The Unfulfilled Promise: The Development of Operational Art in the U.S. Military, 1973-1997

Abstract

This study examines the theory, doctrine, and practice of operational art in the U.S. military starting in the early 1970s after the end of the Vietnam War to the mid 1990s after Operation Desert Storm. Using a model of operational art based on strategy, campaigning, force flow, and logistics, it traces the development of Active Defense and AirLand Battle in the U.S. Army, the emergence of a culture and doctrine of maneuver warfare in the U.S. Marine Corps, the Air Force's efforts to institute centralized control and decentralized execution of airpower in the tactical air forces, and their confluence in the Persian Gulf War. Operation Desert Storm marked the practice of three discrete schools of operational warfare, and provided an impetus to establishing joint doctrine, which built on reforms of professional military education that happened in the late 1980s. The gains made in the doctrine, education and training for the practice of operational warfare gave way to a more pervasive focus on tactics that characterized Joint Vision 2010, the Department of Defense's future vision of warfare, which influenced service concepts away from the effective practice of operational art.