NATO access and force planning before the Kosovo air campaign

Waging Modern War follows General Wesley Clark as he tries to turn NATO political resolve into a workable operation over Kosovo. Macedonia was indispensable for ground access and valuable air corridors, but its president carefully limited how national territory could be used. More than a thousand unarmed international verifiers also had to leave before strikes began because NATO lacked a credible forced-entry hostage-rescue option. When a planned United States carrier was reassigned to the Persian Gulf, land-based aircraft had to cover the shortfall. Read alongside General Mike Jackson's memoir and James Blunt's later account of the Pristina airport confrontation, Clark's book also lets the reader compare theatre command with the experience of troops on the ground. The different perspectives give context to decisions made under severe strain without removing responsibility for their consequences.