National Experiences - British Commission for Military History

do C t r i n e, Ca pa C i t i e s, te C H n o l o g y a n d o p e r at i o n a l en v i r o n m e n t o n t H e em p l o y m e n t o f t H e air po w e r ; t H e Ca s e o f guerrilla wa r fa r e 247
forcing enemy to the camouflage that was never fully effective, for the inherent
offensive capacity, and for the possibility of supporting populations in various domains.
In the war against guerrillas there is room for difference between joint operation
and support operation, in that in the first one setting goals and conception of the
manoeuvre are established by the participant forces exploring synergies resulting
from the capabilities of each type of force. The support operation responds to precise
requests issued by the supported units, but for this type of operation it becomes
mandatory to establish performance standards that allow a better understanding of
the capabilities and vulnerabilities of the air means, which results in the maximized
exploration of the capabilities of the force to be in support. This difference was very
important in certain conditions, despite the difficulty to be managed seamlessly.
The execution of air operations in counter guerrilla warfare placed some specific
problems that can be easily overcome in our days, but there were real problems in
the past. For instance, in addition to its own problems of navigation, it could be as
difficult to detect enemy targets as well as the friendly forces that could be very close
– with the technology available at the time this was a very difficult problem to solve,
although this difficulty did not conduct to situations of fratricide fire. There were no
available guided weapons, but its inexistence did not substantially affect the results
of operations, given the nature of the targets, the level of training of most of the crew
with very good CEP (Circular Error Probable), and the air supremacy that allowed
some stability in the execution of the attack.
In counter-guerrilla warfare there is no need for very sophisticated means of combat
but it is decisive to know how to exploit the potential of such resources in face
of the needs of the mission.
In the Portuguese case, in the fight between the aircraft and the anti-aircraft
weapons, the aircraft survived by adopting the appropriate tactics and reacting hard
against the ground attackers when detected. It is said, frequently, that it was the appearance
of the Strella missile that made the war end sooner. In our point of view,
this analysis lacks fundaments although it is true that the shooting of several aircraft
in a very short period of time produced a very negative psychological effect, by
surprise, but this did not prevent the reaction to occur which lowered drastically the
initial results.
In every theatre the Air Force, in addition to participating in joint and support
operations, acted independently in planning and implementation of many actions,
such as was the case with systematic aerial reconnaissance in exploration of the intelligence
reports, or the selective attack on the enemy positions which constituted
as targets of opportunity, or in areas where it was not easy to access by land. In all
theatres areas of free intervention of the Air Force were marked, where it was not
required prior coordination to perform operations in accordance with high rank directives
of war strategy.