Staff Profile
Dr Ian Horwood
Senior Lecturer: History
I am a Senior Lecturer at York St John University where I have taught History, American Studies and War Studies at both undergraduate and postgraduate level since 1994.
I hold a PhD in history from the University of Leeds, an MA in history from the University of Missouri-Columbia, USA and a BA in politics and modern history from the University of Manchester.
My principle areas of academic interest are in United States military history, airpower history, and the wars in Indochina.
I am a regular presenter at academic conferences and have made several appearances on national and local radio discussing US politics and military affairs. I am a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a member of the York Historical Warfare Analysis Group (YHWAG): an interdisciplinary research cluster including historians and mathematicians from York St John University and the University of York. Along with colleagues at the University of York I helped organise the conference, ‘Borders and Beyond in the Middle East since 1914: Legacies, Changes, Continuities’, which took place in June 2016 and I was a member of the Scientific Committee for the 2017 LPAZ Forum on ‘Aviation: The Impact on Time & Space’ held on the Island of Santa Maria in the Azores in September 2017. I am engaged in ongoing research on professional war gaming between the First and Second World Wars, the application of statistical techniques to historical air combat and the interface between popular literature and historical developments in military aviation technology. Earlier research concerned inter-service rivalry and air power in the Vietnam War.
- School – School of Humanities
- Email – i.horwood@yorksj.ac.uk
- Phone – 01904 876 702
Publications and Papers
Books
Quantifying Counterfactual History (with Niall Mackay, Jamie Wood, Brennen Fagan & Christopher Price) [under contract to CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group] (2019)
Interservice Rivalry and Airpower in the Vietnam War (Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, USA: Combat Studies Institute Press, 2006).
Book Chapters and Journal Articles
'Billy Mitchell: the press and the United States Navy' (with Christopher Price) [in preparation].
‘Early techno-thriller fiction and the manned bomber vs missile controversy of the early 1960s’ [in preparation]
‘Bootstrapping the Battle of Britain’ (with Brennen Fagan, Niall MacKay, Chris Price, Ed Richards and Jamie Wood) [under consideration by Historical Methods].
‘The development of airpower roles and missions in the First World War “Biggles” stories of Captain W.E. Johns’, in: de Almeida, Jose Domingues; Faria, Dominique; Outeirinho, Maria de Fatima and Monteiro, Antonio (eds.) Aviateurs-écrivains: Témoins de l’histoire. Exotopies (Paris, Le Manuscrit, 2017) pp. 147-165.
‘Concentration and Asymmetry in Air Combat: Lessons for the Defensive Employment of Air Power’ (With Christopher Price & Niall Mackay), Air Power Review (Summer 2014), pp. 68-91, http://www.airpowerstudies.co.uk/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderfiles/APRSummer14.pdf
Conference and Seminar Papers
‘The fourth dimension of warfare: early techno-thriller fiction and the manned bomber vs missile controversy of the early 1960s’, a paper presented at the LPAZ Forum: Aviation: The Impact on Time and Space, Santa Maria, Azores, Portugal (7 September 2017).
‘US-UK Military Aviation Cooperation: Past, Present and Future’, a paper presented at The Story of Britain’s Past and Future in the World: An International History Conference’, York St John University (10 June 2017).
‘”The Ethics of Bombing or the Bombing of Ethics”: Airpower in a Time of Austerity’, a paper presented at the RAF Museum & Royal Aeronautical Society Conference: Air Power: Now and the Future (30 September 2016).
‘1925 Tactical Problem 2 and the rise of carrier air power: war gaming at the US Naval War College between the wars’, a paper presented at the British International History Group annual conference, University of Edinburgh (10 September 2016).
‘The development of airpower roles and missions in the First World War “Biggles” stories of Captain W.E. Johns’, a paper presented at the LPAZ Forum: Aviators-Writers/Writers-Aviators, Santa Maria, Azores, Portugal (11 September 2015).
‘RAND, NORAD and the problem of the “sneak attack”: the development of US continental air defence in the era of the manned bomber’, a paper presented at the conference: A Century of Peril and Progress? International History since the First World War, York St John University (26 June 2015).
‘Concentration and Asymmetry in Air Power: Historical lessons for the defensive employment of small air forces’ (with Christopher Price & Niall MacKay)a paper presented at RAF Air Command, HQ Air Command, High Wycombe (11 November 2014).
‘Tin Legs and Big Wings: Film, Historiography and the Public Memory of the Battle of Britain’, a paper presented at the Cultures of Memory II Symposium, York St John University (in association with the College of Visual and Performing Arts, Syracuse University, USA and Massey University, New Zealand) (9 October 2014).
‘Concentration and asymmetry in air combat: from the battle of Britain to the First Gulf War’, (with Christopher Price) a paper presented at the British International History Group annual conference, London School of Economics (5 September 2014).
‘Concentration and Asymmetry in Airpower: Lessons for the Deployment of Small Air Forces’ (with Niall MacKay) a paper presented at the Historical Analysis for Defence and Security Symposium, Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, Portsdown West nr. Portsmouth (21 May 2014)
‘The Vietnam syndrome and the decision to end the 1991 Gulf War “early”’, a paper presented at the British International History Group annual conference, University of Ulster (5 September 2008).
‘Competing visions of airmobility: the Howze and Disosway reports of 1962’, a paper presented at the British International History Group annual conference, Liverpool Hope University (8 September 2007)
Popular Articles:
‘Giulio Douhet: Prophet of Strategic Airpower,’ Strategy & Tactics, no. 174 (May-June 1995).
Radio Appearances
Radio York, Jonathan Cowap Show, Interview subject: Prospects for a visit to the UK by President Trump in 2018 (30 November 2017).
Radio York: Interview subject: US missile attack on Shayrat airbase, Syria (7 April 2017).
Radio York: Interview subject: The ‘special relationship and President Trump’s Meeting with Prime-Minister Teresa May (27 January 2017).
Radio York, Commentating on the inauguration of President Trump (20 January 2017).
Radio York, Interview subject: the US election (8 November 2016).
Radio 4, Last Word, Subject: General Vo Nguyen Giap (11 October 2016).
LBC, Nick Ferrari Show, Interview subject: Vietnam & the Concept of ‘Just War’ (8 March 2012).
Radio York, Interview subject: Britain & the Vietnam War (19 March 2008).
Book Reviews
Gary Hess, Vietnam: Explaining America’s Lost War (2008), Reviews in History (21 February 2009), http://www.ac.uk/reviews/paper/horwood.html.
Review of Mark Moyar, Triumph Forsaken: The Vietnam War, 1954-1965 (2006), Reviews in History (27 June 2007), http://www.history.ac/reviews/paper/horwood.html
Review of Richard M. McMurry, Two Great Rebel Armies, Missouri Historical Review 85 (January 1991).
Public Engagement
Panellist at the Politics in the Pub, American Election event at the Library Bar, Glyde House, Bradford (24 October 2016).
‘The Battle of Jutland: Mathematical wargaming of naval conflict’, a lecture & simulation, with Niall Mackay, Jamie Wood & Chris Price, University of York (June 2016).
‘Friction in War: The German Air Raids of 15 September 1940 during the Battle of Britain’ (with Niall Mackay & Chris Price) a talk for the York Festival of Ideas, York St John University (18 June 2014).
‘Understanding the Battle of Jutland’ (with Niall Mackay, Jamie Wood & Chris Price) a talk & simulation for the York Festival of Ideas, York St John University (25 June 2013).
