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Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War | 
 enlarge | Author: Robert Coram
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Category: Book
List Price: $16.99
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Avg. Customer Rating:  41 reviews
Sales Rank: 45664
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 504
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 8 x 5.4 x 1.4
ISBN: 0316796883
Dewey Decimal Number: 358.43092
EAN: 9780316796880
ASIN: 0316796883
Publication Date: May 10, 2004
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Shipping: International shipping available
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Product Description
A great American hero-a 20th-century warrior and military strategist who lived outside the spotlight but whose work has been enormously influential-is brought brilliantly to life in this acclaimed biography. John Boyd was the finest fighter pilot in American history. From the proving ground of the Korean War, he went on to win notoriety as the instructor who defeated-in less than 40 seconds-every pilot who challenged him. But what made Boyd a man for the ages was what happened after he left the cockpit. He transformed the way military aircraft-in particular the F-15 and F-16-were designed with his revolutionary Energy-Maneuverability Theory. Boyd dedicated his later years to a radical theory of conflict that was largely ignored during Boyd's lifetime, but that is now widely considered to be the most influential thinking about conflict since Sun Tzu's The Art of War.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 36 more reviews...
 He turned air combat upside down. July 6, 2008
Boyd, a rough-cut diamond developed fighter jet theories and stuck to his guns with the hide-bound Pentagon brass. We would all be richer if more military officers quit saying "yes sir" and used their minds to act like Boyd did.Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War
 Tempering Boyd with Chesterton July 1, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
If you want to change the world for the better or just keep your little corner of it from getting worse, then you'll want to read this book. It's not just about "the art of war," as the subtitle claims. It's what Boyd discovered about how conflicts are fought and won. Sadly, although he flew in two wars, most of Boyd's clashes were fought within our own military rather than with some foreign foe. As a result, one of the best USAF fighter pilots who ever lived is better remembered by the Marine Corps, where he is a hero, than by his own branch.
I'm not going spend time praising Boyd. The fact that I finished this book with a list of books and articles to read is praise enough. Instead, I'm going to offer a useful corrective to Boyd the man, by introducing someone else you should read.
That someone is G. K. Chesterton, an Englishman with a maverick, warrior personality every bit as fierce and unyielding as Boyd's. On June 1, 1941, on one of the darkest days in World War II, when the island of Crete had fallen to the Germans, leaving 17,000 British soldiers as prisoners of war, the Times of London, defiantly put these lines from Chesterton's "The Ballad of the White Horse" on its front page:
I tell you naught for your comfort,
Yea naught for your desire,
Save that the sky grows darker yet
And the sea rises higher.
Like Boyd, Chesterton understood that how we fight determines if we win or lose. He shared Boyd's contempt for those who believe that bigger is better. In a 1909 at the height of England's fears about new German battleships, Chesterton wrote precisely what Boyd would later say about fighter aircraft.
"Common-sense tells a man that indefinite development in one direction must in practice over-reach itself... If you perceive your enemy plunging on blindly in a particular direction, the real thing to do, if you have any spirit and invention, is to calculate the weakness in his course and advance yourself in some other direction. You ought to take advantage of his infatuation, not to imitate it; you ought to surprise his plan of campaign, not copy it laboriously. If he is building very big ships, the best thing you could do would probably be to build small ones; ships lighter, quicker, and more capable of navigating rivers."
But Chesterton understood something that Boyd never learned, an aspect of warfare that's so often forgotten today that the very word for it seems quaint--chivalry. Perhaps his best explanation of chivalry came in a 1906 article explaining why the Europe of his day dominated the world. Again Chesterton described a concept dear to Boyd, the power that comes from an ability to think new thoughts and imagine new ways of acting.
"The elements that make Europe upon the whole the most humanitarian civilisation are precisely the elements that make it upon the whole the strongest. For the power which makes a man able to entertain a good impulse is the same as that which enables him to make a good gun; it is imagination."
Boyd thought like a fighter pilot. He would have us understand a man in order to destroy him, knowing that a foe who's blown out of the air will never trouble you again. As a writer, Chesterton had a different perspective. He believed that understanding leads to restraint, writing in that same article: "For if you do not understand a man you cannot crush him. And if you do understand him, very probably you will not."
Chesterton saw conflict in broad terms. When he clashed with H. G. Wells over the latter's infatuation with a World State or with Bernard Shaw over pacifism, he took the time to understand what each was saying. His criticisms of the dangers and weakness of international institutions are among the best ever written. His description of the pacifist personality is so accurate that it applies with near perfection to today's pacifists. But having gotten into the mind of his opponent, he recognized in him a fellow human being. With few exceptions, he retained the respect and even friendship of his foes. Only when one crossed a critical line, demonstrating that without great pain he was beyond redemption, would Chesterton seek to crush him to prevent the evil he intended. What was for Boyd the rule, destroying anyone who disagree with him, was for Chesterton the rare exception. Boyd needs to be tempered with Chesterton
In short, I'd suggest that, as you read what Boyd said about war and conflict, you also read what Chesterton wrote. You'll accomplish a lot more and suffer far less grief if you do. And as you might suspect, I wrote a book on that topic, a collection of Chesterton's best articles on war and peace paying particular attention to his warnings about Germany. And when the necessity arose, Chesterton could be as tough-minded as Boyd. Chesterton used all his powers as a writer to crush those ideas in the German mind that Nazism would later exploit.
--Michael W. Perry, editor of Chesterton on War and Peace: Battling the Ideas and Movements that Led to Nazism and World War II
An Insightful, educational, bio of a little-known American Hero May 31, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
One reviewer said, "This is an extraordinary book about a giant of a man." All true, but Boyd was also a tragic figure (almost in the classic Greek sense) who paid a high personal price for his dedication.
Our lives crossed, but I never knew him. I was at Georgia Tech at the same time Boyd was. There were some "old military guys" in my engineering classes, and I expect he was one. Later, as a management consultant I helped mentor my clients about OODA loops as a part of competitive strategy and new product design. BUT I NEVER KNEW WHO BOYD WAS, AND WHO'D COME UP WITH THE CONCEPT.
The book is a good read. It contains excellent insights and lessons. Love him or hate him -- and I'm sure there are many in both categories -- America needs more people like Boyd, especially these days.
Now I'm going to purchase and read Coram's book about Bud Day. America needs more heros, and less of the partisan bickering and CYA we get from Washington these days. Even Duke Cunningham sold out for personal power and Beltway Politics once he got to Congress....
A rivetting read from start to finish May 7, 2008
I just chanced upon this book in Boders while visiting Penang recently and was pretty much riveted from the moment I picked it up to the moment I finished it, about 3 and a half days later. It is really an intriguing and gripping read and the life of this extraordinary man is certainly worth studying. The author (Robert Coram) is clearly fascinated with his subject and brings his passion to bear on this work of modern historical writing. The only fault I can find is that, as a piece of historical scholarship, it should have been much more diligently and thoroughly footnoted, which could have been done without reducing the book's excitement or the ease with which it can be read. I definitely will buy multiple copies of the book and hand it around to my friends.
The Choice - Be Someone or Do Something April 15, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
An incredibly entertaining and thought-provoking look into the life of Col John Boyd, USAF, one of the most controversial figures in Air Force history.
As a young fighter pilot/engineer Boyd came up with Energy Maneuverability Theory which paved the way for how the world would view fighter design and tactics. Later Boyd would expand his area of influence to include tactics, strategy, and creativity. The OODA loop being one of his most famous works as well as maneuver warfare which the Marines used to help transform the way they do war.
Boyd was known for his utter disdain for the politics of rank that permeated the Pentagon and the wide-spread misuse of funds. His confrontational style didn't play well with many, but his ideas were too valuable to the Air Force, so he was always bailed out at the last second.
He told many that during their career as military officers they would come to a crossroads where they would have to decide if they wanted to be someone, or do something. He chose to do something and the military hasn't been the same since.
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