Saudi air base security worries U.S.

Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Security guards at a Saudi Arabian air base used by U.S. planes found an empty tube from a shoulder-fired antiaircraft missile this week, military officials said Friday.

Saudi security guards at Prince Sultan Air Base found the missile launcher about two miles from the nearest runway, said Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command. The spot was inside the base’s outer perimeter fence and near an inner fence, Quigley said.

A cover on the front of the launch tube was intact, but there were scorch marks on the back of the tube, indicating it could have been used to fire or try to fire a missile, Quigley said. The 4-foot-long tube was for a Soviet-made SA-7 antiaircraft missile.

The discovery has U.S. military officials puzzled and worried. No pilots reported seeing, hearing or detecting any missiles fired, and Quigley said he had no reports of any threats against the air base.

Security at the base has been tightened, however, he said.

About 4,500 U.S. troops and an unspecified number of American warplanes use the base in the Saudi desert.

“Right now it’s a mystery about what it all means, whether it was used or meant to be used,” said Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Dave Lapan.

Someone firing an SA-7 from the spot where the tube was found could possibly have hit a plane taking off or landing at the air base, Quigley said. Various versions of the missile can hit planes up to about 3.5 miles away.

“It’s not an ideal spot to put yourself if you wanted to shoot down a plane. You could do better,” Quigley said. “It’s hard to know what to make of it.”

Quigley said he did not know when the Saudi forces found the missile tube. He said the Saudi forces photographed the tube and destroyed it before U.S. officials could examine it.

First used in 1969, the SA-7 missile has been a favorite of Third World militaries and terrorist groups. Both Iran and Iraq, for example, reportedly used them against each other’s planes during their war in the 1980s.

Afghan forces fighting the Soviets during their 1979-1989 occupation of Afghanistan reportedly fired more than 500 of the missiles, shooting down 47 Soviet aircraft. The PLO has also used the missiles to shoot down Israeli aircraft.

The SA-7 missile is relatively primitive. Its heat-seeking sensor homes in on the hottest object it can sense, making the missile vulnerable to locking onto the sun or even hot rocks. It automatically explodes after about 20 seconds if it doesn’t hit a target.