Yet it was not until the onset of the Second World War that the military fighter and bomber came into its own. The Battle of Britain, the attack on Pearl Harbour and large scale bombing of cities in Europe and Asia saw warplanes developed for specific needs, becoming bigger, faster and more sophisticated. Aircraft played a major role in the Second World War, with bombing raids, including the carpet-bombing of cities, major air battles (the Battle of Britain with Spitfires and Hurricanes against the Messerschmitts) and over-water anti-submarine and convoy bombing raids. It was an air attack (on Pearl Harbour) that forced the United States into the war, initially against Japan.

Alongside this development came radar, huge improvements in radio technology, missiles, the jet engine, and even the computer, which was initially developed for military roles rather than peacetime. At the end of the war it was a heavy bomber, a B-29 Superfortress named the "Enola Gay" that dropped the first H-bomb on Japan.

Britain, which had only 920 aircraft at the start of the war, developed the Wellington bomber (which came into service at the start of the war) the Lancaster bomber, used in the famous raids on the dams of Germany – the "dambusters" – with its bouncing bombs. Japan and the USSR also produced fighters and bombers on a massive scale, though never matching Germany's 1,300 planes being built each month in 1941. In 1944 alone Germany is thought to have built 36,000 planes, and at the same time began developing jet aircraft and even more sophisticated weapons involving rockets (VI and V2) and stealth technology with its Horten 229 "flying-wing" bomber, a technology that came too late to be used in action (see our feature on Stealth planes).

Aircraft production came to a sudden stop at the end of the war as Europe in particularly struggled to return to a peacetime economy. Yet the threat of war was never too far away and within a few years had erupted again in Korea, a battle fought primarily by the United States. Prop-driven aircraft were still in use but by the early 1950s jet engines began to make a noticeable difference to fighter and bomber technology. By 1949 the de Havilland Comet, the world's first civilian jet airliner, had made its first test flight.

The concept of a jet engine had been developed in Romania in 1910 but development work began seriously in the late 1920s in Britain and Germany, independently. A prototype flew in Germany as early as 1939; in Britain in 1941. The Americans heard about it and, using the British technology, flew their first jet plane in 1942. By 1944 the Luftwaffe had the Messerscmitt Me-262A in service.

After Korea a continuing list of hostilities meant the aviation engineers were always being asked to come up with something faster, stronger. The Suez Crisis, Vietnam, the Arab-Israeli wars of the 1960s, many other "minor" wars (if any war can be so described): then the Falklands and, more recently, the long-running Gulf War that has spread over into Afghanistan. India and Pakistan have also been involved in ongoing hostilities involving air power.

The Cold War saw a nuclear stand-off between the USSR and the West (led by the USA) and during that period long-range nuclear bombers patrolled the skies above their own (and others') territories on a 24/7 basis, the Americans using their B-52 Stratofortress (1955), countered by the Soviet Tu-95, albeit a propellor-driven plane (the largest and fastest prop-plane built – and still in use by the Russian air force). At the same time Britain built its nuclear deterrent bombers, the so-called "V"-bombers – Vulcan, Victor and Viking, all introduced in the mid-50s.

The Cold War also saw spy-planes such as the American U-2, one of which was shot down over the USSR whilst on a supposedly secret reconnaissance mission. U-2s were used in the skies above Cuba too in the early 1960s, taking the photographs that provided the definitive proof that the USSR was shipping and assembling nuclear rockets in Cuba, pointing at the United States.

Since then, fighters, bombers and transport planes have been developed to satisfy the needs of the military planners and planes have become fantastically sophisticated - as well as hugely expensive. With this in mind many friendly countries have begun cooperating on development and construction, sharing the work and cost, rather than producing a range of planes that are almost identical. the United States has joint projects with dozens of countries and the Europeans have joined forces to produce the Eurofighter (and the Eurocopter – we should not forget the major role played in military aviation by helicopters – but see our special section on "Helicopters").

Stealth technology is being used (see special section) but perhaps the biggest advance has been in avionics and bomb-targetting, with laser-guided delivery systems ensuring pinpoint accuracy. Sadly this has also led to charges of military planners and leaders almost imagining they are playing some computer game rather than delivery deadly force against an enemy, real or imagined. Planes have become ever faster with Mach 2 now standard. The US (in the shape of NASA) has also produced a rocket-driven plane that has reached 7,000 mph.

Over the years in-flight refuelling has been perfected so planes can stay airborne longer, particularly the lighter fighter strike aircraft which generally have a fairly small range. Yet we should not forget that it was as long ago as 1923 that a plane was refuelled in mid-air over the US. Development work after that slowed down and it was not until the early 1950s that aerial refuelling came into its own. Today it's standard and a tanker aircraft can refuel three planes simultaneously. Aerial refuelling was used extensively during the Vietnam War, during the Falklands War and in every conflict since then.

Also see our special section on Naval Aviation which deals primarily with carrier-based operations.