Wesley Clark's

EN. Wesley K. Clark, United Clark’s candid memoir gives a States Army, led NATO’s view of Allied Force very different G military forces to success in from all others to date. The narrative 1999 in Operation Allied Force. And is dominated not by details of air Gas recently as February, the former combat operations, as one might ex-

US Army photo by Spc. Christina Ann Horne Supreme Allied Commander Europe pect, but rather by recapitulations of told a large USAF–sponsored con- lost political battles and fervent plan- ference, “The US Air Force saved ning for a ground operation that never me, and it saved NATO.” Clark, how- took place and was never really in ever, delivered these remarks before the cards. His tale provides a dis- the appearance of his book, Waging turbing inside look at a Supreme Modern War, in May. Allied Commander who was distrust- Since publication, he has been ful of airpower and out of step with singing a different tune. Clark has military colleagues and political su- been unwilling to describe Allied periors in Washington. Force as an airpower success. The now-retired SACEUR, appearing in Going to War May at National Defense University Waging Modern War takes note of in Washington, D.C., declared to all the fact that Allied Force began on assembled that airpower could not March 24, 1999, with Clark’s full be expected to do much in future backing. In early March of that year, armed conflict. “Boots on the ground,” Clark told Secretary of State Made- he said, would be needed for deci- leine Albright that NATO air strikes sive military action. had to go ahead if diplomatic talks Incredibly, Clark’s 479-page mem- between the Serbs and the Kosovar oir does not even mention the Air Albanians failed. This was true, he Force B-2 stealth bomber—one of said, because alliance credibility was the war’s most effective weapons— on the line. much less recognize the B-2’s key However, Clark had misgivings contribution to the success of the about airpower. He believed that the operation. In contrast, the Army’s limited NATO air strikes had been AH-64 Apache attack helicopter (the effective in Bosnia in 1995 (Opera- core of Clark’s boots-on-the-ground tion Deliberate Force), but his pro- fantasy) gets extended and favor- fessional view of airpower was able attention—despite the fact that shaped in the 1970s, a time in which, it did not ever engage in combat. as a student at the Army’s Command It was exactly this obsession with and General Staff College, he re- trying to put boots on the ground in searched and wrote a thesis about the form of an invasion in Kosovo the “ineffectiveness” of Operation that likely cost Clark his job as Rolling Thunder in Vietnam. Clark’s Reversal. Since publication SACEUR. Even in its rockiest peri- Clark’s skepticism about airpower The campaign of his book Waging Modern War in May, Wesley Clark has stopped ods, the US military Chiefs and White was only reinforced by what he was in the air, but calling attention to the role of House officials offered steady sup- thought he knew about Desert Storm. SACEUR’s mind airpower in the success of Operation port for the NATO air campaign. The general believed (incorrectly) Allied Force. Here, Clark talks with Clark, however, lobbied hard for a that the Gulf War coalition’s airpower Wesley was on the soldiers in Kosovo two months after NATO decision to gear up for land hit only about 10 percent of the Iraqi the end of hostilities. war. forces. He also felt that the long ground. As it turned out, Clark was com- Desert Storm air campaign preced- pletely at odds with Washington and ing a “short ground operation” had European leaders about the preferred wrongly convinced analysts that “pre- direction of the war. His penalty was cision strike” was sufficient to win Clark’s high. Just one month after the end of wars. By Rebecca Grant Allied Force, White House officials After reviewing early studies of leaked the embarrassing news that the situation in Kosovo, Clark felt no Clark would retire earlier than more sanguine about the use of air- planned and vacate the SACEUR post power. Strategic targets were few, for another officer, USAF Gen. Jo- and they did not constitute a firm seph W. Ralston, who was then the center of gravity, in Clark’s view. vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of However, Clark was encouraged when Staff. the threat of air strikes in October 44 War AIR FORCE Magazine / September 2001 AIR FORCE Magazine / September 2001 45 1998 helped force a temporary cease- judged that the way to influence decision to submit a limited number fire between Serbs and Kosovars. In Milosevic was to target his army of targets at the outset doomed Allied early 1999, Clark began to acknowl- forces. From the start, he worried Force to a slow start, if the strikes edge that airpower would have to be that NATO’s airmen “hadn’t worked went beyond three days. NATO’s main weapon in any combat in detail the techniques we would with Serbia. NATO Secretary Gen- use to strike early against the Serb “Moral Necessity” eral Javier Solana, according to Clark, ground forces.” In Clark’s view, however, the co- “saw no chance of maintaining NATO The actual timing of the air cam- ercive potential of air attacks on fixed cohesion if the divisive issue of ground paign was beyond Clark’s control. strategic targets in Serbia proper intervention was introduced.” The NATO had already ceded the initia- paled in comparison to the impact of SACEUR conceded, “I couldn’t be tive to Milosevic as negotiations striking Serbia’s forces in the field sure that an air campaign wouldn’t dragged on. More than 30,000 Serb in Kosovo. Clark had sound military work; it might.” army soldiers massed on the border reasons for emphasizing attacks on For Allied Force, “my intent was of Kosovo and moved into the prov- the Serb ground forces. As he ex- that air strikes would be coercive in ince. Clark correctly concluded, “If plained it, hitting the ground forces nature, following the Bosnia model, we couldn’t quickly break Milo- was “a political, legal, and moral providing a strong incentive for sevic’s will with strategic strikes, necessity.” He wanted to do what he [Yugoslav President Slobodan] Milo- then we had to take away his capa- could to “relieve the direct pressure sevic to halt operations,” Clark said. bilities to fight in Kosovo.” the Serbs were putting on the Koso- Clark wanted NATO airpower to fo- However, Clark had not prepared vars.” cus on halting or degrading the sys- NATO to do either. However, Clark’s strategic ratio- tematic Serb campaign of ethnic Clark launched the campaign with nale went even deeper. “Attacking cleansing. Yet there was a major a short list of targets. All air strike the Serbs’ military machine and po- hurdle. Clark had warned Albright targets went through a complex police in Kosovo also made excellent that the Serbs would most likely at- litical approval process that started military sense,” he said. Milosevic tack the civilian population in Kosovo with Clark and wound its way on a relied on the support of the army to as soon as air strikes started. Worse, two-week journey through US and keep his grip on power. The Serb NATO could do nothing to prevent NATO channels. During fall 1998 leader was himself an officer in the it. It would be “a race” between and winter 1998–99, air planners had army reserve and as such had many NATO air strikes and what the Serb briefed Clark on at least 120 targets. loyalists in key leadership positions forces could do on the ground, and in Clark crafted a plan for “a serious in the armed forces. In the previous the short term, Clark said of the Serbs: attack, with some margin left over,” December, Milosevic had fired the “They can win the race.” but he submitted just 51 of the 120 top army commander and replaced targets for final approval. He did so him with a general who would not Fielded Forces even though the Chairman of the Joint complain about attacking Kosovars. Although Clark was mirroring Chiefs of Staff, Army Gen. Henry H. Clark saw the Serb ground forces NATO guidance and hoping for a Shelton, prodded him to submit more. as a priority center of gravity be- quick success, he had done little to “Wes, how soon are you going to get cause Milosevic “couldn’t stand to prepare for a longer air campaign, me your Phase II targets?” Clark have these forces seriously hurt.” should it become necessary. Clark quotes Shelton as saying. Clark’s He criticized the “classic view of the American airpower adherents,” which pictured Milosevic as an “uncaring leader” who would be “unaffected by losses among his military and police.” NATO aircraft had free rein to attack Serb military forces in Kosovo once they had been identified visually or by intelligence sources. There was no two-week approval process for these targets.

USAF photo by TSgt. Cesar Rodriguez Even so, Clark did not ask for more aircraft to counter the ground forces. In the end, it was early April before air planners put together a request for Clark to triple the strike aircraft in theater. NATO did not approve all of the additional forces in the package until after the alliance summit was held on April 23. Weather and lack of aircraft got the campaign off to a difficult start, and Task Force Hawk. Clark insisted that the Army’s Apache helicopters could it was not until the second week of lead a ground plan in Kosovo, despite their poor performance in bad weather May that sortie rates increased dra- and an Army assessment that they were too vulnerable to Serb weapons. matically. Half of the 38,116 total

46 AIR FORCE Magazine / September 2001 sorties were flown in that last month of action. Meanwhile, Clark was doing his utmost to get Apache helicopters, Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) ballistic missiles, and lead elements of Army ground forces into theater to turn up the pressure on Milosevic. By mid–April, Clark had developed USAF photo by SSgt. Ken Bergmann a very strong interest in a ground option because he wanted a backup plan to pull out in case the NATO air campaign fizzled. The potential outcome of the air attacks was “un- knowable,” he said, and “without a ground force, there was no assur- ance that we could actually force Milosevic out of Kosovo.” A backup plan was a prudent step, but Clark ultimately pursued the ground option with a personal deter- Star Ignored. Clark does not even mention the Air Force B-2 stealth bomber mination stronger than anything else in his 479-page book Waging Modern War, although it was one of the war’s he did during Allied Force. He esti- most effective weapons. mated the air campaign effectiveness would peak by July then start to In his push for ground war plans reasonable than he. Shelton tried to diminish. However, good summer and Apache operations, Clark’s most deal with the CINCs’ requests in a weather, support from Albania, and formidable opponent was not the ci- measured way and kept communica- NATO’s firepower advantage meant vilians in the Pentagon or the White tions open even when he had to relay that ground operations could force House but rather the United States verbatim reprimands from Cohen the Serbs out, Clark thought. Clark Army—institutionally and in the telling Clark to get his face off the also felt that visible preparations for person of the Chief of Staff, Gen. television. Cohen was on solid ground ground operations would “signifi- Dennis J. Reimer. Clark recounts nu- when in 1998 he reprimanded Clark cantly raise the pressure on Milo- merous occasions in which he sought for the leak of a Bosnian Muslim sevic.” By “working backward from support from Reimer, only to be re- paper about Kosovo, telling Clark, the first snowfalls in the mountains buffed. The context of Clark’s book “And I’ve told you before, you don’t of Albania,” he decided that he must makes plain the fact that virtually give military advice to [Richard C.] have national decisions from the everyone in the Army’s leadership Holbrooke.” As JCS vice chairman, NATO allies “to begin preparation thought land war in the Balkans was Ralston made the role of the hatchet of the ground forces on May 1.” a bad idea. Clark’s book also dis- man look sympathetic. In one in- Clark’s urge to champion a ground closes, albeit indirectly, another fac- stance, he gently cautioned Clark to campaign could not have come at a tor that may have served as a re- consider what would happen if war worse time. He took his plan to Wash- straint on Clark’s ambitions: The broke out in Korea or with Iraq and ington during the NATO 50th anni- institutional Army evidently didn’t they had 200,000 troops bogged down versary summit where there was ar- hold him in high esteem. Clark’s last in Kosovo. Clark ignored Ralston’s rayed against him a formidable lack three assignments were as head of warning and charged into the Chiefs’ of interest. The Macedonians refused strategic plans on the Joint Staff; “Tank” later that day with a ground to let NATO use their territory for Commander in Chief of US South- option briefing. It fell flat. offensive operations. The NATO al- ern Command; and the SACEUR The book is littered with examples lies, many with long experience of post. In none of the three was he the of Clark’s evident inability to take a peacekeeping in Bosnia, were not nominee of his own service. hint, even a heavy-handed hint, or to eager to insert ground troops. Through- deal effectively with surprises or out Washington, the ground option Private War uncomfortable situations. The most was a nonstarter. Shelton warned As the NATO summit approached, cringe-worthy story of all concerns Clark not to lobby for the ground Clark promised Cohen not to be “the the moment when Clark turned up a option behind the scenes at the NATO skunk at the picnic,” but his push for few minutes early for a reception at summit. “If that option is going to be ground option planning was becom- the NATO summit. As Clark told it, sold, it will be sold by the President, ing a major sore point in his deterio- President Clinton, Albright, Cohen, not by you,” Shelton told Clark. The rating relationship with Washington. and Shelton were alone in the room Secretary of Defense, William S. Co- Clark’s memoir detailed his many forming their receiving line. Clark hen, ordered Clark to say nothing troubles with other military and po- started to walk over to greet them, about ground forces during the NATO litical leaders—but he employed the then read their body language and meetings. “We have to make this air tell-all tactic largely at his own ex- stopped, alone in the middle of the campaign work, or we’ll both be pense. In vignette after vignette, his room, 20 feet away. In telling the writing our résumés,” Cohen added. tormentors came off as being more story, Clark seemed to want to show

AIR FORCE Magazine / September 2001 47 how he was unfairly shut out. In- that went for two or three pages” force. ... So the air campaign will, in stead, the story tends to paint Clark listing all the weapons capable of fact, continue.” himself as an inept player of the perforating the skin of an Apache The only troops in contact were power game. helicopter. He dismissed the data as the irregular forces of the Kosovo By April 25, the summit was over “the influence of the reluctant Army Liberation Army. The KLA launched and Clark was back in Europe. “I mind-set.” He mentioned in his book its own offensive May 26. Clark es- knew that Secretary Cohen was de- that the helicopters rescuing the timated that four or five battalions termined to make the air campaign downed F-16 pilot drew small arms totaling up to 2,000 men were at- work and make it work in conjunc- and missile fire, although they were tacking over the top of Mount Pastrik. tion with diplomacy,” said Clark. trying to avoid contact. He noted in Clark characterized the KLA action Personally, as of late April, he gave the conclusion that Apaches weren’t as “light infantry against heavy the air campaign a 70 percent chance much good in bad weather but main- forces” and by Friday, May 28, it of working. In his view, the guid- tained that he wanted to use them. was clear to Clark that “the Kosovars ance from Washington left him a To everyone but Clark, the con- were not able to secure their objec- loophole to start an “assessment” of cept of operations for the Apaches tive.” On Saturday, Clark observed a ground option. Flying over Alba- just wouldn’t work in the Kosovo the KLA offensive was “stalled” with nia, he scouted the mountainous ter- environment. Suppressive fires to lay the Serbs “vulnerable to our air- ritory, which he deemed tough but a corridor for the Apaches would power.” On Monday morning, May not impossible for ground operations. have violated the rules of engage- 31, “the KLA was barely hanging His staff set to work on options, ment, rules so tight that A-10 pilots onto the top of Mount Pastrik.” Clark including the possibility of skipping were calling the Combined Air Op- commanded USAF Lt. Gen. Michael the southern approaches and invad- erations Center for permission to C. Short, NATO’s air component ing northern Serbia from Hungary strike targets they positively identi- commander, and Army Lt. Gen. John with the objective of taking Belgrade. fied in daylight. The Apaches had W. Hendrix, Task Force Hawk com- But the ground option planning more than demonstrated their worth mander, to hold the mountain or was not coming together well. New in the Gulf War, where they were a “we’ll have to pay for the top of that estimates also called for almost formidable weapon. However, in the hill with American blood.” 200,000 troops. The planners told Gulf, the Apaches were primarily This was as close as he got to him that if they stayed within the used to protect the flanks in areas directing ground attacks, but at the normal NATO planning process time with few enemy ground forces. Some time, Clark pictured much more. That lines “we would be lucky to attack close air support missions were flown same day, Clark’s planners gave him on Nov. 1.” but from the friendly side of the a revised ground option plan with Clark was not “comfortable” with Forward Line of Own Troops. One D-Day set for Sept. 1. Clark was the ground plans yet, but he did real- look at a map of Albania and Kosovo delighted and determined to push ize that “we were going to have to would be enough to show that by the plan. “This was the culmination commence preparations and deploy- sending in the Apaches, Clark would of my 33 years of military service,” ments before we had a final approved have risked them flying at low alti- he later wrote. plan.” Getting that approval became tude over many miles of enemy-held Here in essence was Clark’s true a top priority for Clark. The mirage territory. Serbs with small arms instinct about how to defeat Milosevic. of a ground operation, with attacks would be eager to pick off an Apache. Roads, bridges, and airfields would on three axes, became the secret heart As it turned out, locating mobile be improved over the summer as of Wesley Clark’s war. In the lead targets was a major challenge, and 175,000 to 200,000 American and would be the Apache helicopters. elements of Task Force Hawk Apache European ground troops moved into helicopters helped that process greatly, position. NATO would have to work The Apaches but fixed-wing aircraft proved fast out arrangements with the KLA (“we Clark wanted the Apaches to rap- and efficient in striking targets once had scrupulously avoided direct con- idly target and strike Serb ground they were identified. tact with them in Albania” so far, forces, and he had asked for them the Clark said), gain access via Monte- day before the start of Allied Force. Denouement of the Ground negro, block the Danube River, and Although he did not receive authori- Option ring Yugoslavia’s periphery with zation to employ them during the air While the Apaches sat, Clark kept troops, presumably in Macedonia, campaign, the Apaches were a con- the ground option planners hard at Bulgaria, and Hungary. suming interest. work, fully aware that it would take Clark presented the new ground Clark’s concept of operations was two-and-a-half months to begin plan to Shelton and the Chiefs via for fighters and artillery—including ground action “even by the most video teleconference. The Chiefs ATACMS—to suppress the enemy. optimistic estimates.” Washington listened but gave “no indications Unmanned Aerial Vehicles would was unresponsive. By late May, the of support.” Changing tactics, he find targets, and “we’d go at night” Joint Staff still had not approved the pressed to be invited to the White with the Apaches. He insisted the initial cadre of engineer units that House for a routine meeting be- Apaches could survive flying at low would have to begin their work long tween the President and the service altitude and that the threat of Serb before the ground offensive. Indeed Chiefs, hoping he could brief his SA-7s “was not borne out by analy- Cohen, giving his first interview since ground plan there. No invitation was sis.” In preparation for a video tele- the war began, said publicly May 28, forthcoming. The denouement at last conference he was shown “a column “There is no consensus for a ground came when Undersecretary of De-

48 AIR FORCE Magazine / September 2001 fense for Policy Walter B. Slocombe consoled Clark by telling him that the President would not make a decision about ground forces without talking to the SACEUR. The issue died. Shelton told reporters at the time that if necessary, NATO would winterize the refugee camps and USAF photo by SrA. Mitch Fuqua enable the air campaign “to go right on into the winter, if that is re- quired.” As Clark put it, “I had been screened off.”

End of Allied Force While Clark fumbled with his ground options, the air campaign was coming to a culmination. Strikes on Serb forces in Kosovo increased, and fresh strategic targets were approved and struck. On May 30, 1999, Clark told the Washington Post that “I No Boots. Clark’s book emphasizes his regret at not getting “boots on the would say the air campaign is work- ground” and gives short shrift to one of history’s most successful air cam- ing” although he added that there paigns. Here, Clark stands with his USN and USAF air commanders. were “theoretical limits to an air campaign.” After a night of heavy air of the KLA. On the very day Milosevic intervention were well under way by strikes two days later he was quoted indicated he would give in, Clark the end of the campaign, and I am as saying in a closed headquarters believed (according to his book) that convinced that this, in particular, briefing that “we’re driving him a ground campaign would still be pushed Milosevic to concede.” Clark [Milosevic] to a decision.” needed two months hence. As it turned contended that the Apaches, the Hindsight altered his view. Two out, an agreement was in place a week corps-level headquarters, and “a full years later, in his book, the impact of later and the air strikes stopped on Army brigade of ground combat the air strikes in late May and June June 10. power” in Albania were enough to barely caught his eye. Clark admit- As for the impact of the air war, offset NATO’s obvious, public op- ted that opinion in Washington leaned Clark praised it on June 5, 1999, position to a ground war and convey toward extending the air campaign telling the New York Times: “What “a powerful image of a ground and against any ground option, with did the trick was the accuracy of the threat.” To Clark, this “image” out- the Army arguing against the ground precision weapons, the avoidance of weighed the fire and steel of the air campaign. He also wrote that around losses, and the increasing destruc- campaign. May 31 he feared that “the air cam- tion of the Serb forces.” Clark’s tes- “Any endeavor that is both suc- paign was in serious trouble if it timony to the Senate in October 1999 cessful and painful is all too apt to be persisted on its present course.” included praise for airmen and ob- forgotten, and its lessons are likely In fact, the Serbs were ready to servations on all-weather precision to be painful, too,” said Clark near accept NATO’s terms. On June 3, weapons, airlift, intelligence, sur- the end of the book. Clark’s written Milosevic accepted key elements of veillance, and reconnaissance assets account of the end of Allied Force Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari’s and other recommendations relevant emphasized again that this general plan for the Serbs to withdraw from to the after-action report on an air had not come to grips with the fact Kosovo. In his book Clark cited the campaign. He commissioned a de- that he was leading—and winning— airmen’s “good results in their strikes tailed survey of damage to critical an air war. Diplomacy and Russian against Serb forces in Kosovo” on mobile targets and went so far as to leverage played critical roles in the June 3. But he drew no special corre- declassify its results, which validated outcome. However, Clark’s insis- lation between the crescendo of sor- NATO airmen’s effectiveness against tence that the threat of a ground in- ties and new progress in the negotia- Serb fielded forces. vasion was a factor is countered by tions. Clark related how he spent part Two years later, however, Clark statements of US officials at the of June 3 pushing to get the engineers did not give airpower much credit time—and by his own, detailed ex- in to prepare for ground operations, for pulling out the victory in Kosovo. planations of his failure to get ap- talking over ground war strategy with Of the war’s end he stated: “Plan- proval for the Apaches, ATACMS, Solana, and monitoring the positions ning and preparations for ground or even the initial construction troops. NATO, the Joint Chiefs, the Secre- tary of Defense, and the White House Rebecca Grant is president of IRIS, a research organization in Washington, were not yet on board. The prospect D.C., and has worked for RAND, the Secretary of the Air Force, and the Chief of Staff of the Air Force. Grant is a fellow of the Eaker Institute for Aerospace of a ground invasion existed mainly Concepts, the public policy and research arm of the Air Force Association’s in Clark’s mind. That may have been Aerospace Education Foundation. Her most recent article, “Deep Strife,” Wesley Clark’s war, but it was not appeared in the June 2001 issue. anyone else’s. ■

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