For example, throughout the 1990s, airlift capacity was well short of what was deemed necessary to fulfill the requirements for two MTWs.

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To apportion forces appropriately, the relevant Combatant Commanders based their contingency planning on the assumption that the two concurrent MTWs would develop sequentially.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Center for Security Policy | The Measure of a Superpower: A Two Major Regional Contingency Military for the 21st Century | Page: 2

In addition, the 2001 QDR explicitly abandoned the focus of prior defense planning documents on two canonical MTWs, one in Southwest Asia and the other in Northeast Asia.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Center for Security Policy | The Measure of a Superpower: A Two Major Regional Contingency Military for the 21st Century | Page: 2

The shift in focus on the two MTWs was a method for breaking away from the Cold War paradigm, but in a cautious and sensible manner that did not reject the possibility of significant conventional conflict.

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