NATO's Gamble examines the key political, diplomatic, and military processes that shaped NATO's management of the 1998-1999 Kosovo crisis and how airpower became the main instrument in its strategy to coerce the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) to accede to its demands. Dag Henriksen provides a frank analysis of the air campaign and discloses the origins and content of NATO's thinking on how force was used to succeed politically in altering the behavior of FRY president Slobodan Milosevic. Known as Operation Allied Force, the air campaign was the first war against a sovereign nation in NATO's history and the first combat operation conducted for humanitarian objectives against a state committing atrocities within its own borders. The author reveals that from the outset, the military leaders set to execute the campaign had no clear strategic guidance on what the operation was to achieve, and he further argues that the airpower community's general focus on high-intensity wars hampered them from developing strategies to fit the political complexities of the Kosovo crisis.

Dag Henriksen is a lecturer in air power at the Royal Norwegian Air Force Academy.