Inflexible Response: Diplomacy,airpower And The Kosovo Crisis, 1998-1999

摘要

This article examines the key lessons of combining diplomacy and airpower in the Kosovo Crisis (1998-99). Drawing on a comprehensive list of primary sources involved in the military leadership of NATO at the time, this article goes beyond existing literature in revealing just how surprisingly unprepared NATO was when it went to war against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY). This article argues that on the eve of war, NATO neither had a political nor a military strategy for handling the war it itself had started - and that at the time, the air power community in general failed to appreciate the need for producing more precise and innovative solutions to complex conflicts and crises in the lower band of the intensity spectrum.