..but I get the feeling that most of those "airborne" operations you sited, had larger then needed troop drops out of politics more then anything else. Afghan was an air-land, not an air-drop, big differance. Deffinetly need some airborne capability, but I think that discusions focused around airborne DIVISIONS (<<--- channeling a little sparky there) are a little silly.
(4) No place is Paratrooper friendly, they take all the girls and the local guys get hacked off.
OK now that was funny, even if i disagree with you on the validity of LARGE airborne ops, I am still very proud to be a paratrooper.
Reed