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Early in the morning of 25 October 1983, Operation URGENT FURY
began with assaults on airstrips at Point Salines and Pearls on the
tiny island nation of Grenada. Over the next nine days US troops
would rescue American citizens, restore a popular native
government, and eliminate a perceived threat to the stability of
the Caribbean and American strategic interests there. Memories of
the Iranian hostage crisis and the aborted rescue attempt at Desert
One were fresh. Anxious to avoid a similar experience, policymakers
mounted URGENT FURY in haste in response to a threat to American
medical students on Grenada. The operation succeeded, but flaws in
its execution revealed weaknesses in joint operations. Together
with the bombing of the Marine Corps barracks in Beirut that same
month, the experience of Operation URGENT FURY added impetus to
efforts to reform the joint system which were already under way.
Since 1979, when Maurice Bishop took power in Grenada, concern in
the US State Department had grown as the country moved closer to
Cuba and the Soviet Union. In late 1983 events in Grenada led to
President Reagan's decision to conduct a military operation there.
Cuba had built a runway on Grenada suitable for aircraft capable of
interdicting US air and sea routes to Europe and the Middle East.
Bishop's overthrow in October by militantly anti-US Marxists
appeared to pose an immediate threat to the nearly six hundred
American students and four hundred other foreigners living in
Grenada. The success of Operation URGENT FURY was marred by the
consequences of inadequate time for planning, lack of tactical
intelligence, and problems with joint command and control. Despite
faults in execution, Operation URGENT FURY accomplished all of its
objectives. The eight thousand soldiers, sailors, airmen, and
Marines rescued nearly 600 Americans and 120 foreigners, restored
popular government to Grenada, and eliminated the potential
strategic threat to US lines of communication in the area. URGENT
FURY reinforced awareness of weaknesses in the joint system and
helped prod Congress to undertake the fundamental reforms embodied
in the Goldwater-Nichols DOD Reorganization Act of 1986. Written
several years after the end of Operation URGENT FURY, this study
focuses specifically on the involvement of the Chairman, the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, and the Joint Staff in planning and directing
operations in Grenada in 1983. The monograph begins with a
discussion of contingency planning for noncombatant evacuation
which started after the 12 October 1983 coup that removed Grenada's
Marxist leader, Maurice Bishop, and ends with the conclusion of the
combat phase of URGENT FURY on 2 November 1983. The author, Dr.
Ronald H. Cole, relied primarily on Joint Staff files and
interviews as sources of information.
This is a reissue of a study first published in 1995. Written
shortly after the completion of Operation JUST CAUSE, this
monograph traces the involvement of the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff and the Joint Staff in planning and directing
combat operations in Panama. The study begins with the initial
development of contingency plans in February l988 and concludes
with General Manuel Noriega's surrender to U.S. officials on 3
January l990. Relying primarily upon Joint Staff files and
interviews with key participants, the author, Dr. Ronald Cole,
provides an account of the parts played by the Chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Joint Staff, and the Commander in Chief
of U.S. Southern Command in planning for operations in Panama and
their roles in the combat operations that followed.
In the summer and fall of 1989, while American attention focused on
events in Eastern Europe which heralded the end of the Cold War,
developments in Panama raised the possibility of combat much closer
to home. Operations in Panama would test the changes to the U.S.
military command system brought about by the Goldwater- Nichols
Defense Reorganization Act of 1986. Panama would also try the team
at the head of that system-President George H. W. Bush, Secretary
of Defense Richard B. Cheney, and the new Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff (CJCS), General Colin L. Powell, U.S. Army.
Strengthened by personal relationships formed during earlier
administrations, this team would, in a large measure, determine the
operational success of the Goldwater-Nichols reforms. Widely viewed
as the most significant defense legislation since the National
Security Act of 1947, Goldwater-Nichols sought to streamline the
command and control of U.S. military forces engaged in contingency
operations. In 1988, as relations with Panama deteriorated, the
commander of U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), General Frederick F.
Woerner, Jr., U.S. Army, had developed a strategy which gradually
increased the strength of U.S. forces in Panama to deter the
dictator, General Manuel Noriega, from attacking U.S. citizens or
interfering with the Panama Canal. If deterrence failed, Woerner
planned to bring in additional forces from the United States over a
three-week period before taking action against Noriega. But after
Noriega overturned the results of the Panamanian election of May
l989, President Bush lost patience with General Woerner's approach
and replaced him with General Maxwell R. Thurman, U.S. Army.
Aggressive by nature, Thurman modified the BLUE SPOON plan to
accommodate a major shift in the strategy for dealing with Noriega.
Accelerating the buildup of U.S. forces in Panama, Thurman also
shortened the timetable for the deployment of additional forces
from the U.S. to three days. Hoping to take Noriega by surprise,
General Thurman intended to overwhelm the dictator's forces before
they could organize effective resistance or take U.S. citizens
hostage. Thurman took advantage of the CINC's power under
Goldwater-Nichols to select Lieutenant General Carl W. Stiner, U.S.
Army, the Commander of the XVIIIth Airborne Corps, to command a
joint task force of 22,000 soldiers, 3,400 airmen, 900 Marines, and
700 sailors. General Powell approved Thurman's action. The result
was a force with unity of command and good interoperability which
would rapidly achieve its operational objectives. In late l989
relations with Panama grew sharply worse. On 15 December l989, the
National Assembly passed a resolution that a state of war existed
with the United States, and Noriega named himself the Maximum
Leader. Violence followed the next evening when a Panamanian
soldier shot three American officers; one, First Lieutenant Robert
Paz, U.S. Marine Corps, died of his wounds. Witnesses to the
incident, a U.S. naval officer and his wife, were assaulted by
Panamanian Defense Force (PDF) soldiers while in police custody. In
the early hours of 20 December, conventional task forces seized
additional key points and the land approaches to Panama City. The
operational success of JUST CAUSE rewarded efforts by Congress and
the Bush administration to avoid repeating the mistakes of Lebanon
and Grenada. The determination of President Bush and the enhanced
authority of the Chairman and CINC combined to provide specific,
readily attainable objectives and responsive and effective command
and control while giving the tactical commander considerable
operational freedom. However, when shortcomings in prior planning
and mistakes by local commanders embarrassed the administration,
General Powell acted to ensure the political success of the
operation.
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