Overlord: General Pete Quesada and the Triumph of Tactical Air Power in World War  II
With this work, Hughes, who teaches history at Ohio State, makes a major contribution to the history of tactical airpower in the U.S. Air Force. Quesada, like most of his pre-1941 contemporaries, was heavily exposed to the orthodoxies of strategic bombardment. His experience in the Mediterranean, however, convinced him that direct support of ground forces was at least as important. As commander of IX Fighter Command (later Tactical Air) from October 1943 to V-E Day, Quesada was instrumental in developing the doctrines and practices that made the role of the American fighter-bomber a decisive factor in the D-Day campaign. He was quickly sidetracked in a postwar Air Force emphasizing nuclear weapons rather than ground attack. But Quesada's legacy, argues Hughes, ignored in Vietnam, bore fruit in Desert Storm and continues to shape Air Force policies. Photos not seen by PW.Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.