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Aerial Warfare: A Very Short Introduction

Frank Ledwidge

26 March 2020

ISBN: 9780198804314

160 pages
Paperback
174x111mm

In Stock

Very Short Introductions

Price: £8.99

Aerial warfare has dominated western war-making for over 100 years, and despite regular announcements of its demise, it shows no sign of becoming obsolete. Frank Ledwidge offers a sweeping global history of air warfare, introducing the major battles, crises, and controversies where air power has taken centre stage.

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Description

Aerial warfare has dominated western war-making for over 100 years, and despite regular announcements of its demise, it shows no sign of becoming obsolete. Frank Ledwidge offers a sweeping global history of air warfare, introducing the major battles, crises, and controversies where air power has taken centre stage.

  • Offers a concise history of air warfare, analysing its influence on wars, campaigns and conflicts from the pre-WW1 period to today and beyond
  • Considers how military operations from the air impact upon political decisions on the ground
  • Discusses the advances in air power technology and capabilities, and the impact this has on warfare
  • Part of the Very Short Introduction series - over 10 million copies sold worldwide
  • Previously published in hardback as Aerial Warfare: The Battle for the Skies

About the Author(s)

Frank Ledwidge, Senior Fellow in Air Power and International Security at the Royal Air Force College at Cranwell

Dr Frank Ledwidge is Senior Fellow in Air Power and International Security at the Royal Air Force College at Cranwell. Over the last 20 years, he has seen air power at work all over the world. After a 7 year career as a barrister, he was called up to serve as a reservist intelligence officer in the Balkan Wars of the 1990s with the mission to locate war criminals. In 2003 Frank served as commander of one of the intelligence teams sent to Iraq to hunt for WMD. One of few British officials to have served in all of the country's recent wars, he has also worked for the UK government in Helmand and Libya during the conflicts there. In his civilian life, he has worked as a human rights lawyer throughout the Balkans, the Former Soviet Union and Africa. Frank is the author of two acclaimed and bestselling books on British military performance in the 9/11 wars; Losing Small Wars (2011) and Investment in Blood (2013) both with Yale University Press, as well as several academic articles.

Table of Contents

    Introduction
    1:Foundations
    2:Beginnings: The First World War 1914-1918
    3:Theory and Practice: The interwar years 1919-1939
    4:The Second World War: air operations in the West
    5:The Second World War: the air war in the Pacific
    6:Cold war 1945-1982
    7:The apotheosis of air power 1983-2001
    8:Aerostats to algorithms; 2001-2018
    9:Per ardua ad astra?
    References
    Further Reading
    Index

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