Most of the bombs dropped by US warplanes during last week's air strikes against Iraqi radar systems missed their mark and Pentagon officials blame most of the misses on a Navy precision-guided bomb, the Washington Postreported today.
About 25 of the guided bombs were dropped in the attack and the majority fell "tens of yards" from their "aim-points", a Navy official told the
Post
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Another official said he had been told the bombs missed by an average of more than 100 yards, the newspaper said.
An official, who was not named in the report, was quoted as saying the guided bombs were fired at about 25 parts of Iraqi radar stations and the Pentagon has been able to confirm damage to only eight of these targets.
Another eight targets escaped damage while satellite imagery has not produced usable pictures of the remaining radar targets, according to the report.
Almost all the Navy guided bombs, known as the AGM-154A "Joint Standoff Weapon" which missed on Friday did so in the same way, veering to the left of targets, officials told the Post.
The paper said Navy officials believe it is likely a software glitch threw off the bombs' guidance systems. But they are also looking at whether the bombs were mishandled or damaged before they were put on F/A-18 jets flying from the USS Harry S. Truman, an aircraft carrier in the Gulf.