Peaceful Air Warfare: United States, Britain and the Politics of International Aviation - Hardcover

International civil aviation is one of the most politically charged of commercial activities. Commercial considerations aside, civil aviation has been deemed important for military and intelligence purposes, as a means of encouraging national and imperial cohesion and as a status symbol. In this examination of civil aviation diplomacy between the United States and Britain in the period from 1919 to 1990, Alan Dobson demonstrates the influence the two countries had in developing the character of the world's first aviation system. Basing his research on both American and British archives, and on interviews and correspondence with officials and politicians such as Lord Callaghan and the Rt. Hon. Edmund Dell, Dr Dobson builds a picture of the political, strategic and economic factors behind the long-running "peaceful air warfare" between Britain and the United States. This was a war in which no shots were fired, but one where major economic and diplomatic battles were won and lost and foreign fields taken and dominated from lengthy periods by one or other of the rivals. This account throws new light on an important but hitherto relatively neglected aspect of the Special Relationship.