ISBN: 9780802096296 - the science of bombing: operational research in raf bomber command (15 Ergebnisse)

Paperback. Zustand: Good. A fascinating glimpse into military strategy and decision-making, The Science of Bombing will find a wide audience among those interested in air power history as well as military strategists, air force personnel, and aviation historians.

Zustand: Very Good. Pages intact with possible writing/highlighting. Binding strong with minor wear. Dust jackets/supplements may not be included. Stock photo provided. Product includes identifying sticker. Better World Books: Buy Books. Do Good.

Paperback. Zustand: Good. A fascinating glimpse into military strategy and decision-making, The Science of Bombing will find a wide audience among those interested in air power history as well as military strategists, air force personnel, and aviation historians.

Paperback. Zustand: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed.

Zustand: new.

Soft Cover. Zustand: VG. 347pp. with b/w illustrations. Small curl/creasing at corners, creasing along the bottom edge near the gutter and light soil to outer edges. Wraps have edge/rub wear, light creasing and creasing bottom left of the front panel. Actual book for sale pictured. 15.2 x 23 x 2.3cm, wt750g Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.…

Zustand: New. A fascinating glimpse into military strategy and decision-making, The Science of Bombing will find a wide audience among those interested in air power history as well as military strategists, air force personnel, and aviation historians. Num Pages: 384 pages, 40 photos. BIC Classification: 1DBK; HBG; HBW; HBWQ; JWG; JWK; JWLF. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 229 x 148 x 24. Weight in Grams: 642. . 2009. Illustrated. paperback. . . . .…

Zustand: New. In English.

Paperback. Zustand: Brand New. 1st edition. 384 pages. 9.25x6.00x1.00 inches. In Stock.

Zustand: New. pp. 384.

Zustand: New. A fascinating glimpse into military strategy and decision-making, The Science of Bombing will find a wide audience among those interested in air power history as well as military strategists, air force personnel, and aviation historians. Num Pages: 384 pages, 40 photos. BIC Classification: 1DBK; HBG; HBW; HBWQ; JWG; JWK; JWLF. Category: (G) General (US: Trade). Dimension: 229 x 148 x 24. Weight in Grams: 642. . 2009. Illustrated. paperback. . . . . Books ship from the US and Ireland.…

Paperback. Zustand: Fine. Dropping a bomb from a moving aircraft at night, through cloud, while being shot at, onto a target hundreds of miles from home is not merely a matter of flying above Germany and releasing it with conviction. It is a problem involving navigation, weather, altitude, speed, wind, machinery, enemy defences and the awkward tendency of gravity to provide accurate results only when supplied with accurate information. In The Science of Bombing , Randall T. Wakelam examines the Operational Research Section of RAF Bomber Command during the Second World War. Staffed largely by civilian scientists?the celebrated ?boffins??the section studied what actually happened during bombing operations and compared it with what commanders believed was happening. The distinction was sometimes large enough to contain several German cities. At the beginning of the war, British strategic bombing theory rested upon considerable confidence in aircraft reaching and striking their assigned targets. Operational evidence was less obliging. Bombers became lost, crews misidentified towns, weather obscured aiming points and navigation over a blacked-out continent proved exceptionally difficult. Reports might record a target as attacked when the bombs had landed many miles away, allowing the paperwork to achieve a precision unavailable to the aircraft. The devastating Butt Report of 1941 examined bombing photographs and demonstrated how few crews were reaching the vicinity of their intended targets. The findings were deeply uncomfortable, but discomfort is one of the more useful products of accurate statistics. Bomber Command could continue trusting optimistic crew reports or begin asking scientists why a large and costly air offensive was distributing explosives across the European countryside. In September 1941, Bomber Command established its own Operational Research Section. Its scientists collected evidence from operations, analysed losses, examined bombing photographs and studied every stage between planning a raid and discovering where the bombs had gone. Their task was to replace assumption with measurement, a process rarely welcomed by any organisation that has already circulated the assumption. Wakelam follows the development of this new discipline as the ORS created reliable methods of gathering and interpreting operational data. The researchers investigated navigation, target identification, tactics, aircraft performance, bombing accuracy and vulnerability to enemy defences. They asked simple but dangerous questions: Were crews finding the target? Which routes reduced losses? Did a particular device actually help? And was senior command prepared to accept an answer containing the word ?no?? The scientists worked closely with aircrew and headquarters staff, turning combat experience into evidence that could influence future operations. They studied returning aircraft, photographs, damage reports and casualty figures, looking for patterns invisible within individual missions. A pilot might know why his particular aircraft had survived; the researchers wanted to know why forty similar aircraft had not. Their work helped Bomber Command understand and employ new navigational and target-finding systems. Electronic aids such as Gee, Oboe and H2S offered methods of locating targets beyond visual range, while specialist Pathfinder crews marked aiming points for the main force. Technology did not abolish error, naturally, but allowed error to become smaller, measurable and accompanied by a technical manual. Operational research also contributed to the development of bomber streams, countermeasures and defensive tactics. By concentrating aircraft through German airspace, Bomber Command could overwhelm parts of the enemy?s night-fighter control system, although concentration introduced its own risks. Every improvement altered the problem, and the enemy, displaying poor scientific sportsmanship, adapted in response. The relationship between scientists and commanders forms the heart of Wakelam?s study. Research could identify a problem and propose a solution, but only senior officers possessed the authority to change doctrine, training or tactics. Evidence therefore had to survive not only analysis but hierarchy. A perfectly sound recommendation remaining unread in a headquarters file has approximately the operational value of a bomber parked without engines. Arthur Harris, commander-in-chief of Bomber Command from 1942, dominates any history of the bombing offensive. Forceful, determined and committed to area bombing, Harris was not a man likely to abandon a policy merely because somebody arrived carrying a graph. Yet Wakelam shows a more complicated process in which scientific advice was sometimes embraced, sometimes modified and sometimes resisted according to operational priorities and the convictions of senior leadership. The book does not treat the scientists as magicians who transformed failure into effortless success. Operational research worked cumulatively: one study improved a procedure, another exposed a weakness and repeated analysis gradually created a more effective organisation. The transformation of Bomber Command from the small, poorly equipped force of 1939 into the enormous offensive instrument of 1944?45 resulted from aircraft production, training, technology, intelligence and thousands of incremental decisions. There is an unavoidable moral unease in the title. The methods being improved delivered destruction to German cities, industries and civilians on an immense scale. Statistics concerning accuracy, bomb density and aircraft losses represented burning buildings and human deaths at both ends of the operation. Science supplied clearer answers about how bombing could be conducted; it could not settle the larger argument about whether particular bombing policies were justified. Wakelam concentrates on institutional decision-making rather than offering another general narrative of famous raids. Drawing upon. …

Paperback / softback. Zustand: New. New copy - Usually dispatched within 4 working days.

Zustand: New. pp. 384.

Soft cover. Zustand: Near Fine. A near fine softcover copy with just a little light shelf wear to the covers and page ends. The spine is straight, the binding is tight and the pages are clean, bright and spotting-free. Please see photos.