Chronicles in compelling detail the historic showdown between the U.S. Air Force and the Navy over the role of carrier aviation in the national security framework of the United States.

Chronicles the showdown between the U.S. Airforce and the Navy over the role of carrier aviation in the national security framework.

With the advent of the atomic bomb in 1945 and its impact on strategic thinking, the future of naval aviation looked bleak. Rapid demobilization after the war eliminated many carriers, and most policy makers believed that future wars would be fought with nuclear weapons delivered by land-based aircraft. In Nuclear Weapons and Aircraft Carriers, Jerry Miller traces the struggle of respected naval leaders to promote a different vision and the innovations in the design and engineering of carriers and aircraft that resulted. He argues that the Navy's hard-won nuclear capability played a significant role in ending the Cold War.

He also is known for his success as a writer, and the best of his work makes up a significant part of this book - excerpts from magazine articles, short stories, and letters that are incorporated into this biography by two English professors who vividly portray the highly original man behind the deeds and the writings."--BOOK JACKET.

“A superbly written biography” of the legendary Admiral who commanded the Allied Pacific Fleet during WWII (Carlo D’Este, author of Eisenhower and Patton). Chester Nimitz was an admiral’s Admiral, considered by many to be the greatest naval leader of the last century. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Nimitz assembled the forces, selected the leaders, and—as commander of all US and Allied air, land, and sea forces in the Pacific Ocean—led the charge one island at a time, one battle at a time, toward victory. A brilliant strategist, Nimitz achieved remarkable victories against fantastic odds, outpacing more flamboyant luminaries like General Douglas MacArthur and Admiral “Bull” Halsey. And he was there to accept, on behalf of the United States, the surrender of the Japanese aboard the battleship USS Missouri in August 1945. In “meticulously researched, immensely informative, and laudably balanced” biography, Brayton Harris uses long-overlooked files and recently declassified documents to bring to life one of America’s greatest wartime heroes (Alan Axelrod, author of A Savage Empire).

This book provides a historical background to the problems met during the early days of defense unification of the three U.S. military services: the Navy, the Army, and the Air Force. The author analyzes the problem of unification during both peacetime and wartime, showing how the Korean War served to point up the capabilities and limitations of the three services.

Arleigh Burke is considered the father of the modern U.S. Navy to many. Sea warrior, strategist, and unparalleled service leader, Burke had an impact on the course of naval warfare that is still felt today. This biography by noted historian E.B. Potter follows Burke's distinguished career from his early days at the Naval Academy through the dramatic destroyer operations in the Solomons, where he earned his nickname "31-Knot Burke," to his participation in the crucial carrier operations of World War II. The author also fully examines Burke's postwar service as a United Nations delegate to the Korean truce talks and his unprecedented six-year tenure as chief of naval operations from 1955 to 1961, where he was a strong advocate of carrier aviation, nuclear propulsion, and a major force in developing the Navy's Polaris missile program. Awarded the Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, in 1977, he became the first living U.S. naval officer to have a class of ship named after him--the Arleigh Burke guided missile destroyers. Now available in paperback for the first time, this definitive 1990 biography is a worthy tribute to a great naval hero.