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Selling Schweinfurt
A common theme of airpower histories is that the Combined Bomber Offensive was the proving ground for a post-war independent air force. Whether or not the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) could perform to the hype of its interwar doctrine, Allied commanders based their rival approaches to victory in Europe on their differing views of independent airpower. However, there is an essential, yet overlooked facet to this story: commanders' convictions alone could not hold sway within the War Department, much less at the politically and bureaucratically charged meetings of the Combined Chiefs of Staff. The air commanders pressed their staffs for decision-quality assessments and photographic evidence to sell their arguments and project their progress. They needed informed targeting plans and objective post-raid reports as well as an air-intelligence enterprise to mature all-too-quickly out of interwar neglect. What they received-and Brian Vlaun explains-was a collision of organizational interests and leadership personalities that shaped Ira Eaker's command of the Eighth Air Force in 1943, the tumultuous air campaign over Germany, and the path of the post-war U.S. Air Force. As a result of the author's research through thousands of declassified files, Selling Schweinfurt examines the relationships between air-intelligence organizations and key decision-makers. His analysis spans from pre-war planning and doctrine development, through the Eighth Air Force's independent air campaign, and culminates with the formation of the United States Strategic Air Forces and its 1944 pre-invasion preparations. This book concludes that military organizations, if left unchecked, may adopt symbols and exaggerate claims to justify their own preferences and market their ideas in ways that mask their optimistic assumptions. In the case of the air campaign against Germany, both the four-engine bomber and specialized targets-like Schweinfurt's ball bearings-served as symbols and powerful marketing tools for the AAF and air intelligence, respectively.
eBook
Energizing Data-Driven Operations at the Tactical Edge
Significant efforts are ongoing within the U.S. Air Force (USAF) to improve national security and competitiveness by harnessing the growing power of information technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics. Product and process technologies are being researched, experimented with, and integrated into future warfighting concepts and plans. A significant part of this effort is focused on integrating operations, from the strategic to the tactical and across all lines of effort. A question that must be asked in considering these future warfighting concepts is: how will the devices that enable the knowledge-based future be powered? The abundant energy supplies that characterize peacetime operating environments may not be readily available at the far reaches of the force projections - the tactical edge - during conflict. Understanding the energy challenges associated with continued data collection, processing, storage, analysis, and communications at the tactical edge is an important part of developing the plans for meeting the future competition on the battlefield.
This report identifies challenges and issues associated with energy needs at the tactical edge as well as any potential for solutions to be considered in the future to help address these challenges. The recommendations of Energizing Data-Driven Operations at the Tactical Edge address understanding these requirement needs and the cascading effects of not meeting those needs, integrating energy needs for data processing into mission and unit readiness assessments, and research into product and process technologies to address energy-efficient computation, resilience, interoperability, and alternative solutions to energy management at the tactical edge.
eBook
The Economics of Air Force Medical Service Readiness
The Air Force Medical Service (AFMS) currently runs three in-theater hospitals for severely injured or wounded personnel. Part of the practioners' preparation was treating DoD beneficiaries for a broad range of injuries and illnesses. Opportunities for this preparation are not as numerous \"in house\" as they once were, and AFMS does not always get proper credit for those gained elsewhere. Proper credit for that work is important for funding.
eBook
To Kill Nations
Between 1945 and 1950, the United States had a global nuclear monopoly. The A-bomb transformed the nation's strategic airpower and saw the Air Force displace the Navy at the front line of American defense. InTo Kill Nations, Edward Kaplan traces the evolution of American strategic airpower and preparation for nuclear war from this early air-atomic era to a later period (1950-1965) in which the Soviet Union's atomic capability, accelerated by thermonuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, made American strategic assets vulnerable and gradually undermined air-atomic strategy. The shift to mutually assured destruction (MAD) via general nuclear exchange steadily took precedence in strategic thinking and budget allocations. Soon American nuclear-armed airborne bomber fleets shaped for conventionally defined-if implausible, then impossible-victory were supplanted by missile-based forces designed to survive and punish. The Air Force receded from the forefront of American security policy.
Kaplan throws into question both the inevitability and preferability of the strategic doctrine of MAD. He looks at the process by which cultural, institutional, and strategic ideas about MAD took shape and makes insightful use of the comparison between generals who thought they could win a nuclear war and the cold institutional logic of the suicide pact that was MAD. Kaplan also offers a reappraisal of Eisenhower's nuclear strategy and diplomacy to make a case for the marginal viability of air-atomic military power even in an era of ballistic missiles.
eBook
Higher, further, faster
In her first year at the United States Air Force Academy, Carol Danvers finds herself overwhelmed with a rigorous schedule, demanding officers, and the looming possibility of joining the elite Flying Falcons program--which has never counted a woman among their roster.
BOOK
Tomorrow's Air Force
Looking ahead to future airpower requirements, this engaging and ground-breaking book on the history and future of American combat airpower argues that the USAF must adapt to the changes that confront it or risk decline into irrelevance. To provide decision makers with the necessary analytical tools, Jeffrey J. Smith uses organizational modeling to help explain historical change in the USAF and to anticipate change in the future. While the analysis and conclusions it offers may prove controversial, the book aims to help planners make better procurement decisions, institute appropriate long-term policy, and better organize, train, and equip the USAF for the future.
eBook