ABSTRACT
From the perspective of US defense planning, the establishment and development of Central Command (CENTCOM) in the course of the 1980s represent a fundamental change in the postwar pattern of US military interaction with the Middle East. The revolution in US military interaction with the Middle East caused by the creation of CENTCOM reflects not only the fact that all the armed services are engaged in planning and training for the defense of the region, but, more specifically, that the Army’s ground forces are fully involved. In fact, if there is a constant point in the pattern of US military interaction with the Middle East from the 1950s to the 1980s, it is the tendency of America’s local partners in the area to be more concerned with intra-regional conflict than with the Soviet threat. CENTCOM strategies in the 1990s will have to utilize technological and tactical innovations in order to be effective in such a politically sensitive zone.
