Typhoon will excel both at shooting down other planes and at precision bombing and aerial reconnaissance.

ECONOMIST: Defence procurement

However, many US supporters of air power have called for precision bombing which would not be aimed directly against civilians but only military and industrial targets.

BBC: Analysis: US 'shock and awe' tactic

The MoD can still offer certain niche capabilities that foreign allies - principally the US - still value, but these can be counted on the fingers of one hand, including special forces, precision bombing, and minesweepers.

BBC: Jubilees show UK's declining ability to protect itself

America's faith in air power, formed by the precision-bombing of Iraqi targets, has already been tested by Mr Hussein's durability.

ECONOMIST: Did Clinton think it through?

Italy's air force is not in the precision-bombing business.

ECONOMIST: Italian brothers in arms

Unlike the British and Germans with their carpet bombing of one another, the Americans put their faith in daylight precision raids and set out to pick off Japan's engineering factories one at a time.

ECONOMIST: Japanese history

But if the blunt instrument of bombing succeeds in this, it will owe as much to luck as to precision.

ECONOMIST: Stumbling into war | The