ABSTRACT
Throughout the Second World War, the new doctrines and technologies so hotly debated in the 1920s and 1930s were validated or altered to help achieve victory. Armor tactics, amphibious operations, and strategic bombing stand as representative case studies. The last of these included the most striking application of air power doctrine—the atomic bomb. In the Central Pacific, large-scale operations did not occur until late 1943 because the United States (US) Navy did not possess enough aircraft carriers to gain, let alone maintain, tactical air superiority. At the beginning of the Second World War, the US Army Air Force focused almost entirely on strategic bombardment. While the atomic bombs did hasten the end of the Second World War, they also heralded the beginning of new age of warfare. Truly, the weapons of mass destruction gave credence to the argument that the Second World War was a total war.
