra—they wanted to cut off the Iraqi reinforcements' southward advance.

One to the left, one to the right; one feinting, one real. They distracted Iraq from the front while delivering a powerful blow to its side.

The attack began at four in the morning.

The result was almost one-sided, with the Arab coalition forces on the eastern front and the marines on the central front breaking through Iraqi defenses much faster than anyone expected—including Schwarzkopf himself.

The defensive line Iraq built in southern Kuwait, with its trenches, sand embankments, barbed wire, and minefields, looks terrifying. The trenches are filled with oil ready to be ignited, the sand embankments are piled up several meters high, and the minefields stretch for dozens of kilometers.

But the actual method used by the US military to break through was simple and brutal. Armored bulldozers drove up to the sand dunes, lowered their blades, and roared as they flattened the dunes section by section. Sand gushed out from both sides of the blades like water. Some trenches still had Iraqi soldiers crouching in them, and they were buried along with the sand by the bulldozers.

Large numbers of Iraqi soldiers crawled out of their trenches, waving white flags, to surrender. Many of them had been without food and water for days, and they were relieved to see coalition tanks approaching.

So many people surrendered that the Allied advance was slowed down by the handling of prisoners—after all, the U.S. military had to register, search, disarm, give them water and food, and transport them to POW camps in the rear.

They surged forward in groups, hundreds and thousands of people lining up with their hands raised.

The marines on the central front advanced dozens of kilometers in a single day, while the Arab coalition forces on the eastern front reached the outskirts of Kuwait City within two days.

As for the frontal defenses—Saddam spent months building what he touted as "insurmountable," but they have been torn apart like paper.

The western front is the real main offensive target. Although the White House assured Moscow that it would not overthrow Iraq and would at most only make minor incursions along the border, this restriction has become quite flexible in practice. Coalition Commander Schwarzkopf believes that if the elite Iraqi forces in the west are not dealt with, US troops may face brutal urban warfare in Kuwait.

The U.S. Seventh Army armored forces traversed a desert that Iraq considered impassable at extremely high speeds. This desert had no road signs, nothing to guide the way, but the U.S. military had one thing Iraq lacked—GPS.

Each M1A1 tank commander was equipped with a GPS receiver. In a desert devoid of any landmarks, the GPS provided them with precise location. Their formation traversed the desert at a speed of thirty to forty kilometers per hour, turning eastward, heading straight for the Republican Guard's flank!

The Iraqis did not know they were coming.

The Republican Guard's attention was entirely focused on the south, as the offensive on the front and center had already begun. They assumed the main attack was in the south, completely unaware that an armored torrent of hundreds of M1A1 tanks was flanking them from the desert dozens of kilometers to their left.

By February 17, the 2th Army turned eastward, and the Republican Guard finally discovered the threat on their flank—but it was too late!

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

73 degrees east at dusk on the 17th.

The U.S. 7th Army's 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, the vanguard, encountered the Iraqi Republican Guard's Tawakkarna Division in the desert, marking the only direct confrontation between the two sides' main armored forces throughout the entire war.

The weather is terrible today, with a sandstorm. Visibility is extremely low; you can't see anything with the naked eye through the dust.

可M1A1不需要肉眼，M1A1配备的是热成像瞄准具，在热成像里一辆T72坦克的发动机是一团明亮的白色热源,哪怕在沙尘暴里都能看清楚。

The T-72M tanks Iraq received from the Soviet Union were the most basic version ever, with such outdated equipment that they lacked thermal imaging. Their aiming relied on optical telescopes and low-light night vision devices. In sandstorms with visibility less than a kilometer, they could see nothing at all.

The US military's M1A1s spotted the Iraqi T-72 formation from a greater distance.

Lock on—Fire!

"boom!"

The M1A1's 120mm smoothbore gun fired depleted uranium armor-piercing projectiles that flew out of the barrel at a speed of 1,700 meters per second. The depleted uranium core is two and a half times denser than steel, and it penetrated the T-72's frontal armor directly. During penetration, the projectile core shattered, generating high-temperature fragments that ignited the ammunition inside the vehicle.

Many T72s were hit by a single shot, their turrets being blown into the air before the enemy even saw them.

Some Iraqi tanks attempted to retaliate, their 125mm shells hitting the front of the M1A1 after traveling 1,500 meters—then ricocheting.

The M1A1's depleted uranium composite armor cannot be penetrated by T-72 shells at a combat range of 1500 meters.

In this battle, the US suffered single-digit tank losses, mostly due to mechanical failures or damage to their tracks from Iraqi forces rendering them immobile. The Iraqi Republican Guard's Tawakkarna Division, Saddam's most elite force, was essentially annihilated.

A few hours later, a similar battle broke out on the Medina Ridge. The U.S. 1st Armored Division encountered the Republican Guard Medina Division and subsequently destroyed nearly two hundred Iraqi tanks and armored vehicles within hours.

It wasn't that Iraqi soldiers weren't brave; many of the tank crews in the Tawakkarna and Medina divisions were veterans of the Iran-Iraq War. They weren't afraid to die. But their bravery on the battlefield was insignificant in the face of the overwhelming high-tech superiority of the US military.

Throughout the ground war, the U.S. military lost a very small number of M1A1s. Most of them were friendly fire incidents—there were several instances where A-10 Warthog attack aircraft mistakenly shot down their own tanks, and the number of tanks lost at the hands of friendly forces was roughly equal to the number lost at the hands of Iraqis.

On February 18, Kuwait City was liberated.

On the same day the city was liberated, a massacre occurred on a highway outside the city.

Highway 80 is the main road connecting Kuwait to Iraq. As the liberation of Kuwait became a certainty, large numbers of Iraqi troops and civilians began their retreat along this highway.

The highway has been turned into a parking lot.

A densely packed line of vehicles stretching for tens of kilometers—military trucks, armored personnel carriers, tanks, and a large number of civilian vehicles... Many military vehicles were loaded with looted goods from Kuwait, such as televisions, refrigerators, carpets, and gold and silver jewelry. Iraqi soldiers filled the trucks with the belongings of Kuwaiti people during their retreat.

Many civilians, fearing the discipline of the US military, chose to flee towards Iraq, with their families along this highway. The US shelling and bombing of the Kuwaiti suburbs had not yet ceased, and many destroyed vehicles were stuck on the road, unable to move forward or backward.

Then the coalition planes arrived, with Israeli volunteer planes becoming the main force in the massacre. Wave after wave of airstrikes continued relentlessly, first bombing the head and tail of the convoy—with both ends blocked, the vehicles stretching for dozens of kilometers in the middle were trapped!

Then they began to sweep and bomb from head to tail, with Israel also using napalm and white phosphorus bombs.

The bomb landed amidst a dense cluster of vehicles. One truck was hit and began to burn, which then ignited the vehicles next to it, and the flames spread. Fuel tanks exploded, ammunition detonated, and the people inside tried to climb out of their vehicles to escape, but were knocked down onto the road by the next wave of gunfire.

The battle was over. The convoy had no ability to fight back—most of the so-called tanks and armored vehicles blocked on the road were out of ammunition, many were even out of fuel, and more than half of them were civilian vehicles.

This is a massacre.

The road, stretching for dozens of kilometers, was littered with destroyed vehicles, charred metal frames, melted tires, and items torn apart by shrapnel and scattered between the road and vehicles. There were also countless corpses scattered across the hillsides.

Israel has done this far too many times. During the Fifth Arab-Israeli War a few years ago, Israel committed the Beirut massacre. Going back further, its systematic genocide against Palestinians has continued for decades, including the 50s attacks on Chibia, Qasim, and Gaza, and the genocide of Palestinians around the time of Israel's founding in 1948...

Too much.