The Joint Chiefs of Staff and National Policy, 1977-1980

: This volume, the twelfth in a series treating the role of the Joint Chiefs of Staffing national policy, covers the period of Jimmy Carter's presidency, from 1977 through 1980. Still recovering from the trauma and setbacks of Vietnam, the Joint Chiefs remained preoccupied with a wide range of Cold War-related defense and security issues. Two themes emerge. The first deals with the deepening US involvement in Southwest Asia and the Middle East, a region exceedingly distant and remote, but increasingly important to the United States and its allies because of its vast oil resources, the on-going explosive struggle between Israel and the Arab states, and its strategic locale on the southern flank of the Soviet Union. The collapse of the Shah of Iran's regime in 1978, followed a year later by the Soviet invasion of Afghani- I Stan, underscored the volatility of that I part of the world and put intense pressure on the Joint Chiefs of Staff to find effective means of projecting US military power into the region in times of crisis.