Many of my academic friends have warned me to take his conclusions with at least a few grains of salt. Whether it was the atom bombs or LeMays bombing tactic that hastened the Japanese to surrender will always be a debatable topic. Once you are in a way, are some forms of bombing more humane than others? Do you prefer this format. The author of the book is Malcolm Gladwell, an English-born Canadian journalist, author, and public speaker. [9], When the United States entered World War II, the Bomber Mafia's doctrine proved of little military use and costly in implementation with the realities of current technology under real-world combat conditions. Relevance; Rating; Price (Ascending) Most Recent; View: Filter. A second shell hit the radio compartment, cutting the legs of the radio operator off at the knees. After difficulties in applying the Bomber Mafia's theoretical strategy, Major General Hansell was replaced by Major General Curtis LeMay, who utilized tactical changes such as attacking Japanese population centers with napalm to ensure a Japanese surrender. Here is Gladwells stunning description of a United States Air Force B-17 bomber being cut up on a run over Germany: One 20-millimeter cannon shell penetrated the right side of the airplane and exploded beneath the pilot, cutting one of the gunners in the leg. Upon release, The Bomber Mafia was met with mixed reviews, with reviewers praising its audiobook version but criticizing the book for a lack of accuracy and for being light on details. You can pose questions to the Goodreads community with However, the doctrine nonetheless became the foundation for the separation of the Air Force from the Army, and the basis for modern airpower theory. Please check back soon for future events. Malcolm Gladwells new book and audiobook The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation and the Longest Night of the Second World War digs deep into one of the lesser-known rivalries of the war, the one between Brig. Visit gladwellbooks.com for moreinformation. Hes more of an intellectual explorer than a disciplined academic. The setting is Second World War. These pilots dreamed of more humane ways to conduct wars. The biggest runs against a strategic target, specifically a ball bearing factory, largely was a failure. This was a ripoff, I didn't know he had a podcast on this topic, but after listening to the book my immediate thought was "Why did I pay for this book? It's true: The audiobook breaks conventional audiobook standards, as this is a well-produced audio experience. If yo. Did the podcast effect the way you approached the book, or understood it? It's true: The audiobook breaks conventional audiobook standards, as this is a well-produced audio experience. Its a history of the dueling philosophies regarding bombing that existed in the US military during World War II. The Listeners Guide features additional commentary from, Suggestions, Fan Mail, Bones to Pick, and All Other Queries, For Speaking Engagements With Malcolm Gladwell, Hasta la Vista, America: Trumps Farewell Address, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. People growing up on animations and motion pictures see planes going down bombs/shooting targets as if done through cross hairs. The State of Journalism on World Press Freedom Day. And then they did the same thing to another city. In the late 1930s, they shared a philosophy that with the new Norden bombsight, bombing could be done more effectively, hitting the enemys vital military targets (called choke points). Those are exactly the same, but there's a lot more to the book. Reader Q&A, However I really did not recognize why this publication merely discusses why this was the status quo. Emergency workers and local residents battled to clear debris and extinguish fires in the Ukrainian city of Uman after Two U.S. army helicopters collided and crashed Thursday in Alaska while returning from a training flight, killing three soldiers 89-year-old Max Hancock was an U.S. airman stationed outside of Oxford, England, in 1953. in the program we will take some of your questions. The three factors that accounted for 91% of the rankings were (1) total endowment (2) price of tuition and (3) how many white people were on campus. Gladwell describes the challenges that both faced. Malcolm Gladwell's extraordinary new book, "The Bomber Mafia," tells the story of a group of pilots who met on a muggy airbase in central Alabama and hatched a plan to revolutionize warfare. or ask your favorite author a question with Required fields are marked *. The book follows the Bomber Mafia, especially Major General Haywood S. Hansell, and the development of a high-altitude precision aerial bombardment strategy in World War II as a means to limit casualties. The ACTS officers who believed in the heavy bomber doctrine realized that any other Air Corps expenditures such as for tactical bombers and fighter aircraft would take away from the proposed large fleet of heavy bombers. On the eve of the Second World War, a band of visionaries at Maxwell Air Force Base tried to reimagine modern warfare. Emphasizes just how technical breakthroughs are typically made use of in means they were not indicated. Thank you for purchasing The Bomber Mafia, an audiobook by Malcolm Gladwell. Malcolm Gladwell The Bomber Mafia Audiobook Online. Most military thinkers in the . [19] Publishers Weekly stated "this history feels more tossed off than fully fledged", though Gladwell "provide[d] plenty of colorful details and pose[d] intriguing questions about the morality of warfare". In Gladwells account, Hansells relatively more humane approach didnt work. Gladwell steps back from the bombing of Tokyo, the deadliest night of the war, and asks, Was it worth it? The attack was the brainchild of General Curtis LeMay, whose brutal pragmatism and scorched-earth tactics in Japan cost thousands of civilian lives but may have spared more by averting a planned US invasion. This page was last edited on 16 June 2022, at 01:38. When you purchase an independently reviewed book through our site, we earn an affiliate commission. The words "Bomber Mafia" refer to a group of American pilots in the 1930s stationed at what was then called Maxwell Field in Montgomery, Alabama. In that sense, Gladwell wrote that Hansell "won the war."[21][22]. I was also aware of Bomber Harris who led the fire battle on Germany, and I have actually reviewed exactly how this impacted cities like Dresden. Contact Us | I knew the Americans went down two atomic weapons to shorten the battle as well as bring Japan to its knees as well as accept surrender to conserve countless lives needed to get into those islands. This is history brought to life through the power of audio. Kelsey formulated a new "interceptor" class of aircraft in order to sustain his idea that a well-armed fighter aircraft could successfully attack enemy bombers, and that, given drop tanks for long range, it could defend friendly bombers all the way to the target and back.[15]. The Bomber Mafia isn't an honest or earnest look at what experts have written and thought about America's air campaigns during WWII. The United States had already completely cut off Japans oil supplies and pipelines by the middle of 1944/beginning of 1945, and decimated their navy. [10] The doctrine also ran counter to the theories of Billy Mitchell himself, who espoused that pursuit support was essential for daylight bombing operations.[11]. ASIN: B08V1N49ZN Edition language: English . General Haywood Hansell was the leader of The Bomber Mafia, a small group within the military that believed an emerging technologyairborne warfarecould make wars shorter and far less deadly. To most people, a city park is a grace note, a green space that makes urban life more livable. Instead, the bomber fleets were a major factor in the general American war effort, helping to reduce the enemy fighting power, especially in Japan where they destroyed the largest cities by shifting to area incendiary bombing tactics. The print has its merits of being able to take your time to know the history of the "bomber mafia." The last chapter deals with the end of the war, as Gladwell examines the moral issues involved in LeMays actions and whether they were justified in the circumstances. The mission failed for several reasons, including clouds that obscured the targets, which had to be seen to use the Norden bombsight. 1. son. As for Vietnam, Johnson and Mcnamara screwed that up by NOT applying LeMay principals and the war should have been ended in 1965 , again saving many lives. The Bombing plane mafia under Hansell are bent on reduce the destruction as well as focused on throwing a spanner in the works of battle. As long as youre comfortable with the numbers of people who were killed during the air attacks described throughout the book. A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality study guides that feature detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, quotes, and essay topics. I seriously doubt Russias entry into the war was a factor. WATCH SEGMENT. They failed. On page 127 of the hard copy, Gladwell got it backwards when he stated heavily laden B-29s headed for a Japan bombing run had to wait for a tailwind to be able to take off. The book concludes that "LeMay won the battle. If LeMay firebombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the loss of life would have been similar as to what the atomic bombs caused without the radiation. This page is not available in other languages. We now live in a world where its not too much of an exaggeration to say that a bomber flying at 50,000 feet can tickle a targets nose hairs with the advanced systems we now have in place. Fans of Revisionist History will recognize some of the characters from the last season of the podcast, but The Bomber Mafia expands on these episodes and includes new original interviews, archival footage, and a fresh analysis of one of the most important events in military history. Do Not Steal My Personal Information. LeMay was instead, in the words of the military historian Conrad Crane, the Air Forces ultimate problem solver. As Gladwell tells it, the practical problem was how to win the war as quickly as possible. The US Bomber Mafia agreed with Baldwin only in that the bomber would prevail in its mission. 4.9 . Take capers these are certainly not peas. In one day in March, 1945, more than 400 B-29s totally burned 16 square miles of Tokyo killing far more than 100,000 people. He revisits the deceptions of Bernie Madoff, the trial of Amanda Knox, the suicide of Sylvia Plath, the Jerry Sandusky pedophilia scandal at Penn State University, and the death of Sandra Blandthrowing our understanding of these and other stories into doubt. This guide is based on the hardcover first edition. But it was news to me. The rest of the book focuses on the Pacific Theater during the last two years of the war. [17] Hansell wrote: It was recognized that fighter escort was inherently desirable, but no one could quite conceive how a small fighter could have the range of the bomber yet retain its combat maneuverability. Its proponents continued to promote the doctrine into the Atomic Age, forming the Strategic Air Command to carry out a vision modified to fit the needs of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear warfare. This book once more casts an extra critical eye on this situation and outcome. LeMay was allowed to kill civilians by the tens of thousands because he had a theory about morale among the populace, which never came close to a conclusion. The airmen believed that the tool would allow forces to focus on taking out specific targets that could cripple the enemys production lines rather than engaging in the kind of indiscriminate bombing that the Germans did on London and the Allied forces would against Dresden. [] Hansell won the war". It was decided primarily by General Curtis LeMay to carpet bomb Tokyo, using napalm. Yes. [24] DeGroot said "the subject demands more depth than this volume provides", and stated Gladwell boiled down the bombing strategy's evolution to personality clashes between Hansell and LeMay while ignoring other major factors, such as how the morality and acceptance of bombing evolved. Bomber Mafia Daylight precision-bombing advocates Carl A. Spaatz, Muir S. Fairchild and Donald M. Wilson at Maxwell Air Force Base in 1946 The Bomber Mafia were a close-knit group of American military men who believed that long-range heavy bomber aircraft in large numbers were able to win a war. A fourth shell hit the cockpit, taking out the planes hydraulic system. It's a history of the dueling philosophies regarding bombing that existed in the US military during World War II. The American militarys precise new way of information-based warfare so far has been tested only in relatively small and short bombing campaigns in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Balkans, the gunboat wars of our time. Actually, Gladwell mentions that the audio style is the initial text, as well as the hardback is the secondary item. The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War is a 2021 book by Malcolm Gladwell that examines the US Bomber Mafia of World War II, which advocated precision aerial bombing as a means to win a war. What would happen with bombing in a really big war remains to be seen. [10] This especially applied with the aerial bombardment of Japan where previously unaccounted atmospheric conditions such as the jet stream seriously interfered with operations under Hansell's command. LeMay has taken over from Hansell and used napalm, resulting in markedly more success but also much greater destruction and killing of civilians. Restricted in scope, short in play time, I located this believed prompting. This change of commandand what it meant in terms of military strategyis the crux of this book. Later, Saville successfully implemented his ideas in the Mediterranean Theater. This exclusive Listener's Guide gives you an inside look at the production process, archival imagery and commentary from Malcolm and the producers and engineers involved with this extraordinary project. To frame the book in this simplistic binary is to misconstrue the doctrines of both precision and area bombing". Note from the author Malcolm Gladwell, author . This Bomber Mafia asked: What if precision bombing could, just by taking out critical choke points industrial or transportation hubs cripple the enemyandmake war far less lethal? Another example: Gladwell calls the firebombing of Tokyo on March 9 and 10, 1945, the longest night of the war. This unfortunate phrase, this unproven superlative, is repeated in the books unwieldy subtitle. Failure to see this issue through proved one of the Air Corps Tactical School's major shortcomings.[18]. in History Nonfiction June 10, 2021, Malcolm Gladwell The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War Audiobook. I'm interested in the Bomber Mafia for my 13 y.o. [13] The result furthered the Allies' military objectives leading to Japan's surrender, such as with the Bombing of Tokyo on March 10, 1945 with Operation Meetinghouse. All Rights Reserved. First, the U.S. command didnt really seem to understand what LeMays campaign was doing to Japan. The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War Buy on Bookshop Little Brown and Company, 256 pp., $27.00 The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the. (Gladwell partly excuses this notorious phrase, saying it was likely the work of a ghostwriter.) Gladwell stated the audiobook for The Bomber Mafia came about as an expansion of material from his podcast Revisionist History, and that the print book originated from the audiobook. And because we dont know how to talk to strangers, we are inviting conflict and misunderstanding in ways that have a profound effect on our lives and our world. The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War is a 2021 book by Malcolm Gladwell that examines the US Bomber Mafia of World War II, which advocated precision aerial bombing as a means to win a war. Hansell was a junior member of the Bomber Mafia, a group that put its faith in the new Norden precision bombsight. Actually, LeMays B-29s firebombed 67 different Japanese cities with far more lives lost than the atomic bombs. Ive read most of Gladwells books, but he always finds something new to tackle from a different angle. [5][6], The book follows the story of the Bomber Mafia, a group of American military officers, especially Major General Haywood S. Hansell, as they developed a military doctrine of daylight strategic bombing as a means to defeat an enemy with precision high-altitude aerial bombardment. By dropping bombs with precision onto strategic targets, Hansell believed wars could be won faster and with far less . He is also the co-founder of Pushkin Industries, an audio content company that produces the podcasts Revisionist History, which reconsiders things both overlooked and misunderstood, and Broken Record, where he, Rick Rubin, and Bruce Headlam interview musicians across a wide range of genres. He was and is wrong, killing the elderly, women, and children is not an object of war, its evil and destructive. The Bomber Mafia: A Dream, a Temptation, and the Longest Night of the Second World War. This book is so much extra; not just filling up a few spaces in my understanding but educating me, simply exactly how little I understood about the altering role of the airforce. Anyone can read what you share. Whats more, the sight itself was less accurate in real-world conditions than during testing. Thank you for purchasing The Bomber Mafia, an audiobook by Malcolm Gladwell. [8] In that regard, this was at odds with Britain's Royal Air Force' doctrine of area bombing under the command of Marshal of the Royal Air Force Sir Arthur Harris. As listeners hear these stories unfurl, Gladwell examines one of the greatest moral challenges in modern American history. James Grosjean Strategy Cards (ShopLVA Exclusive), Las Vegas Advisor Membership + Member Rewards, Other Games, Weird Rules, Promos, Side Bets, Podcast - former surveillance operator Junior. For the first few years, the strongest voice at ACTS against the bomber doctrine was Captain (later General) George C. Kenney who called for the use of air power to attack enemy fighting units on the ground. His thinking was that it would be better to force the enemy to surrender early, as a prolonged war would cause more suffering. Rather than focus on industrial or military targets, the napalm bombs spewed all over cities, destroying housing and killing civilians in a most devastating way. The villain, or at least loser in this account, is another Air Force general, Haywood Hansell, who had tried to win the war in the Pacific through the precision-bombing of Japan. T H E B O M B E R M A FI A. l i ste n er's g u i de ma lc o l m g l a d w e l l Thank you for purchasing Malcolm Gladwell's The Bomber Mafia.. We won the war when we did because our aircraft carriers were luckily out of Pearl Harbor when it was invaded, we were never going to lose but our task would have become daunting if we had to re-build our aircraft carrier fleet in my opinion Germany invaded Russia for its oil, oil was and is the commodity needed for modern militaries, Your email address will not be published. Chapter 7 provides some background regarding the development at Harvard University of napalm, an incendiary substance that could be used in bombs to create an intense firestorm. Why did Neville Chamberlain think he could trust Adolf Hitler? His interview with Fareed Zakaria was interesting, spanning everything from auto-pilot vehicles to U.S. university rankings to a critique of The Little Mermaid (which, thankfully, I have never seen). Two new bomber groups were formed in the Pacific: LeMay headed one in India and Hansell led another in the Marianas. One historian tells the author that Hansell was not the kind of man who was willing to kill hundreds of thousands of people. Captain Claire Lee Chennault, senior instructor in fighter tactics at ACTS, was a vocal Air Corps officer who challenged the bomber mafia for more than a decade; he was forced into early retirement in 1937, leaving the precision bombing advocates unopposed.
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