Airpower Quotes - Page 2

• To me our bombing policy appears to be suicidal. Not because it does not do vast damage to our enemy, it does; but because, simultaneously, it does vast damage to our peace aim, unless that aim is mutual economic and social annihilation.

  J. F. C. Fuller

  Suicide, Suicidal, Enemy

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• And where is the Prince who can afford to so cover his country with troops for its defense, as that ten thousand men descending from the clouds, might not in many places do an infinite deal of mischief, before a force could be brought together to repel them?

  Benjamin Franklin

  Country, Men, Clouds

  Benjamin Franklin (2014). “The Papers of Benjamin Franklin: Volume 41: September 16, 1783, through February 29, 1784”, p.478, Yale University Press

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• War is a nasty, dirty, rotten business. It's all right for the Navy to blockade a city, to starve the inhabitants to death. But there is something wrong, not nice, about bombing that city.

  Sir Arthur Harris, 1st Baronet

  War, Nice, Dirty

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• Whatever the lengths to which others may go, His Majesty's Government will never resort to the deliberate attack on women and children and other civilians for purposes of mere terrorism.

  Neville Chamberlain

  Children, Government, May

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• The Navy can lose us the war, but only the Air Force can win it. Therefore our supreme effort must be to gain overwhelming mastery in the Air. The Fighters are our salvation . . . but the Bombers alone provide the means of victory. . . . In no other way at present visible can we hope to overcome the immense military power of Germany.

  Winston Churchill

  Military, War, Mean

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• To use a fighter as a fighter-bomber when the strength of the fighter arm is inadequate to achieve air superiority is putting the cart before the horse.

  Adolf Galland

  Horse, Air, Bombers

  Adolf Galland (1954). “The first and the last: the rise and fall of the German fighter forces, 1938-1945”

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• The best defence of the country is the fear of the fighter. If we are strong in fighters we should probably never be attacked in force. If we are moderately strong we shall probably be attacked and the attacks will gradually be bought to a standstill. . . . If we are weak in fighter strength, the attacks will not be bought to a standstill and the productive capacity of the country will be virtually destroyed.

  Hugh Dowding, 1st Baron Dowding

  Country, Strong, Air Power

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• The military mind always imagines that the next war will be on the same lines as the last. That has never been the case and never will be. One of the great factors on the next war will be aircraft obviously. The potentialities of aircraft attack on a large scale are almost incalculable.

  Ferdinand Foch

  Military, War, Mind

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• If we should have to fight, we should be prepared to do so from the neck up instead of from the neck down.

  Jimmy Doolittle

  Fighting, Should Have, Air Power

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• Believe me, Germany is unable to wage war.

  David Lloyd George

  War, Believe, Germany

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• Because of its independence of surface limitations and its superior speed the airplane is the offensive weapon par excellence.

  Giulio Douhet

  Airplane, Independence, Excellence

  General Giulio Douhet (2014). “Command Of The Air”, p.32, Pickle Partners Publishing

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• Victory, speedy and complete, awaits the side which first employs air power as it should be employed. Germany, entangled in the meshes of vast land campaigns, cannot now disengage her air power for a strategically proper application. She missed victory through air power by a hair's breadth in 1940. . . . We ourselves are now at the crossroads.

  Sir Arthur Harris, 1st Baronet

  Hair, Land, Victory

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• When I look round to see how we can win the war, I see that there is only one sure path . . . and that is absolutely devastating, exterminating attack by very heavy bombers from this country upon the Nazi homeland.

  Winston Churchill

  Country, War, Mean

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• May it not also be that the cause of civilization itself will be defended by the skill and devotion of a few thousand airmen? There never has been, I suppose, in all the world, in all the history of war, such an opportunity for youth. The Knights of the Round Table, the Crusaders, all fall back into the past.

  Winston Churchill

  War, Fall, Past

  Sir Winston Churchill, Winston Churchill (1965). “Great destiny: sixty years of the memorable events in the life of the man of the century recounted in his own incomparable words”

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• What's the sense of sending $2 million missiles to hit a $10 tent that's empty?

  George W. Bush

  September 11, Tents, Air Power

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• I would attack any squadron blockading a port. Nothing could prevent me from dropping out of the clear blue sky on to a battleship with 400 kilos of explosives in the cockpit. Of course it is true that the pilot would be killed, but everything would blow up, and that's what counts.

  Jules Vedrines

  Blow, Sky, Blue

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• Are you aware it is private property? Why you'll be asking be to bomb Essen next.

  Kingsley Wood

  Asking, Bombs, Air Power

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• Above all, I shall see to it that the enemy will not be able to drop any bombs.

  Hermann Goring

  Enemy, Bombs, Air Power

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• Superior technical achievements - used correctly both strategically and tactically - can beat any quantity numerically many times stronger yet technically inferior.

  Adolf Galland

  Achievement, Stronger, Air Power

  Adolf Galland (1954). “The first and the last: the rise and fall of the German fighter forces, 1938-1945”

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• I wish for many reasons flying had never been invented.

  Stanley Baldwin

  Flying, Wish, Air Power

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• They had bombed London, whether on purpose or not, and the British people and London especially should know that we could hit back. It would be good for the morale of us all.

  Winston Churchill

  People, London, Would Be

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• I will not wage war against women and children! I have instructed my air force to limit their attacks to military objectives. However, if the enemy should conclude from this that he might get away with waging war in a different manner he will receive an answer that he'll be knocked out of his wits!

  Adolf Hitler

  Children, Military, War

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• Aviation is fine as a sport. But as an instrument of war, it is worthless.

  Ferdinand Foch

  Sports, War, Air Power

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• I will ignore all ideas for new works and engines of war, the invention of which has reached its limits and for whose improvement I see no further hope.

  Frontinus

  War, Ideas, New Work

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• Adolf Galland said that the day we took our fighters off the bombers and put them against the German fighters, that is, went from defensive to offsensive, Germany lost the air war. I made that decision and it was my most important decision during World War II. As you can imagine, the bomber crews were upset. The fighter pilots were ecstatic.

  Jimmy Doolittle

  Military, War, Air

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