Responsibility of Command: How UN and NATO Commanders Influenced Airpower over Bosnia by Col Mark A. Bucknam. Air University Press (http://www.maxwell.af.mil/au/aul/aupress), 131 West Shumacher Avenue, Maxwell AFB, Alabama 36112-6615, 2003, 428 pages, $40.00 (softcover). Available free from http://www.maxwell .af.mil/au/aul/aupress/Books/Bucknam/Bucknam.pdf.
In 1991 American airpower was reborn over the desert sands between Kuwait City and Baghdad. In the decade that followed, policy makers aggressively made use of airpower and its promise of seemingly unlimited precision and effectiveness. The forests and hills of the disintegrating former Yugoslavia represented airpower’s next challenges—Bosnia during 1992–95 and Kosovo in 1999. Whether one calls these efforts successes or failures, they highlight the political challenges of employing and controlling violence from the air in situations less amenable to airpower than the first Gulf War. Colonel Bucknam addresses the first of these interventions—the air war over Bosnia, which began as Operation Deny Flight and ended as Operation Deliberate Force.
Through interviews and a study of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and United Nations documents, Bucknam shows how upper-level commanders—of all nationalities—sought to control airpower to meet their particular goals. He details these interventions as they flowed both through and around the chain of command as circumstances dictated. Unsurprisingly, he concludes that commanders used their military expertise to gain influence over airpower from policy makers. What is surprising is that he shows how commanders not only influenced the details of military intervention but also began to function as policy makers themselves. Colonel Bucknam demonstrates how this practice especially held true of NATO commanders, whose airpower plans (complemented by those at US Air Forces in Europe) often drove the selection of possible policy options. This conclusion is one of many worthy insights offered by Responsibility of Command, which should be read by anyone who wants to know more about how airpower functions in both peacekeeping and coalition warfare.
Capt Tim Spaulding, USAF
Royal Air Force Lakenheath, United Kingdom
Disclaimer
The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.
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