 Complete the following phrase:  During the Cold War, the risk of local conflict escalating into nuclear showdown dampened the appeal of military intervention as a tool of U.S. statecraft. Perhaps more importantly, air power was a relatively blunt instrument until the operational maturation of stealth and precision-strike technologies. Before the Gulf War of 1991, air power had not demonstrated the fidelity needed to perform nuanced attacks against transitory, difficult-to-reach targetsit lacked the ability to produce decisive political effects short of total war. However, the 