\ S. Hrg. 104-421 BRIEHNG ON THE F-16 SHOOTDOWN IN BOSNIA AND CURRENT OPERATIONS R7 — [Ciqr^ ~ = Y 4, AR 5/3; S. HRG. 104-421 Briefing on the F-16 Shootdoun in B... ^ BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON AKMED SERVICES UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED FOURTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION JULY 13, 1995 FVinted for the use of the Committee on Armed Services «^K2 3-;5o, U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 21-457CC WASHINGTON : 1996 ForsalebytheU.S.GovernmentPrintingOffice SuperintendentofDocuments,CongressionalSalesOffice,Washington,DC 20402 ISBN 0-16-052553-5 r\ \ S. Hrg. 104-421 ^ BRIEHNG ON THE F-16 SHOOTDOWN IN BOSNIA n AND CURRENT OPERATIONS Y 4. AR 5/3: S. HRG. 104-421 Briefing on the F-16 Shootdoun in D... J.Aj^x XX11JN(jT BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON AKMED SERVICES UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED FOURTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION JULY 13, 1995 Printed for the use of the Committee on Armed Services Uu ^^^JuHif^-^^ ^^Y 2 3-^0^ U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 21-457CC WASHINGTON 1996 : ForsalebytheU.S.GovernmentPrintingOffice SuperintendentofDocuments,CongressionalSalesOffice,Washington,DC 20402 ISBN 0-16-052553-5 COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES STROM THURMOND, South Carolina, Chairman JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia SAM NUNN, Georgia WILLIAM S. COHEN, Maine J. JAMES EXON, Nebraska JOHN McCain, Arizona CARL LEVIN, Michigan TRENT LOTT, Mississippi EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts DAN COATS, Indiana JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico BOB SMITH, New Hampshire JOHN GLENN, Ohio DIRK KEMPTHORNE, Idaho ROBERT C. BYRD, West Virginia KAY BAILEY HUTCHISON, Texas CHARLES S. ROBB, Virginia JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut RICK SANTORUM, Pennsylvania RICHARD H. BRYAN, Nevada Richard L Reynard, StaffDirector Arnold L. Punaro, StaffDirectorfor the Minority (II) CONTENTS CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF WITNESSES July 13, 1995 Page Slocombe, Hon. Walter B., Under Secretary ofDefense for Policy, Department of Defense accompanied by: Lt. Gen. Howell M. Estes, II, LJSAF, Director for Operations, Office of Joint Chiefs of Staff; Lt. Gen. Wesley K. Clark, USA, Director for Strategic Plans and Policy; Mai. Gen. Patrick M. Hughes, USA, Director for JCS Support, Defense Intelligence Agency; and Rear Adm. Charles W. Moore,Jr., USN, Deputy Directorfor Current Operations (III) BRIEFING ON THE F-16 SHOOTDOWN IN BOSNIA AND CURRENT OPERATIONS THURSDAY, JULY 13, 1995 U.S. Senate, Committee on Armed Services, Washington, DC. The committee met, pursuant to notice, in classified TOP SE- CRET session at 9:33 a.m. in room SR-222, Russell Senate Office Building, Senator Strom Thurmond (chairman) presiding. Committee members present: Senators Thurmond, Warner, Lott, Coats, Smith, Hutchison, Santorum, Nunn, Exon, Levin, Robb, and Lieberman. Committee staff members present: Richard L. Reynard, staff di- rector; and George W. Lauffer, deputy staffdirector. Professional staff members present: Charles S. Abell, Romie L. Brownlee, Lucia M. Chavez, Lawrence J. Lanzillotta, Stephen L. Madey, Jr., Thomas G. Moore, Steven C. Saulnier, Cord A. Ster- ling, and Eric H. Thoemmes. Minority staffmembers present: Arnold L. Punaro, minority staff director; Andrew S. Effron, minority counsel; Richard D. DeBobes, counsel; Christine E. Cowart, special assistant; Richard E. Combs, Jr., John W. Douglass, Creighton Greene, and Michael J. McCord, professional staffmembers. Staff assistants present: Alec Bierbauer, Mickie Jan Gordon, Shelley G. Lauffer, and Deasy Wagner. Committee members' assistants present: Grayson F. Winterling and Judith A. Ansley, assistants to Senator Warner; James M. Bodner, assistant to Senator Cohen; Anne E. Sauer, assistant to Senator McCain; Samuel D. Adcock, assistant to Senator Lott; Richard F. Schwab and David J. Gribbin, assistants to Senator Coats; Thomas L. Lankford, assistant to Senator Smith; tjlen E. Tait, assistant to Senator Kempthorne; George K. Johnson, assist- ant to Senator Hutchison; John F. Luddy II, assistant to Senator Inhofe; Richard W. Fieldhouse and David A. Lewis, assistants to Senator Levin; Steven A. Wolfe, assistant to Senator Kennedy; Pa- tricia J. Buckheit and John P. Stevens, assistants to Senator Glenn; C. Richard D'Amato and Lisa W. Tuite, assistants to Sen- ator Byrd; William Owens, assistant to Senator Robb; John F. Lilley, assistant to Senator Lieberman; Randall A. Schieber, assist- ant to Senator Bryan; and Dave Davis, assistant to Senator Hutchison. (1) OPENE^G STATEMENT OF SENATOR STROM THURMOND, CHAIRMAN Chairman Thurmond. The committee will come to order. Senator Warner was the one that asked that we have a briefing on this subject, and we are very pleased to do so, and we thank you gentle- men for coming. The committee meets today to receive a briefing on current oper- ations in Bosnia and to review the circumstances surrounding the recent loss of an F-16 over Bosnia. There are two areas of possible concern that have been raised by the loss of Captain O'Grady's F- 16: the timely distribution of intelligence to tactical units and the overall adequacy ofairborne electronic warfare. I have repeatedly asked witnesses about the adequacy of air- borne electronic warfare during hearings on the fiscal year 1996 defense authorization bill. Unfortunately, the answer has too often been to acknowledge a need, but not to fund programs to provide up to date jamming capability. I would be very interested to see the role airborne electronics did play or should have played in the inci- dent. The downing of Captain O'Grady's F-16 also raises serious ques- tions concerning the adequacy of our ability to distribute intel- ligence data quickly. Despite earlier assertions that Captain O'Grady's shootdown was due to an intelligence failure, it now ap- pears that this was more a failure ofdata distribution. Of particular concern is our ability to share intelligence with al- lied forces. If the United States is to participate effectively with al- lied forces and if the United States is to have confidence in allied components for critical mission support, we must ensure that we are fully interoperable. A final issue that goes beyond the technical questions of what went wrong has to do with the role of the Serbian Government. It now appears that Captain O'Grady's shootdown was the result of a carefully prepared trap which involved, to some degree, the use ofSerbian air traffic control or air defense radars. The committee is anxious to see whether we can learn if Serbia was a knowing participant in the setting of this trap or whether Bosnian Serbs were merely able to exploit Serbian radar data in an unassisted manner. We look forward to the briefings and again thank of all you wit- nesses for coming today. We would be very pleased now to hear from you. General, ifyou want to proceed. General Estes. Mr. Chairman, since you have started the hear- ing and Mr. Slocombe has just joined, I'll go ahead and say a wel- come and how pleased we are to be in front of the committee this morning for the Department of Defense to address the issues that youjust mentioned. The initial purpose of what we will do, then, will be to in fact give the committee an operations and intelligence update on the current situation in Bosnia. We will then be prepared to discuss the shootdown ofCaptain O'Grady's F-16. I brought with me Admi- ral Moore, who was in fact the individual that the Chairman of the JCS directed to do the after-action study. He will personally go through the findings that we had as a result ofthe shootdown. Then Mr, Slocombe is here, Secretary Slocombe, to address policy issues that the committee may in fact have on the situation in Bosnia. Let me just see if Mr. Slocombe has any opening comments he wants to make before we turn to General Hughes for his portion ofthis hearing. Chairman THURMOND. We are pleased to hear from you, Mr. Slocombe. STATEMENT OF HON. WALTER B. SLOCOMBE, UNDER SEC- RETARY OF DEFENSE FOR POLICY, DEPARTMENT OF DE- FENSE ACCOMPANIED BY: LT. GEN. HOWELL M. ESTES, II, USAF, DIRECTOR FOR OPERATIONS, OFFICE OF JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF; LT. GEN. WESLEY K. CLARK, USA, DIREC- TOR FOR STRATEGIC PLANS AND POLICY; MAJ. GEN. PAT- RICK M. HUGHES, USA, DIRECTOR FOR JCS SUPPORT, DE- FENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY; AND REAR ADM. CHARLES W. MOORE, JR., USN, DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR CURRENT OP- ERATIONS Mr. Slocombe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I apologize for being late. They turned up the gain on the metal detector and it took a minute. We have a series ofbriefings which I think will be of interest to the committee and then we stand ready to take your questions on any aspect of this difficult situation. I think the most efficient thing, with your permission, is to go immediately to the briefing. So with the committee's permission, I would like to ask General Estes or whoever you want to begin first. General Hughes will begin the briefing. General Hughes. Good morning, sir. This is a presentation concerning the fall of Srebrenica and the NOFORN current situation. It is being given at the Secret level, al- though a good deal of this information has been and is releasable to NATO. There should be two of those books, sir. That is all I was able to bring. Srebrenica HistoricalSummary [Deleted.] This event began on July 6 [deleted]. [Slide deleted.] [Deleted]. On July 8, while shelling continued, the Bosnian Serb Army did penetrate the southern part of the enclave some 3 kilo- meters from the south. Two Dutch UNPROFOR OP's, outposts, were overrun on that day and one Dutch soldier was killed during an unfortunate exchange offire during that period oftime. Also on the 8th, 20 Dutch soldiers were taken [deleted]. [Slide deleted.] On July 10 [deleted]. On July 11 [deleted]. I would like to remind the committee or the group here that the Dutch peacekeepers in this enclave were never equipped for this kind offighting. They were there to ensure the security ofhumani- tarian services and support and to control the enclave from the standpoint ofhumanitarian assistance, but not to act as a repelling force or to engage in direct conflict of this type. So they were ill- prepared for this sort ofactivity to go on. [Slide deleted.! [Deleted.] [Slide deleted.] Continuing on, the reaction to the close air strikes on the Bosnian Serb attacks was nothing that would surprise any of you. The Muslim political entities were very critical and continue to be to this day. The Western governments expressed dismay in a vari- ety ofways. What was interesting was that the Bosnian Serb political offi- cials were silent and they remained silent, in fact, until last night, when Mr. Karadzic made certain public pronouncements on Ser- bian TV. The only person, the only leader of the Bosnian Serbs, who became active on the 12th and perhaps as early as the 11th about events in was the Bosnian Serb military commander. Gen- eral Mladic. [Deleted.] He has made a number of threats and demands, most of which, by the way, have not held up. He gave time lines that he would shell the Dutch compound if disarmament did not take place, and that deadline has since passed without shelling and without disarmament, [Deleted.] Virtually all of the population of the city departed be- tween the 11th and 12th and essentially became refugees. The ma- jority ofthem went to Potocari. Meanwhile, there were some additional few Dutch peacekeepers taken hostage by the Bosnian Serbs. We hold the total number this morning of Dutch peacekeepers being held by the Bosnian Serbs to be 51, in three different locations. We also hold that the entire Dutch military force, [deleted] is now essentially complaint to the Serbs. They are surrounded by the Serbs, their compound is surrounded by refugees, and they are es- sentially doing what the Serbs tell them to do, within reason. I might comment on the government military force. Some time on the 10th, the government force apparently left the battlefield, and by leaving the battlefield what I mean is that they departed their fighting positions, they melted away into the countryside, and were no longer defe—nders ofthe city. We do not know I do not know as I sit here this morning why they did that. It could have been that they had orders to do that in order to preserve their force. It could have been that a local com- mander made an independent decision to do that, based upon Serb offensive pressure. For whatever reason, on the 10th and certainly on the morning of the 11th, most of the Bosnian Government force was gone. [Slide deleted.] I will show you a few more pictures. Once again, I think they are kind of hard to see. This is a photo of Srebrenica U.N. compound area, and it [deleted]. Next viewgraph, please. [Slide deleted.] Give me the next one, please. [Slide deleted.]