RAF: The Birth of the World's First Air Force

by Richard Overy Ph.D.

Overview

“Packed with drama, both military and political.… It will surely prove definitive.” —Lewis Jones, Daily Telegraph

This compact, masterful work by an outstanding historian marks a pivotal moment in military history: the birth of Britain’s Royal Air Force. Writing with great clarity, Richard Overy shows how the RAF emerged from the deadly stalemate of trench warfare during World War I. With German bombers attacking British cities by 1917, Prime Minister David Lloyd George and his minister of munitions, Winston Churchill, navigated the organizational breakthrough that made the RAF an independent force in spring 1918. The RAF would prove highly influential in the development of air power around the world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393357240
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	07/02/2019
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	160
Sales rank:	1,061,875
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Richard Overy is the author of many outstanding histories of World War II, including Why the Allies Won and, most recently, the best-selling Blood and Ruins, winner of the Society of Military History Distinguished Book Award. His study of Hitler and Stalin, The Dictators, was awarded the Wolfson History Prize. He lives in Brescia, Italy.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations v

Preface vii

1 Britain and the War in the Air 1

2 Battles in the Sky, Battles in Whitehall 20

3 April Fools' Day 1918 47

4 'A Very Gruelling Business': Saving the RAF 81

Notes 115

Map 140

Commentary on Plate Section 141

Index 145

Editorial Reviews

"Concise but fascinating.… Overy is excellent on many of the details of the early RAF."

Literary Review - Leo McKinstry

"Air power [became] the key factor in 20th-century warfare. Overy’s book gives a brilliantly lucid account of how that process began."

Sunday Telegraph - Noel Malcolm

"A vivid narrative."

Times Higher Education - Matthew Reisz

"Important."

Wall Street Journal - Paul Kennedy

2018-03-05
A skillful pocket history of the founding of the Royal Air Force in 1918 and its fate after the armistice.This is well-traveled ground for veteran military historian Overy (History/Univ. of Exeter; WWII Remembered: From Blitzkrieg Through to the Allied Victory, 2015, etc.), who emphasizes that in 1917, after three years of war, Britain's army employed a large air force and its navy a modest one, and no airman yearned for an independent service. That was a decision made by politicians in London and provoked by German bombing raids. Although trivial by World War II standards, the 1,400 Britons killed provoked panic and desire for revenge as well as a more effective air force. "The politicians wanted a force to defend the home front against the novel menace of bombing," writes the author, "amidst fears that the staying power of the population might be strained to the breaking point by the raids." Naval and army commanders opposed the decision, and one of the detractors was Hugh Trenchard, the commander of the Royal Flying Corps who felt that a major reorganization would distract from support of ground forces in France. After consolidation became inevitable, Trenchard reluctantly agreed to become Chief of Air Staff but quarreled so badly with his civilian superior that he resigned after three months. Despite fierce, almost comic-opera disputes over uniforms, ensigns, and titles, ably recounted by Overy, the RAF was up and running by summer 1918. It performed well supporting ground forces against the final German offensive, but this change also encouraged the fantasy, still going strong, that air power alone—strategic bombing then, drones now—will win wars. Shared by civilian leaders, it kept the RAF alive during disastrous cutbacks after 1918 but meant that it got off on the wrong foot in WWII.This is a story Overy has told in earlier, much longer histories, but this is a fine introduction.

Kirkus Reviews