Another issue Horner anticipated and headed off was an attempt by the U.S. Marine Corps to carve out their own space (as ground forces tend to do with land space). Marines like to run their own show, so they bring radars and air controllers to the fight, and are fully capable of controlling the airspace above their portion of the battlefield. Nevertheless, the JFACC is the airspace coordination authority under the CINC, and for him to cede a block of airspace to the USMC component would not only be inappropriate (a functional commander giving responsibility to a service commander) but would not provide for optimum management of the theater airspace.

Though it was not an issue with Walter Boomer, a few Marine officers did have a hidden agenda during the Gulf War: some Marines do not like functional commands—especially when another service will be commanding Marine forces. Since they are in essence a land force, and since the U.S. Army usually provides the major portion of the land forces, the Marines almost always work for the Army, and they don’t like that. For that reason, they resist any efforts to strip off their forces—aircraft working for the JFACC, for instance.

And for that reason, in the part of the Internal Look briefing in which he discussed airspace management, Horner made clear to the CINC that U.S. efforts should be integrated with the in-place system of the host nation, and that all airspace should then be coordinated under JFACC, who knew how to do that better than anyone else, and who would not anger the host nation (which would have been the CINC’s problem, but Horner’s undoing).

Schwarzkopf agreed.

Though some Marines were not happy with this decision (as had been the case in every previous exercise), he had confidence in Horner, and little further came of this problem. (During Desert Shield/Desert Storm there were attempts by Marine officers to go their own way, but Walter Boomer set these people straight.)

Push CAS

Land forces require close air support.

But how much do they need? And when? Is air best used here and now, striking enemy tanks and artillery, or somewhere else—say, striking his fuel depots and tanker trucks? These questions aren’t always easy to answer, unless enemy tanks are about to overrun friendly positions.

As a young pilot, both in war and in countless exercises, Horner had watched airpower’s potential squandered by assigning it to support the Army. He was determined not to let that happen again.

Airmen and landmen see CAS from different perspectives.

The airman sees it as answering the question, “How do I keep from hurting my guys on the ground?” In other words, he sees CAS as a system to hit the enemy in close proximity to friendly ground forces. His worry is not so much about hitting the enemy as about not hitting his own troops on the ground.