Alessandra Nisch
Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of ...

President Putin made three foundational assumptions in launching his war against Ukraine that should have been correct but were not. First, Putin assumed the invasion of Ukraine would be a quick and easy fight. Second, he assumed the world would denounce the invasion but tacitly allow it. Third, Putin assumed the war would deter NATO expansion.

Putin’s Wars: Testing Boyd’s Strategy of Applied Friction

Jet Age

#Reviewing Flying Camelot

#Reviewing Flying Camelot

In Flying Camelot: The F-15, the F-16, and the Weaponization of Fighter Pilot Nostalgia, Michael W. Hankins argues that starting as early as the 1960s, a group of fighter pilots and reformers sought to change the procurement process for aircraft to emphasize the importance of the fighter pilot and air superiority missions. Hankins states that this resulted in the development and acquisition of the F-15 and F-16 fighters by the United States Air Force. Hankins further asserts that these reformers sought to change how fighter pilots were trained to emphasize the importance of dogfighting and air superiority campaigns over other aspects of air combat.

#Reviewing Speed: The Life of a Test Pilot and Birth of an American Icon

#Reviewing Speed: The Life of a Test Pilot and Birth of an American Icon

This book is a testament both to the courage of Bob Gilliland and the ingenuity of Skunk Works at its height. Aviation historians and engineers will appreciate the story while the general public can respect a man’s mark on aviation. The book could have improved if it were more accessible to general readers and if it questioned why there hasn’t been a jet that was as groundbreaking since the SR-71. Nevertheless, the book provides a glimpse of the can-do attitude of the military-industrial complex leaving its readers to wonder whether we can once again scrape the heavens and push the limits of aerospace as Gilliland did nearly 60 years ago.