Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)This is an overall thorough, but very dry account of the US Navy's involvement in the Persian Gulf War. The authors, as part of the Naval Historical Center, obviously had incredible access to firsthand sources, and it shows. It does offer some good insights and presents a "warts and all" perspective at times.
The book opens with a brief and useful historical overview of the Navy's presence in the Gulf and the run up to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. While the story of how the US Military arrived at its plan to fight the war is interesting, the account of the logistics of the buildup is somewhat tedious. I realize logistics are the backbone of any military operation; but it just wasn't that interesting except as part of an official history.
The authors deserve credit for addressing the problems the Navy faced: a lack of integration with the other services, infighting among the Generals (Army and USAF) and Admirals, and an ill-conceived mine laying operations that cost two pilots their lives, for example. It avoids being "whiney" about slights during the air campaign from an Air Force dominated air warfare command structure, yet is somewhat bogged down in details about tasking orders and control systems.
This book will probably only be interesting to the more die hard Naval historian and students of Joint Military Operations for lessons learned. For a good account of modern Naval Warfare, I would be more inclined to recommend Admiral Sandy Woodward's "One Hundred Days" about the Falklands War.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Shield and Sword: The United States Navy and the Persian Gulf War
Though not so well known as the land and air campaigns, the campaign at sea in the 1991 Gulf War was vital in subduing Saddam Hussein's invasion forces and driving them out of Kuwait. U.S. Navy surface ships and submarines launched hundreds of cruise missile attacks against Iraqi targets throughout the war, and carriers sent air strikes deep into enemy territory. The battleships Missouri and Wisconsin bombarded hostile targets while U.S. sailors joined U.S. Army and Royal Navy helicopter crews in additional actions. SEAL missions, global sealift actions, mine countermeasures, and operations in support of the economic embargo were still more contributing factors to the complex joint warfare effort. Details of these naval operations are thoroughly documented and analyzed in this authoritative study, conducted by the Naval Historical Center and published in limited numbers in 1999. It is based on previously classified action and lessons-learned reports, interviews with participants, and studies conducted by the Center for Naval Analyses and the Department of Defense. The book includes candid evaluations of leadership effectiveness, interservice relations, and methods of command and control. It also analyses the effectiveness of various weapons and sensors, including the Tomahawk land-attack missile, the EA-6B Prowler electronic warfare aircraft, the Aegis battle management system, and unmanned aerial vehicles. Winner of the Navy League's Theodore and Franklin D. Roosevelt Naval History Prize and favorably reviewed by military scholars and foreign affairs journals, this credible historical account captures the drama as well as the detail of a modern victory at sea.
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