[iwar] [fc:Jammin']

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2001-11-25 21:15:15
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From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net>
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Date: Sun, 25 Nov 2001 21:15:15 -0800 (PST)
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Navy Times
November 26, 2001
Jammin'
Prowlers zap Osama's communications
By C. Mark Brinkley, Times staff writer
ABOARD THE USS CARL VINSON IN THE ARABIAN SEA - From the outset, Lt. Jeff
"Chet" Smith didn't expect this would be his war.
A pilot for one of the Navy's precious few EA-6B Prowlers, Smith expected
the electronic warfare mission in underdeveloped Afghanistan to be minimal
at best. His radar-jamming jet would be of little use in a country that
lacked a modern military force.
"In the beginning of the war, they used us in our traditional role," Smith
said Nov. 13. "After that, we pretty much thought we were out of a job."
Then someone locked onto a bright idea.
Within days of the massive bombing campaign, Smith and his colleagues were
surprised by news of a nontraditional mission in which they could
participate - jamming ground communications.
Although it had never been done before, the four EA-6Bs on board were tasked
with shutting down frequencies the Taliban and Osama bin Laden used to talk
to each other.
While many of the details of that mission remain classified, Smith can say
that the Prowlers' jamming pods are good for disrupting more than radar
traffic.
"You name the type of communications and we were trying to jam it," Smith
said.
Since then, it's been mission after mission, with Smith himself logging more
than 90 flight hours in six weeks. The new role helped his squadron log a
record number of flight hours for that amount of time, just more than 400
hours.
"It is not typical of what the Prowlers do," said Rear Adm. Tom Zelibor,
commander of the Carl Vinson Battle Group. "It's not the traditional, you
know, going after [surface-to-air] sites and things like that. I think the
way that we are plugging the Prowler into the overall scheme for information
operations is a very positive thing." 
The four Prowlers on board the carrier Theodore Roosevelt, also launching
missions here in the Arabian Sea, have stayed equally busy, and the two
groups have managed to play a prominent role in the attacks. A major mission
has been jamming Taliban communications in order to help protect
special-operations forces working within the country.
"The SOF guys go in and out, and hopefully no one even knew they were
there," said Smith, a member of VAQ-135.
The group must follow strict guidelines, however - jamming some frequencies
while leaving others alone. The pilots must be careful not to interfere with
or disrupt communications with Predator unmanned aerial vehicles, Joint
Direct Attack Munitions and Joint Stand-Off Weapons.
"If you hit one of the frequencies you're not supposed to, you can be
benched real quick," Smith said.
Challenging missions
Despite the increased number of flight hours, the aircraft have held up
surprisingly well, Smith said. Though some routine maintenance is needed,
parts and equipment have been flowing to the ships as needed.
Typically, only one Prowler is flying at a time, though as many as three
have been operating in the region at once.
"It's busier than I've ever been in a Prowler squadron," Smith said. "You're
really pushing the jets, pushing the crew."
One of the biggest challenges for Smith and the other pilots is the sheer
length of the missions. An average flight can take six to seven hours and
includes an aerial refueling.
"It took a little while to get used to," he said. 
It's often hard to tell whether all their hard work is actually having an
effect, Smith said, because the Prowler pilots don't have the visual payoff
of seeing their targets explode the way F/A-18 Hornet and F-14 Tomcat pilots
do.
"You can visibly see what they're doing," Smith said. "We're going in and
trying to shape the [Information Operations] battlefield.
"We knew we did a good job when the SOF guys went in to Kandahar and no one
knew they were there."
The new role is paying off for U.S. forces, even if the Prowler pilots don't
always know it, said Capt. T.C. Bennett, commander of the carrier air wing,
a former EA-6B commander who also has flown both strike and jamming missions
in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.
"An EA-6B guy used to be able to judge his success by looking up in the sky
and seeing how many airplanes landed, protecting the strike aircraft going
in," Bennett said. "That's not necessarily what they are doing now. The
results of what they do don't affect us out here on the carrier.
"The results of what they do are known by people back in Washington, D.C. A
lot of the stuff they are doing, they know the effect of it back there. We
don't know, other than 'Hey you're doing a great job.' It's kind of
spy-vs.-spy stuff that they are out there doing. They have created a lot of
good things for themselves out of this."
Their success could spread throughout the Navy and Marine Corps' Prowler
communities, causing EA-6B pilots to see this type of mission more often in
the future.
"It will certainly spur the development of the follow-on aircraft that needs
to come," Bennett said. "Those airframes are 30 years old, and we're going
to have to replace them sooner or later. We beat them every day. A follow-on
airplane is imperative."
And while the focus of the Prowlers has been on the nontraditional mission,
no one has forgotten that the Prowler is there to support attack fighters if
needed, Bennett said.
"Even though we know there are no surface-to-air missiles, when I'm doing my
attack missions, it's awful nice to know they're there."

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