Member-only story
Bombs Away
The internet enables lots of great stuff: unparalleled scale, fantastic business models, Google Maps, memes. But technology isn’t inherently good. It’s neutral. The same product used to organize a charity fundraiser can be used to organize an insurrection. This week, strategic bombing and the limitations of techno-optimism.
Bigger, Faster, Stronger
Airplanes entered combat during World War I, mostly in artillery spotting and reconnaissance. Initially, the US Air Force wasn’t its own service branch. It was a wing of the Army called the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) tasked with supporting ground troops. It remained a part of the Army until September 1947.
Between the World Wars, airplanes improved. They got bigger, faster, and deadlier. New technology opened up new tactics and strategies. One was strategic bombing. Bombers had long ranges and could deliver large payloads behind enemy lines. While the infantry ground it out on the front lines, bombers could attack communications lines, manufacturing facilities, supply depots, and other infrastructure critical to waging war. For Curtis LeMay, then a rising officer in the USAAC, it was love at first sight.
In the 1930s, a group of officers at the Air Corps Tactical School (ACTS), a training ground for pilots, believed that strategic bombing could transform war. Like calvary men…
