Selling Schweinfurt: Targeting Assessment and Marketing in the Air Campaign Against German Industry

“Brian Vlaun provides an excellent account of the travails of building an effective intelligence establishment almost from scratch.” —Michigan War Studies Review

“The author has provided a very interesting look at the history of the targeting regimes and various metrics shaped in the European bombing campaign. And he has provided a lot to think about with regard to the challenges of modern kill chains and kill webs when addressing how to shape the kind of combat or crisis management effects desired in combat.” —Defense.info

“Brian Vlaun’s Selling Schweinfurt is an insightful examination of the American contribution to the Second World War’s Combined Bomber Offensive (CBO) through its relationship with air intelligence. By exploring the fledging US Army Air Force’s (USAAF) intelligence and targeting enterprise, Vlaun addresses the question: how did air intelligence affect the performance of General Eaker’s Eighth Air Force?.... The book forges a deeper understanding of the holistic system that generates and enables air power, from training and doctrine to organisational interests and dynamics. In this, Selling Schweinfurt is a fascinating exploration of the challenges faced by American air intelligence during the CBO.” —Grounded Curiosity

“Selling Schweinfurt … is an important work for those studying military airpower. Not only does Vlaun concisely review the prevailing theories in airpower studies, such as the role of strategic bombing in creating an independent air force, but he expounds on them by including the intelligence analysts’ varying perceptions, thereby offering a sliver of intellectual history.” —The Journal of Military History

“Col. Vlaun has provided a very interesting look at the history of the targeting regimes and various metrics shaped in the European bombing campaign.” —Second Line of Defense

“Selling Schweinfurt is an important addition to the historiography of the Combined Bomber Offensive and of the USAAF’s campaign against German industry, and one that scholars will gain considerable benefit from. Brian D. Vlaun is to be commended for not only comprehensively filling a gap in coverage with this study of air intelligence during the bombing offensive, but also for providing a well sourced example of the consequences when an air campaign’s targeting decisions and BDA are unduly shaped by organizational biases. In that regard, the USAAF’s experience has an enduring relevance for, as he rightly observes, ‘without a refined sense of what to target or how to measure bombing effectiveness, airpower will be inefficient if not altogether ineffective.’” —The Second World War Research Group

“A superb, engrossing study of the evolution of US air intelligence and airpower from the interwar years to early 1944, Vlaun’s Selling Schweinfurt is a welcome and much-needed addition to the literature not only on strategic bombing and World War II, but also airpower and the US Air Force.” —Paul D. Gelpi, Professor of Military History, Marine Corps University

“If 'air power is targeting,' then Brian D. Vlaun's is on-time and on-target. By deftly weaving together air intelligence, targeting, assessment and the individuals working behind the scenes, Vlaun updates the familiar story of the bombing campaigns of World War II and does the nearly impossible: adds something new to our understanding of that conflict. Comprehensively researched, wisely crafted, and above all well-argued.” —Brian D. Laslie, author of Architect of Air Power: General Laurence S. Kuter and the Birth of the U.S. Air Force

“Vlaun’s sophisticated examination of the effect exerted by personal biases and organizational behaviors on airmen like Ira Eaker and Carl Spaatz, as well as on intelligence personnel themselves and their combat assessments, makes this required reading for military historians, contemporary military planners, and joint force commanders as well.” —Mark J. Conversino, author of Fighting With Soviets: The Failure of Operation Frantic, 19