The Routledge Handbook of Air Power offers a comprehensive overview of the political purposes and military importance of air power. Despite its increasing significance in international relations, statecraft and war, the phenomenon of air power remains controversial and little understood beyond its tactical and technological prominence. This volume provides a comprehensive survey designed to contribute to a deep and sophisticated understanding of air power. Containing contributions from academics and service personnel, the book comprises five sections: - Part I Foundation: the essence of air power - Part II Roles and functions: delivering air power - Part III Cross-domain integration: applying air power - Part IV Political–social–economic environment: air power in its strategic context - Part V Case studies: air power in its national context Examining a series of themes and factors that contribute to an understanding of the utility and applicability of air power, this Handbook focuses on the essence of air power, identifies its roles and functions, and places air power in its wider strategic and national contexts. The Routledge Handbook of Air Power will be of great interest to students of air power, strategic studies, defence studies, security studies and IR, as well as to military professionals and policy-makers.

This survey of American naval history features original chapters from key scholars in the field that trace the relationship between the American Navy and the position of the United States on the global political stage over the past 250 years. Places equal weight on the influence of major wartime campaigns and naval efforts to defend and expand America’s political and economic interests during times of peace Includes an array of illustrations and 56 new maps, seamlessly integrated within each chapter Each chapter features sidebars with biographical sketches of influential leaders and descriptions of weapons and technological developments of the era

A navy is a state's main instrument of maritime force. What it should do, what doctrine it holds, what ships it deploys, and how it fights are determined by practical political and military choices in relation to national needs. Choices are made according to the state's goals, perceived threat, maritime opportunity, technological capabilities, practical experience, and, not the least, the way the sea service defines itself and its way of war. This book is a history of the modern U.S. Navy. It explains how the Navy, in the century after 1890, was formed and reformed in the interaction of purpose, experience, and doctrine.

The history of oil is a chapter in the story of Europe's geopolitical decline in the twentieth century. During the era of the two world wars, a lack of oil constrained Britain and Germany from exerting their considerable economic and military power independently. Both nations' efforts to restore the independence they had enjoyed during the Age of Coal backfired by inducing strategic over-extension, which served only to hasten their demise as great powers. Having fought World War I with oil imported from the United States, Britain was determined to avoid relying upon another great power for its energy needs ever again. Even before the Great War had ended, Whitehall implemented a strategy of developing alternative sources of oil under British control. Britain's key supplier would be the Middle East - already a region of vital importance to the British Empire - whose oil potential was still unproven. As it turned out, there was plenty of oil in the Middle East, but Italian hostility after 1935 threatened transit through the Mediterranean. A shortage of tankers ruled out re-routing shipments around Africa, forcing Britain to import oil from US-controlled sources in the Western Hemisphere and depleting its foreign exchange reserves. Even as war loomed in 1939, therefore, Britain's quest for independence from the United States had failed. Germany was in an even worse position than Britain. It could not import oil from overseas in wartime due to the threat of blockade, while accumulating large stockpiles was impossible because of the economic and financial costs. The Third Reich went to war dependent on petroleum synthesized from coal, domestic crude oil, and overland imports, primarily from Romania. German leaders were confident, however, that they had enough oil to fight a series of short campaigns that would deliver to them the mastery of Europe. This plan derailed following the victory over France, when Britain continued to fight. This left Germany responsible for Europe's oil requirements while cut off from world markets. A looming energy crisis in Axis Europe, the absence of strategic alternatives, and ideological imperatives all compelled Germany in June 1941 to invade the Soviet Union and fulfill the Third Reich's ultimate ambition of becoming a world power - a decision that ultimately sealed its fate.