Naval aviation: lessons from the war; Enduring Freedom reinforces need for new targeting pods, radar, data links.

• Author: Erwin, Sandra I.

The accomplishments of carrier-based aviation during Operation Enduring Freedom, naval aviators say, prove that the fundamentals of flying strike missions don't change. But the air campaign over Afghanistan also accentuated some weak spots--such as the difficulties in locating and striking mobile targets.

According to unofficial reports, Navy aircrews had a 70-80 percent success rate in hitting or damaging their intended targets.

Naval aviation tactics, training and procedures traditionally have focused on fixed-target strike missions. The early days of Operation Enduring Freedom were "pre-planned events," said Rear Adm. Matthew G. Moffit, who is in charge of Navy aviation plans and requirements for air warfare. Later in the campaign, however, target assignments frequently changed. It became more of a "free-flowing event," he noted.

Those "free-flowing events" proved to be challenging, Moffit said. Notwithstanding the success achieved in the war, he asserted, the Navy must work to improve its ability to locate and strike targets on short notice. In military parlance, this is called "time-critical strike." Essentially, Moffit said, "We need to shorten the timeline" associated with time-critical strikes.

Lt. Cmdr. Scott Harrill, an F/A-18C Hornet pilot, flew seven missions over Afghanistan during a period of two weeks last October. He shared with National Defense some insights about what worked and didn't work. He also offered a firsthand account of what it takes to hit those time-critical targets.

Harrill, whose call sign is "Beeker," was heading home on the USS Enterprise on September 11, after a six-month tour with air wing CVW-8 (made up of two F/A-18 and two F-14 Tomcat squadrons). The carrier quickly was ordered to turn around and go back to the Arabian Sea. Before the Enterprise crew heard about the attacks on the United States, "We thought we were going to South Africa for a port visit," Harrill said. "We didn't get far out of the Arabian Gulf."

The Enterprise was the first carrier on the scene. It launched its first strikes on October 7. Harrill considers himself among the fortunate aviators who got to participate in the early, heavy bombing, part of the campaign. By late December and early January, the pace had slowed down dramatically. A Tomcat pilot from the USS Roosevelt said it best, in an e-mail to his family in late January: "Our mission now is equivalent to that of a relief pitcher hanging out in the bullpen, warming up, ready to go on a moment's notice. If he gets the call, his mission is singular--deliver the bean ball. It was much more fun being the starter, but such is war. [Our flights now] are a far cry from all of the action pre-Christmas."

The missions launched from the Enterprise were "both pre-planned and time-critical strikes," Harrill said. "Whenever possible, we like to have a target already figured out before we go." But that was nor always the case. In two out of his seven missions, Harrill's targets were changed after he was airborne. The re-targeting orders typically were communicated to him from an Air Force AWACS or a Navy Hawkeye command-and-control aircraft. Later in the campaign, target changes became more commonplace, because most of the fixed targets already had been destroyed. "We had the luxury of being able to do multiple runs, because there wasn't much of a threat," he said. "We could do practice runs first and then drop the weapon in the second or third run.

Time-Critical Strike

But the sheer length of the missions meant that pre-planned target assignments were likely to change. "From the time we were briefed the mission, to the time we got there, it was eight to nine hours," Harrill said. "A lot of things can change in eight to nine hours."

Finding and killing targets on the...