The Tailhook scandal will doubtless go down in history as the most sordid and divisive episode in the history of the U.S. Navy, rocking it to the highest levels. In this first full-length chronicle of the scandal and its aftermath, Jean Zimmerman explores the link between the events of that hot, sloppy night in Las Vegas and the legal ban on women in combat. That link forms the substance of this bracing narrative as it portrays one of the most traditional organizations in the world, the U.S.

Navy, on the brink of historic change. The reverberations of the Tailhook affair, with their profound implications for the role of women, will ultimately be remembered as changing the face of war. The saga of an institution and the scandal that forever changed it, TAILSPIN is a defining work of military history and feminist scholarship.