Tornado: In the Eye of the Storm

by John Nichol

As a young Tornado navigator in the 1980s I was part of a truly vast, 310,000-strong military machine. The RAF’s Tornado force alone, which would eventually spearhead the defence of Saudi Arabia and subsequent attacks on Iraq, numbered around 430 bomber and fighter aircraft. The total size of the RAF was astonishing – nearly 94,000 personnel and 1,800 front-line and training aircraft.3 To give this some context, in 2020 the RAF had around 32,000 personnel and some 570 aircraft.

With success vital for all three governments, the pressure was mounting. The MRCA label also had to be dealt with. No one falls in love with an acronym. Being fast, low to the ground, nocturnal and stealth-like, Panther seemed a credible choice, but that was also the name given to the legendary Second World War German panzer, and a household lavatory cleaner of the time.7 Tornado, on the other hand, was the same word in all three languages and created the evocative image of a force of nature that could strike with immense power and devastation.

As the 1970s progressed, the Tornado began to take shape. With all three nations in harmony, the development site outside Munich grew to a workforce of almost 200 people. Three decades on from the Second World War, there had been a few stony silences in the office shared by a veteran German Luftwaffe colonel and a similarly aged RAF squadron leader.13 Into this somewhat frosty atmosphere was thrown the snippet of information that both had been fighter pilots, one in Messerschmitts, the other Spitfires. Conversation became a touch more animated when it was discovered that each had fought in the same campaign over northern Europe in the latter stages of the conflict. Logbooks were produced, dates aligned and in no time at all the whirling, twisting and twirling hand gestures favoured by fighter pilots revealed that they had indeed shared the same airspace, though fortunately neither had been on the receiving end of the other’s bullets. As one onlooker dryly observed, they were clearly both lousy shots.

the first few hours of any Cold War conflict, the Tornado’s role would be to prevent the enemy from using their airfields, and the unique JP233 ‘runway denial munition’ was specifically designed to meet its profile for fast, below-the-radar attack. Developed during the 1970s, the JP233 was designed to render the Soviet runways built in East Germany or Poland unusable for critical operations with a barrage of cratering weapons and anti-personnel devices.26 Each JP233 contained thirty runway-cratering munitions weighing 57lb, designed to penetrate the surface of a runway before then exploding and causing massive ‘heave distortion’ to the surface area. The blast would force the tarmac upwards in a great spew of broken rubble. To discourage anyone seeking to make repairs, a further 215 anti-personnel bomblets followed on small parachutes, designed to pop up on three legs and arm themselves, detonating if disturbed. A final kicker was that a number of the munitions would continue to detonate randomly for some hours after lying dormant. It was a vicious weapon. A Tornado could carry two of the 2.5-tonne JP233s, so a single raid by eight jets brought the potent mix of 480 cratering bombs and 3,440 anti-personnel bomblets. It was a brutal and effective method of airfield operating surface denial, with one ‘slight’ drawback. The scientists who developed it required the Tornado to fly straight and level down the runway, at around 200ft and 520mph, which, the aircrews observed stoica...

Margaret Thatcher was giving her full attention to President George Bush’s opening address at a conference at the Aspen Institute in Colorado when news of Saddam’s invasion broke. She steadied nerves by ordering the nearest Royal Navy warships to sail to the region. The British Prime Minister showed her experience as a military campaign veteran for whom the lessons of the twentieth century were clear. The next morning, President Bush asked her: ‘Margaret, what do we do?’3 Mrs Thatcher, who famously ordered the retaking of the Falkland Islands by military force after the Argentine invasion in 1982, replied: ‘Aggression must be stopped. If an aggressor gets away with it, others will want to get away with it too. You cannot gain from your aggression.’

When the Hercules landed in the heat of Dhahran – 30°C at two in the morning – the loadmasters went into overdrive. ‘They kicked us out of the back like there was no tomorrow and the Herc was off taxiing before we’d even put our kit down,’ recalled one airman.

Before deploying to the Gulf, Bellamy made one last trip home. His mother’s parting words were that she had been praying hard, and ‘God has promised you will be safe’. Bellamy told his pilot Trevor Roche that this divine intervention would happily extend to him, as they were in the same aircraft. Then the rest of the formation heard about ‘Dave’s heavenly safety’. Superstitions grew. Perhaps if they flew close to Dave and Trevor’s aircraft, they too would fall under the Good Lord’s umbrella? Word spread and other members of 20 Squadron asked if they could join the formation that was clearly going to be ‘watched over’. While it became a bit of a standing joke, there was just a hint of seriousness behind the smiles. How would they survive what was coming?

It was decided; the JP233 would be the RAF’s main contribution. It had been developed specifically for Tornados to sneak through Soviet defences then deliver their devastating ordnance via a high-speed, low-level overflight.10 The Iraqi Air Force was able to operate from a number of very large and well-prepared bases, and the USAF lacked dedicated airfield-denial munitions, so the Americans warmly embraced the British offer of employing Tornado GR1s to complete the job. But Nige knew that the JP233 was going to present a challenge, particularly to get enough aircraft over the target to achieve the requisite damage. The weapon had been designed to decimate Warsaw Pact runways. Punching through their thick layers built on dense northern European clay subsoil, the cratering munitions would bury themselves then explode, ‘heaving’ the runway surface upwards and causing massive damage. ‘The tactics we had always used dictated that knocking out an 8,000ft Soviet runway on “Day One” of the Cold War going hot would require one Tornado eight-ship formation, each carrying two JP233s, attacking that single airfield. Those of us who survived that initial assault would return to base, reload, refuel and then repeat the attack about four hours later with another eight aircraft loaded with JP233s. We would have deployed thirty-two JP233s: nearly 1,000 cratering munitions and 7,000 anti-personnel bomblets. For one single 8,000ft runway.’ Nige was told their first target in Iraq would be th...

The JP233 was not only unproven in battle; there was barely a Tornado pilot who had flown with one. A live drop had been undertaken during its early testing, and in 1988 two crews had flown with a fully armed and JP233-loaded aircraft to test the handling capabilities at the aircraft’s maximum permissible weight,15 but this very expensive and highly secret weapon was not authorised to be deployed for normal peacetime training. The restrictions were quickly lifted. Nige flew his first ever sortie with two live JP233s on 17 December to check how the war-laden Tornado coped with the weapons – a total of almost 5 tonnes – under its belly, at low level, before people began shooting at them for real. ‘In some ways, the Tornado was a fish out of water in the desert. It had been designed for the European theatre of operations to fly at low level and in a cool climate. Now we were flying it in incredible heat, which meant the engines were less efficient.’

Dear Mum, The time is 0430 and I find myself drinking black coffee and contemplating the days ahead. All of the peace initiatives have failed and by the time you read this I expect we will be at war. It seems almost incomprehensible that, in 1991, such an undertaking is necessary. Everyone held out the hope that the fighting would never really happen. Many seem surprised it now will, and no one is prepared for the sacrifices which lie ahead. We are now on a shift system and I work from 0100 to 1300. Today it has rained since midnight and everywhere is flooding which seems really strange. With all the sandbags and puddles, I am reminded of the [First World War] trenches. Despite the immediate prospects, morale is high. Much emphasis has been placed on our training and equipment but that is all an echo of times past. Undoubtedly we are prepared, but even the best-laid plans have the habit of running amok. Let’s hope the war is decisive and short, though I can’t see it myself. Since this is probably my last letter until war breaks out, I just want to tell you that the last couple of weeks have been very happy for me. I will write whenever I can but circumstances might overtake me. Be brave yourself, I love you very much and am proud to be your son. Hopefully nothing will happen to me – or I will be very angry!44

The opening shots of the war were to be fired by Apache attack helicopters hovering over the southern Iraq desert.22 Their task was to destroy two early-warning radars, creating a corridor down which the hundreds of aircraft could travel en route to strike airbases, power plants, communication centres and Baghdad itself. The attack was timed for 0240 local.23 At 0239.30, the US Army pilots waited, stationary in the hover, peering into the darkness. There was no movement. Ten seconds to go. There was a sudden flurry of heat signatures as Iraqi personnel scurried around the buildings. The clock ticked down to 0240. The crosshairs of Apache weapons systems settled on their targets and a volley of Hellfire missiles speared away. The attack helicopters edged closer, loosing off rockets, then moved in closer still, engaging anything still standing with their 30mm cannon. Fire rose from buildings, trucks burst into flames with bodies slumped around them. During four minutes of unfettered destruction, the Apaches unleashed 27 Hellfires, 100 rockets and 4,000 cannon rounds. The Iraqi radars – and many of the personnel – were obliterated. The ‘back door’ had been kicked open.

General Schwarzkopf now came under pressure from Washington to allow Israeli officers into his Saudi headquarters to identify the best targets. His response was blunt. ‘How can anybody think the Israelis have better target information than our Air Force? We’ve been studying that part of Iraq with the most sophisticated intelligence gathering technology ever invented.’11 And inviting Israelis into the home of Islam was ‘a dumb idea’.

As a veteran of 500 low-level missions in Vietnam, Vice Admiral Stanley Arthur felt duty-bound to share some hard-won knowledge. From his ship in the Gulf, the Commander of the Seventh Fleet sent a carefully worded message to his senior officers. ‘Gentlemen, far be it for me to dictate specific combat tactics but I must interject my early observations relative to the age-old argument of low altitude delivery versus high with a quick look at what has happened to the multinational 6 air forces to date. One cannot escape the fact that the current AAA environment makes low altitude delivery a non-starter.’ He felt that it couldn’t be successfully achieved without the benefit of surprise, and at that moment, they didn’t have it. ‘We learned a hard lesson in Vietnam relative to AAA,’ he reminded his commanders.

‘There was shrapnel under Pete’s seat, holes through the cockpit, the left wing, spoiler, left engine nozzle and the fin,’ Gillies said. ‘And a hole the size of Desperate Dan in the tailplane.’ It was nothing short of a miracle that they had been able to fly at all. And an extraordinary testament to the Tornado’s resilience that it had managed to carry them the 400 miles back home.

On a number of occasions, Spink found himself unnervingly close to the action. ‘During one of the first Scud attacks, I was driving towards one of our Tornado sites on the airfield. I glanced over at the Patriot anti-missile battery about half a mile away. Suddenly there was the most enormous bang and flash as a missile launched. I could see the shock wave forming and spreading out, coming down the road towards me. I dived out of the car and buried myself as best I could in a dip by the road. Seconds later there was another huge explosion as an incoming Scud was hit and the remains fell onto the base about 300 yards from the Tornados. Then bits of Patriot missile debris started to clatter down around me. It was a pretty interesting experience.’

Bill Cope, the Squadron Boss, departed with his most experienced crew at 4 a.m. arriving at Muharraq later that day. Their arrival was somewhat underwhelming. ‘If we had expected a welcome for bringing a much-needed additional capability to the RAF element in-theatre we were to be disappointed,’ Cope later said.19 That night he went for a drink with the Jaguar Detachment Commander in the top-floor bar of the Sheraton Hotel, where they were quartered. What was the drill for a Scud attack? Cope asked. Do we go down to the basement? ‘Not really,’ his friend replied. ‘If a Scud hits the hotel it will be coming vertically downwards at about Mach 5 and will probably pass through all floors before ending up in the basement. So most people rush up here for a beer while watching the Patriot missiles launching from Dhahran across the causeway.’ Cope considered the advice carefully while sipping his beer.

The POWs had been freed so quickly because of Norman Schwarzkopf’s ceasefire demands. ‘Number one was the immediate release of all prisoners of war as well as a complete exchange of information on troops listed as missing in action and the return of any remains. It was essential that I account for everyone. There was no way I wanted a repetition of the POW and MIA agony of the Vietnam War.’

Inspecting the hardened aircraft shelters they had bombed, almost identical to the ones housing his own squadron of Tornados back at RAF Laarbruch, was a revelation to Broadbent. ‘The damage was nothing short of devastating. We had fitted our LGBs with post-impact delay fuses so that they would penetrate the roof of the HAS before exploding inside. The blast of a 1,000lb bomb in a confined space was enough to utterly destroy the contents of the HAS and often blow off the giant steel – supposedly blast-proof – doors. It must have been absolutely terrifying to be on the receiving end of our bombs.’

At the start of the conflict, 2,430 allied aircraft had been based in the region, or close enough to project air power into it. The RAF initially contributed 135 aircraft: 18 Tornado F3 fighters, 46 Tornado GR1/1A attack and recce aircraft, 12 Jaguars, 17 tankers, three Nimrods, 31 Chinook and Puma helicopters, seven Hercules and one HS125 transport aircraft. Countless other transport and supply aircraft flew missions in and out of the region. By the start of the land war, a further twelve Buccaneers and more Tornado GR1s had flown into theatre to support the precision-guided bombing attacks. Around 3,000 RAF personnel were deployed across the Gulf.11 When the ceasefire came into effect, the allied forces had flown 110,000 sorties, of which the RAF flew over 6,100 – the largest number of any nation except the US.

After a few days in hospital and the mentally draining psychological debrief, everyone was suffering from cabin fever. Nichol and Rupert Clark decided to organise an ‘Escape Committee’ in order to have a proper drink. They persuaded a medic to covertly transport them the 3 miles to the Officers’ Mess on the other side of Akrotiri airbase, ‘only for one quiet beer’, they promised. The pilots, navigators and minders walked into the long bar, which was overflowing with fellow fliers – crews of RAF passenger jets, tankers and transport aircraft using Cyprus as a hub to supply the Gulf. Given the former POWs’ international press coverage, they were instantly recognised. A huge cheer went up, followed by clapping and back-slapping as they waded into the gathering.14 ‘I shall never forget the moment we walked into that bar,’ said Buckley. ‘The sea of green flying suits was overwhelming and the camaraderie was intoxicating. As were the pints of Cypriot beer.’ Those drinks flowed even more freely when the President of the Mess invited the new arrivals to drink at the Mess’s expense. They needed no second bidding, and ‘one quiet beer’ was rapidly followed by a dozen considerably louder ones.

As operations in the Gulf wound down, the battle-scarred Tornados arrived back at their bases in dribs and drabs. Their once pristine, sand-coloured livery was now stained with the heat and smoke of intense, wartime flying. A small patch could be seen on a few, covering the hole of a triple-A strike. Four Tornados had been lost in training before the war, another with a technical malfunction at Tabuk, and six went down over enemy territory. There had clearly been some issues with equipment failures. Like all military aircraft, the Tornado was a complex mix of electronics, computerised systems, hydraulics, flying controls and all manner of military hardware crammed into a small airframe which could fly, under fire, at over 700mph in rain, sleet, snow or desert conditions. Some missions had certainly been lost to technical problems, but the incredible teams of dedicated engineers had fought tirelessly to keep the aircraft ready for battle and, despite some challenges, the force had carried out more than 1,800 war sorties delivering over 100 JP233s, 123 ALARM missiles, along with 4,200 ‘dumb’, and nearly 1,000 laser-guided, bombs.17 It had been an incredible achievement by all involved, on the ground and in the air. Seven Tornado aircrew had died during training for the conflict, and five in battle. A total of forty-seven British servicemen lost their lives during the war to liberate Kuwait. John Broadbent had presided over some of their final journeys home. ‘The war had been...

General Norman Schwarzkopf also dealt fulsomely with the concept of ‘regime change’ after the war to liberate Kuwait which had worldwide support, and nine UN resolutions authorising the coalition’s actions. ‘The resolutions that provided the legal basis for our military operations in the Gulf were clear in their intent: kick the Iraqi force out of Kuwait. We had authority to take whatever actions were necessary to accomplish that mission, including attacks into Iraq. We had no authority to invade Iraq for the purpose of capturing the entire country or its capital.’22 Like Baker, he knew that the costs of governing and security would be prohibitive. With some prescience, Schwarzkopf then said: ‘I am certain that had we taken all of Iraq we would have been like the dinosaur in the tar pit, we would still be there. We, not the United Nations, would be bearing the costs of our occupation. This is a burden I am sure the beleaguered American taxpayer would not have been happy to take on.’

Steve was a worker, a man who could be relied upon to complete any task well. He was not slow in voicing his opinions or prodding someone’s shoulder in defence of others. He was a successful ingredient in the formula that is XV Squadron. In the Gulf, his contribution was exemplary. He was generous to a fault and a loyal person, devoted to the Squadron; a man of principles, of truth. We pray that he may rest in peace, and we extend our love and friendship to his wife and two children.

As the formalities drew to a close, Sir Stephen rose to his feet. He recounted his own final flight a few days earlier, when he had flown a series of flypasts over iconic Tornado sites. As he led the last formation over Tain Air Weapons Range in Scotland, the Range Safety Officer’s voice could be heard on the radio. ‘Tornado flight, are you ready for a message?’ ‘Go ahead,’ Hillier replied. ‘Tornado, as you depart Tain Range for the last time, can I just say what an honour and privilege it has been to serve the Tornado force over the past decades.’ The Range Officer then continued with his regulation weapons safety check. ‘So Tornado – for the final time – I ask you to confirm you are all now switches safe.’ There may have been a slight crack in the Chief of the Air Staff’s voice as he told the story. ‘In that time-honoured way which we all know so well, the radio calls rippled up through the formation.’ ‘Three, switches safe.’ ‘Two, switches safe.’ ‘One, switches safe. Thank you, Tain. Tornado is en route.’ Everyone in the audience, many with tears in their eyes, knew this was the last goodbye for the faithful aircraft that had flown an astonishing 186,000 hours on combat operations.

This book began with an account of the twenty-fifth annual reunion of the Gulf War POWs, their colleagues, and some of the loved ones of those who had not returned. After being contacted by the author, President George H. W. Bush, the man who had set the liberation of Kuwait in motion in 1991, sent the group a personal letter: It is with humility and pride that I send warmest greetings to all those gathered. I wish I could be with you to convey my personal respects and my gratitude; I hope you know I have never forgotten the important role you played in this multinational effort. Too often it is said we have no heroes. Not so! We do have heroes and each one of you – aviators and soldiers of clear purpose who put service ahead of self – is a hero in the truest sense of the word. Your service and gallantry will long be remembered, and all freedom-loving peoples owe you a lasting debt of gratitude. This United States Navy man and former Commander-in-Chief salutes you and sends you best wishes for a memorable gathering to celebrate duty, honor, and liberty.