Case Studies in the Achievement of Air Superiority - Air Force ...

CONCLUSION
that a major responsibility of the Luftwaffe was to support the Army that
shielded the sources of German air power. This mission had a subtle impact
upon Luftwaffe thinking. Just as in the United States, where the presence
of ocean barriers led Air Corps officers to think of intercepting incoming
bombers with aircraft rising from their local bases, so too did German Air
Force officers tend to conceive their role as one of operating relatively
short-range aircraft from interior lines and established bases in the defense
of the fatherland. This left them ill-prepared to cope when called upon to
fight in North Africa or deep within the Soviet Union. Nationalistic or geographical
myopia can be a serious intellectual impediment.
At least on paper the RAF also accorded first priority to winning air
superiority, but, as observed above, the service was overwhelmingly
bomber-minded. Much the same attitude prevailed in the United States. In
the era of “massive retaliation” during the 1950s, the Air Force poured the
bulk of its funds into developing strategic bombers and fighter-bombers
with nuclear capabilities to the neglect of aircraft suited to the more conventional
air superiority role. This preoccupation with the potential for
nuclear warfare extended well beyond airplanes to induce a substantial curtailment
of interest in the development of doctrine and training for tactical
air warfare. This concentration on nuclear capabilities was paralleled in the
allocation of research and development finds, especially in the curtailment
of funds for equipment used in electronic warfare. As a consequence, when
the USAF first began to commit substantial numbers of operational units in
Vietnam, it suffered from painfully high loss rates. In sum, the publication
of sound doctrine is not enough; to be effective, air superiority doctrine
must permeate the thinking of the service.
From the foregoing discussion it should be evident that a most important
factor in attaining air superiority is the mind of the commander-at
every echelon from the most junior squadron leader to the commanding
general. His range of experience, whether direct personal experience or
vicarious, indirect experience in the form of sound doctrine carefully
studied and internalized, coupled with a lively imagination in deciding
when to apply and when not to apply the valuable insight gleaned from
the evidence of the past, can play a vital role in the quest for dominance in
the air.
The growth of modern technology has had a decided impact on the
quest for air superiority. By the late 1960s, U.S. experience in Vietnam and
comparable developments in the Arab-Israeli wars began to drive home the
realization that air warfare was undergoing a fundamental change. Missiles
had certainly not replaced aircraft, but they were coming to play an
increasingly larger role. As air-to-air missiles of greater range and accuracy
succeeded one another in the inventory, the character of aerial engagements
has changed. The classic dogfight of World Wars I and I1 was giving
way to encounters with air-to-air missiles launched at targets barely in
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