In earlier lessons we have discussed the core concepts
of Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, and Jomini and observed how later theorists
built upon those ideas to better explain and discuss modern warfare
on land and sea. In this lesson we will study the ideas of Giulio
Douhet, Hugh Trenchard, and Billy Mitchell. They are the pioneering
theorists of air (and space) power. Their thoughts on command
and control of the third dimension also evolved from earlier theories,
and continue to influence how we think about air and space power
today. We will also look at important refinements of Douhet's
Trenchard's and Mitchell's concepts at the Air Corps Tactical
School (ACTS) - ACSC's predecessor - during the interwar period.
The Lawson excerpts drive home the point that while
airpower was used to an ever-widening extent during W.W.I, it
was far from being a mature MTR as defined and discussed in TH
502. The results of the war hinted at the airpower's potential
in the areas of reconnaissance, close air support, interdiction,
and strategic bombing, but there was no existing theory to steer
further technological developments or form the foundation for
an air doctrine and associated organizations. Without such a theory,
air power was destined to remain little more than an aerial reconnaissance
and artillery spotting tool for the Army.
Fortunately, efforts to develop such a theory were
ongoing even as the war progressed. Douhet, Trenchard, and Mitchell
all recognized that air power could fundamentally alter the way
war was conducted. Free from the maneuver constraints associated
with military operations on the ground, air power had the potential
to eliminate trench warfare and dramatically reduce the human
cost of war. Building upon the three "air pioneers,"
the Air Corps Tactical School refined thinking on strategic bombing
during the years leading up to W.W.II.
LOQ. Just as Mahan and Corbett built their theories around the idea of command of the sea, Douhet recognized the need for command of the air and discussed this concept at length. How did Douhet define "command of the air"? How did he suggest it be achieved?
DISCUSSION. Douhet believed
that command of the air transcended our current concepts of air
superiority and air supremacy. Command of the air existed when
"we find ourselves able to fly in the face of an enemy who
is unable to do likewise." Douhet believed that air supremacy
reflected only a capability until it was executed to actually
command the air.
Douhet posited that command of the air was achieved
in much the same way as Mahan sought to achieve command of the
sea. The enemy's air force was to be destroyed to the extent that
it no longer constituted a threat. Douhet believed that this was
ideally accomplished by preemptive strikes against enemy aircraft,
airfields, and related industries. This would destroy enemy aircraft
on the ground, eliminating the possibility of their striking similar
friendly targets. When such a strike was either unfeasible or
not totally successful, air combat would ensue as each side vied
to achieve command of the air.
FUQ. What did the pioneers believe was the best defense against air attack?
DISCUSSION. All three recognized that effective defense against air attack was impossible save through command of the air. Douhet believed that in the event of air combat, attacks from the air could not be prevented. The side which could best withstand the effects of air attacks would prevail. Trenchard would devote a significant portion of his airpower resources to develop pursuit aircraft for use in defensive counterair (DCA) roles, but did so only as a sop to the British public. He had no faith in its success as a concept. Neither did Mitchell, though in Winged Defense he suggested that a rather complex combination of advanced listing posts, surveillance and pursuit aircraft, search lights, and antiaircraft artillery (AAA) would provide the best defense possible. None of the theorists foresaw the development of radar, whose development would contribute so much to the British victory in the Battle of Britain discussed in the next lesson.
LOQ. How did Douhet believe airpower should be used once command of the air is attained? How did Trenchard and Mitchell differ from Douhet on this subject? What did the air pioneers' views have in common with those of Mahan and Corbett?
DISCUSSION. Once command of the air was achieved, Douhet believed airpower should be used exclusively as a strategic, offensive force to eliminate the enemy's war making capability and will to resist. In his single-mindedness, he followed in the tradition of Mahan who insisted that the navy's sole purpose was to assume the offensive and win decisive fleet-on-fleet battles at sea. Douhet also shared Mahan's conviction that his branch of service (in this case, the air force) could be decisive in combat, either eliminating the need for other services or relegating them to minor support roles. Trenchard came to adopt this view only late in his professional life, whereas Mitchell never did so.
While Trenchard and Mitchell (to a lesser extent)
appreciated the rewards of strategic bombing as advocated by Douhet,
their W.W.I experiences gave them broader perspectives which allowed
them to recognize the contribution that airpower could make by
assuming other, sometimes defensive, roles. In this sense, their
relationship to Douhet was similar to that of Corbett to Mahan.
Trenchard and Mitchell had commanded large air organizations during
W.W.I. Trenchard commanded Great Britain's Royal Flying Corps
(RFC) and, later, its Independent Air Force (IAF) while Mitchell
commanded the American Expeditionary Force (AEF). They saw that
despite the trench warfare stalemate, airpower provided critical
support to ground forces in the form of reconnaissance, observation,
close air support, and air interdiction. Indeed, the coalition
aircraft brought together to support the St. Mihiel offensive
which was commanded by Mitchell performed in all of these roles
in a single operation in 1918.
FOQ. The aircraft mixes proposed by the pioneers reflected both how they believed airpower should be employed and unique contexts in which each wrote. What type of aircraft did Douhet, Trenchard, and Mitchell propose to produce and why?
DISCUSSION. Douhet's aircraft
requirements reflected his belief that airpower was by itself
decisive in combat, and that that decisiveness was achieved through
strategic bombing. He ultimately concluded that airpower could
best be exercised by a single type of aircraft: the multi-functional
"battleplane." His battleplane would not only have the
payload and range required to carry out strategic bombing missions,
it would be sufficiently armed and armored to engage in air-to-air
combat en route. This would eliminate the need for special escort
or pursuit aircraft. Adoption of the battleplane concept would
also allow for economies of scale, reduced costs, easier maintenance,
and production surges to support wartime requirements.
Trenchard's final view on the ideal composition for
the British air force reflected his belief in the decisiveness
of strategic bombing tempered by his sensitivity to British popular
concerns. While Trenchard did not believe in the concept of air
defense except through command of the air, he recognized that
the British public (which had been terrorized by Zeppelin attacks
mounted against it during W.W.I) would insist that its air force
devote some of its force structure to defense of the island against
air attack. He therefore proposed that one-third of the air force
be comprised of pursuit aircraft and the remaining two-thirds
be devoted to strategic bombing.
Mitchell encouraged the development of a variety
of aircraft consistent with the broader role he envisioned for
airpower. He recognized three broad categories of aircraft: pursuit,
attack, and bomber, which he proposed to supplement with various
specialty aircraft. Like Trenchard and Douhet, Mitchell built
his air force around bombers. Appreciating US altruism and isolation,
he couched the need for these bombers in defensive terms. He stressed
that their importance did not lay in their ability to win wars
through offensive strategic bombing, but in their ability to defend
the US from attack from the sea. His successful sinking of the
Ostfriesland was key to the expansion of US airpower following
W.W.I.
FOQ. Trenchard and Douhet believed that employing airpower in a concentrated, strategic bombing campaigns could defeat an enemy without resorting to traditional naval or ground forces. What targeting strategy did each suggest and why?
DISCUSSION. Douhet believed
that strategic bombing campaigns should target both population
centers and industries. Successfully doing so would result in
the collapse of enemy material and morale capabilities to resist.
Douhet suggested that a mix of high-explosive, incendiary, and
poison gas munitions best achieved the desired results.
Trenchard's views on strategic bombing are less clearly
stated, but like Douhet he believed that bombing campaigns should
achieve both material and morale effects. He placed higher value
on the latter, believing that "the morale was to the material
as 20:1." Trenchard believed that desired material effects
would be achieved by the successful targeting of enemy "vital
centres." Examples of such vital centers included war-related
industries and key transportation facilities. He was less forthcoming
on how best to affect morale. Morale of factory workers would
be affected by the fear of attack even if that attack was not
forthcoming. Defense measures would be disruptive to their routines,
and destruction of industries producing goods used by soldiers
and civilians alike would result in shortages and a decline in
the standard of living.
But would this be strategy be successful? Probably
not. Trenchard recognized he would not have enough bombers to
execute a decisive bombing campaign as outlined above, particularly
given the need to devote one-third of his resources to fighter
aircraft. Bomber payloads were too small, and bomb sights were
too unsophisticated to achieve the desired level of material and
morale disruption by limiting strategic targets to vital centres.
If strategic bombing was to be effective, target sets would have
to be expanded to include the intentional bombing of population
centers. The British were not culturally prepared to do this.
Trenchard therefore had to express his strategic bombing strategy
vaguely. Target sets were generally expressed in the context of
vital centres, recognizing that successfully engaging them would
entail significant destruction of non-military property and high
civilian casualties.
FUQ. Mitchell did not believe that airpower would marginalize armies and navies to the extent of Douhet and Trenchard, but he did see airpower assuming many of their traditional missions. What missions did Mitchell believe airpower could accomplish more economically and effectively than the senior services?
DISCUSSION. Mitchell believed
that airpower would assume the responsibility of coastal defense
from the army and navy. He also envisioned airpower assuming the
troop transportation mission from the navy due primarily to the
vulnerability of surface vessels to submarine attack. Mitchell
argued that the navy's surface fleet requirements would decrease
proportionally with increases in bomber range until the navy consisted
only of submarines.
FOQ. Douhet recognized that proper employment of airpower dictated that an independent air force be established. Trenchard and Mitchell agreed completely with this view. Why did they believe this was critical? How successful were Trenchard and Mitchell in achieving independent air forces?
DISCUSSION. Their arguments
all centered around what Mitchell referred to as "airmindedness".
The pioneers believed that airpower could only be properly developed
and employed by commanders who fully appreciated its unique capabilities.
Airpower was liable to be underfunded and its capabilities were
likely to be overlooked if it was controlled by the other services.
Trenchard was successful in establishing an independent Royal
Air Force (RAF) between World Wars I & II. Mitchell's efforts
contributed to the establishment of a semi-autonomous Army Air
Service in 1926, but a fully independent US Air Force would not
be created until 1946.
Within the US Army Air Corps resided a group of aviators
who shared the air pioneers' visions of a strategically employed
air force which existed as at least a co-equal to the land and
sea arms. The instructors and students of the Air Corps Tactical
School (ACTS) refined the strategic bombing concepts of Douhet,
Trenchard, and Mitchell. Then, as air leaders in W.W.II, they
applied their refined strategy in successful air campaigns in
both Europe and the Pacific. As TH 510 will demonstrate, ACTS
strategic bombing strategy has continued to be employed with only
minor modifications in all subsequent wars, and is still evident
in the current doctrine of "Global Reach-Global Power."
LOQ. How did the ACTS come into being? What was its initial relationship to the Army?
DISCUSSION. The Army Reorganization
Act of 1920 did not establish an independent air force, but it
did create the Air Service as a combatant arm of the Army. The
Air Service School's (ACTS after 1926) initial goal was to indoctrinate
air service officers in the tactical employment of aviation
in preparation for their attendance at Army Command & General
Staff College. Fortunately, in keeping with the air pioneers,
the ACTS took it upon itself to shift this focus to the more appropriate
strategic level of war.
FUQ. What contextual and operational art elements most influenced the ACTS during the interwar years?
DISCUSSION. ACTS was perhaps
most affected by the socio-cultural, economic, and political contextual
elements, and operational art element technology. The US resumed
an isolationist posture following W.W.I. and as the Howard article
(TH 502) recognized, it is difficult to affect significant change
the military during such "ages of peace". This difficulty
was exacerbated by the Great Depression which further decreased
the government's ability and willingness to devote funds towards
defense. At the same time, while rapid changes in aircraft technology
seemed to support the development of strategic bombing theory,
it made procurement risky. Similar to our situation with respect
to automation today, during the interwar years what was "cutting
edge" aircraft technology one day was dangerously obsolete
the next.
FUQ. What was the essence of the ACTS interwar strategic bombing theory?
DISCUSSION. ACTS theory
involved the destruction of an enemy's "industrial web"
(key industries, utilities, and infrastructure) via strategic
daylight precision bombing.
FUQ. What were the primary challenges facing the ACTS' faculty and students had to address as they developed their strategic bombing theory?
DISCUSSION. Their primary
challenge was to overcome an absence of historical experience.
The scant data available from the W.W.I experimentation with bombing
did not provide a solid basis from which the ACTS could build
a valid strategic bombing theory. (The relationship between history
and theory was discussed in TH 501.) Additionally, little of the
data concerning industries, utilities, and infrastructure and
their relationships to one another was readily available. Such
information was critical to successfully identifying target sets.
ACTS students therefore painstakingly developed such a database
based upon US-specific information. This database not only assisted
ACTS strategists to identify possible enemy centers of gravity
for attack, it also provided insight into potential US vulnerabilities.
In TH 503 Sun Tzu stressed the importance of understanding both
the enemy and oneself. The development of the "industrial
web" database was perhaps the ACTS' greatest achievement.
FUQ. What were some weaknesses of ACTS theory?
DISCUSSION. In hindsight,
the three most easily identified weaknesses were: First, ACTS
theory was based upon successful strategic engagement of an enemy's
"industrial web". This strategy presupposed that the
US's future enemies would resemble its general character.(The
danger of "mirror imaging" was introduced in TH 504.)
Second, borrowing from Douhet and Trenchard, the ACTS' theory
assumed that bomber formations would be able to adequately defend
themselves against ineffective air defense measures and would
reach the target area largely intact. Its strategic bombing theory
ignored the possible need (or escort) aircraft. This aspect of
the theory was perhaps the most hotly debated at the school. Third,
the success of the theory depended upon a degree of technological
development that was not yet available. The greatest technological
deficiency was bomb sights. ACTS theorists greatly overestimated
future bombing accuracy despite their incorporation of a "combat
factor" in their planning estimates. Overestimation of bombing
efficiency resulted in a corresponding underestimation of the
numbers of aircraft and amounts of bombs required to execute successful
strategic bombing campaigns.
Building upon the core concepts of the classical theorists, Douhet, Trenchard, and Mitchell applied the lessons learned from airpower's initial use in W.W.I to establish the first theories of airpower. These theories that airpower could be decisive in future wars if it was used in an offensively to engage strategic targets in rear areas which would destroy enemy material and moral capability to continue to resist. Building upon the air pioneers' ideas, the ACTS overcame a lack of historical experience and inadequate knowledge of the "industrial web" to develop a theory of strategic daylight precision bombing which served as the basis for successful bombing campaigns in W.W.II as well as subsequent bombing campaigns in Korea, Viet Nam, and Southwest Asia. These campaigns are the subject of the next two lessons.