Organizing, Training, and Equipping the Air Force for Crises and Lesser Conflicts,

According to its basic doctrine, The Air Force is responsible for the preparation of the air forces necessary for the effective prosecution of war and military operations short of war... and... for the expansion of the peacetime components of the Air Force to meet the needs of war. Preparation of the necessary air forces means to organize, train, equip, and provide forces to carry out all the operations required to fulfill the Air Forces primary and collateral functions now, more commonly called missions. Throughout the Cold War, the forces necessary for the effective prosecution of war clearly dominated over the other two responsibilities. The Cold War threats required ready forces that were capable, if necessary, of prosecuting a war to termination in hours or days. The immediacy and high stakes of those threats made mobilization for war and operations short of war lesser considerations. So, for more than 40 years, the efforts to organize, train, equip, and provide forces focused on the effective prosecution of war, while operations and mobilization short of war were handled as issues on the margins of Mr Force priorities. That Cold War focus may be contrasted to the peacetime, pre-World War II era when the emphasis was on mobilization and operations short of war.