Looking back over the week, senior Pentagon officials acknowledged that punishing initial strikes fell short of their goal.
"Did they have the effect of tipping the balance?" said one official. "Maybe not. But they sure put them back on their heels."
The targets have included Saddam's palace guard, the headquarters of the Republican Guard, facilities for the Special Republican Guard, whose mission is to protect the government and organizations charged with internal security, like the Special Security Organization.
Special Operations Forces have also called in airstrikes against targets in western and northern Iraq, away from the main clashes in the south and central part of the country.
In the past two days, the air campaign has moved away from mainly pre-planned strikes against targets that support the government's power to attacks on Iraq's fielded forces, specifically the Republican Guard divisions that are Saddam's most loyal and well equipped military forces. More than half of the 1,500 attack missions flown over the past two days were against Iraqi troops.
This is part of General Tommy Franks' strategy to soften up the elite Iraq armored forces before launching a major ground attack against the dug-in and dispersed Iraqi troops.
Even during Tuesday's sandstorm, allied warplanes carried out several hundred attack missions against Republican Guard armored divisions using satellite-guided weapons -- developed since the last Gulf War -- that soar through bad weather.
In the first Gulf War, US ground commanders sought to destroy more than half the Iraqi armor before attacking with ground troops.
Myers suggested that the threshold this time could be lower.
"Their overall strength, their training and their morale is different than it was in '91," Myers said.
"And we're going to take advantage of that in ways that I just can't go into.
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