The 2001 campaign in Afghanistan where precision airpower and special operation forces alongside indigenous allies were used to topple the Talibans has brought debaters to argue whether it was a revolution of warfare or a fluke. Stephen Biddle has argued that this Afghan Model is deeply dependent on the indigenous ally being at least as skilled as its enemy. Ten years later, a similar concept was used in Libya to overthrow the Gaddafi-regime. This paper examines and compares the skill of the rebels and the regime forces fighting on the ground in Libya, in order to test Biddle’s Afghan Model theory. Hence, the purpose for this study is to broaden the understanding as to when and how often the Afghan Model may be used. Initially, rebels demonstrated low levels of tactical skill in comparison to regime forces. However, rebels gradually improved their skills and by the end of the fighting, months later the skill gap had been reduced considerably. Without drawing a definite conclusion, the analysis indicates, that skill of the indigenous ally in order for the Afghan Model to work is of importance, however not to the same degree as presented by Biddle.

John A. Warden's airpower theory, The Enemy as a System, has had a major influence on the strategic discourse ever since the foundation of this normative framework was presented in The Air Campaign in 1988. Warden’s theoretical impact was reinforced by the American successes during the Gulf War, but since then, little research has tested the theory outside the context of conventional wars of aggression. This study analyzes The Enemy as System against a peace enforcing context, characterized by multilateral cooperation. It also identifies intermediate variables that help explain why the theory is strengthened or weakened in relation to this particular context. Through qualitative methods, Operation Allied Force and Operation Unified Protector are analyzed against operational indicators within the central concepts of the five-ring model and parallel attacks. The results of the study show that NATO did not use airpower in accordance with Warden's normative theory in either of the examined operations. The absence of operational indicators could hypothetically explain why NATO failed to produce strategic effects within the operational time limits, although this remains a speculative conclusion. The result instead suggests a number of intermediate variables, such as political disagreement and strategic dissonance, which combined reduced the possibility of using airpower in accordance with Warden's theory. In addition, the fear of civilian casualties and the risk of exacerbating the post-war humanitarian situation, further reduced the possibility of attacking targets within certain subsystems of the five-ring model. The conclusion is therefore that Warden’s theoretical applicability, and thus universal validity, is weakened within the examined context.

This study revolves around the NATO-led Operation Unified Protector in Libya 2011. The military campaign was executed under a UN mandate to protect the Libyan civilian population. Despite the mandate civilians died because of NATO bombings. The purpose of this study is to identify inadequate measures in avoiding civilian casualties during the operation and to continue to work towards minimizing civilian casualties caused by military organizations in international interventions. Early in the operation, NATO’s objective altered from protecting the civilians to over­throwing the Libyan regime. At the same time NATO changed its military targeting. This study concludes that the alteration of the primary objective to have increased the risk of harming innocent civilians in the area of operation because the protection of civilians became a secondary objective.

This paper seeks to conduct a first test of the explanatory potential of the poliheuristic theory of foreign policy decision-making in the context of small states. The case studied is the Swedish decision to contribute to the UN-sanctioned and NATO-led Operation Unified Protector in 2011. The paper conducts a theory-testing Causal Process Tracing (CPT) study drawing on a variety of different sources including news articles, parliamentary records, government bills, official statements and remarks made by key individuals, and secondary sources. The result of the analysis demonstrate the potential validity of the poliheuristic understanding of the decision- making process operating in a small state, but fall short of demonstrating actual validity. The final results are thus more akin to results typically found in a plausibility probe case study, and future research is deemed merited based on the potential validity found.