Operation Southern Watch
Southern Watch establishes a southern no fly zone over Iraq and extending to the borders to just south of Baghdad, captial city of Iraq. The U.S., in September of 1996, extended the zone to that point encompassing the 33rd parallel.
In efforts to ensure security of the forces operating the no fly zone interdiction, the U.S. and coaltion members have responsed to Iraqi aggression both in October, 1994, as well as more recently in Operation Desert Strike in September of 1996.
In the case of October, 1994, just as U.S. began a gradual drawdown of forces in the region began moving "significant number of ground forces south of the 32nd parallel towards Kuwait." 1
Then in response to Iraqi pursuit of Kurdish refugees U.S. announced any further aggression would result in retalitory action. In September of 1996, the U.S. gave a final warning with a short deadline. When no action was taken, the U.S. launched Tomahawk missiles to take out some 15 SAM and training sites, and announced the extension of the no fly zone to include the 33rd parallel. A second strike the following day mopped up restriking key sites and ensuring total destruction. The new no fly zone boundary was then put into force.
The no fly zone is enforced by a majority of U.S. aircraft, however British Mirages and other coalition partners participate in sorties on a daily basis.
There has been one friendly fire incident, the shootdown of two helicopters, details are shown in the Southern Watch Briefings below:
Just a few days after the U.S. launched Cruise Missiles in to take out Iraqi anti-aircraft facilities, an Iraqi SAM sight "lit-up" an F-16 aircraft for a brief moment. However, the brief radar burst was not enough to guide the un-sophisticated SAMs, thus the aircraft was never in danger. U.S. response was mild verbal abuse, but no military was taken.
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