Americas Defense Meltdown - IT Acquisition Advisory Council

Col. Robert Dilger & Pierre M. Sprey • 163Endnotes1 For an additional discussion of larger budgets buying a shrinking, aging inventory, see Chapter11.2 To learn more about this group, see Robert Coram, Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Artof War (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 2002).3 Find these data at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_active_United_States_military_aircraft.However, it is notable that various sources differ, sometimes significantly, in their count of AirForce active-duty and reserve- component aircraft. In response to inquiries, we were informedthat the Air Force, even its historical offices, does not have a publicly available, apples to apples,consistent count of its aircraft over time.4 U.S. air forces went by various names up to the creation of the U.S. Air Force in 1947; U.S. ArmyAir Corps, U.S. Army Air Force, and other titles were used.5 These data were collected by author Dilger at the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force, BomberArchive.6 As an example, the U.S. B-17 bomber cost $278,000 while the P-40 cost $46,000, a 6-1 ratio.(National Museum of the U.S. Air Force archives).7 Williamson Murray, Luftwaffe, 1933-1945: Strategu for Defeat, (Westport, CT: Brassey’s, 1996),40.8 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 18.9 For further discussion of these ratios, see Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 18.10 Cajus Bekker, The Luftwaffe War Diaries: The German Air Force In World War II (New York, NY:Ballantine Books, 1966), 539.11 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 40.12 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 41.13 It is worth noting that some of the Luftwaffe’s multi-engine bombers were equipped to conductdive bombing. However, such variants of the Do-17 were quite small in number and frequentlytasked to horizontal bombing, and such variants of the Ju-88 were found not to have the structuralstrength to perform high-angle dive bombing. See Wikipedia.com entries on these Luftwaffebomber aircraft.14 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 42.15 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 50.16 Peter C. Smith, Ju-87 Stuka, Volume One: Luftwaffe Ju-87 Dive-Bomber Units, 1939-1941 (LuftwaffeColors) (Classic Publications, 2007), 41.17 Smith, Stuka, p. 27.18 Smith, Stuka, p. 49.19 In another success attributable to attack aircraft other than high-altitude, horizontal bombers,against ships, in 1941, Italy had dominated the Mediterranean with four battleships. In a daringmission, the British sent 21 Swordfish torpedo aircraft to attack them at very low level. Thesewere simple, single-engine, old and tired biplanes with a cruise speed of 88 MPH. Nonetheless,they successfully sank all four battleships on a single day in November 1940. (Luftwaffe, Murray,p. 76) This altered the balance of power in the Mediterranean in the Royal Navy’s favor.20 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 49.21 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 57.22 Murray, Luftwaffe, p. 59.23 Adolf Galland, The First and the Last (Buccaneer Books, 1990), 12.