Airpower in the War against ISIS chronicles the planning and conduct of Operation Inherent Resolve by U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) from August 2014 to mid-2018, with a principal focus on the contributions of U.S. Air Forces Central Command (AFCENT). Benjamin S. Lambeth contends that the war’s costly and excessive duration resulted from CENTCOM’s inaccurate assessment of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), determining it was simply a resurrected Iraqi insurgency rather th...

Is it possible for two combatants who possess equally strong air forces to conduct limited warfare by restraining air operations? In Restraining Air Power, Robert C. Owen and contributing authors aim to answer this question by providing theoretical and empirical assessments of restrained air warfare through five historical case studies since 1945. Through an objective analysis of the past, this collection evaluates the principles of escalation and escalation management in conventi...

America’s second war against Iraq differed notably from its first. Operation Desert Storm was a limited effort by coalition forces to drive out those Iraqi troops who had seized Kuwait six months before. In contrast, the major combat phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 was a more ambitious undertaking aimed at decisively ending Saddam Hussein’s rule. After several days of intense air strikes against fixed enemy targets, allied air operations began concentrating on Iraqi ground troops....

Following great success in the War on Terror, politicians and analysts alike all over the free world thought that future global conflict was impossible...but they were wrongJourney into a future where fundamental Islam sharpens its horrific skills & allies with Red China. In such a future, can the U.S. & western civilization survive?Dragon's Fury - World War against America and the West projects a future arising out of current events where:• Implacable enemies of Am...

The Greater Islamic Republic, led by Iran, and the Coalition of Asian States, led by Red China have allied and conspired together to defeat America and her allies on the world stage. The two leaders, Hassan Sayeed and Jien Zemin have planned and conducted surprise attacks against America and pushed American forces back with staggering losses.High technology supercavitating weapons are proving a scourge to the US Navy as American military research and development rush to find answer...

The first in-depth book that sheds light on Canada’s elite warriors who operate in the shadows.In 2001, the Canadian government sent elements of its Joint Task Force 2 counterterrorist unit to Afghanistan to assist the Americans with Operation Enduring Freedom and the global war on terror. Withdrawn a year later, after a brief hiatus JTF 2 returned to Afghanistan in 2005, beginning a continuous tour of duty for Canadian Special Operation Forces (CANSOF) up to the c...

Sua SponteLatin for “Of Their Own Accord”The 75th Ranger Regiment’s MottoArmy Rangers are not born. They are made. The modern 75th Ranger Regiment represents the culmination of 250 years of American soldiering. As a fighting force with our nation’s oldest and deepest tradition, the Regiment traces its origins to Richard Rogers’s Rangers during the prerevolutionary French and Indian War, through the likes of Francis Ma...

Filled with recently declassified material, first hand accounts, and unique photographs, this book offers a rare look at the largest mobilisation of Special Forces in recent history.The companion volume to Elite 163: Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan, Leigh Neville now turns his expert analysis to the Special Operations Forces (SOF) of the US and Coalition allies serving in Iraq since 2003. Examining in detail the US Delta Force, the British SAS, Au...

A thorough investigation of the strengths and weaknesses of two of the twentieth century's most lethal combatants; the M1 Abrams and the T-72.The Gulf War bore witness to a number of deadly encounters between these two great adversaries. Heavily armoured, highly mobile and capable of killing at over 2500m the M1 Abrams is, to this day, a veritable fighting machine. Superior to both Iraq's Soviet era T-55 and T-62 tanks, nearly all sources claim that no Abrams tank ...

On 26 February 1991, cavalry troops of “Cougar Squadron,” the 2nd Squadron of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, charged out of a sandstorm during Operation Desert Storm and caught Iraq’s Republican Guard Corps in the open desert along the North-South grid line of a military map referred to as the “73 Easting.” Taken by surprise, the defending Iraqi armor brigade was swept away in salvos of American tank and missile fire in what became the U.S. Army’s largest tank battle since World War II....

The story of Task Force Ranger – a unit of US Rangers and Special Forces – and their attempt to capture the lieutenants of the Somali warlord Muhamed Farrah Aideed, during the 1993 United Nations' humanitarian relief mission.What started as a simple snatch-and-grab mission quickly degenerated into a desperate battle for survival when US Black Hawk helicopters were struck by rocket-propelled grenades and crashed into the streets of Mogadishu. Racing to save the crew...

Though not so well known as the land and air campaigns, the campaign at sea in the 1991 Gulf War was vital in subduing Saddam Hussein's invasion forces and driving them out of Kuwait. U.S. Navy surface ships and submarines launched hundreds of cruise missile attacks against Iraqi targets throughout the war, and carriers sent air strikes deep into enemy territory. The battleships Missouri and Wisconsin bombarded hostile targets while U.S. sailors joined U.S. Army and Royal Navy helicopter c...