With One Eye on the Horizon: Air Force Special Operations and Military Reforms of the 1980s

During the United States’ conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, special operations forces took a central role. However, little has been written about the aircrews that trained to support these warriors, and less still has been written about how special operations, across the military, developed into the lethal tool of national policy it is today.

This work analyzes these aviators during the 1980s to advance two complimentary arguments. The first argument builds on the idea that the different s...