A Canadian Armed Forces aircrew member waits for the arrival of the CP-140M Aurora aircraft in Kuwait. The Auroras , with their cutting-edge sensors, have been a boon to coalition forces. Photo: Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Department of National Defence KUWAIT CITY, Kuwait — Canadian fighter jets dropped bombs over Iraq late Sunday night, Iraqi time, Defense Minister Rob Nicholson announced in a statement from Ottawa.
“Today, Canada’s CF-18s conducted their first combat strike since joining the fight against ISIL on Oct. 30. Co-ordinated with our coalition partners, two CF-18s attacked ISIL targets with GBU12 500-pound laser-guided bombs in the vicinity of Fallujah, Iraq,” Nicholson said
“The approximately four-hour mission included air-to-air refueling from Canada’s Polaris aircraft. All aircraft returned safely to their base.”
Nicholson said the assessment of damage was continuing.
It was the middle of the night in Kuwait, where the Canadian warplanes are based, and nobody connected with Task Force Iraq was available to comment.
Ottawa received word of the attack at about noon Ottawa time (or around 8 p.m. in Iraq).
First word of the successful sortie came in a statement from the minister shortly after 6 p.m. ET.
Few other details were released about the airstrike, which was the first use of bombs by CF-18 Hornets since the war to oust Moammar Gadhafi.
“We are all proud about the first strike,” an officer in Ottawa familiar with the operation said.
“It’s all good news, but we cannot possibly release information because it has to all come out at once at a tech brief where all the information will be covered so that you have the whole picture.”
As of Sunday evening, that brief for journalists was scheduled to be given in Ottawa on Tuesday.
It is the fourth time that Canada’s venerable CF-18s have dropped bombs, but not the first time that they have been used against Iraq. During the first Gulf War, which routed Saddam Hussein’s army from Kuwait in 1991, several dozen CF-18s flew for weeks against targets in Kuwait and Iraq. For that mission they flew out of a base in Qatar that was dubbed Canada Dry Two. Canadian support elements were housed nearby at Canada Dry One.
Eighteen of Canada’s 30-year-old fighter jets were deployed again in 1999 against Serbian forces during the Kosovo conflict. They flew combat missions again over Libya three years ago.
The bombing run of Sunday may put to rest a minor controversy over whether the laser-guided munitions used in Sunday’s air strike were up to the job because they have trouble identifying targets in cloudy weather. That was a problem during the first two days of Canada’s part in the air campaign, which began on Thursday. But skies were clear Sunday.
To see through the clouds the CF-18s are about to receive GPS-guided bombs as well. The blogosphere was alive this weekend with suggestions that Canada did not have enough of these weapons. It was a charge strongly denied by airmen in-theatre and back in Canada.
But Canada’s mix of bombs is about to improve. All-weather GPS-guided bombs for the CF-18 Hornets are expected to arrive from Canada in the next day or two.
Canadian Armed Forces flight crew service the CP-140M Aurora Long Range Patrol aircraft as they arrive in Kuwait. Photo: Canadian Forces Combat Camera, DND IS2014-5784
There was some speculation in the blogosphere that the delay in getting the GPS-guided weapons from Canada to the Middle East had arisen because Ottawa had failed to order new supplies of munitions after the air war that Canada was part of over Libya three years ago. Several military and civilian sources insisted that supplies of ordnance for the CF-18 were sufficient for the present needs and that the Hornets would be flying with a mix of laser and GPS-guided bombs under their wings very soon.
“We have established an air bridge between Canada and Kuwait and expect them to arrive and to be used in the coming days,” Devenney said.
The Department of National Defence purchased 400 bomb-guidance kits from the U.S. last week that make smart bombs work better in poor weather. “There is no shortage in ammunition stocks,” DND spokeswoman Ashley Lemire told Postmedia reporter David Pugliese before the Canadians began combat sorties over Iraq.
The bomb-guidance kits were not an emergency purchase but had been made because it was thought the air campaign could last for some time, defence sources in Canada said this weekend. The Harper government has until now authorized the mission for six months.
The announcement of the air strike on the fourth day of operations came after the chief spokesman for Task Force Iraq said that the mission had been going well since it started on Thursday, with the CP-140 M Aurora spy planes singled out for praise.
The mostly Canadian-built electro-optical and infrared sensors on the pair of upgraded Block 3 CP-140M Aurora spy planes the Royal Canadian Air Force has been flying over territory held by Islamic State in western and northwest Iraq have been a boon to Hornets pilots and other coalition aircrews. The lumbering 30-year-old propellor-powered Auroras used to be regarded mostly as anti-submarine warfare platforms. That is why they have been based in Nova Scotia and British Columbia. But the cutting-edge systems the aircraft have received recently have turned them into effective battlefield surveillance platforms, too.
“We are extremely pleased with how it is going, especially the Aurora,” Lt.-Col. Dave Devenney, Joint Task Force Iraq’s spokesman, said over the telephone from a base in Kuwait. “They’ve been giving a good, clear image that allow us to assess the effects that coalition aircraft have been having on the ground.
“This the first outing for the Block 3 Auroras. They are providing us with an enhanced picture of the battle space that we can further analyze later. That information is being used in direct support of coalition air missions.”
Canadian Armed Forces aircrew members wait for the arrival of the CP-140M Aurora Long Range Patrol aircraft in Kuwait. Photo: Canadian Forces Combat Camera, DND IS2014-5784
The information collected by Auroras’ sensors were being used by the U.S.-led Combined Air Operations Centre in real time or brought back for processing and then distributed across the wider intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) network, said Col. Daniel Constable, the commander of Canada’s air campaign.
Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS, has threatened to target Canadians, Australians and others in their homelands. It also has encouraged its followers to harm U.S. forces deployed around the Persian Gulf and even the children of western diplomats and other workers who are enrolled at English language schools across the Middle East.
Whether these warnings could have consequences for the 600 Canadian troops in Kuwait is impossible to say. It has been considered unlikely because the Canadian Forces have made no secret of the fact their personnel here are confined to compounds and airfields within highly secure bases.
Nevertheless, two weeks ago nobody would have predicted the murder of two unarmed Canadian troops in separate incidents in Canada.
“The safety of our people, that is my personal number-one concern,” Constable said. “The area where we are operating from is force-protected. There is a level of protection provided by the host nation and by our coalition partners. We definitely contribute to that force protection.
Justice Minister Peter MacKay, left, talks with crew as two CP-140M Aurora reconnaissance aircraft prepare to leave CFB Greenwood in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan
“We’re always assessing threats and adjust our force protection (posture) to take into account any threats.“
Devenney confirmed what the colonel said, adding: “Regardless of what the threat may or may not be, we have had no need to be outside the base. We are still building our camp and have been focused on getting operations underway. There is still so much to do.”
The RCAF had anticipated a slow start to its modest part in the bombing campaign against Islamic State because its pilots had to become used to the terrain in Iraq and a complex operational environment that puts dozens of warplanes, intelligence aircraft and refuelling tankers into the air at the same time. As well as keeping a close eye out for possible fire from the ground, the Canadian aircrews have been testing their connectivity and inter-operability with aircraft from at least 11 other countries and the coalition’s air and land-based command and control structure.
Although cloud cover made dropping laser-guided munitions problematic during the first two days that Canadian aircraft were over Iraq, the weather has improved. Coalition jets carried out strike missions Saturday and Sunday in Iraq.
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