By Megan Ruge Asst. living and arts editor
On Sept. 22, author and political journalist Robert Farley hosted a talk based on his newest publication, “Grounded: The Case for Abolishing the United States Air Force,” in the Degenstein Campus Center meeting rooms.
Farley spoke on the history and functions of the different branches of the military. He focused on the United States Air Force and what it would mean to break apart and distribute the different roles of the service to other branches.
After a brief introduction of the subject matter, Farley spoke on the original idea to create a service specifically dedicated to airpower, known as the United States Air Force.
This concept originated from three men, Giulio Douhet, William Mitchell and Hap Arnold, whose theories and observations contributed to the idea of an individualized service dedicated to airpower.
The ideas that these men based their actualization of an airpower service around stated that there was no necessary need to put men on the ground when they could fight the war from the air with less casualties. Farley called this idea of an airpower-based service the “independent decisive effect.”
Independent decisive effect refers to the theories of these men that said airpower was too complex to be left in the hands of other ground personnel, such as the United States Army.
Independent decisive effect surrounds the idea of airpower’s “ability to strike the enemy homeland until the enemy gave up,” Farley said.
As the Air Force moved forward, they became overconfident in the idea that bombers were the only thing that needed to be in the air. The loss rate on missions became seven to eight percent, with each aviator averaging 20 missions.
This became an eye opener for the Air Force, showing the need for fighter planes and pilots, a necessity that was originally ignored in pursuit of the independent decisive effect.
Farley said that with the introduction of fighter planes, the innovation of close air support followed. This is the idea that in a tough battle where a side feels outnumbered, they can call a friendly pilot to provide air support and help them win.
This became problematic when aviators expressed disinterest in the idea of coming in close range of a battle in which they might endanger themselves as well as friendly soldiers.
Farley went on to talk about the different things that cause many complications in the use of the Air Force as an independent service.
He spoke about the over-promising leadership that has made assumptions to “sell their cause” and was not able to follow through. He called it “bad advice” and chalked it up to the Air Force lobbying.
He also discussed things that differentiate a branch from a service. He elaborated on how it shows that the Air Force as its own service is almost incomplete as it does not fit many of the criteria, such as mission independence.
He spoke about what the future of service may look like and how it may eventually include platforms such as cyber and space warfare, submarines, special operations forces and counter insurgency.
At the end of the talk, Farley summed everything up by giving a rundown of how the Air Force should be broken down and redistributed while the different services also embrace the future of warfare. This includes drones and joint services.
“Every time you create a service, like the United States Air Force, you create a boundary,” Farley said. He spoke about what it meant to break down the walls between these services and how important it is to communicate between different services.
“We tend to think of government institutions as being big stone institutions, something that can’t change,” Farley said. “So this idea of eliminating the Air Force sounds as crazy as eliminating the IRS, but in fact you can do it, all you need is legislation.”
Audience members were given the opportunity to ask questions and respond to Farley’s talk.
Many were captivated by what he said.
“I never really had a lot of knowledge of the ins and outs of the branches of the military as well as the Air Force,” sophomore Jennie Lien said.
“It was interesting to see reasons that we don’t’ necessarily need the Air Force, something I never thought about because it has always been there,” Lien added.
“I really didn’t know this was something people argued about, so to get an inside look of what is going on and hearing solutions to the problem was interesting,” sophomore Alyssa Howson said.
