Published more than a decade after Operation Desert Storm, Stephen Bourque's book is a more detailed look at the conflict told at the Army corps level. Written under the auspices of the U.S. Army's military history organization, the Center for Military History, this book sets a different tone when compared with earlier CMH efforts released within the first five years after the war. The author was a field grade officer assigned to the 1st Infantry Division (a major unit in VII Corps) G-3 shop during Desert Storm, so he personally experienced the events described in this book.

The 514-page book contains 22 chapters, three appendices, and bibliographic notes. It is well provided with clear maps, charts and many b/w photos. There are endnotes provided at the end of each chapter. The first chapter dives into the history of the Army's VII corps and ends with a description of the organization's senior leaders in August 1990. From Chapter Two onward, the author explores the impact of Operations Desert Shield/Desert Storm on VII Corps in chronological order.

While the earlier CMH publications on Operation Desert Storm pointedly avoided political controversies, Bourque's work tackles them headlong. The relationships among the senior Army leaders within U.S. Central Command, Third Army, VII Corps, and XVIII Airborne Corps were among the more controversial aspects of Desert Storm, and Bourque details those issues as they impacted VII Corps. The author extensively cites CENTCOM Commander in Chief General H. Norman Schwarzkopf autobiography, "It Doesn't Take A Hero", lambasting VII Corps commander Lieutenant General Frederick Franks on the performance of his command during the very brief ground combat phase of Desert Storm. Bourque, in turn, uses numerous sources to document the fact that both Schwarzkopf and Third Army commander Lieutenant General John Yeosock were both out of touch with their troops due to the placement of their headquarters and their unwillingness or inability to visit their subordinates to get the real situation on the ground. Desert Storm's ending was messy, and personality issues combined with ignorance of the ground truth led to a imperfect end to the conflict that postponed another contest for twelve years.

I am impressed with the author's professional courage and integrity in researching and analyzing the poor command relationships among CENTCOM's senior leaders, along with CMH's courage to publish a critical piece, especially when earlier authors or command policy glossed over CENTCOM's difficulties and mistakes. I was not impressed with the author's poor identification of foreign equipment in the body of the text as well as in some of the photo captions. However, this book is a great read for those truly interested in an official Army history that tells the Desert Storm story as it was and not how others would like to have seen it. ( )