Tom Engelhardt makes a very convincing case that US air power is making terrorism worse, not better.

His thesis is that, “U.S. air power has, in the last six and a half years, been an effective force in a war for terror, not against it.”

When one considers the nature of the United States’ use of air power, particularly on a strategic level, it has largely proved a failure.

In WWII, when the entire 8th air force was focused on bombing the German aircraft industry during the “big week”, aircraft production increased.

In Viet Nam, bombing increased the support of the Viet Cong in the south, and of the general citizenry in the north, as the North Vietnamese civil defense authorities have attested to repeatedly.

While strategic bombing is more often a failure than not, and is currently failing in both Iraq and Afghanistan because it is the strongest recruiting tool of Jihadists, but the military, including the Army and, to a lesser extent, the Marines, continue to call air strikes in rather than clearing buildings.

It is a fundamental error in doctrine that permeates the US military establishment.