William Mitchell And His Military Thinking

As a well-known American military thinker, strategist and an advocate of American air force in early 20th century, William Mitchell produced six works in his life, among which Air Defense, his masterpiece, is considered a major one of the works in western air power theory.In the Air Defense, Mitchell comprehensively presented his thinking about the air force. It can be summarized as follows: First, the use of aircraft in the war changed the face of the war completely, which turned it from the flat scene into a three-dimensional circumstance. Second, Mitchell proposed the "right on the air" theory because he speculated that the air force would play a decisive role in the future war. Third, according to his "air defense" theory, Mitchell appealed to establishing an independent air force. In Mitchell's opinion, the same with the sea force, Mahan's air power also had the close relation to the future of the country's survival, development, prosperity and security, so the new national defense strategy should be based on the air force .Throughout this book, Mitchell analyzed the role of the air force from the defense point of view that no matter how the army or navy operated in the Earth's surface, the air force must be the main tool in the national defense. Therefore, he advocated strongly that the nation should establish an independent air force. Forth, Mitchell put forward the"strategic bombing"theory that the bombing to the enemy's central area could bring the outcome quickly, such as the central area got in paralysis, the production couldn't be carried out ,and the enemy were destroyed. Fifth, Mitchell stated tactics of the air force systematically. He stressed that the air force should not only concern the offensive side mainly, but also be used in community and the air force should have co-operation with the army. Sixth, Mitchell elaborated the role of the United States'air force in the world .Seventh, Mitchell showed a series of far-sighted strategic vision of the air force., such as the use of No control balloons, airships and airborne ,and so on. Eighth, Mitchell called that the nation should develop the military back-up air force, and that the aviation industry should adhere to the principle of serving both military and civilian use. Ninth, Mitchell stated that the nation should put more attention to education and training of the air force members.Mitchell not only expounded the development of the air force thinking systematically, but also showed great ability to command in a series of actual combats; therefore, Mitchell made a significant contribution in the establishment of an independent air force.In order to elaborate and evaluate William Mitchell's military thought properly, this article attempts to conduct a more in-depth discussion and study to his air force in terms of William Mitchell's life, and makes an objective comment on his contribution in the growth of U.S. and the development in the world, which adopted the basic principles of history and military science. At the same time, we also point out that despite the fact that Mitchell's thinking had some foresight elements , the practice of the Second World War also showed that Mitchell's ideas had a lot of unrealistic things which turned out to be wrong in the future .Conclusion: Mitchell's theory of the air force was formed in the early 20th century, when the aircraft began to be used for the military, and the aircraft had not yet been fully tested by the war in practice. Limited by his own conditions, Mitchell's theory was an assumption under certain condition. However, because Mitchell had served as the senior commander of the U.S. Army Aviation for long time, Mitchell's theory was the summary of his experience in a large extent. His proposition on the building of the air force was more realistic than Duhei. There were many reasonable and correct thoughts in Mitchell's theory, such as the air force of the strategic position ,the building ,the strategic bombing, the coordinated operations, and the role in the world ,etc. which laid the foundation for the uprising and development of American air force, and were fully proved in the Second World War. Among the Mitchell's theory, there were also much realistic significance until now, such as the importance of air supremacy, the air concentration of command, staff training and development of civil aviation point of view, and so on. However, quite a few viewpoints of Mitchell were inevitably narrow-minded, exaggerated and self-contradictory. For example, he exaggerated the role of strategic bombing and air force, etc.