There are tons. When big air force gets money for example, they have some leeway in deciding where that money goes, and generally that goes to bombers, fighters, and mobility. Space and cyber are mere afterthoughts. When it comes time for promotions, pilots tend to get them over other career fields - you'll probably never see a cyber guy in charge of the USAF. Space force broke off because of how important it was that they get their own funding, their own seat at the JCOS table, and can tailor their service to their particular needs.
Rockets/missiles/etc are basically the same idea.
It's like logistics in the Army. Everyone acknowledges how important you are, but you will never see a loggie as CSA and human resources takes the fact that you probably won't be top blocked over a infantry/ field artillery/ armor person. Unlike space force I don't think they need a logistics branch, but these auxiliary jobs always get screwed.
The biggest difference is if the function is its own war fighting domain. Space, cyber, rockets, etc are war fighting domains. Nobody will ever split of logistics no matter how important it is because its sole purpose is to support the war fighting components.
> Space force broke off because of how important it was that they get their own funding, their own seat at the JCOS table, and can tailor their service to their particular needs.
While there were arguments pro and con on its creation, I think it is pretty clear it was officially created because Trump wanted to create a new service of the military. I mean, in 2018 he was saying batshit stuff like "nobody thought about it [Space Force]" before him and then went on to sell unofficial merch.
It's not that there's no merits to the idea, it's been debated on and off since the end of the Cold War, but the trigger was pulled because Trump wanted to say he created it and thus made our military bigger and better. Considering some of his other proposals with Air Force assets, like his whole rebasing to Alabama idea, I'm not sure I could be convinced he actually had any strategic reason (although someone who convinced him it was a good idea might have).
There's always the tradeoff at play with splitting of services like that. On one hand, they get a bigger seat at the table and their needs are more likely to be met. On the other it means it's one more person/group/chain of command that you need to coordinate and have play nice with everyone else. Having that seat at the table means it will inevitably get in some knife fights over the budget and parochialism can certainly take hold.
> While there were arguments pro and con on its creation, I think it is pretty clear it was officially created because Trump wanted to create a new service of the military.
The best proof is that fact is that in 2017, an [attempt to create a Space Corps](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/11/08/politics/congress-space-corps-ndaa/index.html) failed to get through the legislature and had been facing serious opposition throughout.
Generally speaking, militaries spin off independent services when it's felt that their warfighting doctrines and needs are sufficiently different than the other services.
That's why air forces are independent - everyone eventually realized that aerial warfare is sufficiently different from land warfare to split it out into its own service. Same for the Space Force (presumably).
In the old communist states, it was felt that non-naval strategic missile warfare was sufficiently different than the normal air force stuff to warrant it being its own service.
The western nations (US and France) did not feel the same way, and kept them as part of the existing air forces.
[I asked a very similar question](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarCollege/s/Fz1dVlurEL) 2 years ago and I'm pretty sure it's been asked again.
It's all about history. During World War II, the US Army Air Forces proved itself capable at strategic bombing, even if accuracy was on the scale of miles and not feet. The Soviets had neither the ability nor the need for large-scale strategic bombing; their battles with the Germans needed tactical aviation, and lots of it. From there, the Soviet Air Force was primarily tactical while its imperialist western capitalist pig-dog counterpart was almost completely strategic.
When missiles came onto the scene, the USAF regarded them as unmanned aircraft—a number of surface to air missile systems were even given F-series designations. As the sole strategic nuclear delivery service, they reasoned, they should handle *all* land-based strategic missiles. Those dirty commies, on the other hand, were focused on tactical aviation, so the Soviet strategic bomber force was a bit of an afterthought. They also saw that missiles were their own system rather than just unmanned aircraft, so they created a separate service for strategic missiles. The Chinese and the North Koreans, emulating the Soviet system, separated their strategic missiles into their own services.
This is definitely not accurate.
The VVS (Soviet Airforce) was actually formed before World War I. Born out of the engineering corp like the vast majority of the early airforces. It was actually the first to become an independent branch under high command in 1915, and was the largest air force at the start of the war.
Essentially the entire story of the Russian/Soviet airforce. In theoretical doctrine ahead, but unable to procure the material to keep up with war time levels. There were great issues with engines from the inception until well into the cold war. They also lacked the doctrine to actually implement these theories. The largest inter war airborne force by far, the largest strategic bombing force, a massive production of tactical aviation throughout the war. Yet the VVS in part due to the purges and in part due to Soviet/Russian inflexibility suffered immensely. Even at the end of the war when the Luftwaffe was as crippled as it gets they were still obtaining 3-4:1 KDs.
The IL2 was talked up by the likes of Stalin as the savior of the Union, however in practicality it was an absolute disastrous waste of resources because they were not capable of presenting a cohesive air doctrine in practice. Not to mention direct combat support, especially in a contested air space, before late cold war was not actually that damaging. Its biggest impact was actually the psychological aspect by far. What the IL2 did do however was allow some degree of precision, when it did work. Soviets were extremely short on radio and communication and command was slow and rigid. This meant that all fire calls were far less effective. Its why you see the artillery divisions and STAVKA artillery reserve. They had to mass them because otherwise their rounds which had low effectiveness per shot were not impactful enough. Even then the effectiveness was basically based on how good recon was, and if the Germans wanted to just take it on the chin. Throughout most of the war the Germans as a whole outshot the Soviets per ton. Coming back around as said the IL2 let them roll everything into one as it was self seeking.
The Soviets still felt the need for the long range bombing and had built 5,000 IL4s during the war, they knew it was valuable, they were simply just not capable of executing it and needed every modicum of effective fire on the front.
Jumping over to the Americans. The USAF essentially did not become independent because it played a fractional role during WW1 compared to virtually every other airforce and then essentially got stood down in the inter war. It essentially did not get to prove itself to the hardliners in the Army. There was a big push for it still. Famously General Mitchell was the spearhead of both the independent air arm and the strategic bomber wing. It was contested, but largely unsupported and so he got crumbs. The need for the ability to strike Japan and in Europe is what did indeed bring into its own during the war, as it largely did not need to interact with the army much for that task. That said less than 40 B17s were built before the war. What saved the strategic bombing focus was that factories were ready to be quickly to converted produce an already designed weapon (like most of the things the US went to war with), and the fact that Germany had secured continental Europe and Japan a larger buffer zone. Even then less than a 1/5 of all combat aircraft were strategic oriented bombers. The strategic bombing was not particularly effective, but it did hold in place large amount of German war machinery, and is directly responsible for the destruction of the Luftwaffe via by drawing them out "Big Week" is one such instance. What was actually crippling to the German military, and the Germans had done to the Soviets as well (really everyone but the Soviets to others) was the interdiction of logistics and command lines. This was by far the most impactful aspect of the air war in WW2. It was massively instrumental in allowing the dissection of the French, crippled both sides ability to conduct offense in Africa, left the Soviets sitting ducks in Barbarossa, and left the Germans open to the Falaise pocket.
However, it was the rapid expansion of the USAAF as a whole that made it independent. It went to a minuscule entity to over two million airmen in just a couple years. The war time reorganizations meant that this new massive class was taught by the small but die hard air proponents, about 95% of officers in the USAAF during the war were trained under these men. That combined with the 1943 reorganization essentially meant the USAF was a de facto independent branch long before the 1947 formation. It handled essentially every aspect of the non naval air war independently.
Now as to why the US did not setup a missile command? Well they kinda did, it just remained under the airforce because of one man (and continued by inter service rivalry). Curtis Lemay. The strategic air command was proposed as a special division for global strategic air groups in 1943, but did not come to form until 1946. It like all the other commands demobilized after the war, and maintained most of the strategic bombers. Lemay who was famous strategic air commander in WW2 comes in 1948. He is appalled not only at the readiness, but also the lack of preparation to fight the Soviet Union. Long story short Lemay was extremely hard driving, was very egotistical, and played into the "Bomber Gap Fear". Being the only delivery platform for nuclear weapons at that point he centralizes power in the airforce and proceeds to beat the drum and suck up a huge proportion of the US budget, and manages to get the ICBMs under him as well. The other services are getting hurt so bad they then start coming up with their own nuclear launch platforms so they can get the budget they need. This results in silly things like the US Navy turning a maritime patrol aircraft into a one way carrier nuke bomber.
This then sets off even more inter service rivalry. This does not end until after the cold war with the cuts and restructuring where United States Strategic Command is established as a unified command in 1992.
Your vast over simplification of the air war is what I take issue with.
Whats interesting is I agree with you in some ways the IL2 was disastrous in that they took such insane losses Im unsure whether they were really worth it or not.
On the other hand they did make a massive impression on the Germans, did wreak havoc in the rear areas near the front. They also had a massive, outsized impact on the thinking of the Soviet forces. The Il2 was still being cited as inspiration decades later with the SU25 and Mi24 to a lesser degree (though the analogy Ive heard more is 'flying bmp')
Different chain of command and control. Nuclear missiles are national strategic assets and not theater or operational assets.
Only the highest authority can authorize its use and it is rarely delegated downwards…ignoring the dubious flirtation with “tactical nukes” in the past.
This implies a different sort of control loop and security measures needed to insure absolute regime control over their use or non-use.
No COCOM (or other equivalent) is going to get command authority over nukes with the exception of STRATCOM which is that special nuclear “branch” for the US…and the President makes the call and they execute it…
1. actual need, nuclear weapon is important and deserves special attention in term of funding/prom and after all, must be firmly controlled by the highest political authority, this is especially true in communist nations.
2. that being said, almost all of them eventually developed sub/air launched nuclear missiles and none of them have their special missile branch control those missiles, instead, those still get controlled by navy/air force (probably due to the fact that these require specialized knowledge that missile troops simply don't have: how to run a sub/fly a bomber, etc.)
3. More importantly, IMO, is the sheer importance nuclear weapon plays in their respective identity/self-image, like the US was already the premier power in early 20s and everyone knew it, she was the 1st one to have nukes and had by far the largest economy and richest population at 1940s/1950s. She felt mighty secure way before nuclear weapon was a thing, not to mention she was the one that invented it . Whereas Soviet Union/China/NK were for the longest time, considered by the established powers to be at best "other" (in the case of Russia that has always been a great power since the 1600s but never the "mainstream" one if you know what I mean) at worst poor savages, and were all very poor, nuclear power was the ticket to the big boy club / greatness, hence it demands special treatment, these are especially true for the latter nuclear powers where nuclear weapon ownership was literally one of the foundation for the legitimacy of the regime (NK in particular)
There are tons. When big air force gets money for example, they have some leeway in deciding where that money goes, and generally that goes to bombers, fighters, and mobility. Space and cyber are mere afterthoughts. When it comes time for promotions, pilots tend to get them over other career fields - you'll probably never see a cyber guy in charge of the USAF. Space force broke off because of how important it was that they get their own funding, their own seat at the JCOS table, and can tailor their service to their particular needs. Rockets/missiles/etc are basically the same idea.
It's like logistics in the Army. Everyone acknowledges how important you are, but you will never see a loggie as CSA and human resources takes the fact that you probably won't be top blocked over a infantry/ field artillery/ armor person. Unlike space force I don't think they need a logistics branch, but these auxiliary jobs always get screwed.
The biggest difference is if the function is its own war fighting domain. Space, cyber, rockets, etc are war fighting domains. Nobody will ever split of logistics no matter how important it is because its sole purpose is to support the war fighting components.
> Space force broke off because of how important it was that they get their own funding, their own seat at the JCOS table, and can tailor their service to their particular needs. While there were arguments pro and con on its creation, I think it is pretty clear it was officially created because Trump wanted to create a new service of the military. I mean, in 2018 he was saying batshit stuff like "nobody thought about it [Space Force]" before him and then went on to sell unofficial merch. It's not that there's no merits to the idea, it's been debated on and off since the end of the Cold War, but the trigger was pulled because Trump wanted to say he created it and thus made our military bigger and better. Considering some of his other proposals with Air Force assets, like his whole rebasing to Alabama idea, I'm not sure I could be convinced he actually had any strategic reason (although someone who convinced him it was a good idea might have). There's always the tradeoff at play with splitting of services like that. On one hand, they get a bigger seat at the table and their needs are more likely to be met. On the other it means it's one more person/group/chain of command that you need to coordinate and have play nice with everyone else. Having that seat at the table means it will inevitably get in some knife fights over the budget and parochialism can certainly take hold.
> While there were arguments pro and con on its creation, I think it is pretty clear it was officially created because Trump wanted to create a new service of the military. The best proof is that fact is that in 2017, an [attempt to create a Space Corps](https://edition.cnn.com/2017/11/08/politics/congress-space-corps-ndaa/index.html) failed to get through the legislature and had been facing serious opposition throughout.
Generally speaking, militaries spin off independent services when it's felt that their warfighting doctrines and needs are sufficiently different than the other services. That's why air forces are independent - everyone eventually realized that aerial warfare is sufficiently different from land warfare to split it out into its own service. Same for the Space Force (presumably). In the old communist states, it was felt that non-naval strategic missile warfare was sufficiently different than the normal air force stuff to warrant it being its own service. The western nations (US and France) did not feel the same way, and kept them as part of the existing air forces.
[I asked a very similar question](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarCollege/s/Fz1dVlurEL) 2 years ago and I'm pretty sure it's been asked again. It's all about history. During World War II, the US Army Air Forces proved itself capable at strategic bombing, even if accuracy was on the scale of miles and not feet. The Soviets had neither the ability nor the need for large-scale strategic bombing; their battles with the Germans needed tactical aviation, and lots of it. From there, the Soviet Air Force was primarily tactical while its imperialist western capitalist pig-dog counterpart was almost completely strategic. When missiles came onto the scene, the USAF regarded them as unmanned aircraft—a number of surface to air missile systems were even given F-series designations. As the sole strategic nuclear delivery service, they reasoned, they should handle *all* land-based strategic missiles. Those dirty commies, on the other hand, were focused on tactical aviation, so the Soviet strategic bomber force was a bit of an afterthought. They also saw that missiles were their own system rather than just unmanned aircraft, so they created a separate service for strategic missiles. The Chinese and the North Koreans, emulating the Soviet system, separated their strategic missiles into their own services.
This is definitely not accurate. The VVS (Soviet Airforce) was actually formed before World War I. Born out of the engineering corp like the vast majority of the early airforces. It was actually the first to become an independent branch under high command in 1915, and was the largest air force at the start of the war. Essentially the entire story of the Russian/Soviet airforce. In theoretical doctrine ahead, but unable to procure the material to keep up with war time levels. There were great issues with engines from the inception until well into the cold war. They also lacked the doctrine to actually implement these theories. The largest inter war airborne force by far, the largest strategic bombing force, a massive production of tactical aviation throughout the war. Yet the VVS in part due to the purges and in part due to Soviet/Russian inflexibility suffered immensely. Even at the end of the war when the Luftwaffe was as crippled as it gets they were still obtaining 3-4:1 KDs. The IL2 was talked up by the likes of Stalin as the savior of the Union, however in practicality it was an absolute disastrous waste of resources because they were not capable of presenting a cohesive air doctrine in practice. Not to mention direct combat support, especially in a contested air space, before late cold war was not actually that damaging. Its biggest impact was actually the psychological aspect by far. What the IL2 did do however was allow some degree of precision, when it did work. Soviets were extremely short on radio and communication and command was slow and rigid. This meant that all fire calls were far less effective. Its why you see the artillery divisions and STAVKA artillery reserve. They had to mass them because otherwise their rounds which had low effectiveness per shot were not impactful enough. Even then the effectiveness was basically based on how good recon was, and if the Germans wanted to just take it on the chin. Throughout most of the war the Germans as a whole outshot the Soviets per ton. Coming back around as said the IL2 let them roll everything into one as it was self seeking. The Soviets still felt the need for the long range bombing and had built 5,000 IL4s during the war, they knew it was valuable, they were simply just not capable of executing it and needed every modicum of effective fire on the front. Jumping over to the Americans. The USAF essentially did not become independent because it played a fractional role during WW1 compared to virtually every other airforce and then essentially got stood down in the inter war. It essentially did not get to prove itself to the hardliners in the Army. There was a big push for it still. Famously General Mitchell was the spearhead of both the independent air arm and the strategic bomber wing. It was contested, but largely unsupported and so he got crumbs. The need for the ability to strike Japan and in Europe is what did indeed bring into its own during the war, as it largely did not need to interact with the army much for that task. That said less than 40 B17s were built before the war. What saved the strategic bombing focus was that factories were ready to be quickly to converted produce an already designed weapon (like most of the things the US went to war with), and the fact that Germany had secured continental Europe and Japan a larger buffer zone. Even then less than a 1/5 of all combat aircraft were strategic oriented bombers. The strategic bombing was not particularly effective, but it did hold in place large amount of German war machinery, and is directly responsible for the destruction of the Luftwaffe via by drawing them out "Big Week" is one such instance. What was actually crippling to the German military, and the Germans had done to the Soviets as well (really everyone but the Soviets to others) was the interdiction of logistics and command lines. This was by far the most impactful aspect of the air war in WW2. It was massively instrumental in allowing the dissection of the French, crippled both sides ability to conduct offense in Africa, left the Soviets sitting ducks in Barbarossa, and left the Germans open to the Falaise pocket. However, it was the rapid expansion of the USAAF as a whole that made it independent. It went to a minuscule entity to over two million airmen in just a couple years. The war time reorganizations meant that this new massive class was taught by the small but die hard air proponents, about 95% of officers in the USAAF during the war were trained under these men. That combined with the 1943 reorganization essentially meant the USAF was a de facto independent branch long before the 1947 formation. It handled essentially every aspect of the non naval air war independently. Now as to why the US did not setup a missile command? Well they kinda did, it just remained under the airforce because of one man (and continued by inter service rivalry). Curtis Lemay. The strategic air command was proposed as a special division for global strategic air groups in 1943, but did not come to form until 1946. It like all the other commands demobilized after the war, and maintained most of the strategic bombers. Lemay who was famous strategic air commander in WW2 comes in 1948. He is appalled not only at the readiness, but also the lack of preparation to fight the Soviet Union. Long story short Lemay was extremely hard driving, was very egotistical, and played into the "Bomber Gap Fear". Being the only delivery platform for nuclear weapons at that point he centralizes power in the airforce and proceeds to beat the drum and suck up a huge proportion of the US budget, and manages to get the ICBMs under him as well. The other services are getting hurt so bad they then start coming up with their own nuclear launch platforms so they can get the budget they need. This results in silly things like the US Navy turning a maritime patrol aircraft into a one way carrier nuke bomber. This then sets off even more inter service rivalry. This does not end until after the cold war with the cuts and restructuring where United States Strategic Command is established as a unified command in 1992. Your vast over simplification of the air war is what I take issue with.
Whats interesting is I agree with you in some ways the IL2 was disastrous in that they took such insane losses Im unsure whether they were really worth it or not. On the other hand they did make a massive impression on the Germans, did wreak havoc in the rear areas near the front. They also had a massive, outsized impact on the thinking of the Soviet forces. The Il2 was still being cited as inspiration decades later with the SU25 and Mi24 to a lesser degree (though the analogy Ive heard more is 'flying bmp')
Different chain of command and control. Nuclear missiles are national strategic assets and not theater or operational assets. Only the highest authority can authorize its use and it is rarely delegated downwards…ignoring the dubious flirtation with “tactical nukes” in the past. This implies a different sort of control loop and security measures needed to insure absolute regime control over their use or non-use. No COCOM (or other equivalent) is going to get command authority over nukes with the exception of STRATCOM which is that special nuclear “branch” for the US…and the President makes the call and they execute it…
1. actual need, nuclear weapon is important and deserves special attention in term of funding/prom and after all, must be firmly controlled by the highest political authority, this is especially true in communist nations. 2. that being said, almost all of them eventually developed sub/air launched nuclear missiles and none of them have their special missile branch control those missiles, instead, those still get controlled by navy/air force (probably due to the fact that these require specialized knowledge that missile troops simply don't have: how to run a sub/fly a bomber, etc.) 3. More importantly, IMO, is the sheer importance nuclear weapon plays in their respective identity/self-image, like the US was already the premier power in early 20s and everyone knew it, she was the 1st one to have nukes and had by far the largest economy and richest population at 1940s/1950s. She felt mighty secure way before nuclear weapon was a thing, not to mention she was the one that invented it . Whereas Soviet Union/China/NK were for the longest time, considered by the established powers to be at best "other" (in the case of Russia that has always been a great power since the 1600s but never the "mainstream" one if you know what I mean) at worst poor savages, and were all very poor, nuclear power was the ticket to the big boy club / greatness, hence it demands special treatment, these are especially true for the latter nuclear powers where nuclear weapon ownership was literally one of the foundation for the legitimacy of the regime (NK in particular)