Slapout: the AF sends me a check every two weeks, but it is woefully inadequate.
I do not suscribe to the theory that airpower can win all wars. I've read the stuff on the air control theories that came out of the RAF and realize the fallacy of that argument (although I wonder if some modification might make it more useful in some situations; I'm rolling this around in my head). The simple point is that the Army sees airpower solely as a supporting arm while the AF sees it as something separate (some see it as the supported arm, but I dismiss that). Different environments call for different solutions. I see airpower as the supporting arm in Afghanistan and Iraq now, but phase I was different.
The potential for collateral damage is what I see as lethal airpower's fault in COIN. Perhaps airpower theorists have no solution to this so they want to craft something that makes lethal airpower more of a player? I personnally see no problem with using airpower is its less sexy role, e.g. ISR, airlift, etc. However, new technology can lead to smaller warheads that translates into smaller blast patterns and less collateral damage. I envision something small enough to take out a room without hurting anyone in the next room. We have the aiming technology but not the rest of it (at least not that I am aware).
"I hope none of you gentlemen is so foolish as to think that aeroplanes will be usefully employed for reconnaissance from the air. There is only one way for a commander to get information by reconnaissance, and that is by the use of cavalry."
-British Gen. Sir Douglas Haig, summer 1914, addressing the British Army Staff College. Within three months, World War I's First Battle of the Marne and the Battle of Tannenberg had been decided on the basis of information furnished via aerial reconnaissance.
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