Air power is ineffective against dispersed enemies hiding among civilians

Evidence

There is only so much that aerial military campaigns can do. To mitigate the effects of the air strikes, the militants took cover amid civilians, split into small units, shifted locations rather than staying in established military compounds, and moved fighters and vehicles individually rather than in convoys. Not only was ISIS an elusive target, but the severe restrictions on the aerial campaign to spare civilians also did not leave much to bomb. … In most of the missions, fighter planes returned without dropping their bombs because they could not find a permitted target (Schmitt, 2014). Because of these protective measures, the aerial campaign had a limited impact. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 2460

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the Bosnian air-war model discussion at location 2457 and general counterinsurgency literature on air power’s limits. — connects to: LTTE coercion of civilians rationalizes the military’s refusal to distinguish fighters from civilians — Neil DeVotta, Sinhalese Buddhist Nationalist…, 220