Publisher's Synopsis
In this detailed but concise monograph, air power expert Tami Davis Biddle walks us through our century-long experience of air power as an instrument of warfare. Using the twin pillars of theory and history, she explains the expectations that were held for aircraft in war and then examines how those expectations played out in the actual realm of practice. This monograph, which focuses primarily on the most controversial aspect of air power, coercive bombing, takes a chronological approach that starts with World War I and comes all the way to the present day. By contrasting theory and practice, she identifies the overarching themes that have run through history and pinpoints those moments when the gaps between theory and practice have been largest. Her narrative mainly (but not exclusively) follows the experience of the U.S. Air Force. By the middle of World War II, the predecessor institution, the U.S. Army Air Forces, was investing more in aircraft than any other nation. The United States continued that pattern after the war, maintaining a large standing Air Force designed to deter threats to American interests, and to take a leading role in fighting the nation's wars.Each decade brought new capabilities and new expectations. Americans embraced aviation technology and were at the forefront of its rapid development as an instrument of military power. Not infrequently, air power proponents expected more from it than it could deliver on its own. Not every war that the Americans fought after 1945 was suited to the dominant ways and means of American air power. The ability to coerce an enemy rests heavily on an accurate calculation of enemy will, and determination to sacrifice in order to hold or gain a stake. The tendency of Americans to assume that they could successfully coerce-through numbers and power-has not always served them well. Biddle explains, however, those times when coercive air power has been effective in the last century and details the conditions undergirding that effectiveness. Moreover, she argues that early air theorist Giulio Douhet was right in one particular respect: the nation that wins and holds "command of the air" has an immense advantage in conventional warfighting. Biddle agrees with air theorist Robert Pape's argument that gaining air superiority is a sui generis function, distinct from the application of coercive air power, but that such superiority facilitates the subsequent use of coercive air power, and forms a crucial foundation for its success.
