What is a military response?

Answer 1

A limited military response is one which last no more than a few days in duration. No "boots" are put on the ground, however, cruise missiles as well as hard to shoot down aircraft which can drop guided bombs are used. Limited Military Responses are used when a government is trying to stop Another Country's bad behavior in a certain area. As such, the target of the limited response is generally limited to something which is used by the government conducting the bad behavior in order to stop them. For example, to stop Syria from using Chemical Weapons again, a limited response would be to use cruise missiles to take out the launching systems used for the delivery of chemical weapons. If those systems are moved around, then aircraft may need to be used in order to ensure an acurate targeting of those delivery systems. Another means would be to take out the chemical weapons themselves, however, this could end up having even worse results if the bombing of those weapons allowed the chemicals to escape into the atmosphere. The United States more often than not uses limited military responses in order to correct behavior in counties without having to resort to all out warfare. Such was the case in Libia, Panama, Columbia (against drug lords), Grenada (to expell Cuban Armed Forces), Beruit, and Iraq (excluding Gulf Wars I and II). Bosnia can also be looked at as a limited response, although the limited response there was quite heavy handed in scope to the norm. When boots are used on the gournd during a limited response, they are in and out and normally consist of special forces only.