If the US goes ahead with plans to launch an attack on Syria, all signs point toward a short series of strikes based around the Navy’s Tomahawk cruise missiles.
For the US Air Force, which prides itself on being the key to American air superiority, relying on ship-based missiles removes the most visible elements of the service — its fleet of fighters, tankers and bombers — from the equation.
Instead, the service is likely to play a vital background role in any military efforts, relying on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) skills its service members have honed over the past decade of conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya/.../
If the strikes against Syria go off as expected, it may shed light on how the US deals with adversarial, capable nations in the future.
“The kind of engagement we’re talking about — limited air and missile strikes — is exactly the kind of scenario we might anticipate more of in the future,” said Mark Gunzinger, an analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments who served in a number of Pentagon roles. “Using our air power and space capabilities to punish an aggressor, someone who has done something that’s beyond the pale, I think this is very representative of the kinds of operations you may see in the future against states that have some advanced capabilities.”
That may be particularly true in the Asia-Pacific region, Gunzinger said.
“I don’t see where we would use a large ground force in the Pacific region in the near-term, except perhaps the defense of South Korea,” he said. “The trend is toward aerospace capabilities and naval capabilities to conduct these kinds of operations, assuming it’s a limited operation for limited objectives.”