Quote Originally Posted by Ron Humphrey View Post
Why the focus is so often on the nodes vs the paths between them
Because the AF is not especially "into" either close air support or interdiction, at least at the higher policy level. Also, the promise of hitting a node and knocking an opponent out of the conflict is far more attractive from a political standpoint than a prolonged interdiction campaign. One of the odd takeaways that some higher command types got from Vietnam was that interdiction (i.e. Rolling Thunder) failed whereas node strikes (Linebacker II) succeeded. Both these simplistic "conclusions" are flawed, but they did survive for some time and became enshrined in the "lessons learned" from that conflict.

The promise of war on the cheap is based on being able to hit a small number of targets with precision weapons and take out an opponent without ever having to commit ground forces (or at least a very small number of forces).