180 Degrees Out: The Change in US Strategic Bombing Applications 1935-1955

Abstract

This dissertation examines how the U.S. Army/Air Force developed strategic bombing applications during the 1930s and then changed them during World War II and in early Cold War planning. This narrative history analyzes the governmental, military, and social influences that changed U.S. bombing methods. The study addresses how the Air Force diverted from a professed strategy of precision bombardment during the inter-war years only to embrace area, fire, and atomic bombardment during WW II. Furthermore, the treatise continues in this vein by examining how the USAF developed atomic and thermonuclear applications during the post war era and the Cold War.