The First Air War by Lee Kennett Book Review

📌Category: Books
📌Words: 680
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 30 August 2021

Lee Kennett's book, The First Air War, delves into the history of the air war and how it influenced the development of air-powered weapons and aircraft. This is a good overview of prewar aviation, and it should be noted that this topic is rarely discussed. While the former served as primary weapons for reconnaissance, the latter was mainly used to hunt enemy planes. Kennet talks about the role of artillery spotting during the Second World War. Through the evolution of aviation, Kennet explains how planes were adapted to various military uses, and how these roles were then expanded. 

Kennett focuses on the demographics of fighter pilots as well as the evolution of air weapons in general in a few chapters. It provides a type of aviator sociology, an explanation about why the British were so irritating in the air compared to everyone else. It analyzes the progression of scattered squadrons into independent air weapons. As well as the curious disconnect between what people assumed airpower could do. What it indicated was that airpower's main contributions were artillery spotting and reconnaissance, and that bombing and ground attack didn't add up to anything.

The Eastern Front, with its vast distances, and less developed countryside the further east one went, meant that the air war was remarkably different there than in France and Belgium. The Russians and Habsburgs did have air forces, but they were tiny in comparison to those of the French, Germans, or British, and neither were as technologically or technically sophisticated. Both the Austro-Hungarians and the Russians had to largely rely on outside help with building and maintaining their own smaller air fleets. The Russians relied heavily on the French while the Germans were the patrons of Vienna. This relative paucity of numbers of aircraft in the East meant that many German pilots considered it a punishment to be sent East as there were few chances to be made famous as an ace by flying against a foe with so few aircraft. German squadrons that were transferred West to bolster numbers were reportedly looked down upon as their lack of combat experience was all too apparent. The Italians, on the other hand, rushed into the air with great excitement and joy, as they had done during the Great War, but with mixed success. The Russians and the Austrians lacked the industrial and technological infrastructure to start from scratch in building their aviation forces.

Experimented with bombers, and strategic bombing was born during the First World War, but no one was particularly impressed by these early attempts, whether in the military or by people who were subjected to bombing attacks. A few examples, particularly of German attacks that resulted in significant civilian deaths on occasion, or of Russian bombers successfully attacking enemy transportation and supply lines on the Eastern Front.

While aviation had no significant effect on the outcome of the First World War, its development greatly influenced the expansion and development of the combat aviation industry. It is clear from this work that the main use of aircraft in the war is the last one most of us think of. The task of observation, range spotting, and artillery monitoring, and reconnaissance photography flights seldom enter the minds of those who study the Great War or early military aviation, and yet that was the majority use of all air forces during the war. While the aces touched upon in this book, as is the development of fighter aircraft, it is a very small section of the book.

The major use of airplanes in the war is the last one most of us think about, as evidenced by this work. Observation, range spotting, artillery monitoring, and reconnaissance photography flights are rarely mentioned in discussions of the Great War or early military aviation, although these were the primary missions of all air units during the conflict. In this book, the aces were touched upon briefly.

Although this book was dense and hard to get through it gave a good insight into the world of aircraft and the pilots who flew them during the First World War.  All in all this book is a good way to learn about air combat although he does seem a little too focused on debunking "myths" but he rarely goes to the extreme with this. His main error is contending that aircraft had only a minimal effect on the war, although his text often contradicts this.

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