Czarina Louise H.

Navarro

Air Power

Air power theories share a lot of similarity with maritime and land warfare theories.
While there exist different leading personalities and advocacies on air, land and sea
warfare theories, there are key concepts that are shared across these disciplines. One
example would be Douhet’s theory on the decisiveness of air power. Douhet is the pioneer
of the concept of air force. His work, Rules for the Use of Aeroplanes in War, was the first
ever air power manual. Throughout his life, Douhet has advocated the importance of air
power, regarding it as the key to victory. This ideology is reminiscent of Mahan, who
argued that naval power translates to dominance in the battlefield, and ultimately winning
the war. For Douhet, air power is not just necessary, but also sufficient for victory. Douhet
highlights the advantage of air forces over land and naval forces: Battleplanes can easily
go over army fronts and head straight to the objectives. Offensive air power, in the form
of bomber planes and airstrikes can strike suddenly and swiftly into the civilian population.
Civilians are key targets for bomber planes. Douhet claimed: “A people who are bombed
to-day as they were bombed yesterday, who know they will be bombed again to-morrow
and see no end to their martyrdom, are bound to call for peace at length.” By regularly
bombing civilian populations, fear and panic will be instilled on the civilians and will likely
result into the enemy’s call for peace.

Mahan and Douhet have similarities in their theories in that they highlight the
decisiveness of Naval power and air power, respectively. Mahan claims that having a
superior naval force and winning a decisive naval battles results to victory. Similarly,
Douhet claims that having a superior air force and creating as much civilian casualty as
possible wins the war. He, however, also claimed that past experiences are no longer
relevant to this ‘new era’ of warfare. According to Douhet, “clinging to the past will teach
us nothing useful for the future, for that the future will be radically different from anything
that has gone before.”

Douhet sees air power as the new and only way to win battles. For Douhet, the
use of air force for support and assistance is “Worthless, superfluous and harmful.”1
Unlike Corbett’s theories which advocate naval power as auxiliaries for land forces, Air
power is rather a primary actor in battles and the key factor to victory or defeat. Air power
is utilized as an offensive weapon; and instrument for terror and destruction.

Another personality on air power theories is Colonel John Boyd. Boyd’s work
focuses on the systematic way of winning a battle, a “tactical construct” for winning aerial

1
Douhet and the decisiveness of Airpower, John McCarthy, Page 67.
dogfights. Boyd invented the OODA loop, or the Observe-Orient-Decide-Act loop. Boyd’s
theory argues that in a battle, whichever side whose decision-making skills are superior
over the other secures the victory. Unlike Douhet’s theory, Boyd emphasizes that having
a small and faster OODA loop, and being able to get into the enemy’s own loop is of
greater importance than sheer power alone. For Boyd, being able to adapt quicker to the
enemy’s actions and interfere with the enemy’s own decision-making is key to winning
battles. Flexibility and agility matters more than pure force, according Boyd. For instance,
if the enemy aircraft is behind, the pilot must react swiftly by reducing speed, causing the
enemy slip to the front (McIntosh, 2011). The timeliness and appropriateness of the
decisions, in other words, being able to get into the enemy’s OODA loop, decides the
pilot’s success and defeat. Boyd’s theory not only applies to aerial operations but also to
decision making in military operations in general. Understanding, predicting, and acting
accordingly to the enemy’s actions at a fast rate is paramount to a successful operation.

Both Douhet and Boyd advocate the superiority of air power and its decisiveness
on battles. Also, both their theories’ approach is offensive in nature. Many air power
strategists have followed Douhet and Boyd, and aerial bombardment became popular
during the early 1900s. Sir Hugh Trenchard, the father of the Royal Air Force, also
believed in offense, and has applied strategic bombing theories during the 1920s. He
used the RAF instead of the Army to patrol British territories in the middle east, sending
bombing warnings to communities and proceeding with the bombardment if they do not
submit or surrender to the attacking bomber force. This is an example of a method called
the ‘Air Method’. Trenchard believed that in most situations, the Air Force can replace the
Army and Navy, and can get the work done more effectively and efficiently. While this
method was successful in most situations, it did not sit well with the generals and
admirals. The theory of strategic bombing challenged the importance of armies and
navies. In fact, for Douhet, the Air Force is the primary arm of the military, and
strengthening it is necessary, even at the expense of the other services (McCarthy, 2001).
Douhet strengthened his argument by asserting that the sheer speed, agility, power and
destruction capabilities of battleplanes would instill a great measure of fear and terror at
the heart of the enemy population. The idea that victory can solely be achieved through
the air undermined the role of land and sea forces in the battlefield. The decisiveness of
air power meant implied that it was far more important than the Army. Needless to say, it
was perceived as an insult to the army and navy, and has agitated even the generals and
admirals. Douhet clearly prefers strategic bombings and targeting civilians over armies,
and going on the offensive rather than defense. Douhet’s approach have been successful
on many situations. However, Douhet’s theory is only speculative. Douhet overestimated
the effects of strategic bombing, and underestimated the civilians’ ability to withstand such
bombardment. For instance, the Japanese civilian morale didn’t break from the strategic
bombings of the United States B-2 Bomber Aeroplanes during World War II. Around 40
percent of the target cities in Japan were destroyed, 330,000 killed, and 476,000 injured.
It was only during the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki did the Japanese
morale finally break (McCarthy, 2001). In addition, the strategic bombing approach is an
oversimplified one. It ignored armies and navies and targeted only national
infrastructures. It does not consider importance to the enemy army or navy. Furthermore,
the theory assumes that the enemy is passive, only accepting the fate of an impending
bombardment. Douhet assumes that the bomberplanes will always get through, and that
the enemy will not commit to resisting the attacks. The Battle of Britain strengthens this
point. During the 1940s, the RAF successfully defended UK against the Luftwaffe
bombing attacks by creating an early warning system that alarmed the British of incoming
attacks (Korda, 2010). The RAF were able to anticipate and intercepted the Luftwaffe air
raids, and command of the air remained on the British. The Germans were then forced to
instead conduct night raids known as the Blitz. While this time, the German bombers were
able pass through the defenses, but the British morale never broke. The British were
successful, and Douhet was proven wrong.

The leading visionaries of air power regarded air power as the only necessary
factor to winning wars, and it came off as an insult to the army, which was the dominant
arm of the military. The armies and the navies rejected the idea as a sole war winner
because it largely relied on the the enemy civilian’s morale and resistance to aerial
bombardments and ignored other factors in winning the war. By following the air power
theories, it could be concluded that the outcome of war can be decided solely upon whose
side suffered the most damage at the heart of its population. Land and sea theories
prioritize communication and defense over offense, and the aggressive nature of air
power was one of the reasons why the concept did not sit well with the armies and navies.
Ultimately it was Douhet’s incorrect assumptions that made strategic bombing theories
“wrong”. Because Air theory completely ignored defense and assumed that bombers
always get through, the method failed when the enemy’s lines of communications and
defense mechanism were established and strengthen. And because the decisiveness of
the war relied on the strength of enemy’s morale, there was a single point of failure to the
whole battle, and that is the strong morale of the enemy population.

While air power as a single point of success in a war has been disproven by past
experiences and theories, Douhet’s, Boyd’s and other Air power theories remain as
important concepts that exhibit the potential power of strategic bombardment. While land
and sea theories do not see air power as a war winner, the importance of air power is still
present in the battle field. Strategic bombing remains as a viable method in wars, and air
power still strikes a powerful presence in the battlefield.

Works Cited
McCarthy, J. (2001). The Strategists.
Stephens, A. (2001). The War in the Air.
McIntosh, S. (2011). The Wingman-Philosopher of MiG Alley. Air Power History .
Korda. (2010).