Interview with General Norman Schwarzkopf, Commander-in-Chief, Central Command (CENTCOM)

So, what I did was I asked for my principle staff to meet me in the war room down in the basement, a half an hour before `H hour'. And I had written a message to all the forces, and what I did is I assembled them in there and I read them the message... And then I asked the chaplain to say a prayer, and then I played `God Bless the USA' - a blatantly chauvinistic piece of music (chuckle), but I think it characterised the pride that all of us have in our profession, and in what we were, and there's a line in there that says "I would proudly stand next to you, and defend her still today" and that's what it was all about. And I said, "Now, we all know what we need to do. Now let's get on with it."

Q: There was this incredible build-up going on in the Iraqi desert in those final weeks of July 1990. What could you see?

Schwarzkopf: As the build-up was going along the border, we really weren't quite sure what we were seeing. We knew that the area to the west of Basra was a traditional maneuver area for the Iraqi military forces and particularly for their armored forces.

So initially when we saw the armored divisions moving down to that area, we weren't sure whether there was a build-up along the border to threaten Kuwait or whether it was just maneuvers we were seeing and because it was the same time that they normally conduct their maneuvers.

But as time went on a pattern started to emerge; we saw, for instance Marine units and side by side with the amphibious transport, we saw Special Forces units and side by side with the helicopter units.

What I think finally convinced us was we saw logistical supplies being brought up and delivered to these units and, of course, the units were camped in the fashion that showed that they weren't really going on manoeuvres. And then finally as they started moving down towards the border, I think we became convinced that there was going to be some kind of an invasion.

I briefed the Joint Chiefs of Staff on I think it was the last day of July and said based upon this pattern that's emerging we feel that this is definitely a plan.

Q: Why was it you were convinced something was going to happen? Because the State Department people, they were getting assurances from Mubarak, saying it wasn't going to happen. What was it just on that final day that made you think, "Hey, this is serious....?

Schwarzkopf: Well, we were getting diplomatic assurances from all over the world,every elder statesman in the world who was an Arabist was saying, "Oh, this will never happen, you know, an Arab will never invade another Arab, this is all a show of force on Saddam's part and that the Kuwaitis will cave and grant him the concessions that he was looking for, and he won't have to do this invasion."

It was only when we started to see this pattern of the type of forces that you would need to conduct an operation being grouped together geographically on the ground that it became very apparent that what you were seeing emerging was a military plan.

There are certain things that are known in the intelligence communities, indications and warnings, you know, tanks, tanks far forward, artillery placed far forward, this sort of thing it indicates an offensive operation. Whereas if it was a defensive operation artillery is located in depth, that sort of thing.

Q: So, on that last afternoon, I think on August the 1st, you told the Joint Chiefs it was gonna happen, and in the tank you briefed Colin Powell and Dick Cheney. Could you describe what you said to them?

Schwarzkopf: Well, the afternoon of August the 1st, I met in the tank with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Secretary Cheney. My briefing consists of, first of all, of showing them the situation on the ground and showing them this linkage between units and the things that the units needed in order to accomplish what that type of unit did, and I'd explained to them that I was quite sure that this was a plan. I couldn't guarantee them that they were going to invade but I felt that all the indications were there, that they were going to invade.

Then from that point we went into what we could do immediately in the way of military force projection to put forces on the ground to defend Saudi Arabia and, of course, to defend all the oilfields on the Gulf in places like Bahrain, the United Arab Emirate and also how we would conduct a force build-up to put up a robust defence of Saudi Arabia.

Q: At that time, what was your assessment of Iraq and Saddam Hussein?

Schwarzkopf: Well, we had studied Saddam Hussein in my headquarters very carefully and the Iraqi military. Frankly, we had gone to school on what Iraq did in the war between Iran and Iraq, the type of forces they had, the numbers they had, the tactics they used.

They were the fourth largest army in the world, number one. Number two, the economy of Iraq was such that we knew that they could not absorb all the soldiers out of the military back into the economy and therefore the army was going to stay in place. And, number three, they had, in fact, in the Al Fao campaign, for instance, fought quite a credible offensive armored battle. So, I would say, based upon the size of the Iraqi military and the type of equipment they had, they had a vast array of equipment. They had Soviet equipment, they had French equipment, they had British equipment, they had, for instance, from the tanks they imported, they had three different generations of Soviet tank from a very early rudimentary generation of T-55, all the way up to the T-72 which was a very, very good tank.

So they had the capability to be quite a formidable enemy and, of course, you do judge your enemy based upon capabilities, not intent, you have to look at the enemy and really almost make a worst case call every time.

Q: How did you hear that the invasion had happened?

Schwarzkopf: I had just flown home from the briefing that I'd given the Joint Chiefs and it was an evening time and the hotline rung in my home and it was Colin Powell on the other end of the line. And he said, "Well, you're right, they've invaded, and, you know, we don't know what's going to happen now but, they've come across the border and the invasion has started".

And I immediately got dressed. I was dressed to go out and do sport and instead I changed my clothes and went into my headquarters and started monitoring the situation.

Q: From your appreciation of the area, did you think immediately, "This matters, this is serious"?

Schwarzkopf: Yes, there was no question about that. We had been planning for just this sort of occurrence, in our Central Command plans for a year, so, and we always knew the precursor to an overall attack taking over the entire Gulf would be the taking of Kuwait first.

So, when this was launched, your first reaction is this could be a very, very serious matter. Your second reaction is based upon all these diplomatic assurances that we have had, you know, and the Arab League will come into play ...

Of course, even at the time that tthe invasion was unfolding, we were receiving information that all diplomatic measures were underway to stop this whole thing to roll back, that Saddam had made his point and this would all be settled very peacefully in no time at all and thatthis really wasn't an invasion.

So, you were sort of getting stories from both sides, one of which were telling you that serious military situation was going on the ground, and another one that was saying, well, diplomatically it's all gonna be taken care of and... and this just won't last very long.

Q: After a night of no sleep, you arrived at the White House. Can I ask you about that August the 2nd meeting? A lot of people have told us--they all say it was a very disorganised meeting...

Schwarzkopf: Well, the White House meeting on August the 2nd was disorganised. I don't say that critically I say that only because we knew so little about the actual situation as it was unfolding on the ground and certainly many of the people who were at that meeting had no knowledge of what was going on, I mean, you had the entire Cabinet there.

And, what was happening was questions were being asked by the President, rather specific questions and people were being required to generate their answers right there on the spot. Some of the answers were very good and some of the answers, quite frankly, were very, very weak or meaningless, for that matter.

Q: You got very upset with the Intelligence briefing?

Schwarzkopf: Well, the Intelligence briefing I thought was, you know, ill-informed because, of course, I had my own force right on the ground right there and I knew exactly what was going on and therefore the information that the President was being given just wasn't the correct information at that time and I found that sort of a serious breach when the President was not given the correct Intelligence information. But it became apparent to everybody at the table that this was a very serious matter and therefore everybody thought they had to chime in and give their opinions and some of the opinions were ludicrous and others were very good.

What's going to happen to the price of oil? How is this going to affect international you know, commerce and? .. And how is this going to affect the economies of the world and? On and on and on. What is the United Nations going to be able to do about this, will they participate? And that sort of thing.

At the conclusion of this general discussion, Colin Powell introduced me and had asked me to give a briefing of exactly what we could do at that particular time, what our capabilities were at that time, and I got up and gave that briefing of short term capabilities, it wasn't long term program, it was short term capabilities and what we could do at that immediate time. And that was the conclusion of the meeting.

Q: What was your impression then of the President's frame of mind?

Schwarkopf: Well, I thought the President showed great resolve. I mean it was obvious that what he was really in an information seeking mode where he was trying to garner as much information as he could to really kind of decide what the initial reaction of the United States of America should be. He certainly was very much in charge.

Q: What was Colin Powell's opinion of how things were gonna pan out? What was your opinion?

Schwarzkopf: I think in the very early days none of us were quite sure how it was going to pan out. None of us were quite sure what action the United States of America would take. There had been a prevailing opinion for many years in the military the United States would never get involved in a protracted war in the Middle East, that there were no vital interests threatened there, that there were no treaty obligations there.

More and more Colin and I started focusing on, what is the end game? You know, what do we expect to see happen if we focused on various courses of action. And obviously we were looking at the introduction of military forces but kind of saying to ourselves "Gee, if we introduce military forces, what is this going to lead to and when do we come back home, or how long do we stay there or what do we expect to happen as a result?"

All which of course . are imponderables. Certainly there's no easy answers to this. Colin expressed the feeling that certainly we would go to war over Saudi Arabia but would we be willing to go to war over Kuwait?

Q: Camp David, the President had pretty much decided the day before troops would be deployed... did you have a sense of history?

Schwarzkopf: Camp David was certainly an history meeting. Small group there, the President's closest advisers, very calm meeting, much unlike the meeting that we had been to earlier. It was obvious that at this point the President had decided to do something and Colin had said, "Now I want you to talk about the full plan that you are ready to implement for the defence of Saudi Arabia."

So it was a much more in-depth, briefing on the forces that we would commit, how many fighter squadrons, what naval ships, what army units, err, how long it would take for them to get there,the full blown plan. The bottom line I was trying to make to the President is that this is the force that was necessary to guarantee a defence of Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Gulf oilfields; it was not offensive force by any means.

And the last slide as a matter of fact I showed was the fact that, in the event we decided to go on the offensive against this very, very large military force we were gonna have to take on, or if you follow all the rules of the offensive, the force would have to be considerably bigger if we going to eject the Iraqis out of Kuwait by force of arms.

Q: In this plan that you've laid out, how important was it to get permission from the Saudis?

Schwarzkopf: In the early plans of Central Command made for this part of the world, there was always the assumption that we would have to take everything in with us, that we would have to even build our own ports.

When we shifted our planning to the defence of Saudi Arabia and the oilfields against Iraqi invasion, one of the assumptions that we made was that the Saudis would, in fact, allow us to come in and use their facilities; that was critical to the plan.

There was absolutely no way in the world we could rapidly deploy our air forces if we couldn't go in and use the Saudi military airfields that were in place. There was no way we could possibly deploy the Marine Corps and bring in the Marine pre-positioned ships .. equipment, without using the Saudi ports.

So, it was absolutely necessary to have the Saudis' permission to come in because of the sovereignty of the nation of Saudi Arabia and the number of forces we were going to bring into the country and it was absolutely necessary to have their approval because we very, very much needed to use their equipment.

Q: The meeting with King Fahd which was a remarkable..As you walked into the room what were you thinking about the importance of this meeting?

Schwarzkopf: As we were flying over in the aircraft to meet with the King of Saudi Arabia, Secretary Cheney called me in and said, "You know, you've been working in this area for a couple of years now and you know these people, what do you think will happen?"

And I said, " I think what will happen is we'll make our presentation and they'll listen very carefully and then they'll say `Thank you very much, we'll let you know', and we will get back on the airplane and fly back to Washington with no decision."

I was really convinced that was going to happen. So when we walked into the actual meeting room, with the King, that's what I expected. I was quite relaxed, I had a sense of urgency to get the message across, to deliver the correct information, to make sure the Saudis understood what was going on, but I had no expectations that... that... the decision was imminent.

Q: What did the pictures you brought the King show?

Schwarzkopf: The pictures were of Iraqi tanks. And we had the border between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia drawn in on the pictures and we showed the disposition of the tanks actually on the border that showed the tanks were far forward again.

Tanks being deployed far forward is an indication of offensive action; tanks in depth is an indication of defensive action. So we showed a picture of these tanks all strewn along the border between Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and, in fact, some of the tanks across the border in Saudi Arabian territory.

I didn't realise at the time but I think that was very significant in the King's ultimate decision, I think he was infuriated that, in fact, the sovereignty of Saudi Arabia has been violated by these tanks even though it was on a piece of sand out in the middle of nowhere, he was still very upset by this.

Q: What did you do next?

Schwarzkopf: I followed that with a briefing of, "This is what we're prepared to do ..." wanted him to clearly understand the number of fighter squadrons that would be coming in, the number of troops that would be coming in, the number of ships that would be coming in and I showed him a time phase sequence of the build-up so that he understood what we could to counter, to, in fact, defend Saudi Arabia against what looked like could be a very possible invasion from the north.

At that point, I stepped aside, that was the end of my briefing and Secretary Cheney then took over the briefing from there. What Secretary Cheney then told the King was, wasthe United States of America, the President felt this was a very serious situation. He then told the King three things. That, number one, we were prepared to introduce US forces into the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to defend the Kingdom. Number two, we were prepared to stay as long as was necessary to guarantee the safety of Saudi Arabia. And, number three, he told them that when the time came to leave, we would leave, we take all of our forces home, and there would be no residual forces left in the Kingdom.

Q: What happened?

Schwarzkopf: After Secretary Cheney concluded his remarks, there was an ongoing conversation that occurred in Arabic among the King and the member of the Royal Family that were in the room with him. Quite a heated discussion--not very long but quite a heated discussion. At the end of that discussion, the King turned and said, "OK!" And I almost fell out of my chair because I absolutely was sitting there, thinking, "Well, you know, this is going to be thank you very much for the information, we'll let you know", And the King said "OK!" AndI think we all did a double-take, and went back and said, you know, Secretary Cheney said, "So, you agree?"

And the King said, "Yes, I agree." Now Ambassador Freeman said later on, who understood Arabic, said that there was, the discussion was, you know, "Let's not do anything too rapidly and... and this sort of thing and remember what the Kuwaitis did at ..." And, you know, the King made some comment, "Yes, and the Kuwaitis are all living in our hotels right now becausethey weren't willing to make a decision in this matter and I'm not going to have that happen."

That's why I go back to this point of saying that I think that the fact that there were Iraqi tanks on Saudi Arabian soil at that time was one of the things that really, really had the King's dander up. But, in any event, he said "OK, you know, bring your forces!"

And as I say, I was in a state of complete shock. Now the following morning we went and met with Prince Sultan, Prince Sultan was a Minister of Defence who was not at the meeting the night before because he was not in Jeddah. And we met with Prince Sultan and laid it all out again just to exactly what was happening but, in the meantime, I was calling back saying to Chuck Horner's Air Force, you know, "Get your planes ready!"

Without being critical at all, I don't mean this in a critical way, but I think the Saudis were absolutely stunned with the rapidity with which we arrived because the next morning when Sultan said, you know---"Well, when do you expect the first planes to arrive?" I think our answer was, "Within 12 hours, they'll be here." He said, "Within 12 hours?" And we said "Yeah, they're... they're on the way, as we speak."

Q: And it was a huge build-up?

Schwarzkopf: It was a huge build-up. Of course, it was slow at first, from my standpoint the build-up couldn't have been fast enough because, again, we were still facing a very formidable military force, they was still arrayed in an offensive posture along the border and could have attacked at any given time.

We knew that the Iraqis were students of the Soviets, the Soviets have what they call `a strategic pause'. They accomplish one phase of their operation, they then pause there, they refuel, they re-arm, they re-equip, they replace the men that they have lost and then after and they rest, and after this strategic pause they then carry on to the next phase of their offensive, that was their doctrine at that time. Everything we saw along the Kuwaiti border fit the pattern of a strategic pause.

So, again, nobody knew what was going to happen, we had to go with the best information and indications and warnings that we had. And it was highly likely that they were going through a strategic pause ready to carry out the next phase and, therefore, we had to get as much over there as we could, as fast as we possibly could.

But quite realistically the first forces that we brought over there were nothing more than a tripwire force.

Q: Could you have held them, the Iraqis, if they'd attacked then?

Schwarzkopf: I don't think so, no. I think we could have inflicted a great deal of damage on them after the first week, with our air power but, air power could not have done it alone.

The 82nd airborne troops that were over there used to facetiously refer to themselves as `Iraqi tank speed bumps', because they were light infantry and did not have the heavy anti-tank weapons they needed.

So, I think that if Iraq had chosen . to continue their attack at that time and sweep through those oilfields and certainly take the port of Dhahran and the airfield at Dhahran, our problems would have been seriously compounded. There was no question about the fact that had the Iraqis chose to continue the attack at that time they could have swept all the way down the coast, to Dhahran and I think, of course, once you're at Dhahran it would be very easy to go over and take Bahrain and continue on down the coast to, err, taking Qatar and also taking the United Arab Emirate.

And you must remember that Saddam's threats were against both Kuwait and the United Arab Emirate and the only way to get to the United Arab Emirate would have been through Saudi Arabia.

Q: Do you remember your first press conference and some reporter asked if the US could defend them against an Iraqi ground attack? What was going through your mind to see everyone was eye-balling you for the first time?

Schwarzkopf: Well, the first press conference was at the end of August. I think I'd been there about eight days and, there had been some complaints that the press had not been able to meet with people overall in charge and so Washington, in fact, came to me and said, you know, "You ought to conduct a press conference," and my own public affairs did.

And so we had it in the hotel at Dhahran and I walked into the room and I was absolutely floored by the number of people that were in the room to begin with, and I can remember along the back wall was this bank of television cameras, I mean, arrayed across the entire back wall and I was sort of taken aback by the whole thing.

Probably the principal memory I have of that is people kept pressing me for locations and capabilities, you know, "Where are the troops located, what can the troops do?" and that sort of thing.

And obviously that's information that I couldn't give them because, we already knew that Saddam Hussein had... had television right in his own command post and anything I was saying in television cameras, of course, was going right into the Iraqi command post.

So I kept saying, saying, you know, "I'm not going to give you that information!" And then I would get another question asking for essentially the same information, only with a question re-stated in some other matter.