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By 1979, Army concerns with Active Defense coincided with the growing dissatisfaction of many airmen with the muddled, bureaucratic focus of Air Force doctrine. When the 1979 edition of AFM 1-1 regenerated debate over the proper employment of airpower, the Army s evolving AirLand Battle doctrine provided a framework for that debate. AirLand Battle s central tenets of deep attack, second echelon interdiction and joint air-land operations were readily accepted by airpower thinkers hungry for an expanded role for conventional airpower and a common conceptual framework to analyze airpower doctrine. This was no accident. Since June 1975, Tactical Air Command and TRADOC had worked jointly through ALFA to develop second echelon interdiction concepts and resolve procedural differences. However, because the Army s doctrinal decision to extend the xlv battlefield in space and time made interdiction, especially battlefield air interdiction (BAI), the key instrument of deep attack, corps commanders now had an operational requirement to control target selection and allocation of Air Force deep strike and tactical reconnaissance assets. This violated strongly held Air Force beliefs that only centralized control allowed the effective employment of limited air assets. The ensuing debate in the literature indicated that airmen in both services were reexamining the nature of airpower, its inherent characteristics and the possible impact of rapidly advancing computer processing, sensor and target acquisition technology on future airpower employment. Although Army Aviation s mission remained focused on enhancing ground force combat effectiveness, Army commanders now saw airpower playing a major role in seizing the initiative. Air assets could guard the flanks of armored/mechanized forces, assist in creating deeper penetrations, interdict enemy reserves, and provide force protection and aerial fire support in the event of enemy counterattack. For the Air Force, AirLand Battle also represented a welcome shift to a more flexible method of airpower employment if it could retain centralized control. Thus, the near-term, underlying effect of AirLand Battle doctrine was to shift airpower thinking from front-line CAS toward a more flexible, and for the Air Force, traditional emphasis on interdiction. In effect, the Army doctrinally raised its sights and recognized that what happened in enemy rear areas was important to success on the front lines. The AirLand Battle debate also appeared to have a long-term influence on airpower thinking and doctrine within both services. First, the AirLand Battle debate developed among Army airpower advocates a growing awareness that the speed, range, firepower and flexibility of airpower made the Air Force s concept of centralized control desirable. This is evidenced by an ensuing trend to centralize control of Army air assets, first at the division, then the corps level. Simultaneously, the Army recognized that a theater-wide, centralized and highly coordinated air-land effort was essential to cope with the increasing tempo, mobility and lethality of the modern battlefield. The 1986 revision of FM 100-5 represented a significant in Army thinking from tactical levels to the operational level of war. For the Air Force, AirLand Battle debate coincided with a movement in the early 1980 s to take a critical look at the application of airpower in World War II, Korea, and especially Vietnam. These studies evoked a growing awareness that "strategic" and "tactical" divisions of airpower were artificial and limiting. As a result, by 1985, the Air Force was actively involved in training programs designed to expand the utility of traditionally "strategic" aircraft, such as the B-52, in conventional conflicts. Senior Air Force leadership also decided in the early 1980s that a "warfighting" approach to airpower thinking and employment was needed rather than the bureaucratic approach reflected in the 1979 "comic book" version of Air Force doctrine, and instituted the Project Warrior program to encourage this perspective among Air Force officers and enlisted personnel. The 1984 edition of AFM 1-1 codified this significant shift toward a warfighting philosophy. The spark that brought evolving Air Force warfighting doctrine, conventional strategic bombardment; and long-range tactical interdiction concepts together appears to have been generated in part by the flood of xlvi articles on the operational level of warfare that appeared in Army literature following the publication of the 1986 version of FM 100-5.
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