This is the best book-the most scholarly, the most judicial, the best written-about the intelligent, attractive, undiplomatic, quixotic Billy Mitchell, the legendary founder of today's United States Air Force. -Robert H. Ferrell, author of Harry S. Truman: A Life

Revered by many Americans as a martyr for his cause, Brigadier General William Billy Mitchell has been one of the least understood figures of modern military history. His position as the dominant figure in American aviation from 1919 until his court-martial in 1925 has made him the frequent subject of biography, film, and television, but usually these portrayals have overemphasized the sensational elements of his story. For Mitchell, sensationalism was only a means of drawing attention to his farsighted ideas on aviation. In Billy Mitchell, he emerges as a man with a mission and a true pioneer of modern aviation, a man whose ideas about leadership in aerial operations inspire and instruct today's airmen and women. Anyone interested in aviation will delight in this compelling biography.