The Past, Present and Future of Air Power Studies

This paper surveys the genealogy of air power studies, highlights the gap between existing theory and the realities of contemporary air operations, and offers directions for future research. Air power studies have long been dominated by two schools – absolutism and relativism – with discussions centring on offensive usage such as ‘which targets to bomb’. Absolutism posits that air power alone can win wars, while relativism argues that air power supports land and sea operations with the course of war ultimately determined by land and sea combat. However, this binary approach no longer fully explains contemporary realities, including air denial in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, air policing, the diplomatic role of multinational exercises and training, and the relationship between air power and emerging domains such as space, cyber and the electromagnetic spectrum. The paper argues for reconsidering the definition of air power itself.