Video evidence on the effectiveness of patriot during the 1991 gulf war

Abstract

Many of the Patriot‐Scud engagements during the 1991 Gulf War were recorded on video by news media camera crews. These videos are a unique and important source of information on Patriot's performance that has been completely ignored by the US Army in performing its assessments of Patriot's performance. The videos show many examples of Patriots missing their Scud targets, as well as a few examples of Patriots hitting Scuds but failing to destroy the Scud warhead. The videos also contain information about the nature of the Scud targets, and also about other important occurrences, such as Patriots diving into the ground. The videos we have been able to obtain contain no unambiguous evidence that Patriot destroyed even one Scud warhead. Rather, they contain substantial evidence that Patriot's success rate was very low, and provide a record of Patriot performance that clearly is inconsistent with the US Army's current claim that Patriot destroyed 52 percent of the Scud warheads that it engaged.