Colonel Reynolds presents a firsthand account of the struggle to design and implement the air campaign that proved instrumental in defeating Iraq in the Gulf War. Through documentary research and dialogue derived from interviews with key players such as Generals Dugan, Russ, Loh, and Horner, he traces the evolution of the air campaign plan known as Instant Thunder from its origins in the mind of Col John A. Warden III to the decision by General Schwarzkopf to employ airpower as his weapon of choice against Saddam Hussein. Heart of the Storm provides behind-the-scenes insights into how future decisions to use airpower will likely be made. It is a companion volume to Mann's Thunder and Lightning.

Colonel Reynolds presents a firsthand account of the struggle to design and implement the air campaign that proved instrumental in defeating Iraq in the Gulf War. Through documentary research and dialogue derived from interviews with key players such as Generals Dugan, Russ, Loh, and Horner, he traces the evolution of the air campaign plan known as Instant Thunder from its origins in the mind of Col John A. Warden III to the decision by General Schwarzkopf to employ airpower as his weapon of choice against Saddam Hussein. Heart of the Storm provides behind-the-scenes insights into how future decisions to use airpower will likely be made. It is a companion volume to Mann's Thunder and Lightning.

Airmen all over the world felt relief and exhilaration as the war in the Gulf reached its dramatic conclusion on 28 February 1991. Many nonairmen, of course, experienced those emotions as well-but for a variety of different reasons. Airmen, long uneasy about the lingering inconclusiveness of past applications of their form of military power, now had what they believed to be an example of air power decisiveness so indisputably successful as to close the case forever. Within the United States Air Force, among those who thought about the uses of air power, there were two basic groups of airmen. The first-smaller and less influential-held to the views of early air pioneers in their belief that air power was best applied in a comprehensive, unitary way to achieve strategic results. The second-much more dominant-had come to think of air power in its tactical applications as a supportive element of a larger surface (land or maritime) campaign. Thinking in terms of strategic air campaigns, members of the first group found their inclinations reinforced by Col John Warden's book, The Air Campaign: Planning for Combat, published in 1988. Over the years, the second group increasingly concentrated on refining specific mission capabilities (close air support, interdiction, air refueling, etc.) that could be offered to a joint force commander for his allocation decisions. Members of this group rarely thought in terms of comprehensive air campaigns to achieve strategic objectives and indeed generally equated the term strategic to Strategic Air Command's long-range bomber force in delivery of nuclear weapons. Both groups found agreement in their love of the airplane and their search for acceptance as equal partners with their older sister services. In that regard, airmen everywhere stepped forward in late February to receive the congratulations they felt were so richly deserved. Put aside, for the moment at least, was the fact that a hot and often bitter debate had taken place within the Air Force on the eve of Operation Desert Storm over the very issue of the strategic air campaign and the question of whether air power would be used in that form. Here was a story to be told, a piece of history to be recorded. Just how that story would be told was, to my mind, by no means clear. In the end, of course, the Gulf War did in fact include a strategic air campaign, and the very least that one could say about it was that by so thoroughly destroying the Iraqis' capability to conduct warfare, it permitted a relatively blood- less war-concluding ground operation by coalition army forces. The most that one could say about the air campaign was that it-in and of itself-won the war. At Air University (AU), where I was serving at the time as commander, direct involvement in Desert Shield/Storm was about as limited as in any part of the Air Force. We had done some early macroanalyses of air campaign options in the Air Force Wargaming Center; we had excused some students from their studies at Air Command and Staff College to act as observers in various headquarters involved in the war; and-like all commands-we had sent support personnel to augment CENTAF forces in the desert. Otherwise, we were as detached as it was possible to be-that is to say, vitally interested but wholly without responsibility. Our responsibility would begin when the guns fell silent. Within that overall context and in the heady moment of selfcongratulation by airmen, two thoughts occurred to me: (1) the story of the Air Force's development of an air campaign would rapidly become hazy as human memories began to fail-either willfully or through natural erosion-and (2) air power's effect on the outcome of the war would become increasingly controversial as non-Air Force institutions realized that their own resources would likely diminish if airmen's conclusions were accepted.

Operation Desert Storm was arguably the most successful air campaign the world has ever known. It is important to remember Desert Storm, not only for the definitive revelations and demonstrations about airpower, but also because of valuable insights that apply to our current and future wars. The strategy executed in Desert Storm stands in stark contrast to the wars of attrition and occupation that followed the initial successes of Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom in the nearly 20 years subsequent to the attacks on our homeland in 2001. Desert Storm also represented a far more joint style to strategy development. Instead of a ground-centric dominated set of perspectives, the commander of Desert Storm– Army General Norman Schwarzkopf–used airpower as the centerpiece of his strategy in a truly joint approach applying the right forces at the right places at the right times to advance effective, unique concepts that proved pivotal to developing what became one of the most successful military engagements in history. We must remember these key points if today and tomorrow’s generations of military leaders are to benefit from the lessons of this seminal conflict.