Going to War - GPS Declassified: From Smart Bombs to Smartphones - page 103

7

Going to War
GPS aids Military Success in the Persian Gulf

A line has been drawn in the sand.

George H. W. Bush, ifty-ifth presidential news conference,
White House briefing room, August 8, 1990

As day broke on January 16, 1991, seven b-52 bombers rumbled more than nine
thousand feet down the runway at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, finally
lifting into rainy skies and heading for targets more distant than any bombing
run previously ordered. 1 After five months of military preparations and diplo-
matic maneuvering following Saddam Hussein's August 2, 1990, invasion of
Kuwait, Operation Desert Shield was transitioning to Operation Desert Storm.
Not only clouds but also extreme secrecy shrouded the mission. Designated
officially as Operation Senior Surprise, the attack from Barksdale carried such
a top-secret classification that the several-dozen participants did not even utter
its code name. They dubbed the mission Operation Secret Squirrel, a nickname
(taken from a cartoon character) for the weapons they carried, which officially
did not exist. 2 Fifty-seven aviators conducted the mission, with each plane's
crew including two sets of pilots and navigators who exchanged shifts during