I'm sure. But they may not have believed that at that stage of planning.
They knew, they had to know. They'd mostly been under a "no fly" zone (two actually) for a decade. They knew, as much as we'd let them, how long it took before their aircraft would be intercepted. Not very long, and much shorter when a larger fighter force was airborne than during the no fly zone enforcement period. AWACS sees dang near everything that's up over the battlefield, and it talks to fighters.