General Carl A. Spaatz, 1945. 
SPKATZ and the Air VVar inEurope 

- 

Richard G. Davis 

Air Force 

History 

Washington, D.C. 

1993 
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data 

Davis, Richard G. 

Carl A. Spaatz and the air war in Europe / Richard G. Davis. 

p. cm--(General Histories) 

An expansion of the author's thesis. 

Includes bibliographical references @. ) and index. 

ISBN 0-912799-75-7 (casebound).--ISBN 0-912799-77-3 (perfectbound) 

1. Spaatz, Carl, 1891-1974. 2. Generals--United States--Biography. 3. 

United States. Air Force--Biography. 4. Aeronautics, Military--United States- 

-History. 5. World War, 1939-1945--Aerial operations, American 6. World 

War, 1939-1945--Campaigns--Western 

I. Title. 11. Series. 

UG626.2.SSD38 1992 

3 5 8.4'0O92-dc20 

[BI 92-14889 CIF' 

Extended portions of this work have appeared in a doctoral dissertation 

completed by the author for George Washington University. The earlier version 

is copyrighted in its entirety in the author's name. Open permission for reprint 

and reissue of portions of this book by agencies of the Department of Defense 

is hereby granted. Requests by nongovernment agencies or individuals for permission to cite from this work under fair use doctrine may be addressed to 

the Center for Air Force History, Bolling AFB, DC 20332-6098. 

By special arrangement, this publication is being offered for sale by the 

Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C. 

For Sale by the Superintendent of Documents, US. Government Printing Office, 

Washington. D.C. 20402 
Foreword 

Carl A. Spautz and the Air War in Europe offers the first detailed review of 

Spaatz as a commander. It examines how the highest ranking US. airman in the 

European Theater of Operations of World War I1 viewed the war, worked with 

the British, and wielded the formidable air power at his disposal. It identifies 

specifically those aspects of his leadership that proved indispensable to the 

Allied victory over Nazi Germany. 

As Chief of the Air Corps Plans Section and, beginning in 1941, as first 

Chief of the Air Staff, Spaatz helped prepare the United States for war by 

overseeing an unprecedented buildup of military air capability. As Commander 

of the Eighth Air Force, he expanded and maintained a network of bases from 

which his bombers could strike at Germany from England. As General 

Eisenhower’s adviser and Commander of the Northwest African Air Forces, he 

reorganized and vastly improved dispersed and difficult-to-supply Allied air 

activities. After assuming command of all U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, 

he controlled the American contribution to the Combined Bomber Offensive. 

Spaatz’s forces destroyed the Luftwaffe, first by employing new long-range 

fighters in vigorous counter-air actions and then, when the Luftwaffe assiduously avoided further engagements, by forcing it to fight to defend the 

petroleum industry that fueled it. Only after a protracted debate concerning 

which targets-il or transportatiowwere to receive top priority did he win the 

right from skeptical Allied principals to mount strategic bombing missions 

against German oil production facilities. With the Luftwaffe effectively 

paralyzed, Spaatz moved against bridges, ports, railyards, and roads and, finally, 

crushed the Nazi war economy. 

The Anglo-American partnership, although triumphant in the end, was not 

easy. Its lines of authority were frequently and hotly debated. Through portraits 

of major Allied civilian and military personalities, this study describes several 

contentious interactions around which Spaatz maneuvered adroitly to achieve 

his broad military objectives. 

Author Richard Davis contrasts American and British grand strategy, battle 

tactics, and operations, laying bare the political considerations that necessarily 

influenced Allied planning. He demonstrates how clashes among only a few 

individuals can profoundly affect command decisions and the successful prosecution of coalition warfare. Lessons contained in his study have implications 

even now in the post-Desert Storm era. That the Air Force today is able to project global strength is due in large measure to the foresight and tenacity of Carl 

Spaalz, who freed air power to become the dominant force of modern warfare. 

RICHARD P. HALLION 

Air Force Historian 

V 
United States Air Force 

Historical Advisory Committee 

(As of July 1, 1992) 

Professor Roger E. Bilstein 

University of Houston USAF, Retired 

Clear Lake 

Col. Donald S. Lopez 

National Air and Space 

Museum 

Dr. Christopher J. Bowie 

The RAND Corporation 

Mr. Felix C. Lowe 

Smithsonian Institution Press 

Lt. Gen. Charles G. Boyd 

Commander, Air University 

Dr. Peter Paret 

Institute for Advanced Study 

Professor Wayne S. Cole 

University of Maryland 

College Park 

Ms. Ann Petersen 

The General Counsel, USAF 

Lt. Gen. Bradley C. Hosmer 

Superintendent USAF, Retired 

USAF Academy Air Force Historical 

Gen. Bryce Poe, I1 

Foundation 
Introduction 

This study is an expansion of a doctoral dissertation I began in 1982. 

Initially I sought to tell the story of the air war in Europe from a new perspective--that of the senior U.S. Army Air Forces (AAF) officer in the theater, 

General Carl A. Spaatz. Little did I realize the magnitude of the task. I discovered a man who had stood close to the central events of the conflict in Europe. 

Without Spaatz and his insistence on bombing the German oil industry, the war 

in Europe might have lasted several more months. Spaatz commanded more 

men than Patton or Rommel ever led. By the end of May 1945 his forces could 

deliver more destructive power than any force before the advent of nuclear 

weapons. Thus, an understanding of the part Spaatz played in the victory of the 

Allied coalition is necessary to any serious study of World War 11. 

In the course of investigating Spaatz’s activities during the war, I soon realized that many of the conventional interpretations of the role of the U.S. Army 

Air Forces in Europe sprang from the immediate post-World War I1 era when 

the AAF was in the last rounds of its fight to gain independence from the US. 

Army. As a consequence, early US. air historians tended to downplay the shortcomings of air power and to emphasize the advantages of centralized command 

of air power by airmen operating autonomously. In this work I have attempted 

to present a more balanced view of the effectiveness of air power. 

By its very nature this study of the military life of Carl A. Spaatz is virtually 

a history of U.S. military aviation from its beginnings to the end of World War 

I1 in Europe. To place Spaatz in the context of his times, I found it necessary to 

examine the development of U.S. military aviation thought and technology. 

From his tour as Commandant of the Issoudun Pursuit Training Center in France 

in 1917, where he first displayed his skills as an administrator and trainer of 

men, through his service as special observer during the Battle of Britain in the 

summer of 1940, Spaatz’s career reflected the continual changes in air power. 

Immediately after World War I, Spaatz commanded the sole pursuit group 

stationed in the continental United States and led the flight of its air elements 

from Texas to Michigan without the loss of a man or machine (no mean feat in 

1922). Once in Michigan, he established his group at Selfridge Field, which had 

been abandoned two years earlier. Leaving Selfridge in 1924, he attended the 

Air Corps Tactical School at Langley Field near Norfolk, Virginia. 

At that time and place the school was far removed from the future period of 

intellectual and doctrinal ferment in which it produced the American theory of 

daylight precision bombing. Next, Spaatz served in Washington, D.C., in the Air 

Service’s Training and Operations Section. There he testified as a defense witness in the controversial court-martial of Brig. Gen. William “Billy” Mitchell. 

vii 
INTRODUCTION 

During the late 1920s and 1930s Spaatz switched from commanding fighters to 

commanding bombers-a career move that mirrored the Air Corps’ change in 

emphasis from pursuit to bombardment aviation. At the same time, he absorbed 

the new theories that preached the ability of the heavily armed bomber, flying a 

tight defensive formation, to penetrate successfully deep into enemy territory to 

destroy vital economic targets and to return, all the while unescorted by friendly 

fighter aircraft. Even subsequent firsthand experience of the British and German 

failure to bomb effectively in daylight failed to persuade him to modify his 

belief in unescorted bombing. 

Before US. entry into World War 11, Spaatz, as Chief of the Air Corps Plans 

Section and, upon the formation of the AAF in June 1941, as first Chief of the 

Air Staff, helped to plan and supervise the vast expansion of US. military air 

power. On July 1, 1939, the Air Corps had a force of 1,239 combat aircraft, 570 

training planes, 20,191 enlisted men, 633 aviation cadets, and 2,502 officers. 

Many of the aircraft were obsolescent; there were no advanced training aircraft; 

and all but 45 of the officers were rated pilots. Thirty-two months later, on 

March 1, 1942, the AAF had 2,393 combat aircraft (2,182 rated as modern), 

10,087 trainers (2,541 advanced), 3 12,405 enlisted men, 32,896 cadets, and 

27,446 officers (1 3,63 1 nonpilots). These figures represented an increase of 

more than 1,000 percent in every category except combat aircraft, which 

increased only 200 percent. 

With the onset of war, Spaatz took command of the Eighth Air Force and 

helped prepare a base capable of sustaining the thousands of planes scheduled to 

operate against Germany from Britain. After Spaatz had launched only a handful 

of heavy-bomber missions against nearby French targets, however, Lt. Gen. 

Dwight D. Eisenhower summoned Spaatz to the North African Theater to advise 

him and, eventually, to command all Allied air power there. 

In North Africa the organizational chaos of his geographically scattered 

command tested his logistical and organizational abilities to the utmost, but by 

the finish of the Allies’ campaign against the Axis forces in Tunisia, Spaatz had 

produced a well-run, efficient force. Also in North Africa, he played a significant role in solving the dispute between the Army ground and air elements about 

the effectiveness of the AAF’s handling of close air support. 

The fall of Tunisia led to the Allied invasion of Sicily and Italy and a period 

of frustration for Spaatz. After overseeing the reduction of the Island of 

Pantelleria by air power, Spaatz saw his influence on operations decline as 

Eisenhower increasingly relied on British Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder. In 

the summer and autumn of 1943, Spaatz concentrated on perfecting the organization of the AAF in the Mediterranean and on obtaining and establishing a new 

strategic American air force to operate against Germany from its unprotected 

southern flank. 

At the end of 1943, Spaatz left Italy for London where he assumed command of the two American strategic air forces operating against the Germans. 

... 

Vlll 
INTRODUCTION 

As the strategic air commander, he made his two most decisive contributions to 

Allied victory. With the help of an influx of long-range fighter-escort aircraft, he 

launched, in the first five months of 1944, an intensive counter-air campaign 

that emasculated the Luftwaffe fighter force. By the time of the invasion of 

Normandy, the German air force no longer had the strength to interfere with the 

invasion or to defend German industry from each large American bomber mission. 

Shortly before the invasion, Spaatz, after a long policy struggle within the 

Allied coalition, began a strategic bombing campaign against the German oil 

industry. This campaign damaged vital cogs of the Nazi war machine by 

grounding a large portion of the Luftwaffe starving it of aviation fuel, and by 

impairing the mobility of the Wehrmacht, leaving it almost helpless to counter 

the maneuvers of its enemies. 

Under Spaatz’s leadership, in the autumn and winter of 1944-1945, the U.S. 

Strategic Air Forces in Europe (USSTAF) helped to bring the German war economy to a halt by adding the transportation network to its target priorities. 

Spaatz’s forces also participated in the most controversial bombing raid of the 

European war when they joined with British Bomber Command to level the tenter of Dresden on February 14, 1945. An exemplar of AAF bombing policy and 

operations, this raid carried a high proportion of incendiary bombs, was directed 

at a railroad marshaling yard, and was executed in nonvisual bombing conditions. It was not carried out to induce terror but was intended to give direct 

assistance to the Soviets’ winter offensive by destroying a transportation center 

in eastern Germany. In contrast, the February 3, 1945, mission against Berlin 

was specifically ordered by Spaatz to shake the morale of the German High 

Command and government. 

In the middle of April 1945, Spaatz ended the strategic bombing campaign. 

Thereafter, the bombers devoted their efforts to aiding the ground forces and 

flying supplies to alleviate famine in Holland. Spaatz attended the German surrenders to the Allies at Reims and Berlin on May 7 and May 9,1945. 

This work is neither a full-scale biography of Carl A. Spaatz nor a comprehensive history of the USAAF in action against the European Axis powers from 

1942 to 1945. Instead it studies Spaatz as a military leader by examining his 

thoughts and actions within the context of his times. By hewing to Spaatz’s perspective I could not follow the entire course of the American strategic bomber 

offensive in Europe. Those readers looking for a description of the Eighth Air 

Force under Ira Eaker’s leadership or of Spaatz’s valuable contributions in the 

postwar era must look elsewhere, But a year-long trip to North Africa and the 

Mediterranean enabled me to take a close look at the birth pangs of modern 

American tactical air power, to explore the creation of the under-appreciated 

Fifteenth Air Force, and to thoroughly study the last eighteen months of the 

American air effort in Europe once Spaatz had returned to the strategic cockpit 

in London. 

ix 

Acknowledgments 

Many archivists, colleagues, and professors contributed to this work. 

Mary Wolfskill at the Library of Congress; Will Mahoney at the Modem 

Military Division of the National Archives; and my friends at the Suitland, 

Maryland, National Records Center-Richard L. Boylan, Henry Mayer, and 

Bill Getchell-all contributed particular expertise. Col. John F. Shiner, 

former Deputy Chief, Office of Air Force History; Herman S. Wolk, Senior 

Historian, Center for Air Force History; Brig. Gen. Harris Hull, USAF 

(Ret.); Dr. Richard Kohn, former Chief, Office of Air Force History; and 

Professor Wesley Newton of Aubum University read several versions of the 

manuscript and served as final review panelists. Their advice proved crucial 

in the last revision. David Mets, historian at the Armament Division, Eglin 

Air Force Base, Florida, and author of a biography of General Spaatz, reviewed the manuscript and supplied advice from his own extensive knowledge. William Heimdahl, Chief, Historical Support Division, Center for Air 

Force History, and MSgt. Roger Jemigan spent considerable time locating 

obscure documents in the microfilm collection. Dr. Daniel R. Mortensen, a 

tactical air power historian at the Center for Air Force History, shared his 

research on North Africa and helped to refine the treatment of several 

topics. Patrick E. Murray, Chief Historian, Third Air Force, England, made 

a special trip to the Imperial War Museum in London to locate photographs. 

Other colleagues with the Center for Air Force History deserve special 

credit, having learned more about Spaatz than they probably ever wished to. 

Jacob Neufeld, Director of the Center for Air Force History, gave me generous amounts of time to work on the manuscript. Dr. Richard I. Wolf 

proofread large sections of the manuscript and helped me with printers and 

word processors. Two very hard working and professional editors, Mary Lee 

Jefferson of the Center for Air Force History and Priscilla Taylor of 

Editorial Experts, Inc., spent many hours smoothing my prose and forcing 

me to clarify, in as few words as possible, points and concepts I had 

glossed over or abbreviated. Ms. Jefferson then patiently shepherded the 

book through the publishing process, coordinating the efforts of many others. 

Dr. Alfred M. Beck, Chief, Histories Division, corrected my haphazard 

German spelling. Editor David R. Chenoweth designed and typeset the 

statistical appendices. Anne E. Johnson, Chief, Editorial Services, lent moral 

and technical support in the last phases of publication. Members of the 

Graphics Office for the Air Force District of Washington made outstanding 

contributions. Susan Linders, Chief, Conventional Graphics, oversaw 

production of the book’s artwork. Bruce John and Protean Gibril prepared 

the maps; Tracy Miller prepared the charts. Kathy Jones finalized all 

illustrations, and Lori Crane, designed the cover. 

xi 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 

Professor Charles J. Herber of George Washington University, who 

directed this work as a dissertation, was a helpful advocate and editor. 

Professors Robert W. Kenny and Peter P. Hill read and commented on 

earlier drafts. Professor J. Kenneth McDonald ably directed my first years 

of study; and one of the finest scholars and gentlemen associated with 

George Washington University, Professor Roderic H. Davidson, made my 

studies in European diplomatic history a joy. Martin Blumenson, historian, 

and Col. John Schlight, USAF (Ret.), former Chief, Southeast Asia Branch, 

Office of the Chief of Military History, U.S. Army, attended my dissertation 

defense and gave useful criticism. 

xii 
The Author 

Richard G. Davis received his B.A. from the University of Virginia; 

his M.A. from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; and his Ph.D. 

from George Washington University. Before joining the U.S. Air Force 

Historical Program in 1980 he worked for the National Archives and Records Administration as an archivist specializing in the declassification of 

classified documents. His earlier works include The 31 Initiatives, a study 

on Army/Air Force efforts at cooperation and reform, and Tempering the 

Blade: The Development of American Tactical Air Power in the North African Campaign. Dr. Davis has also published several articles in professional 

journals. He is currently researching the U.S. offensive air campaign in the 

Persian Gulf War of 1991. 

Contents 

Page 

Foreword ........................................................................................................... v 

Introduction. ..................................................................................................... .vii 

Acknowledgments ............................................................................................ xi 

Part One. Carrying the Flame 

From West Point to London 

1891-1942 

1. SPAATZ’S EARLY CAREER (1891-1938) ........................................... 3 

Organization and Doctrine of the Prewar Air Corps 

Spaatz’s Association with Arnold and Eaker 

2. PREWAR PLANNING (January 1939-November 1941) ........................ 37 

Rearmament of the Air Corps 

Spaatz Observes the Battle of Britain Firsthand 

Spaatz and Prewar Strategic Planning 

3. SPAATZ COMMANDS THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

(December 1941-November 1942) .......................................................... 67 

Establishing the Autonomy of the Eighth Air Force 

Early Operations 

Spaatz’s Command Style 

The Eighth Air Force and the North African Invasion 

Part Two. Tempering the Blade 

The North African Campaign 

November 8,1942-May 14,1943 

4. THE RACE FOR TUNISIA (November 1942-January 1943) ................. 123 

Initial Invasion Operations 

U.S. Air Support Doctrine Before Operation TORCH 

Operations in November-December 1942 

5. FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION (January-March 1943) .............. 155 

The Casablanca Conference 

Operations, Personalities, and Teamwork 

Reorganization and the Kasserine Pass 

xv 
6. THE COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

(February-May 1943) .............................................................................. 185 

The Air War Against Axis Supply Lines 

Heavy-Bombardment Aviation in Tunisia 

Ground Operations and Air Support 

Spaatz and Changes in AAF Air Support Doctrine 

Part Three. Mediterranean Interlude 

From Pantelleria to London 

May-December 1943 

7. PANTELLERIA AND SICILY (May-August 1943). ............................ ..225 

Puntelleria 

Preinvasion Planning and Air Preparations for Sicily 

Air Power and the Invasion of Sicily 

8. SALERNO AND LONDON (July-December 1943) ............................... 255 

The Invasion of Italy 

The Mediterranean Theater and Strategic Bombing 

Part Four. The Point of the Blade 

Strategic Bombing and 

the Cross-Channel Invasion 

January-June 1944 

9. THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED (January-February 1944) ..................... 287 

Initial Operations 

Leigh-Mallory and the AEAF 

“Big Week” 

The Transportation Plan and Air Command Arrangements 

10. THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED (March-April 1944) ........................... 341 

Air Command Arrangements for OVERLORD Are Settled 

The Dispute over Strategic Targeting 

Operations 

Morale Problems 

The Oil Plan Is Salvaged 

11. FINAL PREPARATIONS FOR THE INVASION (May-June 1944) ..... 395 

The Oil Plan Is Implemented 

Churchill Delays the Transportation Plan 

Preinvasion Operations 

xvi 
Part Five. The Mortal Blow 

From Normandy to Berlin 

June 6,1944-May 9,1945 

12. SUMMER 1944: 

CROSSBOW, THUNDERCLAP, AND STRATEGIC BOMBING 

(June-September 1944) ............................................................................. 423 

Initial Operations 

Operation CROSSBOW 

Reprisal Bombing and THUNDERCLAP 

Strategic Bombing in the Summer of I944 

Problems of the American Strategic Air Forces 

13. SUMMER 1944: 

HEAVY BOMBERS IN CLOSE AIR SUPPORT 

(July-August 1944) ................................................................................... 453 

Initial Attempts at Ground Support 

Operation COBRA 

Later Missions in Support of Ground Operations 

14. STALEMATE ON THE GERMAN FRONTIER 

(September 1 1-December 15, 1944) ......................................................... 483 

The Removal of the Strategic Air Forces from SHAEF’s Control 

Strategic Target Selection in the Autumn of I944 

Operations 

The Resurgence of the Luftwaffe 

Arnold and the Public Image of the AAF 

Conclusions 

15. VICTORY (December 16, 1944-May 9, 1945 ......................................... 531 

The Battle of the Bulge 

THUNDERCLAP and Dresden 

U.S. Bombing Policy during the Winter of 1944-1945 

Operations to the End of the War 

16. AN ASSESSMENT .................................................................................. 587 

Statistical Appendices ..................................................................................... 599 

Notes ............................................................................................................... 675 

Bibliography. .................................................................................................. .74 1 

Index ................................................................................................................ 759 

Glossary .......................................................................................................... 735 

xvii 
1 . Defenses of England and Wales. August 1940 ........................................... 50 

2 . Eighth Air Force Installations. August 1942 .............................................. 84 

3 . Operation TORCH Area .............................................................................. 120 

4 . Allied and Axis Airfields on the Northern Tunisian Front ....................... 129 

5 . Eastern Algeria and Northern Tunisia ....................................................... 138 

6 . Central and Southern Tunisia .................................................................... 166 

7 . Pantelleria .................................................................................................. 226 

8 . Greater German Air Industry Targets ....................................................... 320 

9 . Escort Ranges for the P-47 ........................................................................ 362 

10 . Escort Ranges for the P-38 and P-51 ........................................................ 363 

11 . Greater German Synthetic Oil Plants ........................................................ 397 

12 . Normandy Transport Network .................................................................. 407 

13 . Operation CROSSBOW Network .................................................................. 427 

14 . Operation COBRA Area. Night of July 24-25. 1944 .................................. 473 

15 . Front Lines. 1944-1945 ............................................................................ 502 

16 . Greater German Transport Network ......................................................... 509 

1 . Distribution of Regular Army Rank. 1922-1941 .......................................... 11 

2 . Age and Rank of the U.S. Army Officer Corps. 1931 ................................. 13 

3 . Flight Accident Statistics. 1921-1938 ........................................................... 15 

4 . Eighth and Ninth Air Force Fighter Escort Missions. 1944 ........................ 364 

6 . USSTAF Bomber Losses by Quarter. 1944-1945 ...................................... 527 

5 . The Relationship between H2X Bombing Accuracy and Cloud Cover ...... 505 

1 . Allied Chain of Command. January 6. 1943 ............................................... 169 

2 . Allied Chain of Command. January 30. 1943 ............................................. 175 

4 . U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe. May 1944 .......................................... 291 

5 . Chain of Command. Allied Expeditionary Force. February 13. 1944 ....... 308 

6 . Chain of Command. Allied Expeditionary Force. April 7. 1944 ............... 342 

7 . System of Control of Strategic Air Force .................................................... 491 

8 . Total German Synthetic Fuel Production. 1940-1945 ................................ 506 

3 . Organization of Allied Air Power. February 18. 1943 ................................ 179 

xviii 
Photographs 

General Carl A . Spaatz. 1945 ............................................................fr ontispiece 

Flight Trainee, 2d Lt . Carl A . Spatz, 1916 .......................................................... 2 

Brig . Gen . William “Billy” Mitchell and Maj . Gen . Mason Patrick ................... 9 

Brig . Gen . William Mitchell addressing his court-martial ................................ 21 

The Question Murk flight, January 1929 ........................................................ 26 

Maj . Carl A . “Tooey” Spatz, ca . 1930 .............................................................. 34 

Lt . Col . Henry H . Arnold and actress Bebe Daniels ......................................... 35 

Maj . Gen . Henry H . Arnold, Chief, U.S. Army Air Corps ............................... 39 

Air Chief Marshal Cyril Newall ........................................................................ 43 

Air Commodore John Slessor ........................................................................... 46 

Bomb damage to London, autumn 1940 ........................................................... 49 

John G . Winant, U.S. Ambassador to Britain ................................................... 52 

The Battle of Britain ......................................................................................... 54 

Robert A . Lovett, Assistant Secretary of War for Air ....................................... 58 

Brig . Gen . Ira C . Eaker ..................................................................................... 73 

Henry L . Stimson, Secretary of War ................................................................. 76 

General George C . Marshall, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army .................................. 77 

Air Chief Marshal Charles A . Portal ................................................................. 91 

Air Chief Marshal Arthur T . “Bomber” Harris ................................................. 95 

Lt . Gen . Dwight D . Eisenhower and Eighth Air Force commanders .............. 99 

Maj . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz, 1942 ...................................................................... 102 

Brig . Gen . James H . Doolittle ......................................................................... 126 

Lt . Gen . Kenneth A . N . Anderson ................................................................... 137 

Air Commodore G . M . Lawson ...................................................................... 141 

Air Chief Marshal Arthur W . Tedder .............................................................. 148 

Air Vice-Marshal Arthur Coningham ............................................................. 149 

Lt . Gen . Frank M . Andrews ............................................................................ 156 

Archibald Sinclair, British Secretary of State for Air ..................................... 159 

General Henry H . Arnold and Air Chief Marshal Charles A . Portal .............. 164 

Maj . Gen . Lloyd R . Fredendall ....................................................................... 167 

The new Allied leadership, February 1943 ..................................................... 180 

Air Marshal William L . Welsh ....................................................................... 182 

A light moment in North Africa ...................................................................... 188 

The end of two Axis supply ships off Bizerte, Tunisia ................................... 192 

German Me 323 and Ju 52 aircraft .................................................................. 194 

After an air raid on Castelvetrona, Sicily ........................................................ 197 

Selfridge Field, Michigan, early 1930s ............................................................. 18 

Maj . Gen . James E . Fechet and the Question Murk’s crew ............................... 25 

Brig . Gen . Frank O’D . “Monk” Hunter ............................................................ 73 

Air Chief Marshal Sholto Douglas .................................................................... 87 

Maj, Gen . Carl A . Spaatz congratulating Maj . Charles C . Kegelman .............. 92 

The King and Queen of England ..................................................................... 100 

xix 
A German Siebel ferry .................................................................................... 197 

Generals Spaatz and Patton and Colonel McDonald. Algeria ........................ 205 

Maj . Gen . W . E . Clutterbuck .......................................................................... 228 

Rear Adm . R . R . McGrigor ............................................................................. 228 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz at the 90th Photo Intelligence Wing ......................... 242 

Maj . Gen . James H . Doolittle at Maison Blanche. Algeria ............................. 275 

Commanders, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe ....................................... 289 

U.S. military leaders studying Ninth Air Force photos ................................... 289 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz on an inspection tour ................................................ 292 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz meeting his daughter in England .............................. 292 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz and his command plane ............................................ 293 

Maj . Gen . Frederick L . Anderson ................................................................... 295 

Maj . Gen . Earle E . Partridge ........................................................................... 295 

Brig . Gen . Curtis E . LeMay ............................................................................ 296 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz and his executive officer, Capt . Sally Bagby .......... 297 

Eighth Air Force heavy bombers equipped with H2X radar ........................... 299 

Maj . Gen . William E . Kepner ......................................................................... 302 

Early model P-47s over England .................................................................... 304 

Filling the pipeline: Replacement B-17s. March 1944 ................................... 305 

Maj . Gen . Frederick L . Anderson conferring with meteorologists ................. 318 

Pantelleria, June 1943 ..................................................................................... 237 

U.S. military leaders near the Fifth Army front. Italy ..................................... 274 

Air Chief Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory ................................................... 284 

Air Vice-Marshal Harry Broadhurst ............................................................... 311 

Defenders of the Reich .................................................................................... 324 

Bomb damage to Fieseler aircraft plant. Kassel, Germany ............................. 331 

Brig . Gen . Frederic H . Smith, Jr ..................................................................... 354 

Maj . Gen . Adolph Galland .............................................................................. 363 

Reich Marshal Hermann Goering ................................................................... 364 

The 91st Bomb Group being briefed prior to a raid ........................................ 368 

The Eighth Air Force Unleashed .................................................................... 372 

Eighth Air Force heavy bombers hitting the factory area of Berlin ................ 375 

Air Vice-Marshal Richard Peck ...................................................................... 380 

Morale visit to a Ninth Air Force medium bomber group .............................. 383 

Morale visit marking a bomber group’s 100th mission .................................. 384 

Morale visit to the 381st Bomb Group ............................................................ 386 

The first oil raid. Bohlen. Germany. May 1944 .............................................. 399 

Winston Churchill and his War Cabinet. ......................................................... 405 

A “Chattanooga Choo-Choo” strafing sortie ...... : ........................................... 412 

Generals Spaatz and Arnold at Normandy beachhead .................................... 425 

An Avro Lancaster .......................................................................................... 335 

Maj . Gen . Hoyt S . Vandenberg ....................................................................... 354 

General Dwight D . Eisenhower in the cockpit of a B-26 ............................... 391 

Anthony Eden, British Foreign Secretary ........................................................ 405 

xx 
Winston Churchill at an antiaircraft gun line. England ................................... 429 

A German holding an antiaircraft range finder ............................................... 441 

A synthetic oil refinery. Merseburg. Germany .............................................. 444 

Eighth Air Force ground crews servicing a P-38 ............................................ 447 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz at a crew replacement center. England ..................... 451 

General Dempsey and Air Commodore Boyle ................................................ 459 

Maj . Gen . Elwood R . “Pete” Quesada ............................................................ 466 

Aftermath of Operation COBRA. St . Lb. France ............................................... 475 

Lt . Gen . Carl A . Spaatz at an Eighth Air Force B-24 base ............................. 477 

Air Marshal James M . Robb ........................................................................... 489 

Air Vice-Marshal Norman H . Bottomley ........................................................ 493 

The lieich Besieged ......................................................................................... 498 

General Dwight D . Eisenhower and leading ground commanders ................. 520 

U.S. commanding generals. autumn. 1944 ...................................................... 521 

The 13attle of the Bulge ................................................................................... 534 

Bomb damage to a rail yard near Cologne. Germany ..................................... 539 

Maj . Gen . Laurence S . Kuter ........................................................................... 547 

Fratricide over Berlin ...................................................................................... 554 

Cities in Crisis ................................................................................................. 566 

Ruin and Risk .................................................................................................. 576 

Generals Spaatz and Doolittle with the 303d Bomb Group ............................ 578 

War’s End ........................................................................................................ 583 

Germans preparing to launch a V-1 flying bomb ............................................ 431 

Germans preparing to fire 88mm antiaircraft artillery .................................... 442 

RAF Operations Room .................................................................................... 456 

Field Marshal Bernard L . Montgomery .......................................................... 468 

xxi 
Statistical Appendices 

1 . Aviation Personnel Strength. 1912-1945 .................................................. 601 

2 . Direct Cash and Direct Appropriations Expenditures. 1899-1946 ........... 603 

3 . Combat Groups Overseas. 1941-1945 ..................................................... 604 

4 . Battle Casualties against Germany. 1941-1945 ........................................ 609 

5 . Battle Casualties. ETO. 1941-1945 .......................................................... 611 

6 . Battle Casualties. MTO. 1941-1945 ......................................................... 613 

7 . Heavy Bomber and Day Fighter Crew Losses. 1943-1945 ...................... 615 

8 . Aircraft in Theaters against Germany. 1942-1945 ................................... 618 

9 . Aircraft. ETO. 1942-1945 ....................................................................... 622 

10 .Aircraft. MTO. 1942-1945 ....................................................................... 626 

11 .Aircraft Losses. 1941-1945 ...................................................................... 630 

12 . Combat Sorties Flown. Europe. 1941-1945 .............................................. 635 

13 .Combat Sorties Flown. ETO. 1942-1945 ................................................. 637 

14 Combat Sorties Flown. MTO. 1942-1945 ................................................ 639 

15 .Fighter Sorties Flown against Germany. 1943-1945 ................................ 641 

16 .Bombs Dropped against Germany. 1943-1945 ......................................... 643 

17.Tons of Bombs Dropped. 1941-1945 ....................................................... 645 

18.Tons of Bombs Dropped on German Targets. 1942-1945 ....................... 646 

19.Tons of Bombs Dropped by Heavy Bombers on Germany ....................... 649 

20 .Tons of Bombs Dropped. ETO. 1942-1945 .............................................. 651 

21.Tons of Bombs Dropped. MTO. 1942-1945 ............................................. 653 

22 .Combat Losses by Theater. 1942-1945 .................................................... 655 

23.Combat Losses. ETO. 1942-1945 ............................................................. 657 

24.Combat Losses. MTO. 1942-1945 ............................................................ 659 

25 . Enemy Aircraft Destroyed. 1942-1945 ..................................................... 661 

26 . Enemy Aircraft Destroyed. ETO. 1942-1945 ........................................... 663 

27 . Enemy Aircraft Destroyed. MTO. 1942-1945 .......................................... 665 

28 . Gasoline Consumption. ETO. 1942-1945 ................................................. 667 

29 . Gasoline Consumption. MTO. 1942-1945 ............................................... 669 

30 . Expenditures from Direct Appropriations. 1942-1945 ............................. 671 

xxii 
Part One 

Carrying the Flame 

From West Point to London 

1891-1942 
Flight Trainee 2d Lt. Carl A. Spatz, 25th Infantry, spring 1916. 
Chapter 1 

Spaatz’s Early Career 

(1891-1938) 

The candidate should be naturally athletic and have a reputation for reliability, punctuality and honesty. He should have 

a cool head in emergencies, good eye for distance, keen ear 

for familiar sounds, steady hand and sound body with plenty 

of reserve; he should be quick-witted, highly intelligent and 

tractable. Immature, high strung, overconfident, impatient 

candidates are not desired.’ 

--Army Specifications for Flyers, I917 

Carl Andrew Spatz* was born on June 28,1891, in Boyertown, Pennsylvania, 

and lived there throughout his youth. He was the second child, and first son, in a 

family of two boys and three girls. Both his Prussian immigrant grandfather and 

his American-born father published the local newspaper, at first in German, later 

in English. As a boy, he learned to set type by hand and to run the paper’s printing press. He graduated from high school at the age of fourteen, a fact that says 

less about his academic abilities than it does about the simplicity of the local 

curriculum. To remedy his academic deficiencies, his parents sent him to 

Perkiomen Preparatory School for two more years. Years later Spaatz classified 

himself as a poor student who read what he wanted and never studied? traits he 

continued throughout his life. When his father was badly burned attempting to 

rescue persons trapped in a local opera house fire in January 1908, Carl returned 

home to run the newspaper. Afterwards he attended the Army-Navy Preparatory 

School in Washington, D.C. On March 1, 1910, at the age of eighteen, he 

entered the United States Military Academy at, West Point. 

* In 1937 Spatz, at the urging of his wife and three daughters, legally changed his name to 

Spaatz. He hoped that the additional “a” would encourage the correct pronunciation of his name, 

which sounded like the word “spots.” 

3 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Spaatz himself never revealed why he chose to attend the Academy. His 

attendance at the Army-Navy Preparatory School could have indicated a leaning 

toward the military profession or merely a desire to secure sound credentials 

before attending any college. His wife has said that his family could not afford 

to continue his education. The offer of an excellent free education, coupled with 

an honorable career that stressed the outdoor life he enjoyed all his life probably 

persuaded him to apply for and accept appointment to a service academy.3 

He had an undistinguished sojourn in the Corps of Cadets. Less than three 

weeks after his entrance, he attempted to resign but was dissuaded from doing 

 SO.^ Why he attempted to resign remains obscure. Given his easy-going temperament, it seems probable that the hazing and other traditional indignities 

inflicted on entering cadets almost proved too much for him. Later, although 

guilty, he dodged expulsion for having liquor in his room by escaping courtmartial conviction on a techni~ality.~ Inacademics he stood 57th out of 107. In 

conduct, he ranked 95th. His behavioral shortcomings reflected a distaste for 

“bull” or spit and polish. He received demerits for neglecting to sweep the floor, 

to dust his shoes, to fold his bedclothes, and to keep his rifle clean. In fact, 

Spaatz maintained a rumpled look throughout his career. Rumor has it that on 

his graduation day he was still walking punishment tours. 

He never gained cadet rank, remaining a “cleansleeve” for his four years at 

the Point. What interested him-bridge, poker, and the guitar-he pursued vigorously. His classmates especially relished his repertoire of risquC songs. The 

Howitzer, the West Point yearbook, caricatured him with guitar in hand. The 

editors commented on his silent demeanor, noted his ability to recite with confidence on a subject he had not read, and spoke of his indifference to demerits and 

“independent attitude generally.”6 By his graduation on June 12, 1914, his independence, taciturnity, and impatience with stultifying routine had become fixed. 

He had also acquired a permanent nickname, “Tooey,” because of a chance 

resemblance to upperclassman, Francis J. Toohey. 

Spaatz left the Academy determined to become a flyer. In his third month at 

West Point, on May 29, 1910, he had seen Glenn Curtiss fly by on a 150-mile 

trip from Albany to New York City. (Curtiss stopped only once to refuel, 

thereby setting a new world record of 87 miles nonstop flight.)7 The sight so 

impressed Spaatz that he then and there decided to fly.* In 1914 the U.S. Army’s 

few aircraft belonged to the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps. Before Spaatz 

could join the Signal Corps he was required to serve one year in a line or combat 

unit. 

On joining the 25th Infantry Regiment at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, he 

served in an all-black infantry company. Thirty years later, he testified to the 

Gillem Board, which was investigating the place of the black soldier in the postWorld War I1 armed forces, “I must say that I enjoyed that year of service with 

that outfit as much as any year of service I have ever had-as a white officer in a 

Negro outfit, I would just as soon serve with them any time.” He thought his 

4 
EARLY CAREER 

men made “fine soldiers easily disciplined by white officers and easily kept 

under control.” He also told the Gillem Board that blacks should not serve in 

integrated units and that they would be more effective in support and service 

units than in combat units9 Throughout his career Spaatz evinced the paternalistic attitude of his rank and station toward blacks. He never appeared to question 

their low status within the military; he was simply a man of his time. 

Spaatz made no lasting mark on the 25th Infantry, but he did succeed in 

making an indelible impression on the teen-aged daughter of a cavalry colonel 

also stationed in Hawaii. She became his bride two years later. 

When his year in the infantry ended, Spaatz reported to North Field in San 

Diego, California, on November 25, 1915, to begin flight training. This preparation consisted of two to five hours’ dual instruction, learning how to inspect the 

plane for safety, and how to disassemble its motor. On his first solo flight, the 

engine quit,l0 but he glided the plane to a safe landing and continued to fly. In 

his initial air assignment, May 1916, Spaatz flew to the U.S.-Mexican border for 

a tour of duty in the 1st Aero Squadron with Brig. Gen. John J. Pershing’s punitive expedition in Mexico. The commanding officer of the 1st Aero Squadron, 

Capt. Benjamin D. Foulois, later became Chief of the Army Air Corps. A month 

after U.S. entry into World War I, Spaatz, one of only sixty-five flying officers 

in the Army, was promoted to major and given command of the 5th Aero 

Squadron at Fort Sam Houston in Texas. On July 26, two weeks before his 

departure for Europe, he married twenty-year-old Ruth Harrison, whose father 

had also been transferred to Fort Sam Houston. The couple gave the bride’s parents less than twelve hours’ notice. 

By September 19, 1917, Spaatz found himself in France, where his unit was 

broken up for replacements. He spent the next three weeks in Paris in charge 

of the mechanical training of enlisted men, followed by a month at Chaumont 

assigned to the Supply Section of the aeronautical area of Pershing’s headquarters. While at Chaumont, Spaatz participated in his first combat mission, flying 

as an observer on a French bombardment sortie on the night of October 29. He 

also flew with French observation and reconnaissance squadrons.’ On November 15, 1917, he became the Commander of the 3d Aviation Instruction Center 

at Issoudun, France.12 He received this posting because as both a Regular Army 

officer and a trained flyer, he was one of the very few men qualified to fill the 

job. 

There were no planes suitable for advanced training or pilots qualified as 

instructors in the United States at the outbreak of the war. The Aviation Section 

of General Pershing ’s American Expeditionary Force (AEF) thus had no choice 

but to establish large training centers in Europe, where pilots could practice flying on up-to-date aircraft supplied by the French and the English. Although the 

Aeronautical Training Section of the AEF, Aviation Section, selected Issoudun 

in June, construction on flight training facilities did not begin until August 18. 

By autumn conditions there, thanks to delays in the arrival of construction mate5 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

rials, were, as an official report noted, “to say the least, disheartening.”13 The 

center did not receive its first French aircraft until October, and the provisional 

flight school did not start operation until October 24. Barracks and shops were 

of the crudest construction, and the rainy season had started before roads were in 

place, making the center a sea of mud. On the flying field, mud churned up by 

aircraft wheels broke propeller blades as fast as they could be replaced. The center had no machine shops or material to erect them.14 

The morale of all personnel under these conditions plummeted. Primary 

training cadets, who had joined the Army Air Service for the romance of flying, 

particularly resented their lot at Issoudun, which had no facilities for primary or 

introductory flight training. The center had to accept the primary cadets because 

the French and British initial training schools could not find space for them. 

When pressed into laboring on the center% essential construction projects, they 

reacted with little enthusiasm. l5 This was the initial situation that confronted 

Spaatz, who had no training in aviation instruction and had never flown a modern service plane. 

He spent most of the next nine and one-half months either as commanding 

officer of the school or as the officer in charge of training. Spaatz did his job 

well. By the time he left in September 1918, Issoudun had become the largest 

training field in the world and the Army Air Service’s chief facility for training 

pursuit or fighter pilots. It had 14 airfields, 84 hangars, and numerous warehouses, shops, and barracks.16 The machine shops could completely overhaul 

more than 100 engines a week (each requiring at least 100 man-hours) and 

rebuild from salvaged parts 20 aircraft a week (each plane required 32 mandays). The school averaged 500 to 600 flying hours a day. In all, it graduated 

766 pursuit pilots.’7 This accomplishment was not without cost; Issoudun suffered 56 training fatalities during Spaatz’s tenure. In August 1918, for example, 

17 students died.18 In all, the Army Air Service suffered 128 combat fatalities 

and 244 training fatalities in France and 262 training fatalities in the United 

States. 19 Spaatz also reestablished discipline. One of his trainees recalled fifty 

years later, “The students all thought he was a stiff necked little German,” 

adding, “but he was fair, and that’s all you can expect out of a good officer.”20 

The assignment gave Spaatz invaluable experience as a trainer and administrator of a fledgling air force. He had successfully accomplished his assignment--so successfully, in fact, that Brig. Gen. William “Billy” Mitchell, one of 

Pershing’s chief aviation officers, wanted to return him to the United States to 

upgrade Air Service training there. Instead, Spaatz, not known for his loquaciousness, spoke up. He wangled permission for two weeks at the front with the 

1 st Pursuit Group, which included the 94th Aero (Hat-in-the-Ring) Squadron, 

one of whose members was Maj. Edward “Eddie” V. Rickenbacker. 

Rickenbacker, who ended the war as the highest-ranking American ace, with 

twenty-six kills, had served at Issoudun under Spaatz for several months. 

When Spaatz arrived, he found the 1st Pursuit out of the line and not flying 

6 
EARLY CAREER 

combat missions, so he went on to the 13th Aero Squadron, 2nd Pursuit Group.21 

Upon his arrival, Spaatz won over the outfit’s pilots, mostly second and first 

lieutenants who had first entered combat five weeks before his arrival, by 

removing his major’s insignia of rank and becoming one of them.*2 When his 

first two weeks were up, he ignored his orders and stayed two more weeks.23 

On September 16, 1918, despite the repeated jamming of his machine guns, 

Spaatz shot down his first German aircraft.24 Ten days later, he earned a 

Distinguished Service Cross in a stunt that made the New York Times: “Flying 

officer shoots down three planes-two German and his own.”25 Spaatz had 

focused so intently on his dogfighting that he had neglected to check his fuel 

gauge, causing the loss of his own Spad. Fortunately, when he crash-landed his 

plane near the trenches, he fell into French hands. The friendly poilu started an 

alcoholic celebration, which Spaatz’s compatriots continued upon his return to 

base. When Spaatz left for the United States, Mitchell told him, “I will be glad 

to have you command a group at any time under my command.”26 

Spaatz landed in New York City on October 13. He traveled to Washington, 

D.C., where he was assigned to the Aviation Service’s Training Department as 

Inspector of Pursuit Training and met Col. Henry H. “Hap” Arnold for the first 

time. The two eventually became fast friends-to the lasting benefit of both 

their careers. Spaatz had already heard much about Amold, who was very close 

to Spaatz’s wife’s family, the Harrisons. Next, Spaatz began an inspection tour 

of pursuit facilities. He boarded a train for Dayton, Ohio, where he tested various types of planes, presumably trainers. Just outside El Paso, on November 11, 

1918, he learned that the war had ended. The next day he finished his tour in San 

Diego, California. He emerged from the war as a recognized expert on air training and pursuit aviation.27 

He also emerged convinced that Army air power deserved more autonomy. 

By the end of World War I, many air officers, such as Mitchell and Foulois, had 

become dissatisfied with the place of aviation in the Army. They had encountered too many officers who had gained command of air units without the least 

knowledge of aviation or who, worse still, had no appreciation of aviation’s 

potential.28 Other officers, such as Arnold, had found little sympathy or support 

from War Department bureaucrats in Washington.29 Nor did Secretary of War 

Newton D. Baker demonstrate remarkable insight in his Annual Report of 1919, 

which condemned the principle of bombing civilian areas,30 and by extension, 

all strategic bombing. At the time of the postwar congressional hearings on the 

place of air power within the military establishment, Spaatz said, “My own feeling was all in favor of getting it out of the Signal Corps. . . . I wanted air force 

on the same level as infantry.”31 Within a few years, Spaatz and many other 

Army air officers wanted not just autonomy within the Army but independence 

from it. 

In 1919 Spaatz began the typical treadmill existence of an American officer 

between the world wars-repeated changes of post, lack of public regard, low 

7 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

pay, and agonizingly slow promotion. Although from 1918 to 1920 he changed 

posts twenty times,32 he had two advantages over some of his fellow officersflight pay, a cause of much jealousy among non-flying officers, and seniority as 

a major. For all but three months of the next seventeen years, when he temporarily became a captain, Spaatz remained a major, unlike many of his compatriots 

who lost their wartime ranks and toiled for years as captains or even lieutenants. 

The U.S. Army filled its officer ranks by means of an unmodified seniority 

system. A thorough knowledge of the workings of the Army promotion system 

provides a key to understanding the position of the Air Service and of Spaatz 

within the Army.* The promotion list, a conservative personnel system long in 

use throughout the world’s civil and military services, worked strictly by seniority or time in grade. Unlike many foreign services, which limited the unmodified 

seniority list to captain and below, the U.S. Army’s system extended up through 

Each commissioned officer entered the U.S. Army officer corps as the 

most junior 2d lieutenant and, if he lived long enough, advanced to colonel as 

the men on the list ahead of him left the service. Considerations of merit or ability did not modify one’s relative position on the list, and there was no selection 

scheme to advance deserving and active officers over the heads of the superannuated. The system provided for voluntary retirement at thirty years of service 

and mandatory retirement at age sixty-four. The list did not apply to general 

officers’ promotions, which were by selection. 

Strict adherence to the promotion list had the advantage of allowing every 

officer to know his promotion prospects precisely and gave assurance that there 

could be no favoritism or nepotism. In practice, of course, the choice assignments still went to the favorites who had the rank to qualify for them. The disadvantages of the system included lack of reward for initiative and ability, slow 

promotion, and bureaucratic routine. 

Before World War I, each branch within the U.S. Army (such as cavalry, 

infantry, artillery, and quartermaster) had maintained its own separate promotion 

list, so some officers were promoted faster than others of equal ability and time 

of service. To remedy this perceived flaw, Congress, in the National Defense 

Act of 1920, combined all Regular Army promotion lists into a single list, providing that no officer would hold a relative position on the combined list lower 

than the one he held on his branch list at the time of the bill’s passage. In the 

same act Congress established the Air Service as a separate branch within the 

Army; specified that at all times 90 percent of its officers must be rated flyers, 

balloonists, or observers; and required that all command positions be filled by 

rated officers. 

* The air branch of the US. Army underwent three name changes from 1919 to 1941: 

from 1919 through the first half of 1926 it was officially the Army Air Service; from July 1926 

through June 1941 it was the Army Air Corps; and from June 1941 to September 1947 it was 

the Army Air Forces. 

8 
EARLY CAREER 

These provisions created a closed shop. Officers elsewhere in the Army 

could not transfer into the Air Service unless they passed flight training. Such a 

switch proved difficult for field-grade officers (major and above). Their age 

(mid-thirties, at best) and the extremely high physical standards for pilots almost 

guaranteed failure to gain a rating. Hence accretions to the Air Service’s and Air 

Corps’ Regular Army officer ranks came, for the most part, at the 2d lieutenant 

grade, from West Point graduates and from Reserve Officers, Flying Cadets, and 

enlisted pilots earning regular commissions. 

So sp-ingent were the air branch’s physical standards that only the finest 

specimens entered its training programs. Men who flew in open, unheated cockpits at altitudes well over 10,000 feet at all times of the year, without oxygen, in 

aircraft lacking most types of power-assisted controls required extraordinary 

stamina. The air branch’s basic &and advanced flight training eliminated a large 

percentage of would-be pilots. On the average, about 40 percent of each entering 

class completed both stages of training, although in some classes as few as 25 

percent graduated. Charles A. Lindbergh, who underwent flight training in 1924, 

recalled that only 17 of 103 members of his class completed training, and the 

Air Corps passed only 128 of 592 students in fiscal 1928.34 Moreover, from 

1921 to 1938,95 flying cadets died in air accidents.35 

Because the Air Service (and its predecessors) had existed only since 1907, 

it had had no time to develop its own higher-ranking officers. Even Hap Arnold, 

Maj. Gen. Mason Patrick, Chief of the Air Service, and Brig. Gen. William “Billy” 

Mitchell, early 1920s. 

9 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

one of the very first Army pilots, was only a major and barely in the upper 40 

percent of the major’s ranks of the promotion list. In July 1923, Arnold was the 

fifteenth-ranking major in the Air Service but only 909th of 2,250 majors in the 

entire Army. At the same time Spaatz was the 88th ranking major (of 89) in the 

Air Service and stood 2,207 on the majors list. It took Arnold almost nine years 

to reach lieutenant colonel (February 1932) and Spaatz more than twelve years 

(September 1935) to advance through the entire major’s portion of the list to 

lieutenant colonel. 

The Army’s air branch had a much lower percentage of field-grade officers 

than the remainder of the Army. (See Table 1, Distribution of Regular Army 

Rank in the Air Service and Air Corps Compared with the Army as a Whole 

1922--1941.) From 1923 to 1935, the Air Corps had an average of less than 11 

percent of its Regular Army officers in field grades. The remainder of the Army 

averaged a little less than 33 percent field-grade officers for the same period. 

This imbalance resulted in underrepresentation of the Air Corps’ views and lack 

of understanding of the Air Corps’ difficulties at the senior levels of the Army. 

But if the lack of field-grade officers hurt the Air Corps as an institution within 

the Army, in the long run it may have advanced the careers of officers within the 

Air Corps it~elf.3~ 

The lack of rank within the Air Corps-even within the field grades the 

great majority of officers were majors-meant that officers assumed responsibility and gained experience at levels far above their actual rank. The 1930 Annual 

Report of the Chief of the Air Corps noted that Air Corps Tables of Organization 

called for a major to command each squadron. Yet, of 53 squadrons, majors led 

only 5, and 4 of those majors doubled as base commanders. One squadron was 

led by a second lieutenant of less than four years’ service.37 From 1921 to 1938, 

if not beyond, the same 75 to 90 field-grade officers, many of whom became 

AAF generals in World War 11, controlled the inner workings of the air arm. 

Spaatz, who served as a major for most of the period between 1921 and 1938, 

was always one of the 100 most senior officers in his branch. In an institution in 

which considerations of rank and seniority dominated personnel assignments, 

Spaatz’s seniority kept him constantly in important command and staff positions. 

If the Air Corps had a paucity of field grade officers, it had an overabundance 

of junior officers (captain and below), partly by design. In the early 1920s, Air 

Service thinking estimated a pilot’s active flying career at eight years under 

wartime conditions and, at most, fourteen years under peacetime condition^.^^ 

Because the air branch insisted on officer pilots, it required only first and second 

lieutenants to operate individual aircraft, with captains to command flights. Once a 

man’s flying career ceased, about the time he might expect to become a major, he 

could be transferred, sent to the reserves, or discharged. The operation of aircraft 

by officer pilots necessitated a force heavy in junior officers. In 1924 the Air 

Service used a figure of 85 percent captains and lieutenants as the optimum,39 not 

10 
EARLY CAREER 

Table 1 

Distribution of Regular Army Rank in the Air Service and 

Air Corps Compared with the Army as a Whole, 1922-1941 

Year: 

1922 

1923a 

1924 

1925 

1926 

1927 

1928 

1929 

1930 

1931 

1932 

1933 

1934 

1935“ 

1936 

1937 

1938 

1939 

1940 

1941 

Col 

31627 

31509 

31507 

31504 

21500 

21530 

21549 

31556 

6/57 1 

61567 

71559 

101557 

81553 

91557 

181727 

24I745 

271764 

251793 

261854 

291852 

Lt Col Maj Capt __ 1st Lt 2d Lt Total 

10/797 

111682 

131685 

131689 

131688 

161675 

161658 

161663 

181665 

211674 

261697 

3017 17 

331737 

30/725 

5411,087 

5811,230 

5711,553 

5611,605 

6111,637 

16113.834 

11512,760 

8612,182 

9012,177 

9712.163 

9812,157 

9712,139 

9712,127 

9912,188 

9212,447 

9012,482 

9012,528 

8412,509 

8012,468 

8512,419 

9613,259 

9713,136 

11412,821 

13012,858 

297/3,05 1 

39812,482 

60513,204 

12414,073 

12914,079 

12714,142 

12714,148 

12614,140 

13214,139 

15314,112 

15813,815 

22813.75 1 

29813,706 

34113,741 

39113,767 

43013,778 

57914,009 

59914,009 

64914.066 

72914,094 

67513,899 

49312,386 

60513,204 

54412.783 

5 1612,764 

51012,695 

50212,688 

507/2,7 17 

50712,726 

49412,753 

49212,787 

43112,820 

37512,786 

373D.757 

38412,746 

5 19/23 12 

530/2,113 

50412,156 

48812.222 

4 1612,146 

37812,238 

41812,344 

191202 

12711,184 

11611,051 

16311,S 19 

14211,431 

17211,547 

20711.605 

29411,691 

44111,754 

46011.8 I6 

45811.857 

44411.754 

40311,940 

23011,680 

821856 

1261973 

9711,022 

31411.471 

77312,085 

84512,338 

919112,711 

895111,413 

86711 1,264 

91 311 1,7 12 

88411 1,6 12 

9 1911 1,748 

961111,804 

1,05911 1,963 

1,207112,039 

1,236/12,110 

1,254112,133 

1,282112,035 

1,299112,208 

1,303111,971 

1,359112,051 

1,408112,249 

1,432112,448 

1,670112,967 

2,210113,764 

2,344114,236 

a. The Dickman Board demoted 236 majors, 750 captains, and 800 first lieutenants by 

b. The Promotion Act of 1935 shifted the World War I “hump” one rank higher from first 

January 1, 1923. 

and second lieutenant to first lieutenant and captain. 

Compiled from the Official Reports of the Secretary of War. 

far from the 90 percent average of 1923 to 1935. Throughout the interwar period 

the air branch supplemented its number of officer pilots by using reserve officers; 

for most years the air branch had by far the largest number of reservists on duty 

for periods exceeding fifteen days of any bran~h.~O In practice the single promotion list thwarted the expectations of the Air Service and the Air Corps. 

Instead of an even distribution of officers with like times of service throughout, the list had instances of many individuals crammed into a small time-of-ser11 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

vice bracket. Officers who joined the Army in World War I formed one such 

logjam. At the rear of that jam was what the air officers called the promotion 

“hump.” When men joined the Army at the beginning of the war, those wishing 

to fly went to flight training, in some cases for twelve to eighteen months. The 

flyers received their commissions only after they had completed flight training. 

They were thus well behind the men who joined other branches and earned their 

commissions months earlier. In the interwar period this placed a large percentage of Air Corps junior-grade officers at the bottom of the promotion list, with 

little prospect of ever reaching field grade. In 1930, 400 of the 494 Regular 

Army first lieutenants in the Air Corps had wartime e~perience.~~ The most 

senior of them would have to advance 3,800 places through the captains’ ranks 

and one-third of the way through the entire list to reach major-a daunting 

prospect. The effect on the entering second lieutenants, who could not even 

make captain until the hump cleared, also must have been dramatic. The limited 

promotion potential coupled with the lack of personnel turnover contributed to 

the aging of the small officer corps. (Table 2 for the year 1931, the mid-point 

between the wars, illustrates the interwar relation between age and rank.) It was 

no wonder that the bulk of resignations from the whole officer corps, not just the 

air branch, consisted of junior-grade officers. From 1924 through 1933, 3 

colonels, 8 lieutenant colonels, 8 1 majors, 239 captains, 23 1 first lieutenants, 

and 391 second lieutenants resigned from the Regular Army, an average of 95 a 

year from a force of approximately 12,000.42 As always, those with the least 

invested in the service and the worst prospects of advancement were most likely 

to resign. Well over 90 percent of the officer corps chose to stay with the colors. 

The officer corps as a whole formed a conservative, all-white society removed 

from the mainstream of American life. Postings to isolated forts and bases, lives 

spent in the military ghetto of officers’ on-base housing, a promotion policy of 

glacial slowness, and a professional ethos that led to concentration on the technical aspects of their work and to the avoidance of participation in the partisan 

civilian world accounted for much of the Regular Army officers’ segregation. 

The officers of the Air Service and Corps formed a small band of brothers set 

apart even from the officer corps at large.* They numbered no larger than the 

student body of a medium-size urban high school and they spent much of their 

careers in small groups of a few dozen or less on primitive airfields. Their agita- 

* Regular officers left the air branch by three routes: death, resignation, or retirement. Only a statistically insignificant number of them were dismissed or discharged. From 1925 through 1935, 131 

regular officers died in air crashes, 35 died of other causes, 126 resigned, and 72 retired. At the same 

time, the air branch grew from 913 regular officers to 1,303. As one would expect, retirements were 

concentrated in the years after 1928 (70 of 72), as senior officers who joined the service at the time of 

the Spanish-American War and later reached retirement age departed. Resignations peaked in 1930, 

with 27, as the junior officers resigned to join the newly established commercial airlines, and trailed 

off drastically during the Depression; only 16 regular officers resigned from 1931 to 1935. Figures 

were compiled from the Annual Reports of the Chief of the Air Corps, 1921-1935. 

12 
~~ Age 

64 

63 

62 

61 

60 

59 

58 

57 

56 

55 

54 

53 

52 

51 

50 

49 

48 

47 

46 

45 

44 

43 

42 

41 

40 

39 

38 

37 

36 

35 

34 

33 

32 

31 

30 

29 

28 

27 

26 

25 

24 

23 

22 

21 

Total 

~ 

Table 2 

Age and Rank of the U.S. Army Officer Corps, 1931 

-~ 

Maj Gen Brig Gen Col Lt Col Maj __ __ ______ 

2 

2 

1 

1 

1 

4 

1 

5 

2 

1 

1 8 

3 19 

5 25 

5 18 

7 36 

6 41 

4 42 

7 60 

2 65 

1 64 

4 43 

28 

1 12 

6 

2 

1 

1 1 

2 4 

2 9 

4 5 

7 13 

12 11 

21 10 

23 26 

44 19 

57 18 

70 15 

33 24 

I5 22 

77 54 

49 50 

31 77 

12 113 

7 136 

139 

144 

132 

169 

159 

146 

116 

61 

29 

L 

1 

20 46 470 527 1.725 

~ 

Extracted from the July 1, 1931 Army List and Directory. 

Capt 1st fi-2d Lt Total ~ ___~ 

1 

1 

5 

9 

7 

16 

15 

22 

20 

35 

40 

53 

50 

70 

84 

56 

73 

124 

134 

128 

172 

230 

317 

376 

381 

382 

400 

188 

14 

3 

3.406 

1 

1 

5 

2 

2 

2 

9 

11 

6 

7 

7 

9 

14 

13 

18 

25 

31 

30 

52 

59 

101 

115 

143 

213 

248 

295 

261 

249 

270 

258 

178 

66 

10 

2,711 

6 

14 

19 

40 

71 

136 

182 

265 

286 

259 

260 

155 

69 

18 

1,780 

11 

24 

34 

32 

60 

70 

74 

1 I6 

1 I7 

138 

132 

147 

149 

123 

156 

209 

192 

178 

211 

285 

298 

303 

354 

45 1 

535 

623 

612 

586 

642 

438 

316 

278 

268 

310 

329 

314 

248 

275 

286 

259 

260 

155 

69 

18 

10,685 
SPAA’U AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

tion for a separate promotion the flight or danger pay they earned while on 

flying status (which many in the rest of the Army resented), and the fight 

between the air arm and the rest of the service over the air portion of the budget 

set the air arm apart from the Army as a whole. Although the leading cause of 

accidental death* for the entire Army from 1927 to 1936 was automobile accidents (660), the second leading cause of death was airplane accidents (4519)~4- 

a category confined to only one branch of the service. (See Table 3, Flight 

Accident Statistics, 1921-1938.) This danger exclusively to themselves, their 

low positions on the promotion list, and their mutual participation in an exhilarating, yet highly technical, occupation bound the air officers together. 

Understandably the division of the budget and other service resources created some of the fiercest tension in the Army. From 1920 to 1934, the total cost 

of Army aviation ranged between 13.1 and 22.7 percent of the Army budget, 

averaging 18.2 percent a year. This included not only direct appropriations to the 

air arm but also indirect expenses such as pay, quartermaster and medical services, ordnance, subsistence, construction, and issue of supplies from the war 

reserve from other Army accounts.45 Such expenses in an era of unremitting fiscal belt-tightening created bitterness within the rest of the Army as the financially conservative Coolidge administration, the Depression-ridden Hoover 

administration, and the first Roosevelt administration sought to reduce War 

Department expenditures without regard to military ~apability.~~ 

Spaatz’s life in the interwar years was not uneventful. In 1919 he led the Far 

West Flying Circus in mock dogfighting and stunting exhibitions as part of the 

Air Service’s contribution to the Liberty Loan drive. In December of that year, he 

received a letter of commendation for his achievements in the Transcontinental 

Reliability Endurance Flight. Spaatz won elapsed time west to east, finished third 

west to east all types, and won second place west to east DH-4 ~lass.~7 Colonel 

(ex-Brig. Gen.) Mitchell, now head of the Air Service’s Training and Operations 

Group, had organized the flight of about eighty service aircraft as a promotional 

effort to generate public enthusiasm for aviation.48 By October 1919, Spaatz had 

already, in the course of his career, amassed 600 hours of flight time; checked 

out in eighteen types of French, British, and American aircraft (including the 

treacherous Morane monoplane); and crashed five times.49 

In April 1919, Spaatz became one of only six men to ever receive the rating 

of Military Aviator on the grounds of distinguished ~ervice.5~ Before World War 

I, Congress had authorized the Aviation Section of the Army Signal Corps to 

award Junior Military Aviator and Military Aviator ratings for piloting skill; the 

ratings carried temporary increases in rank and pay. Spaatz himself had qualified 

as a Junior Military Aviator. Congress discontinued the ratings in 1916 but 

allowed their retention by those who had earned them. During the war, Congress 

* Fatalities resulting from illness were the leading cause of all deaths for the officer corps. 

14 
Table 3 

Flight Accident Statistics, 1921-1938 

1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 Total 

Aircraft Accidents 

Aircraft hours (1,OOOs) 75 65 66 98 150 158 141 183 263 325 3% 371 433 374 449 501 513 591 

Number of accidents 361 330 283 275 311 334 227 249 390 471 456 423 442 412 453 430 358 375 

Number of fatal accidents 45 24 33 23 29 27 28 25 42 37 21 33 28 35 33 42 27 38 

Number of fatalities 73 44 58 34 38 42 43 27 61 52 26 50 46 54 47 59 48 62 

Number of injured 98 97 89 55 119 79 60 52 72 82 76 89 82 83 75 69 53 63 

Details of Fatalities 

Regular Army, officers 35 21 28 15 17 14 18 12 9 19 8 13 9 15 12 21 15 15 

Regular Army, enlisted men 17 15 18 8 11 10 5 5 26 9 3 9 13 14 12 17 16 13 

Regular Army, flying cadets 13 7 1 3 1 0 9 4 10 9 3 6 3 8 3 3 3 9 

Reserve Corps, officers 0 17 5 8 14 9 4 13 11 9201816 7 9 1220 

Miscellaneous 8 0 4 3 14 2 2 3 4 3 2 3 113 9 2 5 

Accident Rates (per 1,OOO flying hours) 

Fatalities 0.94 0.86 0.88 0.35 0.25 0.27 0.31 0.15 0.23 0.16 0.07 0.13 0.11 0.14 0.10 0.12 0.09 0.11 

Accidents 4.67 5.06 4.30 2.81 2.07 1.96 1.61 1.36 1.48 1.45 1.15 1.14 1.02 1.10 1.01 0.86 0.70 0.63 

3,252 

6,158 

606 

864 

1,393 

2% 

22 1 

95 

183 

69 

0.27 

1.89 

Compiled from the Official Reports of the Chief of the Army Air Service Corps. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

reinstated the award of ratings but for distinguished service instead of skill in 

aviation. Aside from the honor, the rating entitled Spaatz to a flight pay of 75 

percent of base pay, an emolument he continued to draw even after the National 

Defense Act of 1920 limited all flight pay, except for distinguished Military 

Aviators, to 50 percent. This benefit loomed even larger when Congress passed 

the Pay Classification Act of 1922, compressing the differences between pay for 

rank and emphasizing longevity of service. Under the new act Spaatz’s base pay, 

for a major with less than 23 years’ service, was $2,400 per annum. 

Throughout the period between the two world wars, Spaatz probably earned 

more per year than any other nongeneral officer in the Army. The family apparently lived comfortably with little left over from day-to-day expenses. In 1925, 

in planning for his expected retirement with thirty years’ service in 1940, Spaatz 

bemoaned his financial status, saying, “I have $300 in the bank and owe about 

$2,000.”51 His finances continued to do no better until very late in his career. 

Nonetheless, the extra money certainly gave him the advantage of relative peace 

of mind and the comfort of a lifestyle unavailable to many of his peers. It may 

well have allowed him to concentrate on his profession without the distraction of 

worry. 

In 1921 Spaatz and Arnold, who had sealed their friendship during a mutual 

tour of duty in California, served up a wacky public relations ploy. They persuaded the chef of a San Francisco hotel to prepare the first egg to be laid and 

fried in flight. On the day of the great Egg Festival at Petaluma, the chicken capital of California, Tooey and the chef added a prize hen to the crew and headed 

back for the bay area. They arrived SU~S poulet-the hen jumped ship at several 

hundred feet and dived into San Francisco Bay. But the flight did not exactly lay 

an egg; the chef threw a bash to celebrate his own safe arrival while the newspapers carried the story?2 

From 1922 to 1924, Spaatz commanded the 1st Pursuit Group-the only 

pursuit group in the Air Service-at Selfridge Field in Michigan, just outside 

Detroit. By June 1922, the nation’s military aviation had shrunk to a force of 

fewer than 10,000 officers and enlisted men.53 At Selfridge, he earned a reprimand for neglect of duty. One of Spaatz’s great qualities as a leader was his 

ability to delegate authority and to allow his subordinates to do their jobs with 

minimum interference from above. This time the trait backfired: his finance officer, 1st Lt. Howard Farmer, embezzled $15,000. A court-martial sent Farmer to 

prison, and a review of its findings led to an official reprimand for Spaatz, who, 

aware of Farmer’s weakness for drinking and gambling, should have removed 

him from temptation. Instead, he had accepted the officer’s pledge not to gamble 

while entrusted with government f~nds.5~ Although Spaatz was very upset at the 

deserved reprimand, it was a measure of his force of character that he did not 

overcompensate by too closely circumscribing the actions of future subordinates.55 

During his stay at Selfridge Field, Spaatz cemented his relationship with the 

16 
EARLY CAREER 

Assistant Chief of the Army Air Service, Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell, who regarded 

the 1st Pursuit Group as his favorite ~rganization.~~ After an inspection trip in 

August 1922, Mitchell remarked, “I have had the First Pursuit Group in the air 

every day that I have been here. Their work is extremely satisfactory.” He 

added, “I don’t think we could have a better Commanding Officer of the 

Group.”57 During the course of these seignorial visits, Mitchell invariably 

expected Spaatz to procure a powerful motor car, usually from Rickenbacker 

Motor Corporation, for his personal use. On one occasion Mitchell shipped six 

of his own horses to Detroit, asking Spaatz to find a government veterinarian, 

forage, and men to fix up some stables.58 Within three days Spaatz had fulfilled 

the general’s reque~t.5~ 

In the course of his many trips to Selfridge, Mitchell, one of the most ardent 

air power enthusiasts, took pains to imprint his views on Spaatz. Although 

Mitchell predicted that bombardment aviation would someday have its principal 

value in “hitting an enemy’s great nerve centers,” he gave primacy of place to 

pursuit aviation.60 Mitchell believed that gaining air superiority over the enemy 

air force was the first and the most necessary task of the air arm. Without freedom to operate, air could not perform any of its other missions or deny enemy 

air the ability to conduct its own missions. Mitchell emphasized that friendly 

pursuit aircraft must locate the enemy, concentrate against him, and drive him 

from the sky. Only then could friendly air proceed with the bombardment of 

enemy forces and installations.61 

In accordance with these theories and others developed from World War I 

experience, the Air Service organized three types of combat units: pursuit, bombardment, and attack. Pursuit had counterair and ground-strafing roles. 

Bombardment would attack naval vessels and enemy industrial centers and other 

key areas behind enemy lines and assist in attacks against field targets. Official 

manuals, which were approved by the ground officers who dominated the War 

Department General Staff, paid little attention to the planning or conduct of 

strategic bombing. Instead, they concentrated on bombardment’s role in ground 

operations. Attack aviation would conduct low-level attacks with heavy machine 

guns, cannon, and bombs against battlefield targets. Airmen who believed such 

low-level attacks would expend both men and machines to little purpose were 

overruled by ground officers who valued front-line morale-boosting missions 

against immediate tactical targets.b2 

Spaatz took Mitchell’s theories to heart. In February 1922, he wrote to the 

Chief of the Air Service that he conceived of four distinct types of pursuit missions-offensive, defensive, night, and attack-each requiring a plane of different design.63 As commander of the only pursuit group, he participated in the 

writing of several pursuit training and tactical manuals, including overall pursuit 

aviation training regulations, as well as regulations for the pursuit pilot, squadron, 

group, and wing.64 In only one case did Spaatz envisage the employment of pursuit in an exclusively defensive role. “The first bomb dropped by an enemy on 

17 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

A snow-covered ramp at Selfridge Field filled with Boeing and Curtiss pursuits. 

Frozen Lake Michigan appears in the background, early 1930s. 

one of our cities,” he stated, “will cause such a clamor that no executive would 

be strong enough to withstand it.” Spaatz noted, however, that defensive pursuit would be anything but defensive once airborne.65 When asked to comment on the attack aviation manuals, Spaatz indicated that “pursuit forces 

should not accompany the attack forces in the manner of an escort but should 

be concentrated over the objective of the attack at the time the attack forces 

arrive to deliver the attack.” Spaatz added, “The attack forces must be prepared to disperse a small force of the enemy pursuit which may molest them 

on their way to and from the objective.”66 It is important not to make too 

much of the influence of this early thinking on his subsequent actions, but it 

seems that Spaatz was at least predisposed to accept a doctrine that called for 

loose escort of bombers by fighters and aggressive employment of fighter aircraft at all times. 

While serving in Michigan, Spaatz had his first encounter with “drop tanks,” 

jettisonable aviation fuel tanks carried externally by fighter aircraft. He observed, “This arrangement, of course, permits pursuit to penetrate to much 

greater depth without destroying its characteristics.”67 Here was part of the solution to the long-range fighter-escort problem that would plague Spaatz and other 

bomber commanders twenty years later. Spaatz had recognized one piece of the 

long-range escort puzzle, but, like most other Air Corps officers, he was unable 

to fit that piece into place, to fully realize that drop tanks would give an aircraft 

of fighter performance a bomber’s range. 

Spaatz left the 1st Pursuit Group in 1924 to attend his branch of service’s 

18 
EARLY CAREER 

professional school, the Air Service Tactical School at Langley Field, near 

Norfolk, Virginia, where he had time for reflection-especially when he was 

hospitalized for a neck abscess that almost led to blood poisoning. While at 

Langley, he kept a diary; a practice he would not resume until he went to 

England in May 1940. Spaatz, in an introspective mood, attributed the death of 

one of his classmates in an air accident in part to reflexes slowed by age. Thirtythree years old at the time, he himself had just had a close call and wondered 

whether his own skills were slipping.68 In one of the few personally revealing 

notes in his papers, he analyzed himself as follows: 

CHARACTER ANALYSIS CAUSES AND REMEDIES 

1. Tendency to false illusion that nothing is worth-while except that done 

2. Tendency to be opinionated without sufficient knowledge. 

3. Mental laziness . . . resulting in ability to group quickly certain things 

but with no retentiveness, also resulting in inability to form definite conclusions 

and pursue consistent line of thought. 

4. Tendency to assume everyone acts with right motives hence no effort to 

differentiate between men to separate those whose mental makeup prevent[s] 

their acting with right motives as in case of Fanner [the emng finance officer]. 

5. Egotism which impels me to make authoritative statements on subjects 

or about things with which I am unfamiliar or only vaguely informed. 

6. Tendency to trust instinct rather than make effort to employ reason. 

7. Shyness induced by egotism (hating to admit lack of knowledge), mental 

by myself. 

laziness.@ 

This gloomy self-evaluation accurately highlighted several aspects of Spaatz’s 

personality. He had a quick mind but he was not an air power intellectual or 

philosopher. He relied on instinct and intuition rather than on systematic 

thought. Nor did he have any illusions regarding his depth of knowledge on 

most subjects; throughout most of his career he displayed no great interest, 

knowledge, or sympathy with affairs other than those directly affecting aviation. 

Finally, he admitted his “shyness,” which manifested itself in a painfully 

wooden manner in staff conferences or formal briefings requiring a rapid interchange of ideas. 

Before graduating from the Tactical School in June 1925, Spaatz traveled to 

Washington, D.C., to attend the hearings of the House Military Affairs Committee 

on the Curry Bill for a “separate Air Service.” A month later he gave testimony 

to the Lampert Committee of the House of Representatives which was investigating U.S. aviation. After stating that he personally knew 60 to 70 percent of 

the Army’s flyers, Spaatz gave his views on the place of aviation in the U.S. 

military: “The general feeling is that under present conditions we are not getting 

anywhere.” He went on to express his feeling that, as a new medium of combat, 

the Air Service required its own unique regulations, training doctrines, and 

19 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

methods of conducting warfare. He objected to the then current arrangements 

under which “we follow the doctrines laid down by the Army for their operations so far as the Army is concerned.” He added that “any work we may do is 

based on the effect it has on the Army’s operations. . . . No well-defined policy 

of independent operations by an air force acting independently of the Army is 

being developed under present conditions.” Finally, he noted the prevalent opinion within the Air Service that the next war would start in the air and that if it 

were to do so soon, “this country is absolutely defenseless.”70 

After Langley, Spaatz was posted to Washington, D.C., as Assistant G-3 for 

Training and Operations in the Office of the Chief of the Air Service. Arnold 

occupied the office next door. Spaatz’s four-year stay in Washington opened 

with the controversial court-martial of his old commanding officer, Billy Mitchell, 

during October and November 1925, in which Spaatz and Arnold loyally supported Mitchell. Spaatz participated in the ensuing cause ctlbbre as one of the 

first defense witnesses, testifying about the current strength of the Air Service. 

In his judgment, 1,300 of the 1,800 planes available were obsolete and only 400 

were “standard.” Of those 400, more than half were of World War I vintage; furthermore, only 26 of them were bombers and only 39 were observation planes. 

Spaatz noted that the U.S. Air Service had only 59 modern planes fit for duty. 

“By dragging all administrative officers from their desks,” Spaatz said that he 

could put 15 pursuit planes into the air, adding, “It is very disheartening to 

attempt to train or do work under such circ~mstances.”~~ In a key exchange, the 

defense counsel asked Spaatz if he thought the War Department was slowing the 

development of air power. The prosecutor objected that the question called for a 

conclusion on the part of the witness, but in the accompanying hubbub, Spaatz 

replied, “I do.” 

The defense counsel pressed, “Would the recommendation made by Colonel 

Mitchell have improved the Air Service in the technical and other divisions?” 

The prosecutor objected, and Spaatz was forbidden to say whether flyers were 

sufficiently trained in gunnery to fight a war. Members of the court also questioned Spaatz. One particularly sharp exchange took place between Spaatz and 

the president of the court, sixty-one-year-old Maj. Gen. Robert L. Howze. 

Howze, an old Indian fighter who had earned a Congressional Medal of Honor 

fighting the Sioux after Wounded Knee (the award of the medal was announced 

the day the court-martial opened) and had commanded a division in France, 

asked who was to blame for any shortcomings. Spaatz replied that, where gunnery was involved, the squadron commanders were at fault. Howze continued, 

“Is there anybody higher up than the commander of this unit who is responsible 

for the gunnery work?” Spaatz responded, “Well, in the case of the First Pursuit 

Group [his old command], the commander of the VI Corps Area has charge of 

it.” Spaatz’s pointed rejoinder drew the blood of the VI Corps Area Commander, 

who happened to be a member of the court. 

Maj. Gen. William S. Graves, leader of the U.S. Expeditionary Force in 

20 
EARLY CAREER 

Brig. Gen. William Mitchell addressing his court-martial, Washington, D.C., 

October 28.1925. 

Siberia, 1918-1919, asked whether his office had ever denied help to the air 

squadron. Spaatz responded that when the people of Oscoda, Michigan, had 

offered to rent a gunnery practice field to the Air Service for a dollar a year, he 

had had trouble persuading the War Department to pay. The crowd laughed, but 

Graves won the point when Spaatz was unable to recall specifically which office 

had delayed the matter. 

Neither Spaatz’s nor Arnold’s testimony swayed the court, which was even 

less impressed with Mitchell’s decision to conduct an all-out defense designed 

to take advantage of the circus atmosphere engendered by the trial’s heavy press 

coverage. The court-martial suspended Mitchell from active duty for five years, 

and he resigned72 

The statements Spaatz made at the court-martial illustrate the intensity of his 

convictions about preparednqss and the status of the Air Service. Despite warnings that his appearance might jeopardize his career, Spaatz, who believed in 

loyalty up and loyalty down, supported Mitchell. He displayed equal amounts of 

courage and tactlessness in bluntly describing Air Service conditions and in fixing responsibility for them. Spaatz later commented, “They can’t do anything to 

you when you’re under oath and tell them answers to their questions.”73 

21 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

During his first tour in Washington, D.C., Spaatz demonstrated another 

unusual facet of his character, his respect for the independence and intelligence 

of women. Although anything but a ladykiller or a Don Juan, Spaatz liked and 

appreciated women. As the father of three daughters and no sons he became 

used to living in a feminine household and he endured much good-natured teasing about his “harem.” He developed many deep friendships with remarkable 

women in the course of his career. While in Washington, he encouraged his wife 

to accept what was then a remarkable opportunity. For three years Ruth Spaatz 

became the member of a professional standing acting troupe at the National 

Theater. She eventually played leading roles. Given society’s attitudes toward 

working mothers and actresses, Spaatz’s support of his wife seems all the more 

unusual.74 Later, he would be one of the first and most enthusiastic supporters of 

the Women’s Army Corps (WAC), in World War 11. In fact, his executive officer for most of World War I1 was a WAC, which made him probably the only 

officer of his rank in the U.S. armed services to have a woman serving in such a 

role. 

Spaatz continued on staff duties until the end of 1928, when he received 

orders to command the 7th Bombardment Group at Rockwell Field in southern 

California. One of his first actions there involved a publicity stunt conceived by 

a close friend, Capt. Ira C. Eaker. Eaker proposed to set a new world record in 

flight endurance. In the moderate, predictable weather of southern California the 

flight would be safer, less stressful, and free of weather-imposed interference. 

There was also easy access to the media in nearby Hollywood. The idea appealed 

to Spaatz’s adventurous instincts and he quickly endorsed Eaker’s proposal. 

Between January 1 and 7, 1929, the flight of the Question Mark, a Fokker 

trimotor transport aircraft, commanded by Major Spaatz and crewed by Captain 

Eaker, Lt. Elwood R. Quesada, and Lt. Harry A. Halverson, set a world flight 

endurance record of 150 hours, 40 minutes, and 14 seconds, shuttling between 

Los Angeles and San Diego and gaining national and international attention. The 

Question Mark, so named because no one knew when it would come down, had 

its fuel tanks filled in the air 37 times, received 5,600 gallons of hand-pumped 

fuel, and traveled 1 1,000 miles. Perceptive observers noted that if Spaatz and his 

crew could man a craft that long, so could bomber crews.75 Less technologically 

oriented observers had different opinions. When Ruth Spaatz pointed out the aircraft flying overhead to the Spaatz’s oldest daughter, seven-year-old Tattie, and 

remarked, “That’s your daddy, and he’s been up there longer than any human 

being has ever been in the air before. Isn’t it marvelous?” Tattie crushingly 

replied, “I think it’s sort of dumb.”76 

Early in the flight-n January 1, as the plane flew over the Rose Bowl football game-the converted fire hose lowered for in-flight refueling came loose 

from the tank opening above the Question Mark and drenched Spaatz with 72- 

octane gasoline. Quesada headed for calmer weather over the ocean while the 

other crew members removed Spaatz’s clothes and rubbed him down to prevent 

22 
EARLY CAREER 

burns. Spaatz told them, “If I’m burned and have to bail out you keep this plane 

in the air, and that’s an order.”77 When refueling recommenced, the unharmed 

ma.jor, clad only in a parachute and a grin, stood halfway out an open hatch to 

make sure nothing separated again. 

On January 4, heavy fog prevented supply ships from locating the Question 

Murk, which had flown inland toward the Imperial Valley and clearer skies. When 

the Question Murk finally contacted a refueler, both aircraft almost hit the ground 

after entering an air pocket. Throughout the flight, supply ships delivered box 

lunches prepared by Air Corps wives or purchased from local diners, and when the 

standing endurance record was broken, ground crews sent up five jars of caviar, 

cheese, figs, and ripe olives?8 Engine trouble finally forced the plane down. 

The feat earned the Question Murk’s crew Distinguished Flying Crosses. 

Spaatz’s citation read in part, “By his endurance, resourcefulness and leadership, 

he demonstrated future possibilities in aviation which were heretofore not apparent and thus reflected great credit upon himself and the Army of the United 

State~.”~9 Ofcourse, fleeting international fame and medals carried no weight 

with penny-pinching clerks at the War Department. They forwarded the flight’s 

meal vouchers, approximately $75 per man, to the Comptroller General of the 

United States, who refused payment, noting: 

The fact that in the performance of the duty here in question the officers could 

not procure subsistence in the usual manner or at the accustomed places and 

that it was necessary to procure subsistence by means otherwise than ordinarily 

procured, creates no status giving a right to have the subsistence furnished them 

at the expense of the United States.80 

The flight inspired several imitators and by the end of the year civilian aviators 

had set an endurance record of 420 hours.81 

The Question Murk flight again demonstrated Spaatz’s skill as an administrator and logistician. He set up more than adequate refueling and resupply 

arrangements and showed his intense desire to fulfill his duty-even at risk to 

himself. The drive to complete a task, in spite of obstacles, was his hallmark. 

After three years at Rockwell Field, Spaatz assumed command of the 1st 

Bombardment Wing at March Field in Riverside, California. From California, 

Spaatz traveled back to the Potomac in 1933 where he served for two years as 

Chief of the Training and Operations Division in the Office of the Chief of the 

Air Corps (OCAC). In 1935 he received his first promotion in seventeen yearsto lieutenant colonel. 

With the promotion came orders to attend the Army Command and General 

Staff School at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. Most officers looked forward to 

this posting because it was a mandatory stepping-stone to the rank of general 

officer. Spaatz objected that he was too old (forty-four and only six years from 

retirement) and that he had no interest in the operation of an infantry division. 

He wrote Arnold, “I am going to Leavenworth not because I expect it will do me 

23 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

any good, but primarily because I am ordered there and secondarily to get away 

from here [Washington] ."82 He felt some relief, though, that the course had been 

reduced from two years to one. 

True to character, Spaatz, as he had done twenty-one years earlier at West 

Point, did barely enough course work to pass, finishing 94th out of 121. He 

made little attempt to conceal his contempt for the failure of the courses to contain a meaningful appreciation of air power. This attitude earned him an unfavorable recommendation for any further training in general staff or high command duty.83 The school had little influence on him and he apparently learned 

almost nothing of value there. 

Organization and Doctrine of the Prewar Air Corps 

Upon leaving Leavenworth in July 1936, Spaatz became Executive Officer, 

2d Wing, of the recently created General Headquarters (GHQ) Air Force, 

Langley Field in Virginia. The three wings of GHQ Air Force were far larger 

than the units that had previously held that designation in the Air Corps. As a 

consequence, in going from a wing commander at March Field in 1933 to the 

new post in one of the three major combat units in the service, Spaatz assumed a 

position entirely in keeping with his seniority. The only operational squadron of 

B-17s in the Air Corps made up part of the 2d Wing's order of battle. The 

assignment to the big four-engine bombers showed how far Spaatz and Army air 

power had come since the Mitchell court-martial. 

Although the Air Corps Act of July 2, 1926, had changed the designation of 

the Army Air Service to the Army Air Corps and had authorized an expansion to 

1,800 aircraft and 20,000 officers and men, extra funds had never come and the 

change of name had left the Air Corps' status unchanged; it remained one of the 

Army's combat branches. Over the next nine years, numerous bills on air reform 

were introduced in Congress, but not one received a favorable committee report. 

The failure to obtain independence had led many Air Corps officers, including 

Maj. Gen. Benjamin Foulois, to settle for something more obtainable. They proposed to divide Army aviation into two components: (1) observation planes normally assigned the armies, corps, mobile units, and fixed harbor defenses; and 

(2) remaining tactical support and striking force units grouped under the GHQ 

Air Force. The GHQ Air Force would operate under the wartime Army Supreme 

Commander (Army planning did not envisage a two-front war) to locate and 

attack the enemy; to assist the Army ground forces by attacking enemy rear 

areas; and to give direct support and cooperation, when required, to the ground 

forces. Spaatz served under Col. Frank M. Andrews on an Air Corps board that 

was authorized by the War Department to plan the creation of the GHQ Air 

Force, a concept Spaatz supported. 

On March 1, 1935, with the strong support of the Army Chief of Staff, 

General Douglas MacArthur, GHQ Air Force became a reality, gathering under 

24 
EARLY CAREER 

Maj. Gen. James E. Fechet, Chief, U.S. Army Air Corps, discussing the Question 

Murk’s flight with its crew. Leji to right: 1st Lt. Elwood R. Quesada, Capt. Ira C. 

Eaker, Fechet, Maj. Carl A. Spaatz, and Sgt. Roy G. Hooe. 

its aegis all the tactical units based in the United States. It formed thee combat 

wings, one at its headquarters at Langley Field and the other two at Barksdale 

Field in Louisiana and March Field in California. This measure at least brought 

much of the Air Corps’ combat strength into a single cohesive command structure. 

Unfortunately, this reorganization grafted GHQ Air Force onto the already 

existing Air Corps. Both the Chief of the Air Corps, who retained responsibility 

for mattriel procurement, personnel recruitment, and individual training and 

indoctrination of air crews, and the Commanding General, GHQ Air Force, 

reported directly to the Army Chief of Staff. This duality led to friction and 

competition between the two separate parts of the Air Corps-a situation of 

divide and rule not unforeseen by the War Department. In March 1939, under 

the pressure of rearmament and possible war in Europe, both GHQ Air Force 

and the Office of the Chief of Air Corps became directly responsible to the 

Chief of the Air Corps. 

Technology and doctrine both underwent considerable changes in the postMitchell Air Corps. Spaatz, who had started the 1920s as one of the Air 

Service’s pursuit (fighter) experts, ended the 1920s and spent most of the 1930s 

as a bombardment commander, first as Commanding Officer (CO), 7th Bombardment Group, from May 1929 to October 1931; then as CO, 1st Bomb Wing, 

25 
The Question Mark Flight, January 1929. Scenes from the aerial experiment. Clockwisefrom above: The interior of the Question Mark reveals the positions 

of an auxiliary gas tank on the floor, refueling apparatus on the roof, and berths. A 

chase aircraft with its chalked message (opposite, above) shows one means of communication before the introduction of reliable airborne radios. The gravity-fed 

transfer of gasoline proceeds between aircraft (opposite, below). Spaatz (below) 

wrestles with the refueling hose as it reaches the Question Mark. 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

from November 1931 to June 1933; and finally as Executive Officer of the 2d 

Wing, GHQ Air Force, from July 1936 to January 1939. This change in the technical focus of Spaatz’s career reflected the changes in aircraft and philosophy 

that influenced the Air Corps in the 1930s. 

Between 1930 and 1932, two fast, all-metal, monoplane twin-engine 

bombers entered the Air Corps inventory, the Boeing B-9 and the Martin B-10. 

The B-10, with a speed of 207 mph and a ceiling of 21,000 feet, outclassed any 

other bomber then in use in the world and most of the fighters as well. No 

sooner had the B-10 entered production than the Air Corps accepted bids on a 

newer generation of bombers, which resulted in the B-17. The B-17 weighed 

35,000 pounds (compared with the B-lo’s 9,000), and had four engines and a 

service ceiling of 30,000 feet. At 14,000 feet, at a top speed of 250 mph it could 

carry 2,500 pounds of bombs 2,260 miles. The prototype model first flew in 

August 1935, yet the B-17, suitably modified and upgraded, remained a first line 

bomber in the AAF fleet until the end of World War 11.84 

As bombardment aviation prospered, pursuit aviation languished. The Air 

Corps, squeezed with limited funding, concentrated its appropriations on bomber 

development. The B-10 and the B-17 appeared not to need escort against enemy 

fighters. Also, the B-17 could attack an enemy before he came within range of 

sensitive American targets. With the enemy held at arm’s length, the value of a 

large force of defensive fighters depreciated. As a result, the 1931-1935 period 

was the nadir of U.S. pursuit aviation and pursuit airframe development. The Air 

Corps’ top fighter, the P-26, had an open cockpit, nonretractable landing gear, a 

range of 360 miles, and a top speed of 235 mph. This lag in development left the 

United States almost a full generation of fighter aircraft behind the world’s other 

major aviation powers.85 

The most outspoken advocate of pursuit aviation in the service, Capt. Claire 

Chennault, head of pursuit instruction at the Air Corps Tactical School (which 

had moved in July 1931 from Langley Field to Maxwell Field in Alabama, just 

outside Montgomery), fought for a more balanced doctrine. He emphasized both 

the offensive and the defensive nature of fighter aircraft. Contending that pursuit 

aircraft could successfully intercept and destroy bombers as well as enemy fighters, he enunciated four major principles: 

1. Attainment of air supremacy depends upon the success of the pursuit 

2. The primary function of pursuit is to gain air supremacy. 

3. The first objective of pursuit is to destroy enemy pursuit. 

4. Success of pursuit depends upon equipment, selection and training of 

pilots, numbers, tactics, and organization in units large enough to provide effective concentration of force.86 

His pleading did not convince the leaders of the Air Corps, who distrusted 

him. Chennault retired on the grounds of ill health in 1937 and subsequently led 

a volunteer American pursuit unit, the American Volunteer Group, known as the 

force. 

28 
EARLY CAREER 

Flying Tigers, for the Nationalist Chinese forces fighting the Japanese. There he 

showed that his concepts were workable even under adverse conditions. 

Chennault left behind a few converts, such as Capt. Earle Partridge, who, 

with other officers, slightly revived pursuit aviation in the late 1930s. Through 

their efforts the Air Corps designed and accepted the P-40 fighter, which outclassed the P-26, although it proved inferior to the first-line fighters of other 

major aviation powers. The German Messerschmitt (Bf 109), the British 

Spitfire, and the Japanese Zero-all designed and brought into production at the 

same time as the P-40-surpassed it. 

Air Corps doctrine in the post-Mitchell era shifted materially. Fueled by the 

changes in technology, by Mitchell’s new writings (free of the need to conciliate 

the powers that be), and by the theories of Giulio Douhet (the Italian air power 

enthusiast and theoretician), most of the Air Corps accepted bombardment aviation rather than pursuit aviation as the most important arm of the service. 

Mitchell and Douhet advocated a form of aerial warfare that went far beyond the 

mere support of ground armies. Air power, they argued, could strike directly at a 

nation’s means of production, its lines of transportation, the morale of its population, and the will of its leader~hip.~7 

This aggressive and unofficial doctrine (official War Department doctrine 

focused on defending the continental United States) found a home in the Air 

Corps Tactical School (ACTS), where the instructors, mostly junior officers, 

adopted it and taught it to their classes.88 The major tenets of the ACTS included 

the following: 

1. The national objective in war is to break the enemy’s will to resist and to 

force the enemy to submit to our will. 

2. The accomplishment of the first goal requires an offensive type of warfare. 

3. Military missions are best carried through by cooperation between air, 

ground, and naval forces, although only air can contribute to all missions. 

4. The special mission of the air arm is the attack of the whole of the 

enemy national structure to dislocate its military, political, economic, and 

social activities. 

5. Modern warfare has placed such a premium on material factors that a 

nation’s war effort may be defeated by the interruption of its industrial network, which is vulnerable only to the air arm. The disruption of the enemy’s 

industrial network is the real target, because such a disruption might produce a 

collapse in morale sufficient to induce surrender. 

6. Future wars will begin by air action. Thus we must have an adequate 

standing air force to ensure our defense and to begin immediate offensive operations. We must place ourselves in a position to begin bombardment of the 

enemy as soon as possible. 

7. The current limited range of our aircraft requires the acquisition of allies 

to provide forward bases in order to begin action against the enemy. 

8. Assuming the existence of allies and forward bases, the air force would 

29 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

have the power to choose between attacking the armed forces or the national 

structure of the enemy. The latter should be the primary objective.89 

The foregoing doctrine, given the inevitability of the small prewar force, 

dictated a specific composition for strength available. The force would require a 

preponderance of long-range bombers to operate offensively. Bombers would 

maximize their effectiveness by extreme accuracy-10 tons of bombs on target 

would do as much damage as 100 tons of bombs dropped with 10 percent accuracy. Precision bombing meant daylight bombing; current and foreseeable technology could not provide for precise night bombing. Daylight bombing deep 

into enemy territory, given current technology, meant that bombers would operate without fighter escort and would need the ability to outrun or outgun enemy 

defensive fighters. The B-17, with its highly accurate and super-secret Norden 

bombsight, fit this specification perfectly, as would its successors. 

ACTS doctrine contained many assumptions that eventually proved invalid. 

It underestimated the capacity of a modem industrial nation and its populace to 

survive repeated and heavy bombing. It overestimated the ability of air technology to develop bombs big enough to damage heavy equipment or reinforced 

concrete and the ease with which those new bombs could be manufactured. It 

discounted the possibility of improvements in air defense and fighter technology 

that would reverse the advantage held by the bomber. In their most extreme 

position, heavy-bomber enthusiasts assumed that fighter defenses would be 

unable to locate bombers until they had dropped their bombs. Because bombers 

could strike with seeming impunity, the best defense was a good offense. Enemy 

forces would resort to their own attacks. Then the sky would fill with aerial 

armadas passing each other virtually undisturbed until the side with the most 

effective strength subdued the other. 

In only one other nation did the advocates of strategic bombing gain a decisive voice in shaping doctrine and affecting airframe design and acquisitionBritain. There the followers of Marshal of the Royal Air Force (RAF) Hugh 

Trenchard, the first Chief of Staff of the RAF, a service independent of the 

British army and navy, also adopted a bombing philosophy similar to that of 

Douhet and Mitchell. They, too, committed themselves to daylight bombardment, believing, in the words of Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, in 1931, that 

‘+the bomber will always get through. The only defence is offence, which means 

you have to kill more women and children more quickly than the enemy if you 

want to save yoursel~es.”9~ In Germany, France, Japan, and Italy, however, the 

air services, even if nominally independent, found themselves subservient to theories or general staffs that bound them to tactical support of their country’s land 

or naval forces. 

The advent of radar and highly organized ground-spotter organizations, both 

unforeseen by Air Corps bomber advocates, solved the defensive problem of 

tracking the bomber force. One ACTS instructor, Maj. Haywood S. Hansell, a 

30 
E~ARLY CAREER 

leading Air Corps bomber theoretician, who led the 3d Bomb Wing in Europe in 

1943 and the XXI Bomber Command in Guam in 1944, later admitted, “If our 

air theorists had had knowledge of radar in 1935, the American doctrine of strategic bombing in deep daylight penetrations would surely not have evolved.”gl 

Similarly, improvements in fighter design led to faster, more heavily armed 

types that could best the B-17 and could be overcome only if they were prevented from reaching the bombers. The Air Corps, however, had rejected the 

idea that fighters should escort the bombers deep into enemy territory. Current 

technology seemed incapable of producing an aircraft that could (1) carry the 

combined weight of fuel necessary for long missions and armament superior to 

its opponents’ and (2) retain the speed and agility to survive a dogfight unburdened by the necessary weight penalties of long-range flight. In addition, the Air 

Corps would never have the funds to build both a prewar bomber fleet and an 

escort fighter fleet under a particularly parsimonious Congress. The Air Corps 

maintained its stance against long-range escort through 1940. Only the fortuitous 

development of the long-range P-51 and drop tanks for the P-47, as well as their 

deployment in late 1943 and early 1944, saved American air power from a costly 

mistake. 

During the 1930s, Spaatz articulated few views on air doctrine. What can be 

gleaned from his actions and writings as air observer during the Battle of 

Britain, as Chief of the Air Staff, and as combat commander in World War I1 

suggests a clear affinity with the Air Corps Tactical School branch of air doctrine. He had a close relationship with Arnold, a leading bomber man; Spaatz 

had served on the development boards for the B-17, the B-24, and the B-29,g2 

and he believed in their ability to defend themselves. But there were indications 

that, with regard to the tactical sphere of operations, Spaatz still adhered to 

Mitchell’s early dictum regarding the absolute necessity of establishing air superiority before proceeding to other air operations. 

Spaatz’s Association with Arnold and Eaker 

During the interwar years, Spaatz remained roughly one step behind Henry 

H. Arnold and one step ahead of Ira C. Eaker, two of his closest friends in the 

service. In many ways the careers of the triumvirate reflect the experience of the 

entire Air Corps for the period. 

Arnold to Spaatz to Eaker was not the double-play combination of a professional baseball team but the eventual chain of command for American heavybomber forces in the British Isles. Henry H. Arnold (born June 25, 1886), Carl 

A. Spaatz (born June 28, 1891), and Ira C. Eaker (born April 13, 1896) had a 

long association with one another. The three had first served together at 

Rockwell Field in San Diego, California, in December 1918. Their task of 

demobilizing units of the Air Service had been diametrically opposed to their 

future effort of building up a strategic bombing force. Their friendships, both 

31 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

personal and professional, had deepened through the years. Spaatz and Arnold 

were the closest of confidants from 1918 until the latter’s death in 1950. Eaker 

was almost as close to both. Yet the three had different backgrounds, personalities, and approaches to life. 

Arnold graduated from West Point in 1907. Like Spaatz, he graduated in 

the lower half of his class academically and did not achieve cadet rank. Four 

years (and ten days of flight training) later he became one of the Army’s first 

four licensed pilots and one of the first twenty-nine licensed pilots in the country. Wilbur Wright even served as one of his instructors. Until slowed by a 

series of heart attacks at the height of his career in 1941, Arnold was an 

extremely energetic advocate of U.S. military aviation. He believed it should 

become an independent armed service, and he dedicated his life to seeing that 

it did. Although Arnold was highly intelligent, he was intellectually undisciplined; thus he tended to endorse a variety of contradictory ideas in rushing to 

accomplish his goals. He was, on the one hand, astute enough to support the 

very long-range bomber, the B-29; he was, on the other, naive enough to see 

merit in what was derisively dubbed the “bats in the belfry” project to drop 

fire-bomb-carrying bats on Japanese cities. He had little patience with people 

who opposed his ideas but had an ability to get things done, especially when 

dealing with production and personnel. 

To his friends, Arnold demonstrated a charm, openness, and exuberance 

that helped eam him the sobriquet “Happy” or just plain “Hap.” To his opponents he was “a real S.O.B.” One of his great regrets was missing the chance 

to serve in a combat command during World War I. Instead he had become the 

Army’s youngest full colonel at age thirty-one and had spent the war in 

Washington, D.C., serving on the War Department Staff, where he saw firsthand the difficulties of organizing an air force from the ground up. 

After the war, he stayed in the Air Service, rising to Assistant Chief of the 

Air Corps in 1935; upon the flying death of Maj. Gen. Oscar Westover in 

1938, he became Chief of the Air Corps. Highlights along the way include testimony at Mitchell’s court-martial, attendance at the Command and General 

Staff School in 1929, and the winning of the Mackay Trophy in 1934 for commanding a flight of B-10 bombers from Bolling Field in Washington, D.C., to 

Fairbanks, Alaska, and back. Late in life, Spaatz said of Arnold, “I know he 

had confidence in me, because of the relationship we had before. With me, he 

might sound impatient, but when I responded and gave him the reason for 

what I was doing, that would end it.”93 

Ira C. “Iree” Eaker took a reserve commission in the Infantry after graduating from Southeastern State Teachers College in Oklahoma in 1917. In 

November 1917, he transferred to the Signal Corps, Aviation Section; ten 

months later he received his pilot’s rating. From 1919 to 1922 he served in the 

Philippines, and from 1922 to 1924, at Mitchel Field in New York. From 1924 

to 1926, he was a pilot for the Chief of the Air Service, Maj. Gen. Mason 

32 
EARLY CAREER 

Patrick; the Assistant Chief, Brig. Gen. James Fechet; and the Assistant 

Secretary of War for Air, Trubee Davison. Unlike the fiery, hard-driving Arnold 

or the taciturn Spaatz, Eaker was the diplomat of the trio. Although not asked to 

testify at the Mitchell court-martial, because he served as assistant defense counsel at Maj. Gen. Patrick’s orders, he stayed up nights helping Spaatz and Arnold 

prepare their statements. 

In the late 1920s and 1930s, Eaker pursued his career. He participated in the 

Pan-American Flight goodwill tour of 1926 and 1927 and the flight of the 

Question Mark, and he graduated from the Air Corps Tactical School in 1936 

and the Command and General Staff School in 1937. In 1936 he completed the 

first transcontinental flight purely on instruments, flying the entire trip with a 

canvas hood over his cockpit. 

In 1932 the Army sent Eaker to the Journalism School at the University of 

Southern California; he earned a B.A. in journalism in September 1933. This 

education helped him to write three books with Arnold. The most significant 

was The Flying Game, published in 1936. By 1941, he had gained his full 

colonelcy and the command of the 20th Pursuit Group at Mitchel Field. Both 

Spaatz and Arnold trusted him completely. That trust, Eaker’s skill in gaining 

the respect of others, and his undeniable skills as an air leader and pioneer made 

him Arnold’s logical choice to arrange for the arrival of AAF combat forces in 

England in 1942. When Arnold chose Spaatz to lead the U.S. Eighth Air Force 

to Britain, both men mentally penciled in Eaker as second in c0mmand.9~ 

By the end of 1938, Carl Spaatz had spent twenty-eight years in the United 

States Army, twenty-three of them as a flyer. From his days at West Point 

through his course at the Command and General Staff School he showed little 

appreciation of, if not disdain for, the academic side of the military profession. 

He had independently conceived no profound or original thoughts concerning 

his specialty-military aviation. His mind did not turn to systematic thinking but 

worked intuitively. He was not an intellectual leader, but he became, nonetheless, an early convert to many of the advanced aviation ideas of his era. He 

formed close associations with men such as Mitchell, Andrews, and Arnold, and 

he absorbed their ideas as his own. Spaatz believed that U.S. military aviation 

ought to be independent, and he placed great faith in the doctrine of strategic 

daylight precision bombing. Similarly, he did not display great enthusiasm for 

the technical aspects of airframe and engine research and development. He 

served on numerous aircraft development boards and participated in the Question 

Mark flight, but he was never assigned to his service’s technological areas. 

If Spaatz’s intellectual and scientific prowess did not raise him above his 

peers or catch the eye of Arnold, his breadth of experience in training, operations, administration, and staff work as well as his self-confidence, honesty, loyalty, and courage did. Spaatz was a man of action who invariably accomplished 

the tasks set for him-an invaluable trait for any officer. At Issoudun he had 

demonstrated the ability to train and organize from the ground up. At the front 

33 

EARLY CAREER 

A jaunty Lt. Col. Henry H. Arnold and actress Bebe Daniels pose in front of a Boeing 

P-12 “Peashooter,” Long Beach, California, October 30,1932. 

he had shot down three planes in as many weeks. He had gained insight into the 

problems associated with both pursuit and bombardment as group leader and 

wing commander. In his tours in the operations, trainhg, and plans sections of 

the Office of the Chief of the Air Service/Corps, he had learned the bureaucratic 

intricacies of the War Department and had developed a great dislike for repetitive staff work. As a commander he would use his staff to insulate himself from 

routine in order to free himself for decisions. 

It was Spaatz’s ability to make quick, correct decisions based on his wide 

experience, common sense, and intuition, coupled with the moral courage to 

face such decisions, that would make him an outstanding combat Air Force 

leader. 

35 

Chapter 2 

Prewar Planning 

(January 1939-November 1941) 

It takes close coordination with the Army to obtain maximum misuse of air power.’ 

Spaatz’s Battle of Britain Diary, August 28,1940. 

On January 12, 1939, Spaatz officially left the GHQ Air Force to assume 

command of the Plans Section of the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps 

(OCAC). He rejoined his friend Arnold, who had become head of the Air Corps 

on September 29, 1938. Toward the end of November 1938, a few weeks after 

the Munich crisis in Europe had ended, Arnold temporarily reassigned Spaatz 

from Langley Field to Washington, D.C., and ordered him to draw up in secret 

an expansion plan that would bring the Air Corps up to a strength of 10,000 

planes within two years. This marked the first step of the Air Corps’ planning 

and preparation for World War 11. For the next three years in roles as Chief of 

the Plans Section, as a special Military Air Observer to Britain, and as Chief of 

the Air Staff of the AAF, Carl Spaatz contributed to the Air Corps’ preparations 

for war. 

Rearmament of the Air Corps 

On November 14, 1938, the day the United States recalled its Ambassador 

from Berlin and a week after the mid-term elections had returned reduced but 

still overwhelming Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress, Arnold 

attended a special meeting with President Roosevelt at the White House. Also 

present were Harry Hopkins, head of the Works Progress Administration and 

one of Roosevelt’s chief advisers and troubleshooters; Robert H. Jackson, 

Solicitor General of the United States; Louis Johnson, Assistant Secretary of 

War; Herman Oliphant, General Counsel of the Treasury Department; General 

37 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Malin Craig, Army Chief of Staff; and his deputy, Brig. Gen. George C. 

Marshall. The President apparently called the meeting in response to a series of 

disturbing European events. In late September the Munich Conference, which 

resulted in the German occupation of the Czech Sudetenland on October 3, further revealed the unrelenting nature of Hitler’s territorial demands. A meeting 

with the U.S. Ambassador to France, William C. Bullitt, on October 13, confirmed for Roosevelt the dangerous state of European politics. And the increasingly barbaric behavior of the Nazis toward the German Jews, displayed in such 

incidents as “Crystal Night” on November 8, 1938, amply illuminated the 

viciousness of the German state’s internal policies. These events, the culmination of years of Hitler’s foreign and domestic policies, conclusively demonstrated to Roosevelt the rogue nature of the Nazi regime. They convinced him 

that the United Stated needed to enlarge its airplane production capacity greatly 

in order to counter the mounting security threat to the United Stated posed by 

the Germans. Roosevelt intended these planes not only for the Air Corps but for 

the French and British as well. Apparently FDR hoped that making an increased 

U.S. manufacturing capacity available to the French and British would enable 

them to procure enough aircraft either to forestall an attack by Hitler or to help 

them defeat him if war came.2 

At the meeting on November 14, the President did most of the talking. He 

noted the weakness of U.S. defenses and pointed out that Germany had a 

reported air strength almost double the combined Anglo-French total. The 

President sought an Army Air Corps of 20,000 planes, with an annual productive capacity of 2,000 planes per month. He knew, however, that such a program 

would not pass Congress. Therefore he asked the War Department to develop a 

plan for building 10,000 aircraft and for constructing new plant capacity for an 

additional 10,000 aircraft per year. Although his meeting concentrated on airplanes, it supplied the spark for all subsequent Army and Army Air Corps prewar matkriel and manpower expansion as the War Department sought not only 

new planes but funds to provide a balanced, combat-ready Army.3 

On November 17, Arnold detailed Spaatz along with Col. Joseph T. 

McNarney and Col. Claude Duncan to draw up within the next month the Air 

Corps’ plan to meet the President’s requests. This plan served as the blueprint 

for further expansion of an Air Corps that in the autumn of 1938 had only 1,600 

aircraft on hand. Plants working on aircraft contracts for the Air Corps had a 

productive capacity of only 88.2 planes per month.4 Even six months later (June 

1939), the Air Corps still had only thirteen operational B-17s and 22,287 personnel, only twice the strength of the Ca~alry.~ 

In January 1939, Spaatz became Chief of the Plans Section of the OCAC. 

Aside from fourteen weeks as a special observer in Britain during the summer of 

1940 and one month as head of the Materiel Division, he remained in that post 

until July 1941 when he became the first Chief of the Air Staff, Army Air 

Forces. The major tasks of the Plans Section were the preparation of the Air 

38 
PREWAR PLANNING 

:", \- 

Maj. Gen. Henry H. 

Arnold, Chief, U.S. 

Army Air Corps, 1938. 

I 

Corps annexes to the Army war plans; the integration of the lessons of the war 

in Europe into current Air Corps planning and training; the establishment of aircraft production priorities; the coordination of all research and development projects associated with combat aircraft; and, most important, the creation and management of the various air expansion and rearmament programs introduced in 

the prewar period.6 

The first significant problem to face the Plans Section was Roosevelt's rejection of the expansion plan presented to him by the Army and the Air Corps. He 

had asked for $500 million in Air Corps planes, but the Army and the Air Corps 

had requested an additional $200 million for Army matbriel, $100 million for 

Navy aircraft, plus unstated amounts for air bases and air training. The President, 

who was not at all sure Congress would approve the additional $500 million in 

the first place, redistributed the funds giving $200 million of the $500 million to 

the Army mat6riel branches, earmarking $120 million for air bases and other nonplane air items, and leaving $180 million for procurement of 3,000 combat aircraft. He promised to find the Navy's money elsewhere. Congress passed the 

expansion bill in April 1939, authorizing an Air Corps ceiling of 5,500 aircraft? 

Spaatz spent much of his time dealing with the nuts and bolts of training and 

procurement. The problem of aircraft for the French and British proved vexing 

from the beginning. On January 23, 1939, an advanced model U.S. Army divebomber crashed during a flight test, killing the American co-pilot and injuring 

39 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the French pilot and ten others. This accident gave ammunition to members of 

Congress and others who wished to build up U.S. forces before aiding Britain 

and France or who sought to avoid sending aid to any belligerent in the hope of 

avoiding entanglement in the coming war. 

Yet the accident also established a precedent permitting a policy of more liberal release of advanced aircraft. Within weeks the British purchased 650 aircraft worth $25 million, while the French added another 615 planes worth $60 

million. In the course of the year Canada, Australia, Belgium, Norway, Sweden, 

and Iraq placed further orders. Although the American aircraft industry accepted 

the orders, it feared that U.S. neutrality laws might prevent delivery in the event 

of war and was reluctant to expand production facilities. In the face of this reluctance, the French agreed to underwrite the cost of expansion for engines from 

Pratt and Whitney and airplanes from Wright Aeronautical. By November 1939, 

the British and French had invested more than $84 million in engine plants 

alone.8 

These large orders ran head-on into the Air Corps’ own 5,500-plane program. In July and August 1939, the Air Corps let contracts of $105 million, 

more than the entire business of the industry in any peacetime year prior to 

1938. Congress spent an additional $57 million to buy new manufacturing 

equipment for the aircraft industry. By the end of 1939 there was a backlog of 

orders worth $630 million, with $400 million attributable to foreign purchases.9 

The outbreak of war on September 1, 1939, the same day that George C. 

Marshall officially became Chief of the War Department General Staff, 

increased the pressure from the Western Allies for aid. On March 25, 1940, the 

Allies received permission to purchase all but the most advanced models of U.S. 

combat and trainer types. Aircraft available to the Allies included the B-17, B-24, 

B-25, B-26, A-20, and P-40, all front-line aircraft in the Air Corps inventory. 

After the fall of France, the British took over all French contracts and added more 

of their own. Their orders soon reached 14,000 planes, and after Dunkirk the 

administration continued its policy of filling Britain’s immediate combat needs 

over the requirements of Air Corps expansion.1° As a result, the Air Corps was 

short of aircraft for training and for equipping its new and existing units. 

The entire process left Spaatz shaking his head in disagreement; years later 

he remarked, “In 1939, when the British Mission was here, my own feeling was 

that we should build up our own air force rather than build up someone else’s.”” 

In a memo to Arnold he remarked, “It might be difficult to explain in the case of 

the collapse of England and the development of a threat against the Western 

Hemisphere or our possessions how we can agree that any airplanes can be 

diverted at a time when we have only sufficient modem airplanes to equip a paltry few. squadrons.”12 

40 
PREWAR PLANNING 

Spaatz Observes the Battle of Britain Firsthand 

In May 1940, Spaatz took on a new assignment as Assistant Military 

Attache (Air) to Britain, or as he put it, “a high-class spy.”13 Amold sent him to 

Europe to get a firsthand view of the current state of the air war. Officially, he 

went to study Royal Air Force (RAF) training and tactics. Unofficially, he went 

to discuss British aircraft requirements in light of U.S. production and training 

programs. As Chief of Air Corps Plans, a position he resumed soon after retuming from Britain, Spaatz had unique knowledge of the status of the Air Corps’ 

capabilities, including its readiness, training, procurement, and war plans. He 

would find this knowledge invaluable as he assessed the British experience. He 

could immediately apply whatever he learned from the RAF to the Air Corps’ 

programs. 

The position Spaatz occupied came about as a direct result of the intervention of President Roosevelt. In early 1940, the President and General Marshall 

visited an Air Corps display: afterward the President asked for the number of air 

attaches accredited to London. On learning that the embassy had two air 

attachts, he suggested doubling the figure. l4 The Air Corps promptly asked the 

British for permission to send two specialist officers as assistant air attaches and 

requested the British to share the tactical and technical lessons in the war to 

date. These officers would have diplomatic status as attaches, but they were 

actually technical observers. Their official orders referred to them as “Military 

Air Observers.” Although not explicitly stated, the Air Corps apparently 

intended to fill the two attache positions with a series of technical and administrative experts, on relatively short assignments, to obtain access to the most 

recent combat developments. 

Although the RAF Director of Plans, Air Commodore John Slessor, gave the 

suggestions qualified support, other sections of the Air Ministry greeted the 

propositions with suspicion. The Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Cyril 

Newall asked, “What guarantee have we that this information will not find its 

way back to our enemies?”‘He added, “I am not prepared to be rushed by the 

Americans, who, as always, wish to have the best of both worlds. They would 

like to be our allies, but without any obligations, and they are not blind naturally 

to the pecuniary advantages of such a state of affairs.”’5 

The Air Ministry’s delay elicited a protest from the British embassy in 

Washington. The British ambassador, the Marquis of Lothian, noted the unfavorable impression created by the delay, especially in light of the President’s 

interest. He emphasized the advantages to be gained by having American manufacturers build more combat-ready aircraft, and concluded, “I regard an early 

and favorable decision as highly desirable.”16 On March 11, influenced by the 

interest of Lothian and the President, the Chief of the Air Staff recommended 

approval of the proposal on the conditions “that information made available to 

these Air Attaches should be treated with complete secrecy, and that we should 

41 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

expect to obtain a reasonable amount of information in return for what we give.” 

The Chief of the Air Staff retained the full right to refuse the American attach& 

any information. l7 The British subsequently decided to deny the American 

attach& access to all operations rooms and details of their workings,* to tell 

them nothing about any aspect of radar, to give no information about stabilized 

automatic bombsights, and to share no detailed drawings of power-operated turrets.18 

The first pair of observers arrived in Britain in April 1940. Instructions from 

the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps required them to report on the ability of 

bombardment aircraft to penetrate active antiaircraft defenses, on the use of 

escort fighters, on the effectiveness of aerial bombing, on methods proposed to 

increase bomber aircraft effectiveness, and on methods proposed to increase pursuit aircraft effectiveness.19 Significantly, the Air Corps sent one of its leading 

ordnance, armaments, and bombing technical experts, Lt. Col. Grandison 

Gardner,? and an expert in aircraft engines, Maj. Franklin 0. Carroll. Gardner 

stayed in Britain until the beginning of the German offensive in the west in May 

1940. He became convinced of the need to incorporate either existing British 

power-operated machine gun turrets, or if British designs could not be obtained, 

the development of American turrets, into the construction of all future 

American heavy bombers.20 Both American officers reflected conventional Air 

Corps opinions. Neither expected America to take an active part in the war. 

However, Gardner did suggest that in the event the Americans supplied the RAF 

with a number of B-l7s, experienced reserve Air Corps officers proceed to 

Canada to serve as civilian instructors to British crews.21 

Spaatz and Capt. Benjamin S. Kelsy were the second set of Military Air 

Observers sent to Britain. They received the same instructions as Gardner and 

Two weeks before their arrival, the acting American military attach6 

in England, Col. Martin F. Scanlon, wrote the RAF Director of Intelligence, 

whose branch had responsibility for supervising and escorting foreign military 

visitors, to arrange inspections of RAF installations. Scanlon asked permission 

for Spaatz and Kelsey to observe the headquarters of RAF Fighter, Bomber, and 

Coastal Commands, to visit one station belonging to each command, and to 

inspect one of each type of training scho01.2~ This itinerary matched Spaatz’s 

expertise, as one of the chief Air Corps planning officers assigned to create and 

sustain an up-to-dtte and expanding Air Corps training program. The RAF’s 

methods of coping with the rapid expansion of its force had a direct bearing on 

his own responsibilities. 

* Within the operations rooms, RAF air defense fighter squadrons plotted all incoming information (including radar bearings) on aircraft over Britain. 

t Lt. Col. Gardner’s previous assignment had been in the Air Matbriel Division as Chief, 

Armaments Laboratory, Experimental Engineering Section. For two years before that he had served 

as the operations officer and then the executive officer of the 19th Bombardment Group. 

42 
PREWAR PLANNING 

Air Chief Marshal Cyril 

Newall, Chief of the Air 

Staff, RAF, 1937-1940. 

On May 28 Spaatz sailed into Genoa, Italy, on the U.S. liner Manhattan. 

U.S. neutrality laws forced him to sail on neutral shipping that avoided the 

blockade announced by the warring powers. Three days later, after a journey 

through still-neutral Italy and belligerent France, he arrived in London. The 

Dunkirk evacuation was in full operation, and the Allied coalition prepqred for 

the hopeless second phase of the Battle of France. The next morning, June 1, he 

was presented to the American ambassador, Joseph P. Kennedy. More important for the purpose of his mission, Spaatz also renewed his personal contacts 

with the principal embassy attach& for air, Col. Martin F. Scanlon and his 

assistant, Maj. George C. McDonald. They provided his entree to the RAF. 

On June 1, Spaatz's first full day in Britain, he lunched with Air Chief 

Marshal Newall." He also met the RAF Chief of Intelligence, Air Commodore 

Archibald Boyle. Two days later he lunched with his British opposite number, 

Air Commodore Slessor.24 During these early meetings, Spaatz noted that after 

* RAF-AAF equivalent ranks: 

Marshal of the RAF 

Air Chief Marshal (ACM) General 

Air Marshal (AM) 

Air Vice-Marshal (AVM) 

Air Commodore (NCmdr) 

Group Captain (GC) Colonel (Col.) 

General of the Army 

Lieutenant General (Lt. Gen.) 

Major General (Maj. Gen.) 

Brigadier General (Brig. Gen.) 

43 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

only nine months of war both the Germans and the British had begun to run 

short of trained crews. He learned that the British had captured German pilots 

with less than 100 hours’ flying time and that, for the British themselves, a 

shortage of trained crews, not lack of aircraft, was the biggest bottleneck in 

fielding a large force. He also learned that the RAF “apparently thinks as we 

do, but [has] been hindered by higher-ups” with regard to the feasibility and 

desirability of strategic bombing of the German economy.25 

For the next ten days, Spaatz visited the RAF’s Training Command, 

Technical Training Command, and training bases. The initial training system of 

the British impressed Spaatz, but he considered their bombing accuracy low 

and doubted the effectiveness of night bombing. Spaatz and the two other 

American attach& who accompanied him agreed that, in the event of active 

U.S. participation in the war, the most useful immediate contribution the United 

States could make would be high-altitude long-distance bombem26 This conclusion was probably based more on the predilection of Army Air Corps officers toward the use of large bombers than to any lessons directly related to their 

visit. In almost every other phase of air activity, their observations must have 

shown them that the RAF had outpaced 1940 Air Corps practice. 

Meanwhile, the French, whose army had been shattered by the Wehrmacht, 

on June 17 asked for an armistice. During this dark period of the war, Spaatz initiated informal staff talks to discuss the details of America’s “almost inevitable” 

entry into the ~ar.2~ Spaatz’s authority to begin such extraordinary discussions 

was unclear. No secret instructions or hints of any have surfaced in Roosevelt’s, 

Arnold’s, and Spaatz’s personal papers. Given Spaatz’s presence as an observer 

in an ongoing program (the Air Corps continued to send short-term Military Air 

Observers to England until the U.S. entry into the war) and his assignment to the 

post before the outbreak of the German offensive on May 10, 1940, it seems 

unlikely that any higher authorities would have anticipated the need for immediate emergency aid to England or would have authorized him to initiate such 

negotiations.* Spaatz probably initiated these discussions on his own. 

* Absence of proof, however does not mean that such instructions could not have been 

passed to Spaatz after he went to Britain. Spaatz arrived in London during the repercussions of 

the Tyler Kent affair. Kent was a code clerk in the American embassy. On May 20, 1940, the 

British informed the Americans, using incontrovertible evidence, that Kent had totally compromised US. diplomatic codes. As a result, all communications of the US. diplomatic service were 

blacked out for two to six weeks between Dunkirk and the fall of France, while scores of special 

couriers delivered new codes to all U.S. embassies. It may well have been that higher-ups in 

Washington could not have told Spaatz to begin negotiations even if they had wanted to, unless, 

of course, a courier hand-carried instructions from Washington to him. See David Kahn, The 

Codehreakers: The Story of Secret Writing (New York: Macmillan, 1967), pp. 494-495, for more 

on Tyler Kent. On the other hand, instructions could have reached Spaatz through the US. naval 

or military attach&’ office. Because of known slackness in State Department signal security, 

important message traffic to and from London, such as that between Roosevelt and Churchill, 

came via the Navy message center. 

44 
PREWAR PLANNING 

Such a step was probably less radical than it might at first appear. As Spaatz 

probably knew from his tour as Air Corps Chief of Plans, the U.S. and British 

navies had come to a preliminary meeting of minds on war-fighting strategy as 

early as December 1937.28 In late May 1940, as Spaatz may well have known, 

the U.S..Naval Attach6 in London, Capt. Alan G. Kirk, with the approval of the 

British Admiralty, had recommended to his superiors the assignment of U.S. 

naval officers as observers with British fleet units, which was agreed to.29 On 

June 10, President Roosevelt gave strong public support to the British and 

French in the famous “stab in the back” speech delivered at Charlottesville, 

Virginia. The next day, at the President’s insistence, the War Department transferred to the British “surplus” war mattriel, including 500,000 Enfield rifles, 

129,140,708 rounds of ammunition, 80,583 machine guns, 316 three-inch mortars, 20,000 revolvers, 25,000 Browning automatic rifles, and 895 seventy-five 

mm guns with a million rounds of ammunition, through an intermediary company of the U.S. Steel Corp~ration.~~ On June 15, the British Admiralty set up a 

committee, under the direction of Admiral Sidney Bailey, to consider questions 

arising from possible naval cooperation with the United States.31 As a result, 

Spaatz ran little risk in opening exploratory talks of his own with the RAF; their 

public disclosure would have added little fuel to the measures already approved 

or undertaken. Nor did he commit his country to more than information finding. 

In any case, this dkmarche was one of the first efforts in combined U.S.-British 

operational military planning. 

On June 13, the day before the fall of Paris, Major McDonald, after discussing the subject of direct U.S. aid to the British with Spaatz, visited the RAF 

Director of Intelligence. He informed Air Commodore Archibald Boyle that military officers at the U.S. embassy were considering the possibility that the 

United States would contribute directly to the war in the air over Europe. Acting 

on the assumption that entry of the United States into the war was “almost 

inevitable,” McDonald suggested that plans be prepared for the dispatch of fifty 

B-17s to Britain. If the proposal received a favorable hearing in the United 

States, then pilots could be trained and special targets studied. Bearing out 

Spaatz’s responsibility in initiating this matter, McDonald indicated that if the 

RAF “thought there was anything in it, he could arrange for the necessary 

papers [emphasis in original] to be sent to General Miles [the senior U.S. 

Military Attach6 in London] and General Arnold in the U.S.A. at once.”32 

The Director of Intelligence passed the McDonald-Spaatz suggestion on to 

Slessor, who was “all for the plan” in principle. On June 16, Spaatz, McDonald, 

and Slessor fully discussed the proposal and agreed on the details of a small air 

expeditionary force.33 After this session Slessor circulated the plan to the appropriate branches of the Air Ministry so that each could contribute its share to the 

final plan. The targets suggested by the RAF included oil plants at Vienna, 

Regensburg, Leuna, Stettin, and Magdeburg; aircraft factories at Munich, Berlin, 

Magdeburg, Dessau, and Kassel; and targets in northern Italy. They were 

45 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Air Commodore John 

Slessor, Director of Plans, 

Air Staff, RAF, 1940-1942. 

beyond the range of current RAF bombers or were small, requiring precision 

attacks.34 

Before these talks could progress further, on June 17, the British ambassador 

in Washington, D.C., Lord Lothian, proposed to the President that talks between 

the combined armies, navies, and, if necessary, air forces of the United States 

and Britain might be useful. Roosevelt consented.35 This agreement in principle 

was immediately passed to the British armed services. On June 20, Slessor 

informed the Air Staff, “The President of the U.S.A. has authorized immediate 

secret staff conversations on naval and air matters. . . . Major MacDonald and 

Colonel Spaatz (the U.S.D. of Plans) have already asked me to give them an outline plan for the reception and operation of one heavy-bomber group and one 

fighter gr0up.”3~ Both the RAF and Spaatz seem to have regarded these talks as 

nothing more than courtesies, preliminary to the opening of formal staff conversations. 

Prime Minister Churchill, however, dithered over accepting the President’s 

offer. He feared that the Americans would use the occasion to insist on discussing the transfer of the British fleet to transatlantic bases in the event of 

Britain’s defeat. Foreign Minister Lord Halifax pressed the Prime Minister for 

an early decision, explaining that Roosevelt might cool to the idea, that the situation in the Far East needed coordination, and that the service ministers were all 

in favor of talks.37 On June 30, Churchill agreed to the talks provided they 

occurred in London where the British could ensure security. The President, who 

46 
PREWAR PLANNING 

wished to minimize publicity before the November 1940 national elections, was 

happy to agree.38 

After further delay, on July 20, Lord Lothian learned that Rear Adm. Robert 

L. Ghormley, Assistant Chief of Naval Operations, and Brig. Gen. George V. 

Strong, Assistant Chief of Staff (head of the War Plans Division), had been 

appointed members of a U.S. military delegation destined for London for talks 

with British military leaders. Lothian thereupon pressed for the inclusion of an 

air expert, which resulted in the addition of Maj. Gen. Delos C. Emmons, 

Commanding General, GHQ Air Force. The true purpose of their visit was covered 

by an announcement that they had come for a meeting of the Anglo-American 

Standardization of the Arms Committee. The combined military talks began in 

London on August 20.39 These higher level contacts superseded the initial 

Spaatz-McDonald-Slessor talks, and Spaatz returned to observing the war. 

On July 10, the first phase of the Battle of Britain began with Luftwaffe attacks 

on channel ports and shipping. Spaatz, who had requested and received permission to stay beyond his sixty-day tour of duty$0 watched these events closely. A 

new British disclosure policy made his observations even more valuable. A 

request by Spaatz and the other American air attaches to spend three or four 

days at a British fighter or bomber station in order to get a thorough look into 

the operational use of the aircraft there had forced the Air Ministry’s hand. The 

workings of the operations room and of radar could not be concealed without 

great embarrassment to all concerned. Therefore, the Air Intelligence section in 

charge of escorting foreign officers requested instruction^.^^ 

The situation had changed drastically since April 1940. The British no 

longer had allies outside the Commonwealth and, as Slessor pointed out, the 

Germans had probably gained more information on radar from the French than 

was likely to result from leakage from America. Furthermore, the Prime Minister 

had agreed to exchange almost any sort of secret information with the Americans, 

subject to his personal review.42 On July 3, the Air Ministry ruled that there was 

“no reason whatever why these officers should not be told of the existence of 

R.D.F. [radio direction finding equipment, or radar-radio detection and ranging], its purposes and its achievements.”” The ministry added that “in fact there 

is every reason why they should be told, so that they may report to their own 

country that we have valuable items which would make an exchange of technical information worthwhile from the American ~tandpoint.”~~ At the same time, 

the Air Ministry opened operations rooms and all variations of radar to the 

Americans, but did withhold all technical details and design information. 

Spaatz spent the last two weeks of July with Bomber Command observing 

tactics and methods. Nine of those days he spent with a Wellington twin-engine 

night-bomber group. There Spaatz saw the small scale and ineffectiveness of 

~~~~ _______~ 

* The British used the term RDF to refer to all types of radar devices. 

47 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

current British night bombing. He therefore, not unnaturally, saw little reason to 

question U.S. daylight precision doctrine.44 Concerning the Wellington he 

remarked, “Although night bombing has resulted in few losses, believe answer 

to bombardment is altitude, speed and daylight attack, preceded by weather 

reconnaissance plane in uncertain weather.” A few of the more frank British 

flyers, he added, “have doubts as to the effectiveness of their night attacks.”45 

At this time neither Bomber Command nor the German night fighter defenses 

had reached the high degree of effectiveness they achieved later in the war. Nor 

had the British begun their policy of city area bombing to destroy civilian housing and demoralize the German work force. Instead, confronted with a situation 

even worse than the prewar “worst case” estimates, Bomber Command, since 

June 20, 1940, had targeted the German aircraft industry, but proved ineffective. 

Less than a month later the head of Bomber Command, Air Chief Marshal 

Charles A. Portal, ruefully confirmed Spaatz’s observations: of the ten primary 

aircraft industry targets “only three can be found with any certainty in moonlight 

by average crews. Expert crews may be expected to find the remainder on clear 

nights with a full moon, and average crews will sometimes find them after a 

good deal of time has been spent in searching.” In addition, Portal pointed out 

that the air industry targets were in sparsely inhabited sites so that bombs missing the plants fell on empty ground. Because the vast majority of the bombs 

dropped missed, the raids had no disruptive effect on the German economy. 

Portal suggested bombing rail centers instead.46 Rail yards occupied the center 

of many German cities. Portal, who became Chief of the Air Staff in October 

1940, would have the authority and opportunity to see that his suggestions were 

carried out until the end of the war. The RAF’s ineffectiveness in hitting specific 

targets at night would eventually lead to the institution of the mass fire-raising 

attacks in which hundreds of four-engine heavy bombers would drench the tenter of a city, such as Hamburg or Dresden, with thousands of incendiary bombs. 

The performance of the RAF against the Luftwaffe persuaded Spaatz that 

the British could beat any German invasion attempt. On July 31, he informed 

Arnold that if the Germans did not launch their invasion in August, they would 

have to postpone it indefinitely: “Unless the Germans have more up their sleeve 

than they have shown so far,” Spaatz commented, “their chance of success in 

destroying the RAF is not particularly good. In air combat, German losses in 

daylight raids will be huge. In night attacks, the accuracy of their bombing is of 

very low order.” An all-out attempt might win for the Germans, but Spaatz noted, 

“if not, it would be the beginning of the end for German air ~upremacy.”~~ 

On August 2, Spaatz repeated these views at a breakfast meeting in Claridge’s, 

where the embassy’s military attaches met with William J. Donovan, a “special 

observer” from President Roosevelt. Donovan, a World War I hero and an old 

friend of the President, had come to assess Britain’s chances of staying in the 

~ar.~8 After speaking out at the luncheon, Spaatz noted in his diary that 

Donovan had agreed with his-Spaatz’s-estimates of the threat of a direct 

48 
PREWAR PLANNING 

Bomb damage to London, autumn 1940. 

German invasion of Britain. Both Donovan and Spaatz felt that the Germans 

would try an alternative strategy of closing the Mediterranean and harassing 

British ports and shipping with air raids and U-boak49 Donovan reported to the 

President that the British would successfully resist invasion and were resolved to 

continue fighting.50 The extent to which Spaatz’s advice aided Donovan in 

reaching his eventual decision cannot be determined. As an authoritative 

American military observer, however, Spaatz must have helped counter what 

Donovan termed “a great deal of hopelessness [that] had been coming over those 

in our high command here.” At the end of August 1940, Donovan informed Air 

Chief Marshal Newall, “I still have confidence that my judgment as to your 

power of resistance to invasion and of your resolution is still right.”51 It is not 

unreasonable to assume Spaatz’s similar views must have influenced the President’s special observer. 

During August, when Reich Marshal Hermann Goering, Commander in 

Chief of the Luftwaffe, ordered his men to begin the decisive phase of the Battle 

of Britain, Spaatz spent much of his time with Fighter Command, particularly 

with No. 12 Group under Air Vice-Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory. (See Map 1 

for RAF Fighter Group defensive sectors.) At that point he finally got a good 

look at radar, including its early warning, ground-controlled intercept (GCI), and 

Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) variants. This equipment enabled the RAF 

accurately to track and to intercept German raids, as well as to distinguish its 

aircraft from enemy aircraft. Spaatz and Lt. Col. Frank O’D. Hunter, an Army 

Air Corps pursuit expert who had originally been sent to observe the French air 

49 

PREWAR PLANNING 

force, spent all of August 9 in the operations room at No. 12 Group getting a full 

explanation of night and day procedure^.^^ Spaatz recommended the construction of similar underground bomb-proof control facilities in the Panama Canal 

Zone and Hawaii. He noted favorably the efficiency of female RAF personnel, 

which may have encouraged his own subsequent wartime support of U.S. Army 

female personnel. Spaatz may also have formed an unfavorable opinion of Air 

Vice-Marshal Leigh-Mallory ’s abilities. Spaatz criticized what he termed “too 

much rigidity of control by the higher command, which as stated above, extends 

even to the point of Group control of individual sections of a squadron.”53 

In mid-August, Spaatz spent three days at Dover, where he witnessed German 

air attacks and watched British heavy antiaircraft artillery fire inaccurately on 

friend and foe alike. During his stay at Dover, Spaatz, dressed in his rumpled 

civilian tweeds, wandered away from his escort and was promptly detained by a 

British naval commander as a spy when he blundered into a restricted area. It 

took some hours to establish his identity. Spaatz took the incident with his usual 

good humor and a few days later signed himself in at an RAF field as “Col. Carl 

A. Spaatz, German spy.”54 At the British Technical Establishment, he examined 

downed German aircraft. Detailed reports on each plane soon found their way to 

Amold. As for the performance of the Luftwaffe, Spaatz noted that its bombing 

had been “particularly lousy,” and he suspected that it had been “too hastily constructed” to stand up for long to the apparently better trained RAF Fighter 

Command.55 

In the last week of August, Spaatz maintained his close contacts with the 

RAF. On August 24, he attended bomber crew debriefings. From this and other 

experiences in Britain he deduced, “General opinion is that German fighters will 

not attack a well-closed-in day-bombing f~rmation.”~~ Three days later, he discussed tactics and operations with Slessor’s deputy, Group Captain Baker, and 

with McDonald and Hunter. They agreed that a modem, well-dispersed air force 

could not be destroyed on the ground.57 They further noted the unsuitability of 

dive-bombers against well-defended targets and the relative effectiveness of 

rapid-firing, light antiaircraft weapons. In discussing the jealousy between the 

British army and the RAF, which Spaatz had previously they stated, “It 

takes close coordination with the Army to obtain maximum misuse of air power.”59 

In other words, the more an air force conformed to the wishes of its army, the less 

effective it would be. 

On August 30, Spaatz informed the acting senior U.S. military attach6 in 

London, Col. Raymond E. Lee, that there would be no blitzkrieg of England in 

1940 and that, therefore, he would just as soon “go home and get to work.”6o 

The next day he received his orders to return home. Before he left on September 

9, a week before the British broke the German air offensive, he talked several 

times with Slessor and experienced the first of the major Luftwaffe night raids 

on London. Of Hitler’s terror raids Spaatz noted, “Apparently indiscriminate 

bombing of London has started.”61 During one of the night raids he dined with 

51 
SPAATZ AND THE Am WAR IN EUROPE 

American press correspondent Drew Middleton. When Spaatz heard the bombs 

drop, he recognized that the Germans had switched from their counterair campaign to terror bombing, conceding air superiority to the British. He remarked to 

Middleton, “By God, that’s good, that’s fine. The British are winning.” Spaatz 

continued, “The Germans can’t bomb at night-hell, I don’t think they’re very 

good in daylight-but they haven’t been trained for night bombing. Nope, the 

British have got them now. They’ve forced them to bomb at night. The Krauts 

must be losing more than we know.”62 Spaatz recommended that B-17s be 

shipped at once to the British to add strength to the long-range British striking 

force. 

After leaving England, Spaatz spent ten days in Lisbon. There he saw firsthand the pitiful state of refugees fleeing Nazi-occupied Europe, which further 

hardened his attitude toward the Germans. At lunch at the U.S. legation he told 

those present, including the ex-governor of New Hampshire, John G. Winant, 

who was on his way to London to replace Joseph P. Kennedy as ambassador to 

England, “The English have developed real air power, whereas the Germans so 

far appear to have developed a mass of air geared to the Army and [are] lost 

when confronted with properly applied air effort.”63 By this Spaatz meant that, 

despite the ineffectiveness of its current night-bombing campaign, the RAF had 

laid a solid foundation for development into an effective force; whereas the 

Luftwaffe was flawed at its creation and rickety in its structure and, thus, would 

John G. Winant, U.S. 

Ambassador to Britain, 

1940-1945. 

52 
PREWAR PLANNING 

be unable to sustain its early successes. Spaatz noted that Winant seemed impressed with his views. A week later, with Generals Strong and Emmons, Spaatz 

left Lisbon for Washington. 

Spaatz’s stay in England had shown him the current state of air warfare, but 

it had not shaken his belief in some key Air Corps doctrine. He had seen, for 

instance, no reason to modify views concerning long-range escort fighters. The 

Air Corps held that a formation of self-defending bombers did not need escort, 

especially because such escort, in order to carry enough fuel internally, would 

have to be larger, and therefore would be less maneuverable and combat capable, than lighter, shorter-range defending fighter aircraft. The performance of the 

German heavy twin-engine fighter, the Bf 110, against the nimble, shorter-range, 

lighter British single-engine Hurricanes and Spitfires, confirmed this conviction. 

Spaatz also observed from German operations that close fighter escort, in any 

case, did “not insure immunity from attack by hostile fighters on the bombers. A 

comparatively fewer number of hostile fighters can, by determined effort, break 

up the large [bomber] f0rmation.”6~ 

After talking to RAF bomber pilots Spaatz also reaffirmed his belief in the 

necessity of daylight precision bombing for accurate results and in the defensive 

strength of large, heavy-bomber formations. Explaining away the apparent contradiction between the assumption that determined fighter attack would break up 

bomber formations and the assumption that a well-flown bomber formation 

could defend itself, he observed that so far the Germans had not demonstrated 

the ability to mount a determined attack on British bombers. Spaatz apparently 

had not fully realized that the British had switched to night operations because 

of excessive casualties suffered in daylight operations. These beliefs, typical of 

those of many Air Corps leaders, would be modified only by costly direct 

actions with “determined” German fighter planes in 1943. 

But, as already noted, Spaatz had seen the ineffectiveness of the close escort 

tactics the Germans employed to protect their bombers. In close escort German 

fighters stayed with the bombers until British fighters attacked, at which time 

the escorts tried to break up the intercepting fighters’ assault. This tactic had 

proved ineffective. It robbed the German fighters of their aggressiveness by 

forcing them to react to British attacks instead of launching their own. In contrast, distant escort freed the fighters to leave the slow-moving bomber formations and,to attack enemy fighters when they made their appearance. This observation may have helped Spaatz reach his brilliant wartime decision, in January 

1944, to free the Eighth Air Force’s fighters from the bombers by authorizing 

them to search out and destroy enemy fighters. At the same time, Spaatz discarded one of the tenets of prewar air thinking-that air bombardment could 

shatter a civilian population’s willingness to resist. Spaatz left Britain convinced 

that the morale of the British and probably that of the German civil populations 

would not collapse in the face of bombardment. 

Spaatz’s stay in Britain also exposed him to technical innovations, such as 

53 
The Battle of Britain. Contending aircraft reflected the advanced aviation technology 

of the era. Clockwise from above: The twin-engine Vickers-Armstrong Wellington was one 

of RAF Bomber Command’s principal models. With a 4,500-pound bomb load and a maximum speed of 235 mph, it was among the best of its type. Hawker Hurricanes (opposite, 

above) were the most numerous British fighters in the battle and bore the brunt of early 

engagements with the Luftwaffe. Each was armed with eight Browning .303 caliber 

machine guns and attained a speed of 350 mph. Marks 1 and 1A Supermarine Spitfires 

(opposite, middle) confronted the Luftwaffe in the later days of the battle. As heavily armed 

as Hurricanes but faster, the Spitfires outfought and outlasted most German adversaries. 

The Bf 109E fighter (opposite, below) was the Luftwaffe’s mainstay in Germany’s fivemonth effort to dominate British skies. It was a formidable opponent at 350 mph and combined machine gun and cannon armament. Its fuel-injected engine enabled pushovers into 

sudden dives, giving its pilot the advantage in initiating and breaking off combat, but a 

short range limited its ability to protect German bombers over Britain or to engage the 

RAF at will. The Bf 110 (below, right), designed as a long-range “destroyer” (Zerstorer), 

fared poorly as a fighter and escort in the battle. The Heinkel 111 medium bomber 

(below, left), carrying 4,410 pounds of ordnance and a crew of four, had only light 

defensive armament. In the absence of German fighter escorts with sufficient staying 

power, the graceful but slower Heinkels took heavy losses in the German aerial assault 

on the British Isles. 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

radar and IFF equipment that electronically identified friendly or enemy planes 

on radar scopes; new combat tactics, especially night bombing and defensive 

fighter deployment; and organizational and manufacturing problems and solutions which would help his own planning in the United States. Unfortunately, 

Spaatz appears not to have recorded any opinions he may have formed during 

this trip of RAF leaders. He had only a brief meeting with Portal, Air Officer 

Commanding (AOC) Bomber Command. A colonel, even one from a favorably 

disposed neutral country, simply did not hobnob with officers at the highest levels of command, especially when they were in the midst of their nation’s single 

most important battle since Trafalgar or, perhaps, Hastings. 

Among the more junior RAF officers, however, Spaatz made several friends, 

including Slessor, who became Chief of the Air Staff after World War 11. In his 

memoirs Slessor recorded a lively picture of the American air observer, whom 

he described as “a man of few words but with a dry sense of humor that can 

reduce me to a state of schoolboy giggles quicker than anything I know.” Spaatz 

was, Slessor continued, “a man of action rather than of speech, rather inarticulate but with an uncommon flair for the really important issue and a passionate 

faith in the mission of air power.”65 Spaatz’s acquaintance with RAF leadership 

and methods, acceptability to the RAF, his optimistic reports that contradicted 

gloomy predictions from other sources, and offers of help in Britain’s darkest 

hour had much to do with his selection a little over a year later to command US. 

air power in Britain. 

Spaatz’s time in Britain did not turn him into an ardent Anglophile; even after 

his return to the States he continued to oppose sending aircraft to Britain at the 

expense of U.S. Air Corps requirements. Yet he had been exposed to the latest aviation technology and tactics available, and he had gained a better understanding of 

the RAF, the force most likely to be allied with the U.S. Air Corps after America’s 

certain entry into the war. Spaatz’s initiation of negotiations for Air Corps entry 

into the war, even though superseded, and his often-stated belief in the ultimate 

victory of the RAF earned him the respect of his British associates. More important, Spaatz’s transmittal of his faith in the RAF to Arnold and to Donovan may 

have helped persuade the President to increase U.S. assistance to Britain and, as a 

result, made Spaatz a key contributor to the growing Anglo-American relationship. 

Spaatz’s failure to draw correct conclusions from the German and British 

experiences about the survivability of daylight bomber aircraft also had important consequences. He did not realize that procurement of an effective daylight 

long-range fighter escort aircraft was a top priority or that Air Corps bomber 

formations were no more likely to survive in daylight than RAF or Luftwaffe 

bomber formations. If he had decided that the Air Corps, too, could survive only 

at night, or that it needed to begin development of appropriate escort fighters 

immediately, then the American strategic bombing effort in World War 11, 

which he was eventually to direct, might have taken an entirely different path, 

with incalculable results. 

56 
PREWAR PLANNING 

Spaatz and Prewar Strategic Planning 

On May 16, 1940, two days before Spaatz left for England, the Air Corps, at 

the President’s behest, increased its expansion plans. Spaatz’s plan of December 

1938 had called for an increase in annual military pilot training from 300 to 

4,500 pilots. In the spring of 1939 the Air Corps had adopted a planning goal of 

24 combat-ready groups-that is, fully equipped, completely trained, and capable of fulfilling their assigned missions by June 30, 1941. But the May 16 

expansion raised these goals to 7,000 pilots per year and 41 groups. Barely 2 

months later, on August 8, newer plans called for 12,000 pilots and 54 combatready groups. The August 8 plans also called for 21,470 planes and a total of 

119,000 personnel, almost 6 times the personnel envisaged in the summer of 

1939. These were the changes Spaatz found when he resumed his post as Chief 

of the Plans Division (upgraded from a section in May 1940), Headquarters, Air 

Corps, in November 1940. In another month, on December 17, 1940, a new program called for 30,000 pilots a year.66 

Between his return from England in September and his resumption of duty 

in the Plans Division, Spaatz spent a month as Chief of the Air Corps MatCriel 

Division. Although the MatCriel Division did the bulk of its work at Wright 

Field in Dayton, Ohio, a recent Air Corps reorganization had moved the Office 

of the Chief of the Mattriel Division to Washington, D.C. This was probably 

done in the hope of integrating the technical, aeronautical, and procurement 

knowledge of the MatCriel Division into the Headquarters of the Air Corps, 

where it was desperately needed for planning purposes. It also made the 

MatCriel Chief readily available to Congress, where he had to justify his decisions. Soon after Spaatz’s brief occupancy of it, the Office of the Chief of the 

MatCriel Division returned to Dayton, where it has remained. Spaatz merely 

occupied the post for a month while waiting for his appointment as an Assistant 

Chief of the Air Corps, with its accompanying rank of brigadier general,* to 

become effective so that he could return to the Plans Division. 

As the authorized strength of the Air Corps ballooned, its structure underwent reorganization. In October 1940, General Marshall began a new study of 

Air Corps needs, which resulted in the unsu~cessful~~ reorganization of 

November 19, 1940, under which General Arnold became Acting Deputy Chief 

of Staff for Air, but the GHQ Air Force was removed from his authority and 

placed under the authority of the Army Chief of Staff in peacetime and under the 

control of the Headquarters of the Commanding General of the Army in wartime. 

This scheme, which once again separated the Air Corps’ combat function from 

* The posts of Chief of the Air Corps and the three Assistant Chiefs of the Air Corps endowed 

their occupants with the ranks of major general and brigadier general respectively. The rank stayed 

with the job; former occupants reverted to their Regular Army ranks, usually colonel or lieutenant 

colonel. 

57 
Spun AM) THE Am WAR IN EUROPE 

I 

Robert A. Lovett, 

Assistant Secretary of 

War for Air, 1941-1945. 

its supply and training function, could not long survive. By the end of March 

1941, Marshall initiated new studies that resulted in the final prewar air organization.68 

On June 20, 1941, the War Department issued a revised edition of Army 

Regulation 95-5, which governed the status, function, and organization of the air 

arm. It created the Army Air Forces (AAF) headed by a chief, who also became 

the Deputy Chief of Staff for Air and had the authority to supervise and coordinate the work of the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps, the GHQ Air Force 

(redesignated Air Force Combat Command), and,all other air elements. The regulation further created an Air Staff to assist the new deputy chief, which freed 

the air arm from much of the dominance formerly exercised over it by the 

ground officers who controlled the War Department General Staff. At Arnold’s 

behest, Spaatz became the first Chief of the Air Staff at the end of June 1941. 

This organization sufficed until March 9, 1942, when a final rearrangement of 

positions gave the Army Air Forces equality with the Army Ground Forces and 

greatly reduced the power of the General Staff.69 ~n another War Department 

organizational move, in December 1940, Robert A. Lovett became Special 

Assistant to the Secretary of War on all air matters. The following spring Lovett 

advanced to the post of Assistant Secretary of War for Air, a position left vacant 

by the Roosevelt administration since 1933. Lovett would prove a powerful, 

friendly, and effective civilian advocate for the AAF. 

Negotiations with the British and strategic planning kept pace with air 

58 
PREWAR PLANNING 

expansion and reorganization. On January 29, 1941, committees from the U.S. 

and British armed forces began secret meetings “to determine the best means 

whereby the United States and the British Commonwealth might defeat Germany 

and her allies should the United States be compelled to resort to war.”70 

President Roosevelt had personally read, edited, and approved the U.S. delegation’s initial statement of views, presented to the British at the conference’s first 

session.71 The final report, American-British Staff Conversations No. 1 (ABCl), submitted on March 27, 1941, stated, “The Atlantic and European area is considered to be the decisive theatre.”72 Both parties agreed to the principle of 

defeating Germany first and, if necessary, Japan second. ABC-1 also provided 

for a joint planning staff, a joint transport service, prompt exchange of military 

intelligence, unity of command within each theater, integrity of national forces, 

and for “U.S. Army air bombardment units [to] operate offensively in collaboration with the Royal Air Force, primarily against German Military Power at its 

source.”73 

A second report on these staff conversations (ABC-2) dealt with air matters. 

In it, the Americans agreed that until the United States entered the war, all aircraft production from newly constructed manufacturing capacity would go to the 

British. This decision, of course, delayed the Air Corps’ 54-group program. It 

was also agreed that, if the United States entered the war, new manufacturing 

capacity would be split 50-50.74 Spaatz, in his capacity as Chief, Plans Division, 

had vigorously objected to the agreement because of its open-ended commitment to supply aircraft to the British, which would reduce the reinforcement of 

U.S. overseas possessions and the number of aircraft available for hemispheric 

defense.75 Arnold, who agreed with Spaatz and protested that a shortage of aircraft reduced “to the vanishing point the present low combat strength of this 

force,” nonetheless reluctantly agreed to defer full implementation of the 54- 

group program.76 

In April 1941, the two powers agreed to exchange military delegations to 

facilitate exchange of information and planning. A British Military Mission, 

with joint army-navy-air representatives, came to Washington, and two separate 

“Special Observer Groups,” one U.S. Army and one U.S. Navy, crossed the 

Atlantic to London. Because the largest initial combat force contemplated for 

deployment to Britain was drawn from the Air Corps, an air officer, Maj. Gen. 

James E. Chaney, headed the “Special Army Observer Group.”77 

Under the impetus of ABC-1, U.S. military planners updated and further 

developed Joint Army and Navy Basic War Plan RAINBOW No. 5. This plan 

accepted most of the strategic assumptions of ABC-1 and gained the approval of 

the Secretary of War and the Secretary of the Navy in May 1941. RAINBOW No. 

5 provided detailed breakdowns and deployment schedules for Army (including 

air) and Navy units allocated to areas of anticipated conflict. 

On July 9, President Roosevelt requested the Joint Board of the Army and 

Navy-the predecessor of the current U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff-to prepare an 

59 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

estimate of the “over-all production requirements required to defeat our potential 

enemies.”78 When the President’s request descended on the War Department 

General Staff, the War Plans Division (WPD), the staff‘s most prestigious section and its major military planning component, was already swamped. WPD’s 

chief, Brig. Gen. Leonard T. Gerow, appointed Maj. Albert C. Wedemeyer to 

head the group preparing the estimate. Wedemeyer, in turn, expected Lt. Col. 

Clayton Bissell and other air personnel in the WPD to prepare an air annex. 

Bissell went to Col. Harold George of the newly formed Air War Plans Division 

(AWPD), part of Spaatz’s new Air Staff. Bissell asked George to bring over a 

team to help out. George objected and went to Spaatz, his immediate superior. 

Both he and Spaatz realized that if the WPD prepared the air plan, Army ground 

officers would base their estimates on tactical close air support needs while 

shortchanging strategic air war needs. The two went to Arnold, who supported 

their position. Arnold suggested to Gerow that because WPD already had an 

overload of work, the Air Staff would help draw up the air requirements. Gerow 

acquiesced. He and Spaatz “discussed the over-all problem prior to the work 

being conducted.”79 

George and three other air officers, Lt. Col. Kenneth H. Walker, Maj. Laurence 

S. Kuter, and Maj. Haywood S. Hansell, prepared the air annex in one week, 

August 4-11, 1941. Because of its clear definition of the AAF’s strategic aims 

and its call for a gigantic air arm to accomplish those aims, the Army Air Forces 

Annex, “Munitions Requirements of the AAF for the Defeat of Our Potential 

Enemies” (AWPD/1), proved to be a key document in the AAF’s preparation for 

the war. It defined three AAF tasks in order of importance: (1) to wage a sustained air offensive against Germany; (2) to conduct strategically defensive 

operations in the Orient; and (3) to provide air actions essential to the defense of 

the continental United States and Western Hemisphere. The air offensive against 

Germany had four goals: (1) reducing Axis naval operations; (2) restricting 

Axis air operations; (3) undermining “German combat effectiveness by deprivation of essential supplies, production, and communications facilities” (a strategic 

bombing campaign); and (4) supporting a final land invasion of Germany.*O To 

accomplish its mission, AWPD/1 called for 2,164,916 men and 63,467 aircraft, 

of which a total of 4,300 combat aircraft (3,000 bombers, 1,300 fighters) were 

slated for Britain. 

In mid-August, Gerow reviewed and accepted AWPD/1. Marshall followed 

suit on August 30, as did Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson on September 11. 

AWPD/1 reached the President’s desk a few days later. Along with the Amy 

and Navy requirements, it formed the beginning of the Victory Program on 

which the government based its initial industrial mobilization. Stimson’s and 

Marshall’s agreement with the plan meant that the AAF had the approval of the 

War Department’s top civilian and military officials for its ambitious wartime 

expansion. 

During 1941, Spaatz may have made what in retrospect seems one of the 

60 
PREWAR PLANNING 

biggest mistakes in his professional life. He has been accused of having had in 

his hands, but not having appreciated, the solution to the long-range escortfighter problem. Spaatz apparently failed to realize that available technology in 

the form of expendable, externally carried fuel tanks, called drop tanks, could 

satisfactorily solve the problem of range extension. One scholar has stated, 

Literally hundreds of crewmen lost their lives because escort fighters of suitable range were not ready when needed. The lack of escort fighters jeopardized 

the whole effort to prove the feasibility of strategic air power. What an irony 

that he who was to command the Eighth Air Force and suffer the brutal losses 

incurred in ramming home the Combined Bomber Offensive in 1943 and 1944 

had it in his power in 1941 to provide the solution but did not.81 

Although it is true that the Army Air Corps did not fully realize the possibilities of drop tanks, singling out Spaatz as the man responsible for this situation 

on the basis of one questionable document seems unfair. As the basis of his 

charge, the scholar cited a broadly written memorandum composed by Maj. 

Hoyt S. Vandenberg and signed by Spaatz. The scholar concentrated on the doctrinal aspects of the memorandum, noting its opposition to the “carrying of 

bombs” and “provision of excessive range” (drop tanks), both of which “require 

additional and unnecessary [sic] weight and operational complexities that are 

incompatible with the mission of pursuit.” Furthermore, bombs and additional 

range would “provide opportunities for improper tactical use of pursuit types.”82 

Despite its language, however, this memorandum addressed aircraft production more than doctrine. It disapproved production change no. 3 83 (the addition 

of both a 75-gallon auxiliary fuel tank and provisions for carrying either 300- 

pound or 600-pound bombs) for 623 P-39D aircraft. In a background memorandum to Spaatz, Vandenberg justified the refusal on the ground that all the proposed changes “would tend to slow up production and reduce the combat effectiveness of the airplane.” Vandenberg also suggested that only essential changes 

be approved.84 Spaatz’s Plans Division, faced with desperate aircraft shortages 

throughout its training and readiness programs, concentrated on pushing aircraft 

through the production system. As a consequence, Vandenberg argued that “a 

determined effort should be made to keep the pursuit airplane as simple as possible.”85 As a technical detail it should be noted that the P-39D aircraft’s design 

limited it to operations under 12,000 feet, and at no time did the Air Corps seriously consider using the plane as an escort for heavy bombers. Production, not 

doctrinal considerations, motivated Spaatz’s action. 

Although the Air Corps began a limited-range extension program in 1940 

and expanded it in 1942,86 Spaatz’s and Vandenberg’s attitudes toward longrange fighter escort typified prevailing prewar Air Corps views. The authors of 

AWPD/l, in August 1941, showed equal shortsightedness. “It has not yet been 

demonstrated,” the plan stated, “that the technical improvements to the bombardment airplane are or can be sufficient to overcome the pursuit airplane.” 

61 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Consequently, the plan observed, “It is unwise to neglect development of escort 

fighters designed to enable bombardment formations to fight through to the 

objective.” The aircraft envisioned by the plan was not an aircraft of pursuit performance with extended range, such as the P-51, but, instead, was a convoy 

defender like the YB-40 (a B-17 modified by the addition of extensive armor 

plate and several additional SO caliber machine guns). AWPD/1 called for the 

funding of an experimental squadron of thirteen such planes.87 In combat with 

the American Eighth Air Force over Germany, in 1943, the YB-40 proved a 

costly failure. Similar opinions appeared in the AAF’s last prewar review of its 

pursuit aircraft requirements. In October 1941, Spaatz, as Chief of the Air Staff, 

and at Arnold’s behest,@ appointed a board of pursuit and air matCriel officers 

to recommend “the future development of pursuit aircraft.” The opinions of the 

board’s members, which included Col. Ira C. Eaker and Col. Frank O’D. Hunter, 

illustrated the thinking of the AAF on the eve of the war. 

Eaker, in particular, would have played a key role in this board’s decisions. 

He had just returned from England, where he had served as Special Air Observer 

until October 1, 1941. His primary mission had been to determine the feasibility 

of integrating the radio systems of American ground echelons, pursuit formations, and aircraft into British operations.89 However, Arnold had also instructed 

Eaker to conduct “a broad study of all phases of fighter operations.” This 

included obtaining “the best thought now prevalent on the subject of escort 

fighter protection.”90 Eaker did a thorough job. He not only talked to many 

senior RAF officers, he came back with dozens of copies of British reports concerning British and German fighter tactics and performance. He undoubtedly 

shared the information he collected with the pursuit panel. 

The views of the RAF on bomber escort aircraft, as Eaker accurately 

reported, paralleled those of the AAF. Eaker’s visit to England came just at the 

conclusion of a limited upsurge in RAF daylight bombing missions. The RAF 

directed those missions, nicknamed “circus” raids, at targets on the French coast 

within range of British fighter planes. The purpose of these raids was to produce 

attritional combat between escorting RAF fighters and attacking German fighters. They failed because the Germans soon adopted a policy of engaging only 

when they held the advantage. The Germans could adopt such a policy because 

the limited range of the RAF escorts did not allow bombing of targets vital to 

the German war effort.91 Circus operations reinforced the prevailing RAF opinion that short-range fighter aircraft could not provide strategic escort. 

In May 1941, shortly before launching the operation, the Chief of the Air 

Staff and a former head of Bomber Command, Air Chief Marshal Portal, had 

replied to a query from Churchill on fighter escorts by noting, “Increased range 

can only be provided at the expense of performance and maneuverability.” He 

added, “The long-range fighter, whether built specifically as such, or whether 

given increased range by fitting extra tanks, will be at a disadvantage compared 

with the short-range high-performance fighter.”92 On September 28, Portal 

62 
PREWAR PLANNING 

expressed similar views to Eaker, drawing the logical conclusion “that the 

proper escort fighter will be a ship exactly like the bomber it is going to escort.” 

This heavily armored and armed aircraft would take station at weak points in the 

bomber formation and by “expel[ling] heavy caliber fire in all directions,” make 

it “very difficult for the light single seater fighters.”93 The commander of the 

RAF Test, Research, and Experimental Unit spoke to Eaker of the impossibility 

of the large fighter getting through a screen of small fighters, saying, “They will 

sting it to death.”94 

The organization and design of the RAF contributed to its inability to conceive of aircraft combining bomber range and fighter performance. The raison 

d‘etre of Fighter Command was the air defense of Britain. Its planes, especially 

the superb Spitfire series, had been designed and built for that purpose alone. 

Therefore, they emphasized performance over endurance, which was not needed 

for defense of English air space. Fighter Command had little operational need to 

develop long-range fighters. Likewise, Bomber Command had committed itself, 

despite limited circus operations, to the strategic bombing of Germany at night. 

Night operations depended on avoiding and deceiving the enemy’s defenses, not 

fighting through them, which would have required escort aircraft. Bomber 

Command, too, had little operational need for escort aircraft. Given the perceived lack of need and the limited resources available, the RAF’s refusal to 

invest in escort aircraft and its failure to pursue technical solutions to fighter 

range extension were understandable. In fact, the RAF never developed or 

employed substantial numbers of long-range fighter escort aircraft during the 

These strongly held opinions of a future major ally, with over two years of 

hard-won direct combat experience, which had been confirmed by AAF 

observers, undoubtedly influenced the AAF pursuit board. Eaker, himself, continued to advocate the development of a convoy defender until its experimental 

employment, under his own command, demonstrated the fallacy of the idea in 

actual operations. In any case, the board’s officers had probably held views similar to those of the RAF even before their exposure to Eaker’s reports and documents. 

The AAF pursuit board, like the RAF, could not overcome the seeming tautological improbability of the successful long-range fighter escort and made no 

recommendation whatever for one. Instead, the board suggested consideration of 

a “convoy defender.” “Only with the assistance of such an airplane,” warned the 

board, “may bombardment aviation hope to successfully deliver daylight attacks 

deep inside enemy territory and beyond range of interceptor support.” Yet the 

board feared that the size and expense of such a convoy defender would interfere 

with other production and development projects. It thus gave low priority to 

development of a convoy defender prototype, concluding: 

The Board is unable to say whether or not the project is worthwhile, and can 

only point out the need for furnishing day bombardment with the very maxiWar. 

63 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

mum attainable defensive firepower if that form of attack is to be chosen to 

gain a decision in war against any other modern power.95 

The board also considered a long-range pursuit aircraft with a range of 2,000 

miles and an operating altitude above 25,000 feet, which would have sacrificed 

climb and maneuverability for range and endurance. But the board did not recommend the development of a prototype, nor did it envisage the use of drop 

tanks by this plane.96 

Operational employment and accessory equipment also received attention by 

the board, which recommended the high-priority development of nineteen items 

of new equipment, including new gunsights, pressurized cockpits, new means of 

aircraft propulsion, and “expendable external auxiliary-fuel tanks.” The board 

defined pursuit’s mission in these words: “The general mission of our pursuit 

aviation is to seek out and destroy, by air combat, hostile aircraft which attack or 

threaten to attack our vital installations on the ground or our friendly aviation in 

the air. The principal target is the hostile bomber” [emphasis addedl.97 Here the 

board enunciated a principle embraced by none other than Hermann Goering, 

the Luftwaffe’s commanding officer. Interestingly enough, almost all students of 

great strategic bombing campaigns of World War I1 cite Goering ’s directives to 

attack Allied bombers in preference to Allied fighters as a key tactical error. 

The board saw a need for adding drop tanks and for increasing the safety of 

bombers on deep penetration raids. Yet it never connected the single-engine pursuit aircraft and drop tanks with the bomber protection problem. Neither did the 

rest of the AAF until almost too late. Ironically, a future commander of the 

Eighth Air Force did have the solution to the fighter escort problem in his reach, 

but failed to grasp it. However, that failure, if failure it be, applies more to 

Eaker, who sat on the development board, than to Spaatz. 

The refusal by Spaatz, Eaker, and the board to place a high priority on 

fighter escort stemmed more from technical considerations than from a denial of 

the necessity for it. The recent observations of both men in Britain had shown 

the disadvantages of the Bf 110 against the Spitfire and Hurricane. RAF technical personnel were convinced that a plane capable of both long-range combat 

and successful dogfighting could not be built-a view shared by Spaatz and 

Eaker and reflected in the board’s findings. Eight years earlier Spaatz had written Arnold concerning a long-range fighter prototype: “If this plane used as a 

single seater operates to its full range of 1,000 miles, it would undoubtedly be 

used for the purpose of accompanying bombardment.” In that case, Spaatz thought 

that the fighter “would be forced to meet interceptor pursuit of the enemy which, 

with a much lower cruise range, will have greatly superior performance.”98 

Spaatz and Eaker, of course, had seen the British and the Germans both 

resort to night bombing because their bombardment aircraft could not survive in 

hostile daylight skies. They discounted that experience by calculating that the 

B-17 flew higher, was more rugged, and carried more and heavier guns than any 

European bomber. They also assumed that the Americans would maintain 

64 
PREWAR PLANNING 

tighter defensive formation than the British or Germans. 

Events proved the Americans and British correct in their assumption that no 

heavy fighter could successfully perform long-range escort in Europe. The P-38, 

an American twin-engine fighter, had its greatest impact in the Pacific against a 

very different foe. The P-38, because of its higher operating altitude and faster 

diving speed, a factor of its greater weight, was not helpless against German aircraft; it just operated at a disadvantage in a melee because of its relative lack of 

maneuverability, especially when opposing pilots were of equal ability. The P-38 

performed better than the Bf 110 in the strategic escort role, but as soon as sufficient numbers of long-range single-engine fighters became available, the AAF 

hastened to replace it. 

Ironically, the aircraft that proved the ultimate solution to the long-range 

escort problem, the P-51 (Mustang), had its maiden flight in October 1940, a 

year before the pursuit board met. The Mustang was the direct result of a contract between the British government and the North American Aviation Corporation. 

The contract, signed in January 1940, specified completion within 120 days of a 

prototype single-engine fighter aircraft. Within 1 17 days, North American rolled 

out the plane, complete except for its engine. The design incorporated lessons 

learned from the early days of the war and included simple lines, for ease of production; an in-line water-cooled engine, frowned upon by the AAF because of 

its vulnerability to damage compared with a radial air-cooled engine; and an 

advanced laminar-flow wing section design for improved performance. As recompense for giving permission to the British to produce the aircraft in the 

United States, the AAF took delivery of two of the initial ten aircraft for testing. 

The original U.S.-produced and -designed Allison engine of the P-51, the 

same used in the P-40, did not provide enough power and limited the P-51’s best 

performance to altitudes below 15,000 feet, an operational ceiling unsuitable for 

escort of heavy bombers. The British, who appreciated the possibilities of the 

Mustang’s sleek airframe, replaced the original engine with their own powerful 

Rolls-Royce Merlin engine. The mating of one of the outstanding piston-driven 

aircraft engines ever made and a superb airframe resulted in a hybrid of distinguished performance, perhaps the best propeller-driven fighter of World War 11. 

The Americans, too, made a key contribution to the Mustang’s development. 

In their search for a suitable long-range escort they added increased internal tankage, which extended the P-51’s escort range to 475 miles (the maximum range of a 

P-47 with drop tanks) and 108-gallon drop tanks, which extended its escort 

range to more than 650 miles (to Berlin and beyond). These improvements made 

the P-5 1 the preferred escort for the American heavy bombers and the dominant 

fighter over Europe for the last year of the war. Unfortunately, it did not come 

into mass production in the United States until 1942 and did not reach American 

fighter groups in England until December 1943. It reached the Eighth Air Force 

just in time to help turn the tide of the air war, in conjunction with the yeomanlike service of P-47s equipped with new longer-range drop tanks, and to prevent 

65 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the U.S. strategic bomber effort from foundering because of excessive losses 

sustained in unescorted deep-penetration missions into Germany9 

Moreover, the aircraft was a bargain: in 1943, each P-51 cost $58,824, compared with $105,567 for a P-38 and $104,258 for a P-47.100 An aircraft privately 

designed and built in less than four months, with no government research and 

development input, cost less, was easier to produce, and outperformed the two 

aircraft the AAF had spent years bringing to fruition. Perhaps the P-51 was a 

technological freak aided by wartime combat experience and superior British 

engine technology, or perhaps the Air Corps aircraft development program had 

limited itself to overly conservative engineering. 101 

As 1941 drew to a close, the most important and dramatic portion of 

Spaatz’s career lay before him. In the three years prior to U.S. entry into World 

War 11, Spaatz had worked at the center of U.S. air expansion. Few officers 

could equal his many years of command experience or his breadth of knowledge 

of the current state of AAF readiness and plans for future production. He understood his force’s lack of training and the long delays to be expected in securing 

replacement aircraft, and this knowledge may account for much of his subsequent reluctance to commit his command in Britain to combat until it was fully 

ready. Finally, his trip to Britain, which gave him knowledge of modern combat 

and acquainted him with senior RAF officers, made him an obvious choice for 

leadership when the United States entered the war in Europe. His seniority entitled him to a large role, but he could keep such a role only by successful performance. 

66 
Chapter 3 

Spaatz Commands the 

Eighth Air Force 

(December 1941-November 1942) 

If we fold up here, where will it stop? It could be an 

irreparable blow to our side, at the very time our Allies are 

hanging on by a hair absorbing terrible punishment, and 

counting on us to live up to our big promises. We’re the 

only force in U.S. uniforms capable of hitting the numberone enemy for a long time.’ 

daj. Gen. Pritchard to Brig. Gen. Savage, 

Archbury Field, England, late 1942 

Early in the afternoon of December 7, 1941, Spaatz at home in Alexandria, 

Virginia, answered his phone. He exclaimed “Christ, no!,” slammed down the 

receiver, and headed for the front door.2 The Japanese had attacked Pearl 

Harbor. Almost ten years earlier, after participating in maneuvers based in Oahu, 

Hawaii, Spaatz had written that the exercises had, “conclusively demonstrated 

the ineffectiveness of carrier based airplanes against land based airplanes.” To 

be fair to him, one should note that he had also suggested the dispersal of Army 

aircraft in Oahu to forty or fifty airfields-a move that would have rendered the 

Japanese attack against the AAF much less effective.3 

Like many officers in Washington, D.C., in late 1941, Spaatz had braced for 

an imminent outbreak of hostilities with Japan, but the date and location of the 

attack, Pearl Harbor, instead of the Philippines, had surprised him. The next day, 

Congress, after President Roosevelt’s dramatic “day of infamy” speech, declared 

war on Japan. On December 11, Hitler declared war on the United States. 

Hitler’s action allowed the Allies to implement the decision that formed the 

bedrock of all U.S. and combined Anglo-American prewar planning4ermany 

67 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

first. Hitler had not even obtained a Japanese declaration of war on the Soviet 

Union in return. 

In the next year, Spaatz would devote all his energies to defeating the Nazi 

regime. He would organize, lead to Britain, and send into combat the first increments of an armada destined to rule the daylight skies over Europe. He would 

defend the AAF’s doctrine, its public image, and the integrity of his forces 

against all comers. And he would oversee the allocation and organization of 

much of his force for participation in the Allied invasion of North Africa in 

November 1942. 

When Spaatz reached his office on December 7, he and several others who 

had also just arrived discussed what to do. Spaatz placed the Air Staff and AAF 

Headquarters on a round-the-clock manning basis. Next, he ordered the 31st 

Pursuit Group to the Seattle area and the 1st Pursuit Group to the Los Angeles 

area, and he activated the Western Aircraft Warning Service.4 The destruction of 

the fleet left the West Coast wide open to attack. 

Among those present at Spaatz’s office in the Munitions Building on the 

mall in Washington, D.C., were Robert A. Lovett, Assistant Secretary of War 

for Air, and Maj. Lauris Norstad, Chief of Intelligence for the Air Force Combat 

Command. They all sat on the floor with their backs toward the wall and listened to a hasty and inadequate intelligence briefing on Japanese strengths and 

intentions. They discussed the applicable war plans and settled on RAINBOW No. 

5 which provided for a two-front war, with the main thrust in Europe and holding action against Japan. Because Arnold was on a trip to the West Coast, Spaatz 

was, to use Norstad’s phrase, “sitting in the seat,” the man responsible for making decisions. He promptly decided to implement the plan. In iess than an hour 

after the news of the attack broke, Spaatz was calling AAF units and ordering 

them to fulfill their roles in RAINBOW No. 5.5 

Rapidly unfolding events in the Pacific soon destroyed the strategic basis of 

the plan. The attack on Pearl Harbor eliminated whatever chance the U.S. Navy 

might have had of preventing an all-out Japanese attack on the Philippines and the 

tiny U.S.-held islands of Guam and Wake. Moreover, the loss of the British capital ships HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse on December 10 plus the 

impotence of the U.S. Navy and the incompetence or unpreparedness of the 

defenders produced further disasters in Malaya, Burma, the East Indies, the 

Philippines, and the Pacific islands. These events forced the Americans to divert 

considerable air resources to the war against Japan, but not to abandon their 

commitment to defeat Germany first. 

At the first of the great series of Allied strategic planning conferences, the 

ARCADIA Conference held in Washington, D.C., from December 24, 1941, to 

January 14, 1942, the Americans and the British agreed that Germany remained 

the chief enemy. Among the decisions made, two affected the AAF’s hope of 

launching a bomber offensive from Britain: the Allies reluctantly decided (1) to 

send additional troops to the Pacific and (2) to mount an invasion of French 

68 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

North Africa. The Americans would garrison the stops on the air ferry route 

from Hawaii to Australia; supply more garrisons for islands such as Christmas, 

Borabora, and Samoa; and station a large number of troops in New Caledonia to 

help the French. Because the British could not meet their strategic commitments 

to Australia and New Zealand, the Americans sent 61,000 troops and over 

500,000 tons of cargo to help defend both countries. 

Troops sent to the Pacific required more shipping than troops sent to Britain 

because those units sailing to the Far East expected to enter combat soon after 

arrival. This meant that they had to carry all equipment required for combat with 

them which had to be combat loaded, i.e., completely assembled and packed on 

the ship in a manner that enabled the off loading of essential weapons, ammunition, and supplies first. Loading for combat emphasized combat necessity, not 

efficient use of a ship’s storage space. Hence, combat loading consumed more 

shipping tonnage.6 In contrast, troops going to Britain still had months of training and preparation before them and did not have to travel combat loaded. The 

diversion of shipping to the Pacific war slowed AAF deployment to Britain. 

Roosevelt and Churchill further complicated matters by directing an invasion to be mounted against French North Africa known as SUPER-GYMNAST. The

British, whose 8th Army had just relieved Tobruk and seemed to have defeated 

the Germans and Italians, had great interest in a North African invasion. The 

Americans, except for Roosevelt, had less enthusiasm. They had to find shipping 

to send a force across the Atlantic and were not about to allow the siren song of 

their ally to bring them to grief in the Mediterranean. This alternative kept more 

shipping tied up and unavailable for carrying men and mattriel to the British 

Isles.7 

An Axis resurgence in Libya undercut the planning to invade North Africa 

by bringing into question the attitude of the Vichy government, which gave 

every indication that it would support the Germans as long as they continued to 

win. On March 3, 1942, the Combined British and American Chiefs of Staff 

(CCS) dropped SUPER-GYMNAST as an operational possibility.8 The Americans 

advanced a new alternative. One American in particular, the new head of the 

War Plans Division, Brig. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, had already sent two 

important memoranda to General Marshall proposing that the Allies launch an 

early invasion of Europe. Eisenhower had good reasons for the suggestion. It 

placed a minimum strain on shipping. It did not disperse the escorts vital to the 

North Atlantic line of communications to Britain. A buildup in England would 

force the Germans to put a larger garrison in western Europe, leaving fewer 

troops to fight the Soviets. Once ashore in France, the invaders would find better 

land communications than anywhere else in Europe. Numerous airfields already 

existing in England allowed for the establishment of the large air force necessary 

to gain air superiority over the beachhead. An invasion of western Europe would 

allow the British to employ offensively a maximum portion of their combat 

power because they would not have to leave behind a large force to defend the 

69 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

home islands. And the attack would cause the Germans to fight on yet another 

front.9 One can find no better statement of the U.S. Army’s rationale for an 

invasion of northwestern Europe. Eisenhower made passing reference to a U.S.- 

British air attack designed to clear the way for the landing but no mention of a 

strategic bombing campaign against the Reich. 

By the end of March 1942, the Operations Division (OPD), the successor to 

the War Plans Division under the Army reorganization of March 9, delivered yet 

another plan to Marshall emphasizing the need for a massive assault from 

England to France. Marshall, of course, needed no convincing. He and Secretary 

of War Stimson urged the President to approve the project. Instead, Roosevelt 

approved the idea of developing a plan and clearing it with London. Within two 

days of the President’s decision, OPD produced a draft invasion plan, including 

an analysis of troop readiness and availability, supply requirements and shipping 

resources, and an AAF outline for attacks on either September 15, 1942, or April 

1, 1943. Marshall and Stimson presented this latest design to Roosevelt, who 

approved it, authorizing Marshall and Harry Hopkins, FDR’s chief aide, to 

travel to London to secure British agreement to a common strategy. The President made clear to the British his support of the plan by sending Marshall not 

only as Chief of Staff but as an envoy or negotiator “in the name of the 

President.”lo 

The U.S. delegation arrived in London on April 8. It included an air planner, 

Col. Howard A. Craig. The Americans repeated the arguments of Eisenhower’s 

memoranda and stated that if all preparations went forward, a combined force of 

5,800 aircraft and 48 divisions could begin the attack against northwestern 

Europe. The plan had three phases. The preparatory phase (code-named 

BOLERO) was to include development of a logistics base, movement of troops 

and equipment, establishment of a preliminary front using England to stage 

commando raids and to mount strategic air attacks against occupied Europe and 

Germany on an increasing scale, and contingency planning for a possible emergency offensive in 1942. The second phase (SLEDGEHAMMER) wasthe crosschannel invasion to seize beachheads in the Le Havre-Boulogne area. The third 

phase (ROUNDUP) was the expansion of the beachhead and breakout. The 

Americans promised to have 1 million men, 30 divisions, and 2,550 combat aircraft ready by April 1, 1943, but only 3‘/2divisions and 700 combat aircraft by 

September 15, 1942.11 

For the next six days the British and American planners and the British Chiefs of 

Staff discussed the “Marshall Memorandum,” as the British dubbed the plan. On 

April 14, the British accepted the plan with one proviso-that all necessary measures be taken to prevent a joining of Japanese and German forces.12 The Americans 

had no objections. 13 The Marshall Memorandum, especially the BOLERO phase, was 

the strategic foundation for Spaatz’s own plans for the buildup of the U.S. Eighth 

Air Force in England. By the end of July 1942, the ground under this foundation had 

shifted, threatening to bring down the planning basis of the AAF in Europe. 

70 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

The decisions at the ARCADIA Conference and the acceptance of the 

Marshall Memorandum substantially modified AWPD/l. The diversion of shipping to the Pacific overturned deployment predictions, and the preparation for a 

land invasion meant less time for the strategic bomber offensive and an increased emphasis on the creation of tactical air power to support the invasion. 

On February 12, 1942, General Arnold announced that the AAF would send to 

the British Isles 16 heavy-bombardment groups, 3 pursuit groups, and 8 photoreconnaissance squadrons, 5 12 heavy bombers, 225 fighters, and 96 reconnaissance planes. In a personal telegram to Churchill, which examined the disposition 

of U.S. armed forces throughout the world, Roosevelt supplied a tentative schedule for the arrival of the AAF in Britain: 

July 1942-3 heavy-bomber groups (105 planes), 1 medium-bomber 

group (57 planes), 3 light-bomber groups (171 planes), and 5 fighter groups 

(400 planes); 

October 1942-1 1 heavy-bomber groups (385 planes), 3 medium-bomber 

groups (171 planes), 5 light-bomber groups (285 planes), and 7 fighter groups 

(560 planes); 

January 1943-15 heavy-bomber groups (525 planes), 7 medium-bomber 

groups (399 planes), 7 light-bomber groups (399 planes), and 13 fighter groups 

(1,040 planes). 

The President explicitly noted that the fighters were “to be used as fighter 

escort for daylight bombing and for offensive sweeps.”l4 The man intended to 

prepare the way for this armada, Brig. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, arrived in England on 

February 20 and established the VIII Bomber Command on February 23. 

On February 2, 1942, Arnold made Spaatz Commander-designate of the AAF 

in Britain. Spaatz also became Commanding General of the Air Force Combat 

Command (the successor to GHQ Air Force). The position carried with it the 

rank of temporary major general. For the next three months, Spaatz applied his 

organizational skills to preparing the AAF for overseas movement. He suggested 

on March 3 1 that the Eighth Air Force be made the intermediate command headquarters between the U.S. Army European Theater of Operations and its subordinate AAF commands. Thus, the Commanding General of the Eighth Air Force 

would be not only the chief of all AAF units in the theater but also the airman 

responsible for overseeing both a large strategic and a large tactical air force. 

Official orders established the Eighth as such exactly one week later, on April 7. 

When Spaatz assumed command of the Eighth Air Force on May 10, the initial movement of personnel and matCriel had already begun. Some potential 

organizational and command problems had also been solved. ABC- 1 established 

the principle that the theater air forces of each nation would be treated as separate entities under the strategic direction and command of one of the Allies. 

Moreover, Arnold gained Marshall’s agreement that the U.S. Army in Britain 

would be organized along functional lines. Instead of dividing Britain into geo71 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

graphically denominated corps or army areas, each composed of a force of all arms, 

the senior officers of the Army Ground Forces, the Army Air Forces, and the Army 

Services of Supply in the theater would command only their own branch and be 

directly subordinate to the theater commander. Arnold had hewn to one of the cardinal rules of air power: Air power must be concentrated to be most effective. Spaatz 

would command an air force composed of all air and aviation support units in the 

theater. Air components would not be split up and parceled out to army ground generals in charge of subregions. This arrangement relieved the theater commander of 

the administrative and tactical details of operating an air force and provided flexibility enough to accommodate the vast air armada then contemplated for deployment to 

Britain. The Headquarters of the Eighth Air Force, as the highest level AAF headquarters in England, was therefore responsible for the theater’s air power. 

The Eighth consisted of an air force headquarters and four subordinate commands, each carrying the number of the overall headquarters: VIII Bomber 

Command, VIII Fighter Command, VIII Air Support Command, and VIII Service 

Command. The composition of these commands corresponded to expected functions. The VIII Bomber Command, consisting of heavy-bombardment groups, each 

containing 32 aircraft, would carry out the operational aspects of the strategic 

bomber offensive. Later in the war, the Eighth’s heavy-bombardment groups 

gained authorization for a front-line strength of 48 planes. The VIII Air Support 

Command, made up of the medium-bombardment groups, the light-bomber groups, 

and the dive-bomber groups (all of 52 planes each), would provide tactical support 

and interdiction for the ground troops invading France from England. The VIII 

Fighter Command, made up of the fighter groups (75-80 planes each), would 

escort, according to the situation and its range capabilities, the planes of either the 

Bomber Command or the Air Support Command. If required, Fighter Command 

could also join the Air Support Command in direct assistance to the ground troops. 

The functions of VIII Service Command included supply and maintenance of all 

items peculiar to the Air Force. As the size of the Air Force increased, additional 

echelons appeared between the commands and the groups. First came wings, 

formed of several groups. Next, for the heavy bombers only, came bombardment 

divisions containing three to five wings. 

Combat aircraft equipping the three fighting commands varied in quality from 

poor to excellent. The B-l7E, although somewhat undergunned by later standards, 

outclassed any other daylight heavy bomber in the world. In addition to speed and 

high-altitude capability, the B-17E had a rugged construction that allowed it to 

absorb unbelievable amounts of battle damage and still return to base. Variants of 

the B-17 served as the backbone of the Eighth’s bombers throughout the war. The 

B-17E had a combat radius of approximately 750 miles.” 

* The combat radius is the straight distance a plane can fly from its base and return. It takes into 

account taxiing, taking off, forming up, and landing, and is calculated at 3/8 to 2/5 of the aircraft’s 

rated range. 

72 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The B-25 Mitchell medium bomber had a combat radius of about 500 miles 

and a bomb load of 3,000 pounds. It was usually operated at altitudes below 

20,000 feet and thus was unable to attack targets defended by heavy antiaircraft 

guns, which usually guarded strategic targets. It was sturdy and fairly heavily 

armed. 

American fighters did not measure up to world standards. The P-39 

(Aircobra), although fast, lacked the maneuverability and altitude to contend 

with German fighters. It had a combat radius, allowing 10 minutes of combat, of 

150 miles. The P-40 (Warhawk) had a similar combat radius. But given proper 

tactics and disciplined pilots, it could hold its own against the German fighters at 

lower altitudes. By 1942, the AAF official history acknowledged its obsolescence.15 The twin-engine P-38 (Lightning) was a good high-altitude heavy 

fighter with a combat radius more than double that of other American fighters. It 

could hold its own at high altitudes against German aircraft but its engines 

reacted badly to the unique combination of high humidity and extreme cold 

found over northwestern Europe during winter; it operated more satisfactorily in 

the warmer Mediterranean and the Pacific. 

Upon taking over command, Spaatz immediately began the final preparations for sending the Eighth to England. Contrary to what one might suspect, the 

headquarters personnel of the Eighth Air Force did not consist of a group of elite 

officers hand-picked by Spaatz and Arnold for their dedication to the ideals of 

daylight strategic bombardment. In fact, Spaatz had inherited the Eighth Air 

Force Headquarters because its previous assignment, preparing for a possible 

invasion of French North Africa, had lapsed, leaving it available for reassignment. The Eighth’s former Commander, Col. Asa N. Duncan, became Spaatz’s 

Chief of Staff, and Duncan’s staff continued its work for Spaatz. The new staff 

faced an abrupt change in focus from planning a tactical mission in support of a 

possible small-scale invasion to planning both the major ground support and the 

major strategic air campaigns of the American armed forces in Europe. Spaatz’s 

staff faced a daunting challenge; in spite of the grandiose numbers and missions 

described in AWPD/l, the AAF appears to have done little operational planning 

for combat over Europe. In early April 1942, Maj. Henry Berliner, a personal 

friend of Spaatz and the Eighth Air Force Assistant Chief of Staff for Plans, 

approached Col. Richard D’O. Hughes of the target planning section of the AAF 

Air Staff. Major Berliner admitted that Spaatz had sent him to find out if any 

serious planning existed concerning the Eighth’s mission. Hughes shared target 

intelligence he had gathered and an impressed Berliner asked him to meet 

Spaatz the next day. At the meeting, Spaatz, as usual, said little, but he absorbed 

everything that Hughes related. A few days later General Marshall ordered the 

Eighth Air Force to prepare and to present to him in ten days a complete operational plan. Berliner and his staff promptly appeared, hat in hand, at Hughes’s 

door. Hughes noted, “they had none of them ever made an operational war plan 

before in their lives, none of them had had the opportunity to study the problems 

74 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

involved, and a more scared and nervous bunch of officers I have seldom seen.” 

Hughes agreed to help and within five days he prepared a slick and plausible 

plan. Shortly thereafter he found himself transferred permanently to Spaatz’s 

headquarters. 16 

On May 10, Spaatz and Arnold met at Bolling Field to discuss the movement of the Eighth to Britain and Hughes’s plan. Spaatz “expressed the hope 

that the force would not be stampeded into premature action by political pressures and other influences.”l7 He warned against exaggerating AAF strength 

and cautioned that he intended to operate on the basis of 100 percent reserves at 

all times, until the pipeline of replacement combat crews and machines had been 

put in place and filled. Spaatz wanted it understood that he would not begin 

combat operations until his force was ready.18 

Four days later Spaatz and Marshall met, and Spaatz again presented his 

(and Hughes’s) basic concept of operations. The Americans meant to draw the 

Luftwaffe into combat and destroy it in a battle of attrition. A great air force, as 

Spaatz had observed in England, could not be destroyed in one or two battles. 

He had seen how constant action had broken the German air offensive while 

bringing the British themselves to the brink of defeat. It would take months of 

constant bleeding of experienced pilots and loss of first-line machines to draw 

the sting of the Luftwaffe and make a cross-channel invasion possible.19 

To force the Luftwaffe to come up and fight, the Americans intended to 

bomb targets of such economic or military importance that the Germans would 

have to defend them or lose the war. General Spaatz contended that “the full or 

partial destruction of Ploesti would force the enemy to defend many of those targets now considered unimportant.” Once Hitler’s chief source of natural petroleum 

in Ploesti, Romania, dried up, the synthetic oil plants of the Reich would have to 

be defended or Germany would be helpless to fight a modem war.20 

Given the Marshall Memorandum, tactical air plans for the European invasion ranked high on the agenda at this meeting. Marshall discussed the strength 

of Nazi defenses and the necessity of reducing them. He next turned to the need 

for air superiority over Allied preinvasion troop concentration points and asked 

what the AAF could do to counter night movement of enemy armored formations. Marshall also expressed concern about the AAF’s capability to protect the 

invasion areas. Spaatz, in turn, suggested that timely reconnaissance and properly stationed planes would solve those problems. He defined for Marshall the 

difference between air superiority and air supremacy. Air superiority meant that 

the stronger force could operate with freedom but could not guarantee that the 

opposing air force would be unable to execute damaging air raids. Air supremacy 

meant that the opposing air force would be completely unable to operate effectively. Spaatz emphasized that the cross-channel invasion required air supremacy 

before October, when bad weather would tie up the air arm and the plan. 

Ma&ball accepted a weather deadline of “early October” and asked Spaatz to 

brief Secretary Stimson.21 

75 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

c 

Henry L. Stimson, 

Secretary of War, 

194-1945 

The next day Spaatz explained his basic concepts a third time to the Secretary 

of War. Stimson noted that the strategic targets differed from those of AWD/l. 

Spaatz replied that the original conceptions of AWPD/l “involved the usage of 

Air Power-supported by ground forces,” but that the present planning “involved Air Power-supporting ground forces [emphasis in original] .” Spaatz 

then spoke of having two U.S. expeditionary air forces, one of which “would 

attack vital enemy industries and interior installations” while the second would 

“establish air supremacy over a lited area-permitting ground forces a necessary latitude to carry out the mission.” Clearly, Spaatz conceived of two separate 

American expeditionary air forces-one strategic, one tactical. Both would 

operate under the same overall commander. Stimson promised his full support to 

On May 16, 1942, Spaatz and company terminated their series of conferences with nearly two hours of discussion with Maj. Gen. Robert C. Richardson, 

Jr., Marshall’s personal representative, who was to leave shortly for a tour of 

Pacific combat zones. Richardson’s task was to determine for the Chief of Staff 

the minimum amount of Army resources required to hold the line against Japan. 

This rationale would enable Marshall to devote the remainder of his forces 

against the more powerful foe in Europe. 

After the obligatory explanation of the basic concepts and exhortations 

against premature commitment, discussion turned to more technical matters of 

spaatz.22 

76 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

General George C. 

Marshall, Chief of Staff, 

U.S. Army, 1939-1945. 

compatibility of AAF and British equipment and of target selection. Spaatz men 

tioned railroads, waterways, and troop concentrations. Richardson pointed out 

the importance of submarine production as a key target. Both generals discussed 

the effect of combined Anglo-American command on target selection and 

agreed that the Americans should retain the right to select their own targets. 

During the targeting discussions, Spaatz included German aircraft production, 

noting that the necessary rate of destruction would be twenty planes a day. With 

regard to fighter escorts for the bombers, Spaatz expressed the then standard 

AAF opinion on the defensive prowess of the B-17 as a gun platform.23 

Finally, discussion turned to methods of sending the Eighth to England. 

Spaatz presented a plan to fly the Eighth’s aircraft over a Maine-LabradorIceland-England ferry route. Richardson was impressed, and as he departed, 

indicated that Marshall, too, had expressed great optimism about the plan’s success. The key element of the plan was its provision of aircraft and crews in 

England as early as possible. Aircraft that arrived crated and disassembled via 

sea transport would need to be assembled and checked out. Their entry into 

combat would be thus delayed. Each B-17 heavy bomber would lead four P-38 

fighters. The flying of hundreds of planes across the relatively undeveloped 

North Atlantic route required detailed and accurate scheduling to assure the 

presence of vital supplies and navigation aids along the way. The plan also sacrificed future combat strength for immediate effect, because the inexperienced 

77 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

crews ferrying the planes would suffer attrition at a fairly high rate, while all 

seabome airplanes and crews would arrive intact, provided German submarines 

did not sink them. Once the route had been established, as it was later in the war, 

regular ferry crews, rather than combat crews, delivered the planes.24 

In these conferences Spaatz left no doubt in the minds of his superiors, military and civilian, about what he intended to do and how he meant to do it. The 

Eighth Air Force, when fully prepared and only then, would be hurled en masse 

against vital German targets that absolutely had to be defended by the Luftwaffe. 

The Luftwaffe would destroy itself on the guns of the Eighth’s bombers and, if 

possible, those of its short-range fighters. And as the battle of attrition continued 

in the air, the Eighth would also throttle the Luftwaffe on the ground by destroying the aircraft production industry. This action would ensure air supremacy for 

the invasion of Europe and severely damage Germany’s capacity to wage war. 

Spaatz’s knowledge of the Luftwaffe’s size, strength, and deployment came 

almost entirely from British intelligence. The AAF official history admitted, 

“When the war began, the AAF probably was more deficient in its provisions for 

intelligence than in any other phase of its activities.” The same source also 

stated that the AAF remained dependent on British intelligence for the combat 

status of the Luftwaffe and for target information for the balance of the war.25 

The British possessed reasonably accurate reports on those matters in part 

because of their European intelligence network26 and in part because of their 

breaking of top-secret German codes (known as the ULTRA secret), especially 

those of the Luftwaffe. The breaking of the codes enabled the British to obtain 

accurate readiness, location, and order of battle information on Luftwaffe combat formations.* This information gave Spaatz confidence in his assumptions 

that the Germans would continue to deploy the bulk of their air power on the 

Eastern Front or Mediterranean. Furthermore, code breaking could give him 

quick warning of any change in enemy air plans. 

Spaatz’s strategy, given the disposition of the Luftwaffe and the on-time 

delivery of the aircraft promised him, did not seem unreasonable. The Luftwaffe 

had between 4,000 and 4,400 front-line combat aircraft for most of 1942, 

60 percent of them deployed against Russia, a little less than 10 percent assigned 

to the night fighter defenses of Germany,27 and a large contingent in the 

Mediterranean. Spaatz may have faced no more than 400 to 500 machines of all 

types, which gave a large statistical edge to his own initial strength of 512 heavy 

bombers and 225 fighters, plus the several thousand British bombers and fighters stationed in Britain. Any major German redeployment or upset of Spaatz’s 

timetable would invalidate his calculations.28 Postwar examination of captured 

Luftwaffe records revealed that Spaatz faced a larger force than he had antici- 

* It is doubtful that in May 1942 the British were directly sharing the ULTRA secret with the 

AAF. However, information derived from ULTRA, but not attributed to it and suitably disguised, 

would have figured in the British appreciation of German air strength made available to Spaatz. 

78 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

pated. German day fighters on the Western Front began the year numbering 292 

aircraft and ended the year numbering 453. In September, German day fighter 

strength reached a high of 574 and then dropped to 500 for the following two 

months.29 

The most salient point of Spaatz’s plans was the emphasis on destroying the 

Luftwaffe rather than on conducting a strategic bombing campaign against the 

German war economy. Spaatz would strike at important economic targets primarily to force the Luftwaffe to defend them and only secondarily to damage 

German production. He apparently muted his own beliefs in the effectiveness of 

strategic bombing in order to present to Marshall and Stimson views more in 

keeping with the role of the Eighth Air Force as only one part of the U.S. forces 

to be employed against Germany. To concentrate on strategic bombing at the 

expense of tactical air operations in support of U.S. ground units would hardly 

have persuaded his listeners of the AAF’s willingness to join the combined-arms 

team envisaged for Europe. Lack of cooperation may have cost Stimson’s and 

Marshall’s support for AAF logistics priorities. Or, practical as always, Spaatz 

may well have realized that the destruction of the Luftwaffe was a necessary 

preamble to the freeing of American air power to conduct both strategic and tactical operations at will. 

On May 21, Spaatz learned of the first of the diversions of strength that 

eventually hamstrung the Eighth’s ability to engage in an effective strategic 

bombing campaign in 1942. Admiral Ernest J. King, Commander in Chief of the 

U.S. Fleet and Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), insisted that the Eighth divert 

four B-17Es to the defense of Alaska. Spaatz, unaware that King had foreknowledge (thanks to the breaking of Japanese naval codes) of the upcoming Midway 

Island campaign, viewed the action with a jaundiced eye. Such withdrawals, in 

his opinion, were merely the entering wedge of a whole series of possible diversions that could only hinder the creation of a stable air force.30 Spaatz complained about the diversion of the B-17s to Alaska; he strongly protested the 

dissipation of his force and the disruption of his movement to England. In the 

interest of safety, Spaatz said he could not allow the B-17s to shepherd more 

than four fighters each across the Atlantic. Arnold regretted the diversion of the 

B- 17s but insisted that “certain pressure” (King) made it necessary.31 

Later that morning Spaatz met with Arnold and Maj. Gen. Millard F. 

Harmon, Spaatz’s successor as Chief of the Air Staff. The three analyzed a letter 

Spaatz had just received from Eaker expressing “the opinion that the R.A.F. 

would attempt the dispersal of our units and absorb them within the British 

Command.”32 Because both parties accepted the assumption that the U.S. bombing force would operate semiautonomously, this dispute centered on the control 

and basing of U.S. fighters. During the ABC talks in January and February 1941 

and in a final report of March 27, 1941, the Americans had agreed to undertake 

the air defense of the bases of U.S. naval units in British waters and of certain 

other areas as we11.33 In the summer of 1941, the Air Ministry and the U.S. 

79 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Observer Group made concrete plans to station U.S. pursuit groups in Northern 

Ireland, with the clear intention of having the Americans assume full responsibility for the air defense of that sector. The Observer Group further agreed to 

allow individual pursuit squadrons to gain operational experience by working 

with British units in different sectors of the British air defense network.34 

The rapid buildup of tactical air forces required by the Marshall Memorandum and the AAF’s intention of building up a large strategic bombing force led 

the Americans to change their opinion on the proper basing for the pursuits. 

Arnold expounded the new strategy to Portal in mid-April 1942. In order to gain 

air supremacy over Europe and to divert the Luftwaffe from the Russian front, 

Arnold said, the United States and Britain would have to concentrate the greatest 

mass of aircraft as soon as possible in England. Because night bombing alone 

could not wear the Germans down in time for the cross-channel invasion, daylight bombing must resume. In its first stages, daylight bombing would necessitate a large force of fighter escorts to hold down losses from enemy fighters. 

Once the day bombers had gained greater defensive firepower and perfected formation flying, they would extend their attacks beyond the range of their fighter 

escorts.35 American pursuit units would have to have fields close to the French 

beaches and within escort range of their bombers. 

This new policy encountered British opposition. When Maj. Gen. James E. 

Chaney, head of the U.S. Observer Group in Britain, presented Arnold’s new 

plan to the British on May 8, the head of Fighter Command, Air Chief Marshal 

Sholto Douglas, insisted that U.S. fighters become part of the British integrated 

air defense establishment, the Air Defense of Great Britain (ADGB).36 Chaney 

replied that his instructions were to limit the use of U.S. fighters to bomber 

escort and invasion support. The British appealed to the RAF Delegation in 

Washington to explain the British position to Arnold. It was not possible “to 

accept for operational training in the front line between 200 and 300 American 

fighters without V.H.F. [radios] or I.F.F. or any knowledge of routing and recognition or flying control or, in fact, of any procedure at all.” In the event of an 

enemy raid, “the Americans could not cross their fingers and say they were not 

playing. They must take their share in the defence of what was in fact an AngloAmerican air base.” 

In a reply that the Air Ministry found most unsatisfactory, the RAF Delegation said, “You are up against a very strong determination on the part of 

Arnold, Spaatz, and others to concentrate the training and employment of their 

forces in the U.K. entirely upon proving the daylight bombing offensive can be 

made a success.” Attempts to explain the technical difficulties to Spaatz in particular had failed, but the RAF Delegation thought that he might come to accept 

universal fighter control once he reached Britain and experienced those difficulties. The delegation warned that the Americans would not easily be turned from 

their determination to use their pursuits primarily as escorts.37 

On May 12, Chaney delivered a new proposal asking to put two fighter groups 

80 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

on fields near U.S. bombers (in the Huntingdon area) and to delay the arrival of an 

additional five groups. Portal rejected it. The delay jeopardized the Marshall 

Memorandum objectives. The plan to occupy Northern Ireland had already 

gained the approval of the Combined Chiefs of Staff; moreover, the RAF had no 

objection to the proposal that the primary task of the U.S. fighters be offensive 

and had already offered cooperation in the early stages of the bomber offensive. 

Portal insisted, however, that U.S. pursuit units in RAF sectors have not only 

offensive tasks but convoy escort and air defense duties as well. The Chief of 

the Air Staff proposed that the United States eventually take over British No. 12 

Group’s sector, the second most important sector for the defense of eastern 

Britain and the sector defending the U.S. bomber bases.38 The issue remained at 

an impasse until Arnold’s visit to Britain at the end of May 1942, to discuss the 

reallocation of U.S. aircraft production with the British. 

While in Britain, Arnold apparently agreed to station the first two and the 

last U.S. fighter groups in the Huntingdon area and the second two in Northern 

Ireland. British sources state that he further agreed to the fitting of one fighter 

squadron into each active RAF Fighter Sector (to gain operational experience) 

and to the eventual takeover of the Northern Ireland and other group sectors.39 

Given Arnold’s subsequent instructions to Spaatz, which forbade the integration 

of U.S. fighters into British air defense schemes, either Arnold changed his mind 

or the British assumed agreement where there was none. 

While Arnold preceded him to London, Spaatz, with what must have been a 

sense of relief, left the round of conferences in Washington to supervise the 

overseas movement of his forces. On May 23, he flew to Fort Dix in New Jersey 

and inspected all units. From there he motored to Mitchel Field in New York 

City, and, on May 25, he flew into Grenier Field in New Hampshire. His command’s aircraft had already started to arrive-57 P-39s and 3 B-17s. By May 28, 

the total had risen to 76 P-39s and 17 B-17s, with an additional 78 P-38s at Dow 

Field in Bangor, Maine, and 31 transports at Westover Field in Massachusetts.40 

The next three days were taken up by meetings with Maj. Gen. Harold L. 

George, the head of Ferry Command, who controlled the ferry route itself, not 

the planes traveling through it; Maj. Gen. Sherman Miles, the Army Corps Area 

Commander for New England; and Col. Howard A. Craig of the Air Staff. 

George agreed that Ferry Command had the responsibility for the proper functioning of the movement route and would establish communications and provide 

housing, supplies, and weather reports. General Miles agreed to provide ground 

security. Spaatz said that the Eighth could provide its own air defense.41 

On June 1, Spaatz began his flight for Prestwick, Scotland, the first leg of 

which ended at Presque Isle.42 Thanks to the Battle of Midway in the Pacific, 

the trip to Scotland took seventeen days. On the evening of June 1, as Spaatz, 

George, and Craig worked to perfect plans, they received a priority call from 

Brig. Gen. Laurence S. Kuter relaying orders from Marshall to halt all movement. 

Midway had claimed its first casualty-the Eighth’s departure for England. At 

81 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

8:30 P.M. Kuter issued orders placing all units on six-hour alert for movement to 

the West Coast, where they would pass to the control of the Fourth Air Force.43 

Spaatz relayed the changes to his subordinates and ordered the transports to 

Presque Isle to unload 80,000 pounds of supplies and then to comply with War 

Department orders. By June 3, Spaatz had returned to the District of Columbia. 

Victory at Midway unscrambled the Eighth’s plans. On June 6 and 11, the 

1 st Fighter Group and 97th Heavy Bombardment Group returned to Spaatz’s 

control. He escaped Washington on June 10 and arrived at Grenier Field that 

evening. Winging into Presque Isle by 11:30 the next morning, Spaatz inspected 

each item covered in his previous visit.44 On June 12, Spaatz tried twice to fly 

the 569 miles to Goose Bay, but thunderstorms and icy conditions forced him to 

turn back. Communications remained unsatisfactory. Weather and communications failed to cooperate on June 13 as well. Frustrated, Spaatz wired Arnold to 

send “the best communications expert in the country” to Presque Isle at once. 

On June 14, Spaatz landed in Goose Bay-two hours ahead of his staff. Despite 

more unfavorable weather reports, Spaatz wished to get a first-hand idea of the 

difficulties involved in the 776-mile flight to Bluie West I (B.W.I.) Field, 

Greenland, so he pushed on to Greenland on June 15. Once there, he received a 

wire from Arnold asking when the first contingent would start for Britain. 

Spaatz replied that the B-17s not needed for escorting fighters or for weather 

patrols would start at once; the 1st Pursuit Group could start in a week. On June 

17, Spaatz’s party flew the 779 miles to Reykjavik, Iceland. They completed the 

last leg (884 miles) to Prestwick on June 18.45 

Spaatz alighted at Prestwick to the greetings of Brig. Gen. Ira Eaker, who 

had done a thorough job in preparing Britain for the initial presence of the AAF. 

Soon after his arrival on February 20, 1942, Eaker had set up the first AAF 

headquarters in Europe. He then proceeded to RAF Bomber Command Headquarters, where he began studies of its staff procedures. Next, he drafted recommendations for training, equipment, and employment of U.S. units. He found 

time to examine British airfields intended for American use, to present a plan for 

reception and assignment of bombers, to prepare a scheme for supply and 

administration of such units, and to take appropriate steps toward close coordination of effort with the RAF. On February 22, two days after Eaker arrived at 

Bomber Command, Air Chief Marshal Arthur T. Harris replaced Air Marshal 

Richard Peirse. 

On June 19, Spaatz and Eaker motored to London to pay a call on the U.S. 

theater commander, Maj. Gen. Chaney. (The next day Maj. Gen. Eisenhower 

relieved Chaney and assumed command of the European Theater of Operations 

[ETO].) The two airmen then called on the American ambassador, John G. 

Winant, a great air enthusiast who had been a Navy pilot in World War I. He 

wished to visit all of the Eighth’s installations. Spaatz invited Winant to accompany him on his first inspection trip. Before completing his last call of the day, 

on Portal, Chief of the RAF Air Staff, Spaatz held a press conference. Unlike 

82 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

current press conferences, those of World War I1 tended to be mannerly, with 

newspaper men throwing slow pitches and off-the-record comments staying off 

the record. Spaatz did well. Quentin Reynolds, Drew Middleton, Ed Beattie, and 

the rest of the press corps liked Spaatz’s straightforward answers as well as his 

honest desire to stay out of the limelight. The correspondents honored Spaatz’s 

request that his presence in the British Isles not be mentioned. In that, they had 

no choice. Strict US. military censors subjected all news stories to their flintyeyed gaze before release, pruning them of information valuable to the enemy. If 

Spaatz could keep his presence secret a while longer, perhaps the Germans 

might be less prepared for the AAF’s first raids. Perhaps more important, the 

American public might be less inclined to demand immediate action if it 

remained unaware of the Eighth’s arrival in Britain.46 

On June 20, Spaatz held a full-scale staff conference at High Wycombe. After 

a complete briefing, he set the tone for his command. First, he complimented 

Eaker for “his splendid work and accepted any commitments made by him in 

toto.” He stressed the necessity for a “pleasant” relationship between his staff and 

the British. “The 8th must do well,” he noted, “otherwise our prestige would suffer 

at home as well as with the British who depend on the U.S. effort.” Spaatz ended 

on a cautionary note. The Eighth should take advantage of British experience, not 

British tactics. The B-17s and daytime operations must start under fighter escort 

and not count on their own firepower until they had to make penetrations beyond 

escort range.47 Spaatz’s remarks about the defensive power of the B-17s demonstrated, at this point, more concern about lack of numbers, skill at formation flying, and gunnery training than any lack of faith in the ability of the B-17s to 

conduct unescorted deep penetration missions. He would need his fighters for the 

early shallow penetrations and for supporting the upcoming invasion. 

For the next two weeks Spaatz threw himself into the task of preparing a 

logistics and base structure for his command capable of sustaining the Eighth for 

a prolonged campaign. (See Map 2, Eighth Air Force Installations, 1942.) He 

flew all over England and Ireland, laying the groundwork for large-scale air 

force repair and supply depots. These large facilities would serve as the backbone of the Eighth’s logistics efforts. They would be the first recipients of new 

planes and supplies from the United States and would condition them for dispatch to the combat units. In addition, they would handle complex repairs and 

overhauls beyond the capacity of the forward depots assigned to the combat 

groups. Spaatz reported to Arnold that by January 1, 1943, he would have 3 million square feet of storage for air supplies, which would enable the depots to 

operate at full capacity. These main depots would require at least 25,000 additional personnel. Spaatz also planned for 20 forward supply depots to serve the 

combat groups.48 Kay Summersby, Spaatz’s British driver during the summer of 

1942 and later General Eisenhower’s driver and confidante, remembered Spaatz 

at this time as a “serious man, serious to the point of grimness, and certainly the 

hardest working man in the whole U.S. Army Air Force [sic].”49 

83 

THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

The first bottleneck Spaatz encountered was the shortage of labor and construction supplies in the British Isles. The British, although willing to help, 

found difficulty in squeezing either commodity out of their overstrained war 

economy. At one point, when Air Marshal Christopher Courtney, the RAF’s 

chief supply officer, humorously promised that the bases for the first six groups 

would be ready on time even if they lacked “plush chairs,” Spaatz replied that 

his units would sleep in tents if necessary.50 

Next, Spaatz traveled to Northern Ireland to inspect newly created Eighth 

Air Force training facilities. He planned to set up a training command to give a 

final polish to newly arrived combat crews from the United States.51 The British 

agreed to hand over seven airfields and a headquarters facility. On July 4, 1942, 

the AAF activated the Eighth Air Force Composite Command at Bolling Field in 

Washington, D.C.,52 which was soon transferred to Ireland. Spaatz knew full 

well that Arnold would send him crews as soon as they could make the trip 

well before they had finished their training. 

Two factors prevented this training command from completing its mission: (1) 

the scarcity of active U.S. combat formations (new groups were sent into combat 

very soon after arrival, before their training could be enhanced) and, by midsummer 1943, (2) the higher training level of arriving groups. In fact, because of diversions to North Africa and elsewhere, combat crews did not arrive in Northern 

Ireland for training until September 1943. The few replacements reaching the 

Eighth were easily handled at one of the two AAF training fields in England.53 

The Eighth disbanded the training command by the end of 1943. 

The aircraft needed for operations arrived after a painfully slow journey over 

the ferry route. The first two, a B-17 bomber and a C-47 transport, arrived on 

July 2. Six days later a grand total of eight B-l7s, seven P-38s, and five C-47s 

had arrived. Spaatz’s reception plans for his forces were not helped by constant 

changes in the number of aircraft scheduled for the theater. By June 19, 

Arnold’s original promise of February had grown by one heavy-bomber group 

(32 bombers), nine fighter groups (675 fighters), six medium- and six lightbomber groups (624 planes), eight transport groups (480 transports), and four 

observation groups (144 planes). Many of these additional 2,000 aircraft were 

intended to provide support for the cross-channel invasion.54 Subsequent strategic decisions sending groups to the Pacific or to North Africa caused numerous 

delays in the planned shipments for England. Not until July 27, 1943, did the 

Eighth report a strength of sixteen heavy bomber groups-the original figure 

promised by Arnold in February 1942.55 

Establishing the Autonomy of the Eighth Air Force 

Aside from the primary task of readying his force and deploying it in battle, 

Spaatz had to establish the autonomy of the AAF in England, not from the U.S. 

85 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Army-whose overall leader in Britain, Eisenhower, faithfully adhered to the 

agreements allowing the Eighth to operate as a whole-but from the Royal Air 

Force. The RAF, at this stage in the war, was far larger than the AAF in Britain 

and incomparably more experienced. The RAF had committed itself to night 

bombing because its own operations had shown that daylight bombing raids 

against Luftwaffe-defended targets produced unacceptable losses of men and 

machines. Therefore, the RAF wanted the Americans to abandon their attempt to 

bomb in daylight and to join with them in night raids. Initially, at least, the 

British also wanted to employ U.S. fighters to augment their own air defenses. 

On June 22, Spaatz paid an informal call on Rear Adm. St. G. Lyster, British 

Chief of the Naval Air Staff. Lyster suggested U.S. fighter protection for British 

shipping, a suggestion that Spaatz resisted. His fighters’ primary function was 

U.S. bomber protection, and the instructions given to him from Arnold through 

Eisenhower were clear: U.S. fighters would not “be integrated with British 

fighter units employed in the defense of the United Kingdom, or into the British 

Fighter Command.”56 

The following day Spaatz and Eaker drove to RAF Fighter Command to 

confer with Air Chief Marshal Sholto Douglas.57 Spaatz again emphasized that 

the primary function of U.S. fighters was to support U.S. bombers. He did concede, however, that his fighters would be trained in air defense procedures to 

assist the RAF in the unlikely event that it could not cope with a renewed 

German air offensive against Britain. Douglas suggested that the most expeditious way to acquaint American pilots with operations was to blend U.S. 

squadrons with British wings until they learned procedures. Spaatz agreed to 

consider this suggestion. Next, Douglas “expressed the hope that eventually the 

U.S. Air Forces would take over an entire sector.”fig Spaatz pointed out that the 

Americans would then have to assume responsibility for the air defense of that 

sector. Douglas admitted “that if U.S. forces did take over a sector, U.S. Air 

Forces might be called upon to furnish Fleet Arm protection.”59 Spaatz deferred 

his decision. 

He continued his delaying tactics on other occasions during the summer 

when the RAF again made tentative attempts to gain closer operational control 

of the AAF in Britain. On July 7, Douglas repeated his attempt to pin down 

Spaatz on sector air defense. Finally, on July 15, Eisenhower and Spaatz met 

with Douglas and Slessor and obtained British agreement to the principle “that 

the integrity of the 8th Air Force must be maintained in any organizational setupbut there was no objection to all Air Powers being under one Command.”60 

If not in this meeting, then at some time during the summer, Spaatz made substantial concessions to the British. He allowed the attachment of his fighter 

squadrons to British groups for final training and acclimatization and agreed to 

the eventual assumption of control of British sector and group areas.61 Spaatz 

might well have taken the calculated risk that the integration of his fighters both 

86 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Air Chief Marshal 

Sholto Douglas, Air 

Officer Commanding, 

Fighter Command, 

RAF, 1942. 

offensively and defensively into the British air control network would be a liability only if the Germans launched attacks on Britain-a possibility that he discounted. Spaatz probably did not object to the responsibility for the air defense 

of his own fields, if needed. In return, he gained a well-functioning control network with which to coordinate his own operations. In any case, Spaatz’s accommodation became unnecessary with the unanticipated transfer of all his active 

fighter groups* to the North African operation, and it came too late to head off 

unfavorable press reports. One, which appeared on the front page of the August 

8 issue of the New York Times, began, “The widely advocated British-American 

air offensive against Germany is not being carried on because of BritishAmerican inability to agree on methods or objectives.”62 The article added that 

British air officers doubted the ability of U.S. heavy bombers “to do the job.” 

Instead, according to the Times, the British wanted the Americans to build night 

bombers. Although the American and British publics may have failed to grasp 

the import of the RAF’s suggestion, professional air officers knew that the 

AAF’s switch to night bombing would bring the entire American air effort under 

total British control. Three days later the New York Times printed Spaatz’s 

rebuttal on page tw0.63 He asserted that the dispersal of men and planes dictated 

* The Eighth did retain the British-trained ex-RAF Eagle squadrons just transferred to its control. 

- 

87 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

by strategy, bad weather, and the necessity of putting American crews through 

advanced operational training-not disagreement over tactics-had delayed the 

start of the joint air offensive. 

The opening of Park House, where Spaatz and most of his staff lived and 

took their meals, allowed him to entertain high-ranking RAF officers in comfort 

and privacy. Spaatz also visited them often at their offices or over a working 

lunch. On occasion, his diary recorded the subject of discussion. On August 8, 

for example, he and Air Chief Marshal Wilfred Freeman, Vice-Chief of the Air 

Staff, “conferred” on the transfer of the Eagle Squadrons-fighter squadrons 

composed of American citizens who had joined the RAF to fight the Nazis 

before Pearl Harbor-from the RAF to the AAF. (In September the three 

squadrons of combat-experienced pilots became part of the Eighth Air Force, 

forming the 4th Fighter Group.)@ Between August 11 and 21, Spaatz saw Air 

Vice-Marshal Norman H. Bottomley, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Operations), five times.65 Although some of their conversations must have centered 

on coordination for the first U.S. heavy-bomber raid on August 17, Bottomley 

was the officer, subject to Portal’s and possibly Churchill’s approval, who 

defined operations. If he accepted operational independence for the AAF, the 

goal was three-quarters gained. 

Bottomley and Spaatz had lunch on August 11 and dinner at Park House on 

August 13 for a preliminary round of negotiations. Five days later, probably 

after both sides had reviewed the original scheme, the two met again. The next 

day Spaatz sent Bottomley a letter, perhaps a draft proposal, and the two dined 

that evening at Park House.66 Although speculative, this scenario fits with subsequent events. 

On August 20, Spaatz forwarded to Eisenhower a draft proposal on AngloAmerican operations. The same day, in light of the commencement of active 

U.S. operations on August 17, the Eighth Air Force and the Air Ministry 

together held the first of a series of weekly meetings to discuss operational questions. At the first two meetings, both attended by Spaatz and chaired by Slessor, 

the chief order of business was consideration of a joint U.S.-British directive on 

daylight bomber operations involving fighters.67 Modifications to suit both 

staffs and the approval of Eisenhower and the British resulted in the promulgation, on September 8, of the “Joint American/British Directif [sic] on Day 

Bomber Operations Involving Fighter Cooperation.” 

The joint directive divided the development of the day bomber offensive 

into three successive phases and provided command procedures for implementing each. In phase 1, U.S. bombers would fly with combined U.S.-British fighter 

cover. In phase 2, U.S. fighters would escort the bombers while the British supplied diversions and withdrawal cover. In phase 3, the AAF would operate independently in cooperation with the RAF, a phrase ambiguous enough to allow the 

AAF complete control over its own operations. The directive did, however, 

imply U.S. coordination and adjustment of operational intentions with British 

88 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

air control plans. The joint directive effectively laid to rest the question of integration of U.S. forces into the RAF.68 Spaatz had convinced the RAF that the 

AAF should retain its operational integrity. 

Although Spaatz had fended off too close an embrace from the RAF, the 

“Joint Directif,” at least in the minds of the RAF’s top leaders, merely allowed 

the AAF to continue its experiment in daylight bombing.@ The British, as the 

New York Times had implied, did not believe it would succeed. Portal flatly predicted failure. On September 26, 1942, he stated to Archibald Sinclair, the 

Secretary of State for Air, with remarkable accuracy the conditions the U.S. 

strategic bombers would face in October 1943: 

The Americans will eventually be able to get as far as the Ruhr, suffering very 

much heavier casualties than we now suffer by night, and going much more 

rarely. They will in effect do area bombing with the advantage of the absence 

of decoys. If it can be kept up in face of the losses (and I don’t think it will be), 

this will of course be a valuable contribution to the war, but it will certainly not 

result in the elimination of the enemy fighter force and so open the way to the 

free bombing of the rest of Germany. I do not think that they will ever be able 

to regularly penetrate further than the Ruhr or perhaps Hamburg without absolutely prohibitive losses resulting from being run out of ammunition or from 

gunners being killed or wo~nded.’~ 

Called Peter by his close associates, Portal was the youngest of the Combined 

British and American Chiefs of Staff. He had begun his military career in 1914 as 

a motorcycle dispatch rider. A year later he joined the Royal Flying Corps, earning 

a Distinguished Flying Cross and shooting down several German aircraft before 

the end of the war. Between the wars he served as Commander, British Forces, 

Aden; as instructor at the Imperial Defense College; and as Director of 

Organization on the Air Staff. Personally somewhat remote and cool, he nonetheless established excellent working relationships with Spaatz, Eaker, Arnold, and 

Eisenhower. The British Chiefs of Staff and Churchill respected him for his strategic ability and brilliant intellect. Because he was virtually unflappable, he could 

weather the storms of Churchill’s fanciful military ideas, often hurled with insulting vehemence by the Prime Minister at the Chiefs of Staff, and temper those ideas 

with wisdom. Portal worked exceedingly long and hard hours during the war, leaving behind him a voluminous official, but scant personal, correspondence. 

Despite his sincere doubts about U.S. daylight bombing policy, which he 

believed would delay the Americans’ eventual and necessary conversion to night 

bombing until 1944 or later, he loyally supported the AAF’s determination to 

build up the largest possible force in Britain. Always a realist, he probably 

accepted the political fact that the Americans were so wedded to daylight bombing that only repeated setbacks and not advice could divorce them from it. He 

may also have recognized that vocal opposition to daylight operations could 

only work against British interests in the long run. Any undermining of the AAF 

buildup would result in the dispersal of units slated for Britain to other theaters. 

89 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Early Operations 

Even as Spaatz fended off the British with one hand, he had to use the other 

to restrain Arnold. Arnold wanted AAF aircraft operating from Britain against 

the Germans as soon as possible. He had promised Churchill action by July 4, 

nine days before Spaatz arrived in Britain.71 As Commanding General of the 

AAF, Arnold naturally had priorities very different from those of the leader of a 

combat air force like the Eighth. Arnold had to justify AAF appropriations to the 

President, the Congress, and the public. In addition, he had to maintain AAF 

production and strategic priorities in the face of challenges from the British and 

the U.S. Navy. All this required a perception of the AAF as a successful and 

aggressive weapon actively being used against the enemy. 

In the summer of 1942, the AAF’s image needed bolstering. Navy air had 

won at Midway while the public still wondered about Army air’s performance at 

Pearl Harbor and in the Philippines. Furthermore, Arnold knew that Roosevelt 

wanted to see results from the AAF which would justify the massive aircraft 

production program and shipping priorities slanted toward the projection of air 

power. On June 28, Spaatz received orders from Arnold to schedule a raid for 

Independence Day. Because his B-17s had not yet arrived and his 31st Fighter 

Group had just received its unfamiliar Spitfires, he chose a squadron of light 

bombers assigned to the VIII Air Support Command. The unit had landed in 

Britain months earlier as part of a token U.S. force. Spaatz and Eaker viewed the 

raid as a premature commitment. 

The results, from Spaatz’s viewpoint, justified his counsel against forcing 

action too early. The morning of July 4 six American crews and six British 

crews, all in RAF Boston Bombers and all flying in a joint formation, with the 

Americans in relatively protected positions, attacked German airfields in 

Holland. Two of the planes with American crews were downed and two more 

failed to reach their target. The attacks inflicted little damage. From Arnold’s 

point of view, however, the raid was successful. Not only had Americans been 

bloodied, but one of their pilots had heroically managed to bring home his 

severely damaged plane. Capt. Charles C. Kegelman was promptly promoted to 

major and awarded the first Distinguished Service Cross (DSC) earned by a 

member of the Eighth Air Force. British and American papers gave the story of 

the raid headline treatment. To complete the episode Spaatz personally pinned 

the DSC on Kegelman on July 11. His command diary sourly noted, “The cameramen and newspapermen finally got what they wanted-and everybody 

seemed contented.”72 But not Arnold, who continued to press Spaatz for more 

AAF action and publicity. 

Spaatz not only had to meet Arnold’s demands, he had to satisfy Dwight D. 

Eisenhower, the new head of the European Theater of Operations (ETO). Spaatz 

and Eisenhower had not known each other well before their current assignments. 

They had crossed paths only three times-once at West Point, where Eisenhower 

90 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Air Chief Marshal 

Charles A. Portal, Chief 

of the Air Staff, RAF, 

1940-1945. 

graduated a year after Spaatz, -A 915; again in Washington, D.C., from 1933 to 

1935, when Spaatz served in the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps and 

Eisenhower was in the Office of the Chief of Staff; and, finally, during the first 

six months of the war, when both men had served in high Army and AAF staff 

positions. Although the new theater commander was not an air enthusiast, he 

was much less closed-minded about the AAF than many staff and ground officers; he even had a private pilot’s license. Marshall had selected him for his current position and had promoted him to lieutenant general. Eisenhower had spent 

the previous seven months working hand in hand with the Chief of Staff as head 

of the Operations Division of the War Department’s General Staff and had prepared the Marshall Memorandum, which set out the invasion plans for northwestern Europe agreed to by the Anglo-American Allies. Having written the 

plan, he would now execute it. 

On June 26, Spaatz had his first appointment with his new commanding officer. It was the start of an effective, close, working relationship that did much to 

advance the cause of the Allies and, to a lesser extent, the AAF. This first meeting proved typical. Spaatz agreed to notify Eisenhower one week before his 

units were scheduled for combat or to telephone him at any time day or night 

that AAP units entered combat. Eisenhower, as the officer responsible for conducting the amphibious assault on the Continent, was naturally concerned that 

VIII Air Support Command (VIII ASC) had not yet set up its headquarten in 

91 
I SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz congratulating newly-promoted Maj. Charles C. 

Kegelman to whom he has just awarded the first Distinguished Service Cross 

earned by a member of the Eighth Air Force. 

Britain. Spaatz sent a cable “asking for Colonel [Robert C.] Candee to get here 

immediately with Air Support Headquarters.” Then Spaatz and Eisenhower 

agreed to locate VIII ASC Headquarters at Maj. Gen. Mark W. Clark’s I1 Corps 

Headquarters. In this they adhered to the essential principle of co-location of a 

tactical air headquarters with the headquarters of the ground unit it supported. 

Clark’s I1 Corps Headquarters commanded all Army Ground Forces in 

Eisenhower’s theater and was scheduled to have direct tactical control at the 

invasion beachhead.73 

Spaatz did not walk away empty-handed from his first meeting with 

Eisenhower. He obtained support for his position against the British on the role 

of U.S. fighter aircraft in England. In a letter to Arnold dated the day of the 

meeting, Eisenhower confided: 

We intend to insist that the American squadrons should be looked upon as an 

offensive force with the result that our fighter squadrons will be fully engaged 

fighting over hostile temtory. If we are going to provoke a fight, we have got 

to have the close support units to fight with, and they must not be worn out by 

keeping them on regular ale1ts.7~ 

Apparently Spaatz had drawn Eisenhower’s attention to the fact that any 

92 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Eighth Air Force fighter assigned to air defense over England and naval support 

over the English Channel might be a fighter unavailable for tactical air missions 

over a beachhead. 

The Spaatz-Eisenhower relationship eventually grew into what Spaatz later 

termed “a rather close personal relationship, and I think on both sides that 

mutual confidence made it unnecessary to have long detailed explanations for 

courses of action.”75 From July 1 to October 31, 1942, the two generals “conferred,” to use the term employed in Spaatz’s Command Diary, fifty-five times. 

On June 26, after dinner at High Wycombe, Spaatz, Eaker, Winant, and Air 

Chief Marshal Harris retired to Eaker’s apartment for drinks and discussion. 

Harris had met Spaatz and come to a first-name basis with him during a trip to 

the United States as a member of a British purchasing commission in 1938, and 

again when he headed the permanent RAF Delegation to the United States in 

late 1941. That evening Spaatz and Harris agreed that, given 5,000 bombers, 

they could end the war in three months. When Winant pointed out that current 

production schedules should soon supply that force, Spaatz noted that attrition, 

operational damage, and commitments to other theaters had significantly altered 

the situation. As Spaatz’s Command Diary narrated, Spaatz and Harris disagreed 

at only one point. Spaatz “contended that the war could not end until the Allies 

gained a foothold on some point now occupied by Germany, and operated from 

that territory against the enemy.” Harris insisted that “a prolonged bombing of 

the enemy’s vital industry alone could finish the job.” Placing troops on occupied soil meant supporting them, thereby jeopardizing other operations. Harris 

also raised the possibility of another Dunkirk disaster. Spaatz replied that “no 

such effort should be attempted until the Allies were certain of the results and 

that the propitious moment was only when and if the Allies gain complete 

SUPREMACY [sic] in the air.”76 

This discussion neatly summarized the differences between these two great 

practitioners of strategic bombing: Spaatz, the flexible, pragmatic disciple of 

Billy Mitchell, who, despite his belief that strategic bombing alone could defeat 

Germany, also anticipated and accepted having a large percentage of his force 

assigned to tactical air missions supporting an invasion of France; and Harris, 

the inflexible student of the great British air power advocate, Trenchard, who 

insisted in the face of all opposition that his bombers could win if he was given a 

chance to prove it. Almost two years later, when the two men actually had 5,000 

bombers between them, they would find themselves unable to end the war 

within their self-imposed deadline, perhaps because diversions prevented them 

from applying the full effort of their bombers. 

In June 1942, Spaatz and Harris had much in common. Both had received 

their commands in February, and neither led a large force. Spaatz hoped to have 

at least 500 modem heavy bombers by January 1, 1943. Harris, despite taking 

great risks to get 1,000 bombers in the air for a raid over Cologne, hoped to have 

a similar number. Harris had mounted this large raid only by including 370 

93 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

aircraft and their half-trained crews from his operational training units and by 

having his regular units put up every bomber airframe they had, including second-line aircraft.77 When he took charge, he found a total operational force of 

only 374 medium and heavy bombers, of which only 44 were four-engine 

Lancaster heavy bombers-the mainstay of the British night-bomber campaign.78 

Harris also found a new directive for operations, dated February 14, 1942, 

which authorized him to employ his effort “without further restriction” in a campaign whose primary objective “focused on the morale of the enemy civil population and in particular, of the industrial workers.” This directive continued a 

policy first enunciated in a directive of July 9, 1941, which called for attacks 

against civilian morale and the inland transportation system in Germany. The 

Air Ministry issued the February directive to take advantage of a newly developed radio navigational aid, Gee, which promised greater accuracy in night 

bombing of targets within its range, 350 miles from Mildenhall. The accuracy of 

the system varied from 0.5 mile to 5 miles.79 Targets within range included 

Germany’s chief industrial area (the Ruhr) and the coastal ports of Bremen, 

Wilhelmshaven, and Emden.80 

The bombing of Germany to reduce the morale of its civilian population, 

especially the work force, which emphasized the targeting of city centers rather 

than precision targets and the use of large numbers of incendiary bombs, became 

an ide‘efixe with Harris. He had observed how the RAF had scattered its effort in 

vain attempts to bomb the Germans’ transportation system, synthetic oil industry, and capital ships at Brest. From these failures he drew firm conclusions that 

Bomber Command lacked the accuracy to destroy precision targets and that any 

attempt to divert his forces to such targets should be resisted at all costs. He 

dubbed plans that promised to end the war by knocking out a single system of 

key targets “panaceas” and those who advocated them “panacea mongers.” 

A study issued on August 18, 1941, six months before Harris’s assumption 

of command, had already drawn attention to Bomber Command’s inaccurate 

night bombing. The Butt Report, named for its author, D. M. Butt, a member of 

the War Cabinet Secretariat, had concluded, after examination of 633 photos 

taken by attacking aircraft, that only one aircraft in five dropped its bombs 

within five miles of its target. Only 7 percent of the British bombers attempting 

to demolish the Ruhr dropped their bombs within five miles (or within seventyfive square miles) of the target.81 The Butt Report, with its damning indictment 

of RAF night navigation, spurred the development of electronic navigation aids, 

such as Gee. The report may also have tipped the scales toward adoption of the 

area-bombing policy embraced by the February 14 directive by eliminating any 

option featuring precision night bombing. The Butt Report could only have 

strengthened Harris’s mistrust of precision targeting. 

Like the majority of high-ranking British and American airmen, Harris had 

spent his adult life in the service. In 1914, he had joined the Rhodesia Regiment 

and had fought as a mounted infantryman during the conquest of German South94 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Air Chief Marshal 

Arthur T. “Bomber” 

Harris, Air Officer 

Commanding, Bomber 

Command, RAF, 

1942-1945. 

West Africa. Forswearing the infantry, he had trekked to England where he 

joined the Royal Flying Corps and finished the war as a major. For the next fifteen years he had commanded various bomber formations throughout the British 

Empire. He had served on the Air Staff for five years before going to the United 

States in 1938 to head a British purchasing commission. At the start of the war, 

he commanded the crack No. 5 Group, where he displayed his talent as a harddriving director of bombing operations. 

Harris had a forceful personality and was prone to wild overstatement of his 

views. In support of his opinion that the Army would never understand air 

power, he was said to have remarked, “In order to get on in the Army, you have 

to look like a horse, think like a horse and smell like a horse.”Q In an even more 

pungent utterance Harris was supposed to have said, “The Army will never 

appreciate planes until they can drink water, eat hay, and shit!” When stopped 

for speeding on a road between High Wycombe and London, he replied to the 

constable’s admonition that he might kill someone, “Young man, I kill thousands of people every night!”83 Harris also enjoyed a special relationship with 

Churchill, which, if not personally close, was at least founded on a mutual interest in advancing Bomber Command. Churchill needed a means to strike at 

Germany proper before the cross-channel invasion, and Harris wanted as large a 

force as possible to bomb Germany into surrender by air alone. Harris had 

“direct contact” with the Prime minister.84 The proximity of High Wycombe 

95 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

(Headquarters, Bomber Command) and Chequers (Churchill’s country residence) facilitated frequent and frank exchanges of views between the two men. 

This easy availability for face-to-face discussions often gained Harris the advantage of Churchill’s support and a strengthened position with the Air Ministry. 

Spaatz, whose position in dealing with the AAF staff was also strong, 

although it rested on his relationship with Arnold rather than with the head of 

government, nonetheless came under increasing pressure to commit his forces to 

combat. Throughout July, the combat aircraft of the Eighth trickled in. On July 

1, the 97th Heavy Bombardment Group’s first B-17 landed at Prestwick, but it 

was not until July 27 that the entire group and its ground echelon were completely assembled.85 The 1st Fighter Group’s initial P-38 touched down in 

England on July 9, but the group was not operational until mid-August. The 31st 

Fighter Group completed its conversion to Spitfire MK Vs, becoming operational on August 12. All of the groups had been rushed overseas after receiving 

only minimal unit training in the United States. The 97th lacked experience in 

formation flying, high-altitude operations, gunnery, and navigation. When 

Spaatz and Eisenhower inspected a bomber group in late July, they flew a gunnery training mission with a crew that had never fired on the range before, had 

just arrived from the United States, and had not even initiated crew training. 

After the flight Eaker chewed out his subordinate in a furious letter, asking: 

What would you think of an infantry regimental commander who, when told 

the commanding general was coming to inspect his regiment, assigned the latest recruit to put on the effort as representative of the organization? That is 

exactly what General Eisenhower, General Spaatz, and I think of you and your 

judgment and that of your organization commanders. It was a disgraceful performance. It wasted their time and gave them an erroneous idea of the state of 

your crews.86 

Practice missions alleviated many of these problems and, on August 9, the 97th 

received orders for its first mission, which weather postponed until August 17. 

For Arnold back in the States, mission no. 1 could not come too soon. He 

had asked, then requested, then cajoled, and eventually prodded Spaatz for 

action. On July 16, Arnold had noted, “The movement of the First Pursuit Group 

with its accompanying heavy bombardment has not progressed by a long shot as 

I had hoped.” On August 9, he had written, “I am personally gravely concerned 

over the apparent extension of the time period which you had anticipated necessary to complete the training of our units prior to their actual entry into combat.” 

He continued, “The strategic necessity for the immediate or early initiation of 

effective, aggressive American Air Force offensive operations becomes more 

and more apparent here daily.” The harried AAF leader closed by admonishing, 

“Where doubt exists as to the ability of our units to acquit themselves adequately, I urge that you do not be over conservative.”*7 

Arnold needed results to justify the retention of top priority for allocation of 

96 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

air resources to the strategic bomber offensive in Britain. Perhaps even more 

than Marshall he had opposed the newly agreed upon invasion of North Africa 

(TORCH).* The diversion of heavy-bomber groups to North Africa delayed the 

bomber offensive from England called for in AWPD/l. The longer the delay, the 

greater the gathered momentum of the demands generated by other theaters. On 

July 24, as part of the final settlement concerning the invasion decision, 

Marshall had allotted to Admiral King fifteen heavy- and medium-bomber 

groups for use in the Pacific. In addition, the U.S. Chiefs of Staff shifted heavyand medium-bomber groups from the scheduled buildup in England to the North 

African operation. In November 1942, the Eighth would have to transfer four 

I-eavy-bomber and four fighter groups already in England to TORCH. North 

Africa, where the battle was against German and Italian ground units, would be 

a ground forces theater. The Pacific would be either a Navy show (in the central 

Pacific) or the ground Army’s (in MacArthur’s area of operations). In 1943, at 

least, the European Theater of Operations with its scheduled air offensive 

against the enemy’s homeland, would be the theater that got the AAF its share 

of newsprint, but only if Arnold could get results. 

The press stories of disagreement between American and British airmen 

added to Arnold’s desire for action. On August 15, Arnold felt compelled to call 

a press conference to defend the AAF. The conference, which the New York 

Times described as “perhaps the most active military press conference held in 

Washington since the war began,” had extensive off-the-record portions. In 

reply to a question on the bombing of Germany he could only say it was “merely 

a question of getting the planes over there.”88 

The next day, in the Sunday Times of London, Peter Masefield, a wellregarded British aviation expert, roundly condemned the American heavy-bomber 

effort. Masefield echoed the view of the RAF Air Staff, which had concluded 

that the B-17 and the B-24 were unsuitable for day operations in Europe. In 

January, on the basis of its experience with twenty early model aircraft, the Air 

Staff had concluded that “unless the Fortress or the Liberator can be adapted for 

employment at night they are unlikely to achieve more than intermittent harassing operations in daylight in a European theatre and in the face of modem air 

defenses.”89 Masefield suggested that the Americans produce and operate 

British-designed heavy bombers at night alongside the RAF.90 The American 

papers also carried the story. 

The day after Masefield’s article appeared, Spaatz held a joint AAF-RAF 

press conference to emphasize cooperation between the two forces and to finally 

launch mission no. 1. 

Spaatz had intended to lead the mission himself.91 Eisenhower approved 

these arrangements,92 with the proviso that both Eaker and Spaatz not fly on the 

* The decision to invade North Africa is discussed later in this chapter. 

97 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

same mission, but apparently, the British objected. What would happen, they 

asked, if a ranking officer were downed over occupied France and ended up in 

the hands of German military intelligence? Spaatz and Eaker reluctantly accepted 

the British view but decided that the psychological value of a general flying was 

worth the risk. Spaatz, however, had already learned one of the most important 

secrets of the war; the British had already fully briefed him on the ability of the 

British Government Code and Cypher School (GC and CS) at Bletchley Park to 

decrypt the messages of the German top-secret Enigma enciphering machine 

(used by all the German armed services and many civil and police organizations 

as well).* Spaatz obviously knew too much. Therefore, Eaker, Spaatz’s deputy 

and Commander of VIII Bomber Command, who did not yet know the ULTRA 

secret,93 led Eighth Air Force heavy-bomber mission no.1, directed at the 

Rouen-Sotteville railroad marshaling yards.94 The targeting officer of the Eighth 

Air Force, Col. Richard D’O. Hughes, selected the marshaling yards because 

they were far enough from the town to minimize killing French civilians and 

because they fell well within the range of escorting Spitfires.95 

The attacking planes bombed with reasonable accuracy; approximately half 

of the 18.5 tons of bombs released fell in the general target area. They damaged 

ten of twenty-four lines of track, destroyed some rolling stock, and scored direct 

hits on two large transshipment sheds in the center of the yard. The attack may 

have temporarily disrupted service, but it caused no lasting injury to the Germans. 

Serious damage to such a target required the attack of a far larger number of 

bombers.96 An overjoyed Spaatz greeted Eaker as soon as the latter alighted 

from his aircraft. 

After the first raid Spaatz enthusiastically told Arnold, “It is my opinion and 

conviction that the B-17 is suitable as to speed, armament, armor, and bomb 

load. I would not exchange it for any British bomber in production.” Arnold sent 

Spaatz’s message directly to the President, adding, “The above more than vindicates our faith in the Flying Fortresses and precision bombing.”97 

As Arnold’s letter to Spaatz on August 19, 1942, indicated, the news of the 

Rouen raid was the perfect tonic which Arnold couldn’t wait to share with the 

“highest authorities.” He told Spaatz: 

You can’t blame me for being a little impatient, because I have been impatient 

all my life. . . . I was very glad to get the information covering the operation of 

the bombers over Rouen. That mission came just at the right time to act as a 

counter-irritant to the British report that our airplanes were no good, etc. etc. 

As a matter of fact, the President had me up to Hyde Park day before yesterday, asked me about that article, and told me he was much concerned. I assured 

him that there was no reason for being Concerned. I hope we are right. 

* The high-grade signal intelligence material produced by the British Government Code and 

Cypher School was tightly controlled and distributed under the code name ULTRA. Hence references 

to GC and CS as the ULTRA organization and to the material as ULTRA or the ULTRA secret. 

98 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

-- 

Lt. Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Commanding General, European Theater of 

Operations, and Eighth Air Force commanding generals, summer 1942.kfl to right: 

Lt. Gen. Robert Candee (Commander, VIII Air Support Command), Brig. Gen. 

Frank Hunter (Commander, VIII Fighter Command), Col. Asa Duncan (Chief of 

Staff, VIII Bomber Command), Maj. Gen. Walter Frank (Commander, VIII Service 

Command), Eisenhower, Maj. Gen. Carl Spaatz (Commander, Eighth AF), and 

Brig. Gen. Ira Eaker (Commander, VIII Bomber Command). 

Arnold was still greatly worried about “the tendency of the Strategic 

Planners to take aircraft away from the European Theater and throw it in the 

Southwest Pacific Theater.” He lamented, “We are so dispersing our effort that 

we will have an overwhelming superiority in no theater. This in itself violates 

the approved conception of employment of aircraft.” Arnold asked Spaatz 

whether he could “get Eisenhower and Portal together and for you to get everybody over there to stand up on their hind legs for the Air Force that is needed?”98 

In quick succession, on August 19, 20, and 21, the Eighth sent out three 

raids. None consisted of more than twenty-four B-17s, and the last one sent 

against the Rotterdam shipyards was recalled at the French coast after being sixteen minutes late for its escort. Attacking German fighters damaged one of its 

planes, but the bombers seemed to have defended themselves well. Spaatz sent 

reports of these pinpricks to an impatient Arnold. In a hurried letter, hand-carried to Arnold, Spaatz wrote that the latest operations indicated “we can bomb 

accurately from high altitude.” Spaatz further commented favorably on his 

bombers’ ability to maintain formation, fly formation through flak, and defend 

themselves against the Germans’ best fighter, the Focke-Wulf 190 (FW 190).99 

99 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The King and Queen of England inspecting an Eighth Air Force field with Maj. 

Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, summer 1942. 

Earlier the same day Spaatz, who said he had delayed judgment until operational 

experience allowed him to gauge with accuracy the value of U.S. training and 

equipment, had justified his actions to Arnold. “First let me say that I can imagine what a strain this inaction has been on you and what a lot of gripes you have 

had to put up with and answer. But I really believed we were justified in withholding action with our B-17s until we could get off to a good start and am following a similar policy with the P-38s.” Then Spaatz told Arnold that critics had 

begun to recant: 

In spite of the London Times, Seversky or anyone else the B-17s are far superior to anything in this theater and are fully adequate for their job. The British 

themselves admit this and say that with similar equipment and training they too 

would day-bomb. They are unanimous in their praise of our Bombing accuracy 

about which they had their fingers crossed until now.*O0 

Arnold, recognized that Eisenhower because he had Marshall’s complete 

confidence and would soon be a power in his own right, should have the best air 

advice available, especially if he were in charge of American air power’s most 

important theater. Arnold tried to supply Eisenhower’s staff with high-quality 

officers. On July 30, Arnold informed Spaatz that to help him meet TORCH planning obligations he was sending him Colonels Vandenberg and Norstad. Arnold 

wanted Eisenhower to accept Spaatz’s headquarters as his own air planning unit. 

100 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

“Get him to use you in that way as he is the head of all U.S. Army Forces in 

Europe.” Arnold added, “I want him to recognize you as the top air man in all 

Europe [emphasis added].” A few days later Arnold rather querulously observed, 

“I am not satisfied that Ike is using you and your staff to the extent that we 

hoped he would. Perhaps geographical separation, or other factors not in evidence here lead him toward decisions without the advice and counsel of the airthought represented in your command.” Arnold had wanted to offer Eisenhower 

“any officer in the Army Air Forces whom he might wish to have as his Chief of 

Staff’ but was unable to derail Brig. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith’s assignment as 

Eisenhower’s Chief of Staff.101 

Spaatz replied on August 11, “Hansell will be the top planner for air and as 

such under the present instructions will be the Theater Commander’s Air 

Planner.” Spaatz went on to point out that Hansell would live in the same house 

with him and other key officers of the Eighth. Norstad and Vandenberg were 

assigned to Headquarters, ETO, as air planners for the cross-channel invasion 

and Operation TORCH respectively.102 

The complexity of these arrangements apparently caused Spaatz some concern. On August 14, he told Arnold, “I am certain that it would be a mistake for 

two large Air Staffs to be built up here.”lo3 Spaatz suggested a solution to Arnold 

and Eisenhower, and so, on August 21, Arnold, at Ike’s request, gave Spaatz 

additional duties as Air Officer for ETO and appointed him head of the Air 

Section of the ETO staff, thus assuring the Eighth of active participation in theater 

planning. 

Earlier, on July 7, Arnold had given Spaatz a second hat by appointing him 

Commanding General, AAF, ETO, which did not add a plane or private to 

Spaatz’s command, but did elevate him a step on the ETO organization charts. 

Before that, as Eighth Air Force Commander, Spaatz was a tactical commander 

and therefore was organizationally outranked by the Commanding Generals of 

the Service of Supply, ETO, John C. H. Lee, and Army Ground Forces, ETO, 

Mark Clark, who had theaterwide administrative training and doctrinal responsibilities. 

Spaatz now wore three hats (CG, Eighth Air Force; CG AAF, ETO; Chief, 

Air Section, ETO Staff) with one goal-keeping air power and its advocates at 

the forefront of the theater scheduled to receive the preponderance of U.S. 

wartime air strength. When Eisenhower was officially transferred to the 

Mediterranean in January 1943, an airman succeeded him. General Marshall’s 

selection of Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews as CG, ETO placed the theater in the 

hands of a man committed to daylight strategic bombing. 

In September 1942, Arnold, eager for more materials with which to wage his 

air power publicity campaign on the home front, applauded Spaatz for suggesting photographs of bombing results. “People believe more readily what they see 

than what they hear,” he noted, “Every daily paper in the United States will feature the pictures if you can get them to us.”104 Arnold extolled the value of posi101 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, 

according to his driver, 

“the hardest working man 

in the whole U.S. Army 

Air Forces,” summer 1942. 

tive publicity, saying: “Within the borders of [the] continental United States, 

two most important fronts exist, namely, aircraft production and public opinion. 

Nine months have passed since Pearl Harbor, and the American public now 

wants to see pictures, stories and experiences of our Air Forces in combat zones. 

The public is entitled to expect us to furnish . . . them.” Arnold directed Spaatz 

to give the subject of publicity and news coverage “his full and immediate cooperation.”lOfi 

Spaatz had probably borrowed the idea of bomb damage photos from Harris, 

who habitually trotted them out to impress the Prime Minister and others with 

his efforts. Eventually Arnold, too, kept albums stuffed with strike photos, dutifully supplied by Spaatz, in his office to spring on unsuspecting visitors. He circulated the photos and even a glossy monthly magazine entitled Zmpact” 

throughout Washington. Air power publicity was rapidly growing. On September 7, 1942, for instance, the lead story in Time magazine covered the Eighth 

and its commander. 

Spaatz also cultivated the press, though less ebulliently than Arnold. Several 

times he invited correspondents such as Ed Beattie and Joe Morrison of United 

* Impact was a security classified publication, but it appears to have circulated freely throughout the AAF and official government circles. In fact, its security classification may have lent it a certain cachet, making readers think they were “in the know.” 

102 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Press, as well as Walter Lippmann and Wes Gallagher of Associated Press for dinner and late-night poker at his residence in London. He held press conferences in 

July and August. On August 23, Spaatz even allowed Arthur Sulzberger, publisher 

of the New York Times, to accompany him on a flight to High Wycombe where 

Eaker would be decorated with the Silver Star. The flight almost ended in tragedy 

when the pilot of their plane ground-looped on landing, wiping out the props and 

landing gear. Happily, everyone in the plane walked away from the crash.106 

After a while, General Marshall, who did not want one part of the Army 

praised at the expense of another, cabled Eisenhower on August 19, questioning 

the advisability of all the attention given U.S. air raids and airmen. The next day 

Eisenhower passed the word to Spaatz, who temporarily muted his public relations 

activities. Spaatz persuaded Time to take him off the cover of the September 7 

issue (but not out of the lead story) and had his chief of staff substitute for him on 

a March of Time radio broadcast scheduled for that very evening.107 

In the meantime, Spaatz and the Eighth continued to struggle toward full 

operational readiness. In August, the Eighth Air Force sent out eight heavybomber missions, including one completely aborted. The largest August raid had 

only 30 B-17s. In September, the Eighth launched only four heavy-bomber missions, including another aborted mission. It lost its first 2 B-17s to enemy action 

on September 6 and had two new heavy-bomber groups (the 301st and 92d) enter 

combat on September 5 and 6. On its busiest day it sent out 76 heavy bombers. 

The next month the Eighth mounted only three raids, the largest of which 

numbered 108 heavy bombers. Two more groups (the 93d and 306th) entered 

combat, while the Eighth Air Force lost its first B-24 in combat. Yet for every 

few steps forward there would be one backward. On October 21, the 97th Bomb 

Group, the Eighth’s most experienced heavy-bomber formation, transferred to 

the Twelfth Air Force, which the Americans had formed to support the Allied 

invasion of French North Africa, scheduled for early November 1942. Its second 

most experienced group, the 301st Bomb Group, went to the Twelfth Air Force 

on November 8. In November, the Eighth finally matched the number of missions flown in August-eight. It put 91 bombers in the air for the month’s 

largest mission and had three additional groups enter combat (the 44th, the 303d, 

and the 305th.)los 

These first short steps failed to please Arnold. His records showed 178 

heavy bombers in England by September 30,109 but as yet no single mission had 

come close to matching that figure. He sent Spaatz the first of a series of messages that would continue for the next sixteen months and were directed at the 

US. bomber commanders in England. Arnold sarcastically noted, “It is believed 

that some powerful reason must obtain which limits your heavy-bomber operations to an apparent average of less than one per week. Weather conditions alone 

are not believed the cause, nor the preparation of some of the two hundred heavy 

bombers under your control in England for use in other theaters. Request full 

information on the subject.”110 

103 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Arnold, who had never led a unit in combat, never seemed to appreciate fully 

the difficulties involved: Spaatz, Andrews, and Eaker repeatedly had to defend 

their seemingly dismal operational readiness rates which, in the autumn of 1942, 

could be attributed in large part to bad weather and training requirements. Before 

Spaatz could field all the bombers on hand, he had to fiiish training their crews, 

all of which arrived unready for combat. Weather played a far larger role than 

Arnold would acknowledge. An authoritative postwar study of weather as it 

affected heavy-bomber missions stated that weather reduced “the potential effort 

planned on a monthly basis by 45 percent.”lll This figure included the summer 

months, which, of course, contained the best flying weather. 

Spaatz and Eaker, however, were encouraged by their progress. In a series of 

memos written for internal AAF use, Eaker gave his and Spaatz’s views. After 

the first four missions, he confidently stated his conviction that “in the future, 

successful bombing missions can be conducted beyond the range of fighter protection.”ll2 Six weeks later, after suffering his initial losses from German fighters, Eaker reiterated his beliefs: 

Our bombing experience to date indicates that the B-17 with its twelve .50 caliber guns, can cope with the German day fighter. There will be losses, of 

course, but there is no evidence that the losses will be of such a high order as to 

make day bombing uneconomical. I think it is safe, now, to say that a large 

force of day bombers can operate without fighter cover against material objectives anywhere in Germany, without excessive losses. 

Such losses as did occur could be much reduced, Eaker thought, with the 

provision of a B- 17 type convoy defender aircraft, already existing in prototype, 

“with extra ammunition supply and extra armor, flying on the flanks of the 

bomber formations.” He requested the shipment of a group or squadron of such 

planes as soon as possible.113 

Eaker seems not to have yet accepted the technical feasibility of a long-range 

escort fighter. He did not ask for more P-38s or for the development of an even 

longer-range fighter. In reply to Arnold’s criticism, Eaker wrote, “Three hundred 

heavy bombers could attack any target in Germany with less than four percent 

losses.” A smaller number of bombers, which would lack the self-defensive 

strength of the larger force, would suffer greater losses. “The daylight bombing of 

Germany with planes of the B-17 and B-24 types is feasible, practicable and economical.’’l14 In the next year, the Luftwaffe day-fighter force would amply 

demonstrate the inaccuracy of Eaker’s and Spaatz’s initial assessments. 

Spaatz’s Command Style 

In early August, Spaatz settled Eighth Air Force Headquarters (code-named 

WIDEWINGS) inBushy Park, on the outskirts of the Hampton Court palace 

grounds, southwest of London. Spaatz himself occupied a comfortable house 

104 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

nearby in Wimbledon. He continued seeking out comfortable if not palatial residences throughout the war-a habit that gave rise to ill-concealed jealousy 

among critics. They complained that such self-indulgence and Sybaritism were 

only to be expected of a fly-boy general. Spaatz did like his comforts, but there 

was a method in his practice: Spaatz made his quarters his command post, a 

command post where he housed many of his staff officers and held daily staff 

meetings. 

Shortly after the war one officer told an interviewer, “General Spaatz apparently does not like an office. He likes to be alone, to relax in the atmosphere of 

his home, and so we used to take major things out to him.” Spaatz’s deputy or 

chief of intelligence would take documents to him at lunch time. “At the end of 

the day,” the officer continued, “you found yourself with a collection of papers, 

cables, etc. to go out to Park House because most of the key people lived 

there.”l15 The same officer further observed: 

We lived and messed there and there was nearly always some key personnel 

around there day and night-it operated on a 24-hour basis. I can remember 

being there at two o’clock in the morning, rushing over to General Spaatz’s 

house; General Anderson came out in his bathrobe, and General Spaatz served 

us tea. During a big night we were up all night in some cases.116 

Living and working together fit in with Spaatz’s philosophy of leadership. 

Spaatz once said of himself, “I may be peculiar in that I refuse to be seated at a 

desk with a bunch of papers in front of me to pore over.”ll7 In the same context 

Spaatz philosophized, “I doubt you can run any big outfit . . . immersed in all the 

details . . . so you must delegate responsibility.” He went on, “It has always been 

a fetish of mine that you can’t delegate responsibility without delegating authority with it.”118 

A long-time friend also spoke of Spaatz’s attitude toward routine: 

Tooey, like some literary characters, was inclined to get up very late and work 

very late. He was a night worker more than a day worker. So actually [he did] 

much of [his] work in pajamas in a messed up bedroom at 10 or 11 o’clock in 

the morning. That’s just the way he worked; I’m not disparaging him. He was 

firmly in command. . . . The last thing in the world he wanted was an 8 o’clock 

officers’ call someplace with everybody sitting down at desks pushing papers 

around. He just didn’t want to be bothered with administration or minor matters. He refused to be.119 

Spaatz ran a military household that had much more in common with the 

staffs of Lee and Napoleon than the German General Staff. By keeping his 

senior officers close at hand, messing, drinking, and even gaming with them, he 

established a firm and deep rapport with his subordinates. He did not make a 

habit of issuing long, detailed orders. Former Air Force Chief of Staff, General 

Curtis LeMay, who served under Spaatz in both the Pacific and European the105 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

aters of World War 11, recalled many years later that he “never got any direct 

orders from General Spaatz on anything,” but after a few hours of sitting at the 

same poker table in the evening, he understood what Spaatz wanted him to 

do.120 

Not everyone appreciated Spaatz’s methods. The informality of his headquarters led some to believe that he was lazy, lax, or merely a good old boy 

prone to cronyism. As late as June 1943, after a year’s close association with 

Spaatz, Eisenhower wrote of “the only weakness” he had found in Spaatz: 

I have an impression he is not tough and hard enough personally to meet the 

full requirements of his high position. He is constantly urging more promotions 

for subordinates and seeking special favors for his forces. My belief in this 

regard is further strengthened by the type of staff he has accumulated around 

him. He has apparently picked officers more for their personal qualifications of 

comradeship and friendliness than for their abilities as businesslike, tough operators. 

Repeated urgings from Eisenhower to correct this perceived defect produced no 

change. Spaatz’s request for a liquor ration for his units also raised Eisenhower’s ire.121 

By freeing himself from the mundane chores of excess paperwork, Spaatz 

freed himself not only for decisions but for personal leadership. Throughout the 

war his relative freedom from his desk enabled him to visit and inspect the combat, training, and supply units under his control. Of course these units “prettied” 

themselves up for his visits, but he had far too much experience doing the same 

thing himself not to know how and where to look for any shortcomings. Because 

of his desire to avoid personal aggrandizement and his less than charismatic personality, these visits had none of the flamboyant trappings that similar visits 

from Patton or Montgomery might have had. Spaatz went to see, not to be seen. 

The Eighth Air Force and the North African Invasion 

Even as Spaatz labored to create an effective force in England, events in the 

Middle East drastically changed the Allies’ strategic plans. German Field 

Marshal Irwin Rommel launched an offensive in the Libyan desert that, after 

overcoming fierce British resistance, captured the fortress of Tobruk, shattered 

his enemies, and sent them reeling back to El Alamein, Egypt, the last defensible 

position in front of the Suez Canal. The debacle in the Middle East, the locale of 

Britain’s major effort against the European Axis powers, threatened one of the 

basic strategic underpinnings of the Eighth-that Britain would be the base for 

an Anglo-American ground offensive against Germany in either 1942 or 1943. 

Churchill, already jolted by the disasters to British arms suffered at the 

hands of the Japanese in Malaya, Burma, and the East Indies, now needed to 

106 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

shore up a rapidly crumbling situation in the Mediterranean. Added strength for 

that theater could come only from forces designated for the cross-channel invasion; Churchill set out to divert them to North Africa. As he remarked in his 

memoirs, “During this month of July, when I was politically at my weakest and 

without a gleam of military success, I had to procure from the United States the 

decision which, for good or ill, dominated the next two years of the war.” He 

had to ask the United States to abandon plans for a cross-channel invasion in 

1942 to undertake the occupation of French North Africa in the autumn or winter by a large Anglo-American expedition. “I had made a careful study of the 

President’s mind and its reaction for some time past,” remarked Churchill, “and 

I was sure that he was powerfully attracted by the North African Plan.” The time 

had come, Churchill believed, to shelve the cross-channel invasion, “which had 

been dead for some time.”122 

Roosevelt himself needed American troops in action against the Germans in 

1942,123 if possible before the congressional election of November 1942. 

Although leaning toward the proposed North African operation, the President 

gave General George C. Marshall, the outstandingly talented U.S. Army Chief 

of Staff and one of the strongest supporters of the cross-channel invasion, one 

last chance to persuade the British Chiefs of Staff to carry it out in 1942.124 

Marshall, Admiral Ernest J. King, Chief of Naval Operations, and Harry 

Hopkins, arrived in London on Saturday, July 18. They immediately closeted 

themselves with Eisenhower, Spaatz, and Admiral Harold R. Stark, chief 

American naval officer in the British Isles. Over the weekend, the Americans 

discussed a revision hurriedly thrown together by Eisenhower’s staff, of the previous cross-channel invasion plans. This revision called for the establishment of 

a secure foothold on the Cotentin Peninsula of Normandy.125 Eisenhower, who 

had been recommended for command of the American forces in Britain by his 

mentor, Marshall, supported it, as did Spaatz. 

During the weekend Spaatz contended that a cross-channel invasion in 1942 

had a better chance than one in 1943. He based his reasoning on the condition 

and disposition of the Luftwaffe. In July 1942, the German summer offensive 

had taken Sevastapol and broken through Soviet defenses toward Stalingrad. 

This offensive had absorbed the bulk of the Luftwaffe’s resources and would 

obviously do so for several more months. During the winter months the Luftwaffe 

could rehabilitate itself and would therefore be a much more formidable opponent in 1943 than in 1942.126 

Spaatz repeated this position,l27 but he and the rest of the Americans failed 

to move the British in ensuing meetings. On the day Marshall arrived in 

England, Churchill and the British Chiefs of Staff met and unanimously decided 

that the proposed autumn 1942 cross-channel invasion “was not a feasible or 

sensible operation.”l2* Because the British would be supplying most of the 

resources required in any action, their refusal to go along ended all prospects of 

an early invasion. When the U.S. delegation reported this impasse to the Presi107 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

dent, he replied with a list of alternative U.S. actions against Germany, but indicated a preference for U.S. actions against French North Africa. Marshall bowed 

to the inevitable and agreed to a US-British invasion of French North Africa 

code-named TORCH. By July 30, Roosevelt and Churchill made their tentative 

agreement on a North African campaign. 

The Allies’ decision to invade French North Africa by November 1942 had 

important long-term and short-term effects. It undermined large-scale U.S. 

heavy-bombardment operations launched from the British Isles and postponed 

the cross-channel invasion until 1944. More immediately, TORCH or its ramifications required that Spaatz substantially modify his plans and expectations from 

midsummer to the end of 1942 and beyond. On August 6, he received a letter 

from Arnold detailing, with what turned out to be undue optimism, the final 

results of the Marshall-King-Hopkins mission to London: 

1. The cross-channel invasion would be abandoned for the year. 

2. The air buildup in Britain would continue. 

3. TORCH would be executed. 

4. More aircraft might be diverted to the Pacific. 

5. A TORCH planning unit would be created in London. 

The letter contained a postscript: “I have just agreed with General Marshall that 

Doolittle will go to England at once as Commander of Air Forces for TORCH.”129 

By selecting Brig. Gen. James H. Doolittle, America’s reigning air hero, Arnold 

at least assured the AAF that it would receive extensive press coverage of its role 

in TORCH, whatever that role might be. Subject to Spaatz’s and Eisenhower’s 

approval of Doolittle, the Eighth had made its first contribution to the North 

African venture-its air commander. Doolittle had been slated to command the 

4th Bombardment Wing (Medium) for the VIII ASC. He checked into WIDEWINGS 

the same day, August 6. 

TORCH not only delayed the cross-channel invasion, it slowed the buildup of 

the Eighth. In mounting the North African invasion, the Allies had accepted the 

necessity of assuming a defensive posture in operations against the Germans 

from Britain. As a consequence, Britain for the time being no longer required a 

rapid buildup in air power to support a ground offensive. The North African 

invasion would consume resources and shipping originally destined for Britain. 

All this meant that the U.S. bomber offensive mounted from England would 

start considerably later and with far less force than that envisaged prior to July 

1942. 

The shift to TORCH disconcerted Spaatz. He believed that the Eighth was 

making great progress. He had even somewhat optimistically convinced himself 

that “the presence here now of 200 B-17’s would be a major factor in crippling 

German air power and insuring air supremacy next spring.”l30 In a letter to 

Arnold, he wrote that he was “much concerned about possible diversion of units 

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THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

from the Eighth Air Force. . . . Regardless of operations in any other theater, in 

my opinion this remains the only area from which to gain air supremacy over 

Germany, without which there can be no successful outcome of the war.”l31 

Four days before the Eighth’s first B-17 raid over Europe on August 13, 

Eisenhower cabled Marshall that the current air plan, with which Generals 

Spaatz, George S. Patton (one of the ground force commanders), and Doolittle 

agreed, called for forming “the nucleus of TORCH Air Force from the Eighth Air 

Force-to be supplemented as necessary direct from the United States.”l32 

Eisenhower required the Eighth to contribute two heavy-bomber groups, 

three medium-bomber groups, two P-38 groups, two Spitfire groups, one transport group, and one light-bomber group. To compensate for these losses, he 

asked for five additional heavy-bomber groups in Britain. 

By August 18, Spaatz had been charged with the planning, organization, and 

training of a new air force, the Twelfth, code-named JUNIOR, which would command the AAF units assigned to the North African operation. Spaatz directed 

each of his various command headquarters to sponsor the creation of a corresponding unit of JUNIOR. On September 23, Doolittle assumed command, with 

Vandenberg as his chief of staff.133 By October 24, the day Headquarters 

Twelfth Air Force embarked for North Africa, the Eighth had supplied 3,198 

officers, 24,124 enlisted men,134 and 1,244 planes for JUNIOR. Until well into 

January 1943,50 percent of the Eighth’s on-hand supplies and much of its maintenance work were devoted to the Twelfth. Well might Spaatz ask, “What is left 

of the Eighth Air Force after the impact of TORCH? We find we haven’t much 

left.”135 

The creation of the Twelfth Air Force prompted a disagreement between 

Spaatz and Eisenhower. On September 8, the two discussed the problems caused 

to the AAF, ETO, by having to raise the Twelfth while the Eighth simultaneously flew operational missions. Eisenhower solved the problem very simply. 

He ordered Spaatz to cease all combat air operations by the Eighth at once.136 

The next day Eisenhower cabled Marshall his proposals on how to conceal the 

halt. 137 

From Spaatz’s point of view, Eisenhower’s decision was the worst possible. 

It delayed the entire AAF bomber offensive for an indeterminate period. If it 

provided an opportunity to justify the diversion of yet more AAF strength to 

subsidiary theaters, it might prove fatal to AAF hopes and deleterious to the 

morale of the Eighth’s service and combat personnel. Spaatz apparently wasted 

no time in appealing to Arnold. On September 10, Arnold cabled Eisenhower, 

“You and Spaatz are urged to continue intensive air operations until the last possible moment as the Eighth Air Force is now accomplishing the mission for 

which it was intended: (a) draw the GAF [German Air Force] from other fronts, 

(b) attract the attention of German fighters, (c) reduce German war effort by 

bombing important targets.”l38 

On the same day, Spaatz gave Eisenhower a draft cable he wished to send to 

109 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Arnold in which he forcefully expressed his disagreement with Eisenhower’s 

order to halt operations. Spaatz was certain that missions from North Africa 

would not be as effective against the Luftwaffe and German war strength as 

those from Britain. He argued that “new operations jeopardize acquisition of air 

supremacy over Germany and may have serious effect on successful outcome of 

war”139 and warned that air operations would be delayed for at least two months. 

Eisenhower persuaded Spaatz not to send the cable. Instead, he modified his 

position, cabling Marshall: “Ground elements of U.S. Air Squadrons in U.K. 

that are set up for service in the expeditionary force are compelled to begin 

packing of equipment immediately. Nevertheless, provision is being made to 

carry on at least two bombing missions a week.”l40 Apparently, Spaatz was able 

to convince Eisenhower that the Eighth could devote maximum attention to 

organizing the Twelfth while continuing to bomb Europe. As long as Spaatz 

realized that TORCH had overriding priority, Eisenhower was willing to allow 

him to salvage the bomber offensive. In the end, harsh northern European 

weather limited the Eighth’s bombers to four raids in September, three in 

October, and eight in November. Although the rate of operations was only half 

of that authorized by Eisenhower and far less than that hoped for by Spaatz and 

Arnold, it at least gave the crews and commanders experience and probably kept 

some German attention focused on northwestern Europe. 

While the Eighth continued to aid JUNIOR, Spaatz pursued two courses of 

action with equal vigor. He provided unstinting cooperation in all phases of the 

Twelfth’s growth while doing everything possible to maintain the Eighth as a 

viable fighting force capable of sustaining a strategic offensive against Germany. 

He failed in the latter but not through lack of effort. In a series of letters to 

Arnold, whose views were identical to his own, Spaatz attempted to further his 

fight for the AAF bomber offensive. Noting unanimous British praise of the 

Eighth’s bombing accuracy, he began, “I am more confident than ever before 

that the war can be won in this theater if we are permitted to carry out the policies which were built up under your command.” Daylight precision bombing 

would be decisive, provided the Eighth received an adequate force in time. “For 

God’s sake,” Spaatz exclaimed, “keep our Air Force concentrated here so we 

can polish off the Germans and get on with the war.”l41 Three days later, he 

wrote: 

In so far as my advice is requested, and often when it is not requested, I have 

reiterated the folly of attempting to fight the war all over the world. In my opinion unless the powers that be come to a full realization of the necessity for concentration of the Air Forces in this theater, we stand an excellent chance of 

losing the war.’42 

The three raids the Eighth had flown so far had convinced him that accurate, 

high-altitude bombing could be performed by unescorted bombers penetrating 

into the heart of Germany. Because TORCH was turning the ETO into “a 100% 

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THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

air theater of operation” until the mounting of a cross-channel invasion, Spaatz 

wrote that, in conjunction with the RAF, he needed only 20 heavy-bomber 

groups (960 planes), 10 medium-bomber groups (570 planes), 10 fighter groups 

(800 planes), 10 photo reconnaissance/weather squadrons, and 2 transport 

groups (supply carriers) to attain “complete aerial supremacy” over Germany 

within a year. 

Spaatz’s and Arnold’s advocacy of a continued air buildup in England did 

not stem from a desire to prove their air power beliefs at the expense of the 

remaining U.S. war effort. As their correspondence shows, they both genuinely 

feared a complete German victory over the Soviet Union or a stalemate on the 

Eastern Front that would allow the Luftwaffe to recuperate and redeploy to the 

west in the winter of 1942-1943.143 Although convinced that unescorted deeppenetration bombing was feasible, they did not believe that it could then succeed 

against the entire Luftwaffe or even against serious German counterbombing 

over Britain. They also had justifiable concerns about the German summer 

offensive in the Soviet Union which had, by late August, progressed through 

Sevastapol, Voronezh, and Rostov; penetrated far into the Caucasus; and 

reached the Volga River a few miles above Stalingrad. 

Roosevelt’s August 24 request for production requirements necessary “for 

complete air ascendancy over the enemy”144 gave Arnold a chance to open a second front of his own in the war to mount the European bomber offensive. Arnold 

assembled a team of air planning experts to produce a new document for the allocation of the nation’s economic assets toward aircraft production, called Air War 

Plans Division plan for 1942 (AWPD/42). When he received the President’s 

request, Arnold sent a priority cable to Spaatz ordering him to detail Brig. Gen. 

Haywood S. Hansell, one of the authors of the AAF’s prewar planning blueprint, 

AWPD/l, to Washington for an important conference. Hansell woke Spaatz at 

midnight, August 26, to inform him of the message’s contents, and Spaatz and his 

staff worked until six in the morning to gather background material.145 

Spaatz and Eaker enthusiastically supported Arnold’s attempt to refocus U.S. 

strategic thinking. Spaatz, deciding to send Eaker along with Hansell because he 

recognized the “vital importance of the forthcoming decision,” wrote to Arnold: 

Hansell is thoroughly familiar with my ideas, and Eaker’s ideas as of operations, etc., exactly parallel mine. I hope the idea can be put across that the war 

must be won against Germany or it is lost. The defeat of Japan, as soul-satisfying as it may be, leaves us no better off than we were on Dec. 7. The war can be 

lost very easily if there is a continuation of our dispersion. It can be won and 

very expeditiously if our effort is massed here and combines its strength with 

the RAF.146 

Although Arnold could not get Eaker in to see the President, he did order 

him to make presentations to the Chief of Staff and the Secretary of War. Arnold 

remarked to Spaatz, “Our major program is more or less bogged down due to the 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

diversity of interest. It has been dispersion, dispersion, and more dispersion in 

our unity of thought for the main effort.”l47 Arnold told Harry Hopkins that the 

frittering away of air units and resources had sapped AWPD/l. Arnold pleaded 

for a revival of AWPD/1 because “it represents the only way in which we can 

vitally affect the No. 1 enemy at once. Given twenty heavy groups of bombers700 bombers-operating from U.K. bases this fall and winter, I believe that we 

can prevent the rehabilitation of the German Air Force this winter.” 

Arnold further promised to dislocate or depreciate the German submarine 

effort by destxoying the five U-boat bases in southwestern France.148 Failure to 

deliver on those promises would cost him in a coinage he could ill afford-credibility. Arnold’s pressure on subordinates to perform-as well as his penchant 

for counting raw numbers of aircraft in a theater instead of only those operationally ready-stemmed directly from the practice of painting himself into corners with promises. 

AWPD/42, issued September 9, was the AAF’s official response to TORCH 

and to the Navy’s demands in the Pacific. In its strategic intent AWPD/42 

closely resembled AWPD/l, arguing that conducting simultaneous effective air 

offensives against both Germany and Japan was impossible with the resources 

available. Because the vital industrial areas of Japan were currently out of range 

of U.S. aircraft, Europe had to be the target for the one offensive that could be 

launched. 

The projected offensive would destroy the German war economy by combining a U.S. force of 2,225 operational bombers, based in Britain and deployed 

by January 1944, with RAF Bomber Command. The AAF would concentrate on 

the “systematic destruction of vital elements of the German military and industrial machine through precision bombing in daylight,” whereas the RAF would 

specialize in “mass air attacks of industrial areas at night to break down 

morale.”l49 In addition, AWPD/42 called for priority production of large numbers of aircraft, which clashed head on with the Navy’s projected shipbuilding 

programs and the Army’s anticipated heavy-equipment requirements. 150 

When the US. Joint Chiefs of Staff met to discuss the availability of the fifteen groups (two of them heavy-bomber groups) promised by Marshall to King 

in mid-July 1942 and destined for the Pacific, Arnold used AWPD/42 as the 

basis for his argument in favor of delay. The Navy objected and the battle was 

joined, finally to be decided by the President. Roosevelt, in typical fashion, gave 

each side half a loaf; the Navy got the groups for the Solomons campaign, but 

AWPD/42’s basic assumptions and all but 8,000 of its production requirement 

of 139,000 planes in 1943 were approved. By the end of the year, production 

realities reduced the aircraft goal in 1943 to 107,000.151 

In conjunction with AWPD/42, Arnold asked Spaatz to enlist the aid of key 

commanders in the ETO for the AAF position 152 Spaatz complied, producing 

messages from Patton, Clark, and Eisenhower. Eisenhower’s message to 

112 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

Marshall on September 5 shows Spaatz’s handiwork: “We are becoming convinced that high altitude daylight precision bombing is not only feasible but 

highly successful and that by increasing the scale of attack, effective results can 

be obtained.”l53 Eisenhower’s request for the 20 heavy-bombers, 10 mediumbombers, and ten fighter groups that Spaatz had already determined would be 

needed so pleased Arnold that he told Marshall, “I believe that this cable is of 

such great and immediate importance as to warrant the presentation of its contents to the President and to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.” Arnold asked Marshall to 

make the presentations to enhance its effect.154 Apparently he did. 

TORCH siphoned off the Eighth’s operational groups and changed its bombing priorities. Transatlantic shipping, which formed the centerpiece for the operation’s logistical planning, had become the objective of both the German and 

Allied navies in the Battle of the Atlantic, the outcome of which was still in 

doubt between September and November 1942 as German submarines continued 

to sink Allied shipping as fast as it could be produced. Thus, the Eighth 

embarked on a campaign against German submarine bases in France, particularly those at Brest, St. Nazaire, L’Orient, Bordeaux, and La Pallice. Their suppression would ease the pressure on the Allied navies and increase the chances 

of safe passage for the TORCH convoys as they sailed for North Africa. 

After preliminary discussions beginning at least as early as September 25, 

Eisenhower, on October 13, ordered Spaatz to make the submarine pens and bases 

his top-priority targets and to estimate the size of the campaign to be mounted and 

the extent of British cooperation.155 

The next afternoon, Spaatz met with Air Marshals Harris and Portal to discuss Eisenhower’s order. They agreed that RAF Bomber Command lacked the 

equipment to precision-bomb the submarine bases during the day and that night 

bombing would be ineffective. Therefore, the RAF would bomb submarinemanufacturing installations in Germany while the Eighth hit the submarine 

pens.156 At the time, this latter task seemed perfectly suited to the limited reach 

and punch of U.S. bomber forces. Spaatz, Eaker, and Arnold apparently 

expressed no objection to the new priority. The Luftwaffe would certainly defend 

its submarine bases, start the battle of attrition in earnest, and realize the AAF’s 

desire to draw it into combat and destroy it. Only later did the AAF’s lack of 

proper ordnance (it had no bombs heavy enough to penetrate the massive concrete roofs of the submarine pens) and its concentrating on a limited and predictable set of targets, become painfully obvious. 

In a letter to Spaatz dated September 3, Arnold first voiced a theme that he 

would sound well into 1943. As with so much else, TORCH was its inspiration. 

“Please understand,” he wrote, “that the decision for undertaking the special 

operation is now completely out of my hands and it is upon that basis that I have 

insisted that it and the United Kingdom operations are complementary.” Because 

TORCH could not be averted, perhaps it could be deflected or at least be made to 

serve other AAF goals. TORCH should go forward with all possible support; 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

therefore any units that helped to ensure its success, such as the Eighth, should 

be as strong as possible, too.157 

Arnold soon concluded that coordinating the efforts of the Eighth and 

Twelfth would best be accomplished by a single USAAF commander supervising operations in both Britain and Africa. That officer would be directly 

subordinate to the overall U.S. commander, Eisenhower. Arnold also concluded, pari passu, that only one man had the proper qualifications for the 

post-Spaatz. As Maj. Gen. George E. Stratemeyer, Chief of the AAF Staff, 

noted, Arnold had expressed a desire for Spaatz to remain at Eisenhower’s 

side and provide him with AAF advice. Stratemeyer told Spaatz, “You really 

should be designated as the Commanding General, American Air Forces in 

Europe,” not just of the ETO. Such “a request to place you in that position 

should come from Eisenhower, and I am sure that it would be approved 

here.”158 Spaatz discussed the suggestion with Eisenhower, but then rejected it 

on the ground that the already thin ranks of experienced staff officers would 

be diluted if yet another headquarters were created.159 This was not an idle 

objection; throughout the war, the Achilles heel of the AAF was its shortage of 

adequately trained staff officers. 160 

Although Eisenhower had initially agreed with Spaatz that an overall 

USAAF commander was not needed, he gradually came to side with Arnold, but 

for his own reasons. He accepted the AAF’s contention that a bombing offensive 

should be waged from Britain but thought it should come after the conclusion of 

TORCH. He wanted to strengthen the Eighth immediately to use it as a reinforcement pool for North Africa,l61 believing that once bases were set up along the 

African Mediterranean littoral, Africa and Britain would form a “single air theater” in which air power could be‘concentrated at any point to take advantage of 

weather conditions or strategic opportunity.162 

On October 29, Eisenhower requested Spaatz’s support for his own plan of a 

unified AAF command “from Iceland to Iraq.” He had apparently obtained clarification on the War Department’s view of a unified command. A single theater 

would help keep resources from the Pacific, an appeal that two separate theaters-Europe (Britain) and North Africa-competing against each other would 

lack. If TORCH succeeded so that a unified command was possible, Eisenhower 

intended to place Spaatz in the position of “Supreme Commander of all U.S. 

Army Air Forces which came under his command, and to advocate the inclusion 

of U.S. Army Air Forces in the Middle East also in that same command.”l63 He 

instructed Spaatz to prepare a plan for implementation of his proposal within 

thirty days.164 

By the eve of the invasion, which started on November 8, 1942, Spaatz 

seems to have resigned himself to being Eisenhower’s chief air officer in North 

Africa, although he would far rather have stayed in Britain to direct the Eighth 

Air Force. In a series of mid-November letters, Arnold and Stratemeyer urged 

Spaatz’s appointment. On November 13, Stratemeyer wrote Spaatz, “You 

114 
THE EIGHTH AIR FORCE 

should get yourself appointed as overall commander of his Air Force.”l65 Two 

days later, Arnold wrote in a letter to Spaatz, 

With all due respect to everybody concerned, you are sidetracked. In my opinion, this whole problem of air operations in Europe must be controlled by one 

man. Are you in a position in England to give the best advice to Eisenhower in 

Gibraltar on such matters? It appears to me that if something is not done we 

will find the air being used more as a support for the ground arms than it should 

be, particularly so, when ifthere ever was a time to use it strategically that time 

is now [emphasis added]. It may be that you should take a trip down to see 

Eisenhower and talk this matter out.166 

The same day Arnold wrote to Eisenhower, “Sticking my neck out considerably, I suggest that you have Tooey join you at your present headquarters.”l67 

Finally, Stratemeyer put it most succinctly, “You should be in Ike’s pocket.”l68 

All these communications illustrate Arnold’s perception of Eisenhower as the 

most important and influential American officer in Europe. (Eisenhower’s 

European Theater of Operations command already included all U.S. Army and 

AAF units assigned to Iceland, Britain, and North Africa.)l69 Arnold’s and the 

AAF’s best interests lay in providing him with the best possible advice on air 

matters. Naturally, in Arnold’s opinion, only Spaatz could give that advice. 

Stratemeyer’s last exhortation proved unnecessary. By the time Spaatz 

received it, he had already flown to North Africa to inspect the Twelfth and 

from there on to Gibraltar, where he met with Eisenhower and accepted the job 

as Theater Air Commander. Eaker moved up to command the Eighth Air Force. 

At a meeting at Headquarters, Eighth Air Force, on November 23, Spaatz 

explained to his staff the general function of the new theater air command. He 

saw its chief duty as strategic control, not operational or administrative control. 

It would be organized as follows: 

Eighth Air Force (in command of all U.S. air forces in Britain) 

Twelfth Air Force (in command of all U.S. air forces in North Africa) 

Iceland air forces. 

The theater air forces commander would exercise technical supervision and 

control of units attached to ground forces. General directives would be issued on 

strategic bombing, on allocation of units between the Eighth and Twelfth Air 

Forces, and on the readiness of heavy- and medium-bombers in each air force to 

support operations throughout the theater.170 

The questions of the final operational objectives and strength of the Eighth 

and Twelfth Air Forces and the organization of a combined Allied air command 

would be settled only after successful initial landings in North Africa. But at the 

end of November 1942, it probably appeared to Spaatz that he had guaranteed 

the attainment of the strategic goals of AWPDA. He had gained a position from 

which, subject to Eisenhower, he could direct the strategic bombardment of 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

German-occupied Europe from any point between London and Baghdad. He 

could also concentrate his forces to operate in those areas most favored by the 

weather, wherever they may be in his vast command. 

Disillusionment would soon come in muddy Tunisia. 

116 
Part Two 

Tempering the Blade 

The North African Campaign 

November 8,1942-May 14,1943 

Part Two 

Tempering the Blade 

ternper\‘tem per\vb\: to make stronger and more resilient through hardship: to 

put in tune with something.‘ 

Current and long-standing USAF tactical air power doctrine defines five 

combat functions for tactical air power: counterair or air superiority, close air 

support, air interdiction, tactical air reconnaissance, and tactical airlift operations. USAF doctrine adds that the governing principle for determining the priority given to each function is the neutralization of “the enemy threat having the 

most profound and continuing influence on the total mission of the area [theater] 

command.” Air Force Manual 2-1 further notes that “all five combat functions 

are performed concurrently because they are mutually supporting.”2 Although 

the next three chapters touch on all the combat functions of tactical air power, 

they concentrate on three: counterair-air superiority, close air support, and air 

interdiction. They also give not only an in-depth analysis of the tactical air 

power experience of another major air service, the Royal Air Force (RAF), but 

trace the influence of thought within the RAF on the emergence of AAF doctrine. 

During the campaign in North Africa (see Map 3, Operation TORCH Area), 

the U.S. Army Air Forces in Europe and their commanding general, Carl A. 

Spaatz, met and overcame fundamental problems in the employment of air 

power. At the campaign’s opening, Spaatz left his task-that of introducing the 

strategic U.S. Eighth Air Force to limited combat operations from a secure and 

logistically sophisticated base area in Britain-to assume entirely different 

duties in North Africa. There he directed combined Anglo-American strategic, 

tactical, and coastal air forces in the midst of sustained combat at the end of an 

attenuated supply line. As the leader of tactical forces, Spaatz met and mastered 

three primary tasks of air in the support of ground operations: 

1. The achievement of air superiority throughout the theater of operations 

2. The provision of close air support to the ground forces; and 

3. The interdiction of enemy supplies and reinforcements to prevent their 

and above the battlefield; 

utilization at the front. 

If superiority had rested simply in numbers of machines, the Allies would 

have had it throughout the campaign. Mere numbers, however, were decisive 

only if all other factors-training, logistics, organization, doctrine, weapons and 

geographic position, as well as the morale, combat experience, and condition of 

available manpower-were equal. These variables had to be factored into any 

119 

meaningful calculation of Allied versus Axis air strength throughout the campaign. When initial Axis advantages are considered, the inability of the more 

numerous Allied air forces to achieve their goals becomes clear. 

The delivery of close air support proved one of the most nettlesome problems because it depended on the resolution of other shortcomings and on the 

personal relationships between the air and ground commanders. Close air support was the application of aerial firepower in coordination with the movement 

and fire of friendly ground formations against hostile targets near ground combat operations. Successful close air support required attainment of air superiority 

over the field of ground combat operations. It also required the maintenance of a 

mutual spirit of cooperation between the ground elements and the air forces providing support. During the early phases of the North African campaign, the 

Allied air and ground forces could achieve neither air superiority nor satisfactory teamwork. Consequently, from November 1942 through mid-February 

1943, Allied close air support was ineffective. 

Interdiction proved far easier to solve. The complete dependence of the Axis 

powers on supplies transported to Africa from Italy, the few ports available to 

receive those supplies, the shortage of suitable shipping, the limited number and 

constricted nature of shipping lanes, and the paucity of protected air transport 

fields made the Axis extremely vulnerable to any logistical disruption. Allied 

breaking of Axis codes, which enabled precise tracking of supply convoys and 

routes, added immeasurably to the ease with which Allied air power could locate 

and attack the many weaknesses in the Axis logistical network. Any problem 

stemmed chiefly from the difficulty of obtaining sufficient striking power. 

By using his managerial, organizational, and, above all, operational skills, 

Spaatz played a vital role in Allied tactical air power’s reversing the variables 

that prevented Allied attainment of air superiority. In the later stages of the campaign, Spaatz improved the team work between Allied air and ground elements, 

which had been noticeably lacking in both the American and British components 

of Operation TORCH’S invasion force. As for interdiction, Spaatz was instrumental in keeping the heavy bombers on interdiction tasks and in disrupting the Axis 

air transport system. Spaatz’s treatment of air superiority, close air support, and 

air interdiction is explored within the next three chapters. 

121 

Chapter 4 

The Race for mnisia 

(November 1942- January 1943) 

Perhaps the most glaring error in the higher planning was 

the decision not to have a unified Air Command. The separation of the Air Forces into two separate commands with 

two distinct areas of responsibility was a stab in the back 

from which they never recovered until they were re-organized under Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder.‘ 

4HB Narrative, ca. 1950 

Initial Invasion Operations 

On November 8, 1942, three Anglo-American task forces landed in French 

North Africa. After overcoming half-hearted French resistance, they occupied 

their initial objectives-Casablanca, Oran, and Algiers. Fortunately, Admiral 

Jean Francois Darlan, Commander in Chief of the Vichy French armed forces 

and second in command to Marshal Petain himself in the Vichy regime, happened to be in Algiers in the midst of an inspection trip of France’s colonial possessions in Africa. Darlan ordered all French forces to cease fighting on 

November 10. The Nazi invasion of unoccupied France, part of the German 

response to the North African invasion, led Darlan to agree to place French military forces under Eisenhower’s command and to order the French civil administration to cooperate with the Allies. This agreement, signed on November 13, 

secured Morocco and Algeria for the Allies and allowed them to turn their energies toward the liberation of Tunisia, much of which the Axis had taken over 

from the Vichy French at the start of the invasion. The Axis powers, aided by 

the confusion and inaction of the Vichy French government in Tunisia, rushed to 

forestall the Allies by hurrying troops and equipment across the narrow stretch 

of the Mediterranean separating Sicily and Cape Bon, Tunisia. 

123 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The stresses engendered by the race to acquire Tunisia revealed weaknesses 

in Allied logistics, organization, and doctrine, particularly in the area of airpower. AAF personnel had played a minor role in preinvasion planning. Chief 

U.S. Army and Navy planners had limited the role of AAF personnel to providing air details concerning tactical support to the invasion task forces rather than 

to employing air power in the Mediterranean at large. Ten days before the operation started, Spaatz confessed to Doolittle that he had never understood the 

“what, when, and where” of the Twelfth Air Force’s assigned mission and function.2 AAF planners did, however, convince Eisenhower on one point-that the 

British and American air forces should be commanded directly by Eisenhower 

rather than by a subordinate air commander in chief.3 

The original invasion plan had called for an overall air commander, but 

Eisenhower said, “I accepted representations made to me, principally by American 

airmen in whom I had the greatest confidence, that the projected use of the 

American and British air forces involved such a wide geographical dispersion 

that unified command would be impracticable.”4 This advice, consistent with his 

thinking, probably came directly from Spaatz. The abortive air plan for the 

autumn invasion of France that Spaatz prepared and presented to the Combined 

American and British Chiefs of Staff (CCS) during the King-Marshall-Hopkins 

mission of July 1942 provided for an organization exactly like the one Eisenhower adopted for TORCH. The July plan explicitly admonished that “there must 

be no subordination of U.S. Air Units, and no attachment to R.A.F. units.” 

Instead, the plan specified, “there will be unity of command through the Task 

Force Commander. He will use his two air forces, British and American, as a 

Corps Commander would use two division commanders, without subordinating 

one to the other.”5 Even when the two air forces operated in the same area, let 

alone widely separated ones, the AAF would not subordinate itself to the RAF. 

This failure to set up a combined air command before the invasion hamstrung 

the efficient application of Allied air power during the first crucial month of the 

campaign. 

Spaatz erred in his resistance to possible RAF domination. Although understandable, his loyalty to the AAF weakened his military judgment. Of course, 

the example of General John J. Pershing, Commander of the American Expeditionary Forces to Europe for World War I, influenced the U.S. Army leaders of 

World War I1 who had served their apprenticeships in the ranks of his forces. 

(Except for a few cases of extreme emergency, Pershing had adamantly refused 

to place his forces under the command of his French or British allies.) In other 

preinvasion planning for TORCH, only the U.S. Navy consented to a combined 

command with its British counterpart. The U.S. Army and the AAF, for whatever reasons, did not.6 

For the landing phase of the invasion, the inexperienced Twelfth Air Force, 

designated the Western Air Command, assumed responsibility for supporting the 

Casablanca and Oran task forces, both composed entirely of U.S. forces. Plans 

124 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

called for the Twelfth to attain an eventual strength of 1,244 aircraft, including 

282 in reserve. The combat-experienced RAF supplied the Eastern Air Command 

(EAC) to assist the chiefly British Algiers task force. The EAC had a planned 

force only one-third the size of the Twelfth’s454 planes of all types, many of 

them short-ranged Hurricane and Spitfire fighters. The EAC also had responsibility for air operations to the east of Oran, including Tunisia. Once French 

North Africa capitulated and Fascist Spain appeared quiescent-a situation that 

released the Allied forces assigned to watch those areas-the Twelfth had no 

strategic role other than to support the drive on Bizerte.7 

Inexperience hampered the AAF’s effectiveness. Twenty-nine years later 

Doolittle admitted, “I was a brand new Air Force commander, and I had never 

commanded anything bigger than about a flight prior to that time, so there were 

a great many things I had to learn, and I endeavored to learn them very rapidly. 

For one, I had to learn my job, and I worked hard at learning it.”8 

Doolittle, the short, stocky, forty-five-year-old son of a carpenter, had a 

devil-may-care image that masked a man of surprising substance. In the 1920s 

and 1930s, he won several international airplane speed races, including the 

Schneider Trophy for seaplanes in 1925 and the first Bendix Trophy for transcontinental speed in 1931; in taking the Thompson Trophy in 1932, he also set a new 

speed record. As one of the most famous pilots of his day, he had the same aura 

of mystery and death-defying courage that clings to modern-day astronauts. 

Doolittle had, on occasion, shown bad judgment. On a trip through South 

America in 1926, when he was under the influence of alcohol during a stopover 

in Santiago, Chile, he fell from a second-story window ledge and broke both 

ankles. Yet he finished the journey, including air shows and stunts, by flying in 

leg casts. On other occasions Doolittle engaged in wingwalking or sat on a 

biplane’s wheel spreader or axle while it landed. 

Unlike many AAF leaders, Doolittle was not a career officer or a West 

Pointer. He had joined the Army in April 1917, transferred to the Aviation 

Section, and served there for thirteen years, until early 1930, before resigning to 

join Shell Oil. While in the Air Corps he earned a doctorate in aeronautical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. At Shell, Doolittle 

worked to develop 100-octane aviation fuel, a prerequisite for the advanced and 

more powerful piston-driven engines that would equip U.S. aircraft in World 

War 11. Recalled to duty as a major on July 1, 1940, he acted as a troubleshooter 

at various aircraft plants. In late January 1942, Arnold assigned Doolittle, by 

then a lieutenant colonel, to command Special Project No. 1, a combined ArmyNavy effort to strike Tokyo with Army bombers flying from a Navy aircraft 

carrier. 

“Doolittle’s Tokyo Raid,” sixteen B-25s launched from the USS Hornet on 

April 18, 1943, once more catapulted Doolittle into national prominence. He 

again demonstrated his great physical courage by leading the flight and taking 

off with the shortest run. When a Japanese picket boat spotted the Navy task 

125 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Brig. Gen. James H. 

Doolittle, Commanding 

General, Twelfth Air 

Force, 1942. 

force before the planned launch time, he displayed the ability to take a calculated risk and demonstrated the moral courage needed for high command by 

ordering the flight to leave early, lengthening the journey by 250 miles. 

Rewards followed. The AAF and the nation, saddened by the surrender of U.S. 

and Filipino forces in Bataan in early April, rejoiced over a genuine hero. By 

May 5, the day before the surrender of Corregidor in Manila Bay, Doolittle 

was jumped to brigadier general. On May 19, President Roosevelt pinned a 

Congressional Medal of Honor to his chest. Arnold assigned him the command 

of the Eighth Air Force’s 4th Bombardment Wing, a medium-bomber wing 

being formed. When the British and the Americans agreed on the North 

African invasion, Arnold reassigned him to command the Twelfth Air Force, 

which in the initial planning had not been large but which grew substantially 

with the invasion. Doolittle was definitely a man of parts, most of them excellent.9 

For all his abilities, however, Doolittle was slow to gain Eisenhower’s confidence. Eisenhower wrote in his postwar memoirs, “It took him [Doolittle] some 

time to reconcile himself to shouldering his responsibilities as the senior United 

States air commander to the exclusion of. . . going out to fly a fighter plane 

against the enemy.”lo The first meeting between Doolittle and Eisenhower 

sometime shortly after Doolittle’s arrival in Britain on August 6 proved disastrous, for Doolittle had managed to convince Eisenhower only of his brashness 

and his ignorance of the job.11 

Although the AAF official history implies Eisenhower’s acceptance of 

126 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

Doolittle as the American air commander for TORCH prior to August 6, any such 

agreement must have been tenuous.12 On September 13, Eisenhower wired 

Marshall that he personally preferred and strongly recommended Eaker for the 

command of the Twelfth. He suggested Doolittle for the XI1 Bomber Command 

or command of the air supporting the Casablanca invasion force. The next day 

Eisenhower suggested to Marshall that Maj. Gen. Walter H. Frank, Commanding General, VIII Air Service Command, was equally acceptable. Both Frank 

and Eaker had already gained invaluable experience establishing and preparing 

an air force for a major operation.13 

Eisenhower’s second message crossed with Marshall’s reply to the first. 

Marshall gave Doolittle an exceptional recommendation: “Arnold and I both feel 

very strongly that Doolittle is a much more effective organizer and leader for the 

U.S. air force and Casablanca. He is a leader par excellence and both highly 

intelligent and strongly persistent in work of preparation.” Marshall had just finished taking Doolittle on a trip to the West Coast and noted as a result that with 

“his combination of industry, intensity, technical knowledge and level headed 

bearing he greatly impressed me as probably the outstanding combat leader type 

in our Air C0rp~.”l4 Marshall added that, despite what he had just said, the decision was of course Eisenhower’s to make. A few days later Marshall, in a handdelivered note to Eisenhower, expressed his full confidence and approval of all 

but two actions-the appointment of Frank instead of Doolittle, which he termed 

a “tragic error” and the selection of Maj. Gen. Russell P. Hartle to command the 

Center (Oran) Task Force for TORCH. Marshall offered to send any of eight other 

generals. 15 Eisenhower selected Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall and retained 

Doolittle. On September 23, Doolittle officially assumed command of the Twelfth. 

It took Doolittle months of hard work to change Eisenhower’s opinion. The 

Twelfth’s top remaining leaders had little or no more combat and administrative 

experience than their commander. 

North Africa, in the winter of 1942-1943, proved an unforgiving locale 

for the conduct of air operations. The division of the Twelfth into two parts, 

each directly subordinated to its invasion task force commander (Maj. Gen. 

George S. Patton in Casablanca and Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall in Oran), 

put the two sections of the air force 365 miles apart by air. The route traveled by the ground echelons from Casablanca and Oran to the front would, 

naturally, be more arduous and less direct. Furthermore, the task force commanders’ reluctance to give up command of their air assets prevented the 

Twelfth from gathering its full force. Part of the Twelfth remained tied to the 

U.S. Fifth Army in Morocco to watch the Spanish. Although portions of the 

AAF would eventually travel the entire 1,065 miles from Casablanca to 

Tunis, the Luftwaffe and the Reggia Aeronautica (Italian Royal Air Force) 

were more favored by geography. They had major depots in Sicily, which 

was 160 miles from Tunis, and Naples, 375 miles from Tunis. The Axis 

powers also seized the only four all-weather, hard-surface airfields in the 

127 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Tunisian plain,* which gave them a considerable advantage over the Allies, 

who operated from unimproved dirt fields in the eastern Algerian highlands. 

When the rainy season began in December 1942, these fields immediately 

turned into mud puddles. The Allies had only one hard-surface field east of 

Algiers, at Bane, 115 miles from the front. (See Map 4, Allied and Axis 

Airfields on the Northern Tunisian Front.) To add to the confusion in the initial 

phases of the campaign, RAF and AAF units operated from the same airfields. 

All supplies for the forward units of the Twelfth would have to move along the 

feeble colonial road network and one overworked, single-track rail line from 

Algiers. 

In addition, the Twelfth lacked mobility. Aircraft might travel far and 

swiftly, but they remained tethered to their ground echelons. The ground echelons required considerable motor or rail transport to keep pace with the rapidly 

changing front lines characteristic of modern warfare. Already hampered by 

frangible French railways, the AAF in North Africa had to prevail over a chronic 

shortage of motor transport. The Twelfth started the Tunisian campaign understrength in trucks because invasion planners, facing the usual premium on shipping space confronting any large-scale amphibious invasion and envisaging a 

static role for the AAF, had pared the Twelfth’s motorized components to a minimum. The Oran task force carried no two-and-one-half ton trucks, and only 50 

percent of all types of organizational vehicles. The Casablanca task force sailed 

with 100 percent of its men but only 50 percent of its matiriel.16 U.S. ground 

units moving to support the advance of Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. Anderson’s 1st 

British Army into Tunisia aggravated the transportation shortage by stripping 

away much of the Twelfth’s shrunken allocation of motor transport. 

The Eastern Air Command suffered the same hardships. It had requested 

shipping for enough motor transport to make its ground echelons 100 percent 

mobile, but was allocated only half of its request.17 Many vehicles immediately 

fell into different hands. One air observer reported that new units’ “Senior 

Officers and others were in the habit of commandeering vehicles as soon as they 

were unloaded in ALGIERS, without regard to whether they were consigned to 

their unit or not. When no longer needed, these vehicles were abandoned by the 

wayside.”lg 

The original strategic plans placing the Twelfth Air Force in a static role, far 

to the west of the combat area, added to the organizational chaos. Doolittle had 

difficulty regaining command of his widely separated forces from the task force 

commanders. Each of the task force commanders (ground force generals who 

were the equivalent of corps commanders) for the Casablanca and Oran invasions had received control of approximately one-half of the Twelfth Air Force to 

* One, El Aouina, was only 20 miles from the front lines, and another, Sidi Ahmed, was 25 

miles away. 

128 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

provide support for their invasion assault. After the assault, the task force commanders only reluctantly released their attached air forces. The confusion compounded when new air and ground elements landed in Algiers, in order to enter 

the fighting in Tunisia immediately, while their rear echelons landed half a continent away in Casablanca. The Twelfth had other units still in Britain or the United 

States, or on convoys in the middle of the Atlantic. 

Communications and intelligence problems also plagued the Twelfth at the 

start of the campaign. The French telephone system, at best primitive and inefficient, soon failed under the demands placed on it. Atmospheric conditions 

unique to North Africa hindered radio transmission, as did lack of modern 

equipment and half-trained signals personnel.19 In many instances motorcycle 

couriers had to carry the load.20 Moreover, the Twelfth had no military intelligence. All its operational information came from the British; there were thus 

delays in planning and consequent delays in missions. 

U.S. Air Support Doctrine Before Operation TORCH 

U.S. ground and air forces started the North African campaign with an 

untested air support doctrine. Because of the AAF’s position as a combat arm 

subordinate to the Army rather than as a service independent from the Army like 

the RAF, the ground forces, rather than air, had the decisive voice in determining official doctrine. In 1926 this dominance was reflected in War Department 

Training Regulation 440-15 (TR 440-15), which stated categorically, “The mission of the Air Service is to assist the ground forces to gain strategical and tactical successes by destroying enemy aviation, attacking enemy ground forces and 

other enemy objectives on land or sea, and in conjunction with other agencies to 

protect ground forces from hostile aerial observation and attack.” TR 440-15 

also stated that the “Air Service is an essential arm in all major operations. The 

organization and training of all air units is based on the fundamental doctrine 

that their mission is to aid the ground forces to gain decisive success.”21 TR 

440- 15 authorized strategic bombardment operations under favorable conditions 

and after the defeat or neutralization of a hostile air force if it was “based on the 

broad plan of operations of the military forces.”22 

The advent of General Headquarters Air Force (GHQ AF) in 1935 led to the 

revision of TR 440- 15. This revision placed GHQ AF under the commander in 

chief in the field in wartime, and under the Chief of Staff of the Army in peacetime. The revision gave the GHQ AF three functions: 

1. Operations beyond the sphere of influence of the ground forces; 

2. Operations in support of the ground forces; and 

3. Coastal frontier defense. 

Operations beyond the ground forces’ sphere of influence were still required 

130 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

to conform to the Army strategic plan, prepared by a section of the War 

Department General Staff dominated by ground officers. In addition, the GHQ 

Air Force Commander could be directed by the commander-in-chief in the field 

to “support designated operations of an army with all or with a specified part of 

GHQ Air Force in accordance with the instructions of such army commanders.”23 Yet the 1935 version of TR 440-15 represented a significant step forward in the eyes of air officers, in that it recognized a role for strategic bombardment equal to that of ground support. 

It is important to remember that strategic bombing offered the airmen an 

institutional advantage not offered by tactical operations. Strategic operations 

were independent of the Army and could be used to justify an independent air 

arm. Tactical operations, in contrast, would always be in cooperation with 

ground forces and difficult to separate from them-hence the airmen’s constant 

attempts to advance strategic air and their lack of interest in tactical air. 

Adolf Hitler’s aggressive, revanchist foreign policy of 1936-1 939 and the 

outbreak of war in Europe led to the reexamination of U.S. Army air doctrine. 

On April 15, 1940, War Department Field Manual 1-5 (FM 1-5) superseded TR 

440-15 of October 15, 1935. The authors of FM 1-5 intended it to be the comprehensive rubric for the employment of all types of U.S. military aviation. As 

such, it defined the basic doctrines for strategic bombardment, antiaircraft 

defense, support of ground and naval forces, and air operations in lieu of naval 

forces. This manual was based on the recommendations of a War Department 

Air Board, appointed by Secretary of War Harry H. Woodring on March 23,1939. 

Woodring designated Arnold president of the board, and its membership 

included Maj. Gen. Frank M. Andrews (recently appointed by Marshall to head 

G-3, Operations of the General Staff) and Brig. Gen. George V. Strong (head of 

the War Plans Division). After polling the components of the Army and the Air 

Corps, including GHQ Air Force, and the Air Corps Tactical School the board 

submitted its findings to the Chief of Staff on September 1, 1939. With only 

minor changes these findings became FM 1-5.24 

Although the manual emphasized the role of air power in the defense of the 

United States and its possessions, it provided for a strategic air offensive to 

“decisively defeat important elements of the enemy armed forces” or to “deprive 

the enemy of essential war material.”25 In its discussion of air operations in support of ground forces it laid down the following instructions: 

The hostile rear area is the normal zone of action of support aviation, since 

operations in this area permit the full utilization of striking power against concentrated targets with the minimum of losses and the maximum of results. 

Support aviation is not employed against objectives which can be effectively 

engaged by available ground weapons within the time required. 

FM 1-5 also observed that “aviation is poorly suited for direct attacks against 

small detachments or troops which are well entrenched or disposed.” 

131 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The manual addressed the control of tactical air as well, stating that, in general, centralized control at the theater level maximized effectiveness, but noted: 

When decentralization becomes necessary in situations requiring immediate 

tactical support of specified units, the superior commander may attach to or 

place in support of specified large units a part or all of his support aviation. 

Support aviation may thus act with greater promptness and better understanding 

in meeting the requirements of the supported unit. When combat aviation is 

employed for immediate tactical support of surface forces, the requirements of 

the supported force will be of paramount importance in the selection of objectives for air operations.26 

In theory, the manual should have supplied a reasonable compromise solution to the ground forces' desire for control of support aviation in a battle situation and the desire of elements of the Air Corps to centralize the control of all 

tactical air under an airman. In practice, all would depend on the attitude of the 

theater commander, who would almost certainly be a ground officer. In that 

case, Air Corps officers feared that he would routinely attach air support units 

directly to his field armies or corps and ignore the strictures on centralization of 

air command. Army and corps commanders, whose attention would be focused 

solely on the attainment of their own immediate objectives, would be slow to 

release the attached air units and would invariably be unable to cooperate effectively with each other in a timely enough manner to take advantage of air's ability to concentrate all of its forces over a single objective. FM 1-5, however, 

reflected the increased influence of the Army Air Corps within the structure of 

the Army and the development of an aircraft capable of strategic bombardment, 

the B-17. No longer, as in 1926, could the ground forces impose doctrine by fiat. 

A series of important prewar Army maneuvers in Louisiana and North 

Carolina in 1941 showed the extent of the rift between the ground forces and the 

air forces. As the Army ground forces sought to adapt to the German method of 

blitzkrieg warfare, they clashed with the Army Air Forces, which had a different 

set of priorities. The ground forces, looking at the war in Europe and seeing the 

successes of the German army acting in close concert with the Luftwaffe, a force 

designed for ground support, formed armored divisions and an armored corps to 

fight the new war. To work effectively, these new corps required large-scale 

close air support to form a combined-arms team capable of fighting the Germans 

on equal terms. Thus they needed modern planes for training and an air support 

communications network and support team to function at full capacity. The AAF 

had difficulty supplying those items. 

The AAF, studying the war in Europe, realized it would need an air defense 

network and a strategic bombing campaign to weaken the Germans before 

attempting an invasion of the Continent, if that proved necessary. The needs of 

the ground forces took lower priority. The Western Allies were buying hundreds 

of modern warplanes and the AAF's own training programs were consuming 

132 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

most remaining aircraft production, leaving few aircraft for air support training. 

Given these conflicts, prewar maneuvers had proved unsatisfactory. 

Ten days before the attack on Pearl Harbor, Arnold noted the poor coordination between ground and air during the North Carolina and Louisiana maneuvers 

that he and Marshall blamed on the “lack of knowledge of fundamentals on the 

part of both the Air and Ground elements.”27 Air and ground officers did not 

know air communications techniques and procedures, proper employment of 

their own forces for air operations, and the characteristics and limitations of air 

itself. Arnold informed Spaatz that Marshall wished to hold a series of command 

post exercises at Fort Benning in Georgia for all major combat commanders of 

the Army. “The first one should be started off,” recommended Arnold, “with a 

general discussion by all present as to exactly what Air Support means and how 

it is to be carried out, so that the fundamentals may be discussed frankly and all 

present get some ideas of what can and should be expected.”28 

U.S. entry into the war increased the intensity of the dispute between air and 

ground. The Army reorganization of March 9, 1942, institutionalized the dispute 

by giving air and ground the same degree of power and prestige. In that reorganization the AAF and the Army Ground Forces (AGF) became separate and 

equal organizations under the Army General Staff and the War Department. If, 

as in 1926, one arm or the other could have imposed its will, at least one of them 

would have been content. Or if a virtually unlimited number of planes had been 

available, both sides could have had adequate air resources for strategic bornbing and ground support, as was the case in 1944-1945. 

On April 9, 1942, the War Department promulgated a manual on air support 

based on the lessons of the prewar exercises, War Department Field Manual 31- 

35 (FM 31-35), “Aviation in Support of Ground Forces.” Air historians have 

charged that it created many of the AAF’s ground support woes early in the war. 

The AAF official history said of FM 31-35, “The outstanding characteristic of 

the manual lay in its subordination of the air force to ground force needs and to 

the purely local situation.”29 Yet the AAF itself had issued the manual. The 

Army Air Support Staff Section had drafted the manual. Its successor in the 

March 1942 reorganization, the Directorate of Ground Support, had produced 

the finished copy. 

In fact, the manual attempted to reconcile irreconcilable air and ground positions. It was not intended to speak to any aspect of air power other than air support. The manual devoted more than half of its text to a detailed exposition of the 

air-ground communications network rather than to doctrines of employment. It 

placed an air support command-along with fighter, bomber, and base commands-within a theater air force, all under the control of an airman. The manual 

offset this arrangement by noting that the air support command would be habitually attached to or designated to support a particular field army. Within the air 

support command, all control was centralized in the hands of its commander, an 

airman, who would assign missions as the needs of the ground units developed. 

133 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

If required, however, an aviation unit could be “specifically allocated” to the 

support of subordinate ground units.30 In such a case, the aviation unit would 

receive its orders from an air support control unit commanded by an airman and 

co-located at the command post of the supported unit. The overall air support 

commander retained the right to assign other air support missions to the “specifically allocated” unit. The manual went on to state: 

Designation of an aviation unit for support of a subordinate ground unit does 

not imply subordination of that aviation unit to the supported ground unit, nor 

does it remove the combat aviation unit from the control of the air support commander. It does permit, however, direct cooperation and association between 

the supporting aviation unit and the supported ground unit and enables combat 

aviation to act with greater promptness in meeting the requirements of a rapidly 

changing situation. Aviation units may be attached [emphasis in original] to 

subordinate ground units. This is exceptional and should be resorted to only 

when circumstances are such that the air support commander cannot effectively 

control the combat aviation assigned to the air support command?’ 

The manual assumed that in most instances air control would be centralized at 

the theater level. 

FM 31-35 began its consideration of the method of employing air support 

aviation with the following obvious, but often ignored, homily: “The basis of 

effective air support of ground forces is teamwork. The air and ground units in 

such operations form a team. Each member of the team must have the technical 

skill and training to enable it to perform its part in the operation and a willingness to cooperate thoroughly.”3* The first factor affecting employment was the 

establishment of local air superiority to ensure air support without excessive 

losses. Next came economy of force, defined as hitting the right target at the 

right time rather than using a few aircraft to hit widely scattered targets. Other 

factors included attention to time and space factors (distance from air bases, 

speed of communications, readiness status of aircraft, etc.), the inherent flexibility of air power to concentrate on short notice, and the necessity of the air support command to cooperate with other air elements in the same area. 

The manual’s procedures for selecting targets raised the ire of pro air power 

critics, who focused on one paragraph: “The most important target at a particular 

time will usually be that target which constitutes the most serious threat to the 

operations of the supported ground force. The final decision as to priority of targets rests with the commander of the supported unit.”33 This lifting of one paragraph from its context distorted the balanced intent of the entire manual, which 

was not an encomium for the doctrinal positions held by the ground forces. 

Ground force officers objected to the centralized control of air support aviation 

inherent in the air support command; they favored the direct attachment of air 

units to the units they supported.34 FM 3 1-35 satisfied neither the ground forces 

nor the air forces, which was perhaps the true measure of its attempt at objectiv134 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

ity. If it proved wanting on the battlefield, it was because most of the American 

air and ground commanders in North Africa were inexperienced in combat and 

half-trained in the air support procedures laid down by FM 31-35 or ignorant of 

its provisions. 

The issuance of FM 31-35 did little to solve the U.S. Army’s and AAF’s ground 

support training deficiencies. In front of War Department, Navy, and British 

army observers the AAF botched its share of a corps-level demonstration at Fort 

Benning on June 13, 1942.35 This demonstration, conducted under the command 

of Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall, included units of the 1st Infantry Division. 

Both the division and Fredendall would play large roles in North Africa. In July 

1942, Maj. Gen. Jacob L. Devers, the Commander of the U.S. Armored Force, 

the chief armored training unit of the Army, complained to Marshall that the 

armored forces did not have a single combat plane working with them. When 

informed of the complaint, Arnold tartly replied that the armored forces had the 

best the AAF could supply and that he hoped to have sufficient quantities of 

light bombers and observation planes to meet ground force requests in full by 

the end of the year.36 

In September Devers complained directly to Arnold of “lots of talk but no 

real action because there is a great shortage of equipment.” He pointed out specific shortcomings in bombardment, observation, and communications units 

attached for training. “I stick to my opinion,” said Devers bluntly, “that there is 

no air-ground support training. We are simply puttering. Cannot something be 

done about it?” Arnold replied that he had no modern heavy-bombardment, 

medium-bombardment, or fighter units available because all such units and their 

replacements were committed to active battle fronts. He had already allocated 

his only uncommitted light-bombardment group to one of the Armored Forces’ 

major training establishments, the Desert Training Center. He attempted to reassure Devers by observing: “When our ground forces are committed to an active 

combat theater, I believe that they may look upon practically the entire Air 

Force in that theater as support aviation, as it is in North Africa today.”* Arnold 

concluded by saying that he would continue to push for modern aircraft for 

training as soon as they became available.37 

If the state of air-ground training of the armored forces, which had the 

highest priority, needed bolstering as late as September 1942, one can only 

imagine the status of the Army’s remaining divisions and of the forces assigned 

to the North African invasion. Lt. Gen. Leslie J. McNair, Commander of the 

Army Ground Forces, admitted on December 30, 1942, “So far as I know, there 

is no U.S. ground unit overseas which had air-ground training before leaving the 

US., other than the superficial occasions incident to large maneuvers.”38 Clearly 

* Arnold’s mention of North Africa referred to Egypt where the British Western Desert Air 

Force (assisted by a handful of AAF units) was supporting Lt. Gen. Bernard L. Montgomery’s 

British 8th Army against German Field Marshal Irwin Romrnel’s GermamItalian Panzer Army. 

135 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the invasion ground and air forces were woefully untrained for the task ahead of 

them. 

Despite the benefit of Britain’s more than three years at war, the British 1st 

Army, Eisenhower’s chief British ground formation, entered battle with air support doctrine and practice hardly superior to those of Eisenhower’s American 

troops. The British air planners for the invasion, perhaps constrained by security 

considerations, which prevented direct contact, took no notice of the combat 

proven air support advances made by their own forces in the Middle East.39 The 

British 8th Army and the Western Desert Air Force (WDAF), thanks to the hard 

lessons learned at the hands of the German Afriku Korps, had developed both an 

effective air support team and a modified air support doctrine based on close airground planning and communications. The British North African contingent for 

TORCH ignored that example and instead produced a.plan similar to that of the 

advanced air striking force that had accompanied the British Expeditionary 

Force to France in 1939.40 That plan had proved deficient because it did not provide close enough cooperation between the RAF and the British army. The 

TORCH invasion plan in general suffered from the same defect. 

Nor were the British troops appreciably better trained in air-ground operations than the Americans. The British 1st Army, under Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. 

Anderson, was a hastily assembled force that had never operated together as a 

whole. Nor were its troops of the highest quality; the British had skimmed their 

home country units (units stationed in metropolitan Britain) of their best manpower and starved them of modem equipment in order to maintain the British 

8th Army in the desert war against Rommel. In particular, the home forces had 

been forced to divest themselves of almost all their organic light antiaircraft 

artillery to augment that of the desert forces. This deficiency was not corrected 

before British units embarked for the invasion.41 The shortage of antiaircraft 

weapons left the British 1st Army vulnerable to even light air attacks unless it 

received adequate protection from friendly fighter forces. 

The Eastern Air Command, the RAF force responsible for the 1st Army’s air 

support, had also been created for the TORCH invasion. It had not worked or 

trained with the 1st Army. Its staff had come together at the last moment, with 

no opportunity to form a team. Its squadrons had worked together, but its administrative and service troops were a hastily amalgamated hodge-podge of men 

with no training for field service or field conditions. They suffered severely in 

the North African countryside, where virtually no supplies could be obtained 

locally. The EAC had responsibilities beyond its means. It not only had to give 

air support to the 1st Army, it also had to provide for the air defense of all ports 

east of and including Algiers, escort and protect reinforcement convoys and 

shipping, and support the operations of the Allied fleet. Until it gained experience, the EAC’s own manpower and organizational deficiencies, not to mention 

the unfavorable airfield situation and totally inadequate supply lines, would hinder its performance.42 

136 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

..---I. - 

Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. 

Anderson, General Officer 

Commanding, British 1st 

Army, 1942-1943. 

In the long run, these shortcomings merely slowed the eventual victory of 

the Allies. The Axis powers could only delay the inevitable, given the decisive 

Anglo-American advantages in men and matbriel-advantages, in turn, augmented by the priceless information supplied by the British signal intelligence 

organization, which decoded German Air Force, Navy, and Army as well as 

Italian air force and navy ciphers at both the strategic and the tactical levels. The 

British breaking of Axis codes, known as ULTRA, may have contributed more 

decisively to the North African campaign than to any other in the European 

Theater. 

Operations in November-December 1942 

The Allies had originally planned to capture airfields at BGne, Bizerte, and 

Tunis with airborne and commando troops, but uncertainty about the reaction of 

the French forces in Tunisia led to the cancellation of those ambitious plans. 

(See Map 5, Eastern Algeria and Northern Tunisia.) On November 10, a fast 

convoy left Algiers to occupy the port of Bougie, a little less than 100 miles 

away but still beyond the practical escort range of the EAC's Spitfires flying 

from Algiers. This convoy and a slow reinforcement convoy initially had air 

cover from the British carrier Argus. In the meantime, high surf foiled an 

attempt to land aviation fuel at the airfield at Djidjelli, on the coast a few miles 

137 

THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

east of Bougie, grounding a squadron of just-arrived Spitfires. An attempt to 

supply fuel by truck from Bougie, a distance of 60 miles by road, misfired when 

the British 36th Infantry Brigade commandeered the designated trucks for reconnaissance purposes.43 As a result, when the Argus withdrew in the afternoon, 

according to schedule, the unloading ships at Bougie had no air protection. The 

Luftwaffe promptly took advantage of this situation to sink three transports. 

On November 12, a small British landing force seized the port of Bane, 125 

miles east of Bougie and 185 miles by road from Bizerte. BBne had the easternmost hard-surface all-weather airfield available to the Allies for the bulk of the 

campaign. It served as the forward air base for the RAF Eastern Air Command. 

It also had unloading facilities for twenty-two ships-an important consideration 

when the relative ease of sea transport was compared with the difficulties 

encountered on the only two roads eastward from Algiers and the single-track 

railroad. It took trains four to six days to reach the advanced railhead at Souk el 

Arba (taken on November 16 by British paratroopers) from Algiers, and the line 

could sustain only six military trains a day with a daily capacity of only 2,000 

tons.44 The rail line underwent a change in gauge just east of Constantine, which 

added the delay of transshipment and the threat of another bottleneck in the line 

General Anderson, despite the grandiose title of his command, had only the 

understrength British 78th Division to send overland from Algiers. Its main 

body started its advance from Algiers on November 14. Its spearheads reached 

Djebel Abiod, about 25 miles from Bizerte, on November 17. At that point the 

British ran into tough German paratroops advancing from Bizerte and halted to 

organize for a general attack. 

U.S. Twelfth Air Force units began to arrive at British forward fields by the 

third week of November. They placed themselves at the disposal of Air Marshal 

William L. Welsh, but not under his command. He could not order U.S. squadrons 

to specific objectives, and “the targets were decided on a day in advance after 

exhaustive discussion.”46 A week later, reinforced by units from the U.S. 1st 

Armored Division, the British resumed their advance. Overcoming counterattacks 

supported by tanks and dive-bombers, the Allies advanced to the outskirts of 

Djedeida, twelve miles from Tunis, on November 28. Concentrated German divebombing attacks and newly arrived antitank guns halted them there. The next day 

the heaviest air attacks to date hit exposed Allied tanks and infantry, while the 

Germans organized their defense. 

By November 27, the 1st Army had one squadron of Twelfth Air Force P-38s 

(25 planes) at Youks-les-Bains, two squadrons of RAF Spitfires (36 planes) at 

Souk el Arba, and two squadrons of RAF Spitfires and one of Hurricane fighterbombers (54 planes) at B6ne available for both air superiority and close air support operations. These planes had a serviceability rate of only 50 percent and 

Spitfires had no bombing capability. The aircraft at Bane provided air defense 

for the port and arriving convoys and were not always available. In fact the 

of supply.45 

139 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

British did not use fighter bombing to support their front-line troops in the campaign until December 15.47 

The Luftwaffe countered those planes with a force of approximately 81 

fighters and 28 dive-bombers based in Tunisia. In the entire Mediterranean the 

Germans possessed 1,220 aircraft, of which more than 5 12 were operating 

against TORCH by November 12 and some 850 by December 12. At the same 

time they raised the number of their transport aircraft from 205 to 673.48 

Anderson naturally found the air situation unsatisfactory. He called off his 

attack on November 29 partly because “the strain of persistent dive-bombing 

was beginning to tell.” He complained further that air attacks on B6ne had seriously disrupted his supply lines and said, “This week was notable for the heavy 

scale of enemy air attack, particularly by dive-bombers, to which the leading 

troops were subjected, and which our own air forces were at this stage unable to 

prevent.”49 Here, the inexperience of Anderson’s troops, their light scale of antiaircraft armament, and their lack of ammunition proved nearly disastrous. The 

slow-flying dive-bomber was a terrifying weapon, especially against untried 

troops who lacked the firepower to keep it at a respectful altitude. 

In the first phase of the campaign, the Allies did not provide adequate close 

air support because they could not obtain air superiority and because no airground team existed. The EAC’s Commander, Air Marshal Welsh, had appointed 

Air Commodore G. M. Lawson to operate the forward squadrons. Upon arrival at 

1 st Army Headquarters and later at 78th Division Headquarters, Lawson found 

communications chaotic. “Quite candidly,” he acknowledged, “I am astonished at 

every point I have visited [by] the lack of knowledge of the operational setup and 

of the urgency of the drive in getting proper communications established.”50 

Without communications, air-ground coordination ceased. Anderson complicated 

matters further by insisting on repeated attacks on Tunis, Bizerte, and Axis airfields elsewhere, as well as defensive patrols, known as “air umbrellas,” over his 

own troops. These demands stretched the EAC far beyond its limited ability. 

Welsh did not help the situation by establishing his headquarters six miles outside 

Algiers, isolated not only from Anderson and Doolittle but also from Eisenhower 

and his headquarters, known as Allied Force Headquarters (AFHQ).51 

On November 13, the day before Anderson began his advance toward 

Tunisia, Eisenhower telegraphed Spaatz: “I continue to look to you not only for 

control of the United States air in the United Kingdom but as my most trusted 

air advisor. . . . It may be best for us to confer immediately in light of what has 

so far transpired.”5* Eisenhower referred to the Axis powers’ prompt and vigorous decision to establish a bridgehead in Tunisia, surprising the Allies, since 

invasion planners had discounted any possibility of such action. The Allied command had expected a cakewalk into Tunis once they had overcome the Vichy 

French.53 Four days later, on November 17, Spaatz’s B-17 touched down at 

Gibraltar, the site of Eisenhower’s headquarters for the initial phase of the campaign. Doolittle met Spaatz, who had come to the Rock at Eisenhower’s request. 

140 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

Air Commodore G. M. 

Lawson, Air Officer 

Commanding, No. 242 

Group, RAF, 1942-1943. 

P 

i 

c 

By the time of their meeting, Eisenhower had already received from Bletchley 

Park, the location of the British Government Code and Cypher School, signal 

intelligence revealing an unexpectedly heavy Axis response. British cryptologists had cracked the particular Enigma machine key setting (Locust) employed 

by the German Supreme Commander in the Mediterranean, Luftwaffe Field 

Marshal Albert Kesselring, and could read the intercepted traffic without 

delay.”54 As the daily intercepts arrived, confirming increased totals of Axis 

men, aircraft, and tanks, Eisenhower redoubled the pressure on his subordinates 

to secure Tunisia. 

Thus Spaatz, who had arrived expecting to discuss the plan for a single theater air force (see previous chapter), instead found himself enmeshed in 

Eisenhower’s anxious attempts to hurry the Twelfth to the east and to interdict 

the flow of Axis reinforcements. The confused state of Doolittle’s command 

took priority over all other air concerns. At the meeting, Spaatz and his commanding officer “decided to postpone the discussion of the organization of the 

Air Force until I [Spaatz] could complete a brief visit to the principal establishments in the North African Theater.”55 

As Spaatz emerged from the Gibraltar meeting, he learned that his chief of 

staff, Brig. Gen. Asa N. Duncan, had ditched his B-17 into the Atlantic. Subsequent air search unearthed no trace of his plane, its crew, or passengers. The 

AAF had lost a valuable, experienced officer, and Spaatz had lost a friend. 

The tour itself was hardly a case of veni, vidi, vici for Spaatz. On his-tour of 

141 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the theater he found much to correct while obtaining few concrete results. He 

and Doolittle left Gibraltar for Africa on the morning of November 18. At Oran, 

Spaatz noted its excellent repair facilities and “great numbers of [AAF] men 

who knew what they were doing and who were going about it in a fast and 

orderly fashion.” He gathered a somewhat different impression at Algiers, particularly of its major air facility, Maison Blanche, which he found overcrowded 

as well as unsuitable for deployment of B-17s. Its location put the heavybombers too close to the front, leaving them too exposed to enemy counterstrikes. Typically, Spaatz observed that “the place lacked organization.” After a 

quick stop at Gibraltar to inform his superior of his findings, he flew to Casablanca 

on November 20. There he conferred with Brig. Gen. John K. Cannon, Commander 

of the Twelfth Air Support Command (XU ASC). “Uncle Joe” Cannon, although 

not one of the top AAF decision makers, was only a step below the Arnold, Spaatz, 

Eaker, and Andrews echelon. Cannon had taken flight training in 1921, had graduated from the Air Corps Tactical School and the Command and General Staff 

School in the 1930s, and had led the First Air Force’s Interceptor Command in 

1941. His specialties, pursuit aviation and training, neatly complemented the 

responsibilities he faced in North Africa. Spaatz reported to Arnold that “my 

impressions at Casablanca were very favorable”; he noted excellent shop facilities, 

but added that Casablanca’s turf-covered main aerodrome was muddy.56 

That evening Spaatz returned to Gibraltar once again and spent the next day 

conferring with Eisenhower and his staff. These conversations resulted in an 

agreement on the single theater air force that Spaatz and Arnold had championed 

for months. Eisenhower informed both airmen that he “was going to put in a 

firm recommendation to that effect but would await, for the moment, the “outcome of the Tunisian fight.”57 This caveat proved the undoing of the unified air 

plan. The fight in North Africa dragged on so long and absorbed so many resources that it required the creation of a new theater of operations, which made 

permanent the split in AAF European resources. The most concrete result of the 

November 21 meetings was Spaatz’s transfer from England to North Africa as 

Eisenhower’s chief air adviser. 

Spaatz returned to England on November 23. He designated Eaker to command the Eighth Air Force, and shortly thereafter he informed Arnold that 

“plans are underway for a Theater Air Force Headquarters and integration of the 

Eighth and Twelfth under its command. . . . With a very small staff I rejoin 

Eisenhower.”58 Arnold approved these moves and Spaatz flew back to Gibraltar 

on December 1. The same day the Germans, strongly supported by tanks and air, 

attacked-dnving back the advance elements of the 1st Army. By December 3, 

the Germans had defeated the 78th Division and substantial portions of the U.S. 

1st Armored Division operating under British control. The air superiority the 

Germans had established over the battlefield proved a decisive factor in their 

victory. 

142 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

Also on December 3, Eisenhower appointed Spaatz Acting Deputy Commander in Chief for Air of the Allied forces in North Africa. Spaatz’s appointment marked Eisenhower’s first attempt to improve the effectiveness of the 

Allied air forces in his command. Spaatz would coordinate air operations rather 

than command them, because his new position had only advisory functions. 

Eisenhower noted, “This arrangement is to meet an emergency.”59 Spaatz wrote 

to Stratemeyer, the Chief of the AAF Staff, “This is a temporary solution to a 

situation which will eventually require further clarification.”60 

Temporary or not, Spaatz immediately made his presence felt. On December 

2, he had met Doolittle, Brig. Gen. Howard A. Craig, and Vandenberg, who enumerated the difficulties facing them. The Twelfth’s leaders especially objected 

to Eisenhower’s directive to both the Twelfth and the EAC to give General 

Anderson and his 1st Army “everything he asked for.”61 In effect Eisenhower 

gave complete control of air operations to Anderson, which, as the assembled 

airmen all agreed, “resulted in misuse of air power.”62 Anderson’s daily demands for maximum effort in the defense of his front-line troops meant the dedication of all missions to air defense and ground support operations-an ineffective practice resulting in terrific wear and tear on crews, aircraft, and maintenance personnel. Anderson, in the airmen’s opinion, also failed to allot them 

necessary road and rail transport for their forward fields. Eisenhower’s directive 

chafed the U.S. airmen because its restrictions placed them under the command 

of a ground force general whose ideas of air power seemed, at best, hazy. Spaatz 

agreed to broach these problems to Eisenhower as soon as possible.63 

On December 3, Spaatz established his headquarters. Craig had responsibility for liaison between the Twelfth and Eisenhower’s headquarters, AFHQ, 

while Air Vice-Marshal James M. Robb would handle liaison duties between the 

EAC and AFHQ. Spaatz also decided to assign deep bombing missions (in current USAF terminology, “deep interdiction” missions) against enemy supply 

lines to the Twelfth and support of ground operations to the EAC. The light- and 

medium-bomber units of the Twelfth would be attached to the EAC when the 

congested supply situation in the forward fields eased.64 

Spaatz’s decision to divide his forces, with one force devoted exclusively to 

bombing missions behind the enemy’s lines and the other devoted solely to the 

support of ground operations, departed from the then current AAF doctrine of a 

composite air force, a self-sustaining unit capable of all types of combat and 

support missions. Of course, the composition of the forces at hand made his 

decision almost mandatory. The EAC was equipped largely with fighter and 

other light aircraft, whereas the Twelfth had the only heavy bombers dedicated 

entirely to the theater. This functional division of December 1942 cleared the 

way for the AAF to concentrate on daylight precision bombing while giving to 

the RAF the responsibility of ground support for the 1st Army. It also helped to 

relieve the increasing congestion of aircraft in the forward airfields. Doolittle 

and the Twelfth Air Force had literally marched to the sound of the guns, flying 

143 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

groups into the fields before their ground echelons arrived and crowding the 

EAC. To remedy the situation, the Allied airmen decided to withdraw four 

squadrons of fighters (out of twelve) from the front to Constantine and to recommit them when the land offensive started.65 

At Spaatz’s insistence, the flow of ULTRA intelligence to the AAF in North 

Africa greatly increased. Spaatz arranged to have ULTRA and other intelligence 

reports delivered to him each day by eleven o’clock. Then he and his staff would 

discuss and analyze the information before he made his daily call to Eisenhower. 

Spaatz brought the Eighth Air Force Chief of Intelligence, Col. George C. 

McDonald, from Britain to organize the U.S. intelligence setup. Spaatz had 

worked closely with McDonald, then Assistant U.S. Military Attach6 for Air, 

during the Battle of Britain and during their stint with the Eighth. McDonald had 

twenty years’ experience in intelligence with a specialty in photographic reconnaissance, to which he had added several months’ experience in operations, and 

a familiarity with ULTRA.@ 

On December 3, Eisenhower, Anderson, Spaatz, and Doolittle met to discuss 

current operations and future plans. The shortcomings of Allied air power, highlighted during the successful German counterattack of December 1, ranked high 

on the agenda. Eisenhower reported to the Combined Chiefs of Staff that “the 

scale of possible air support is not sufficient to keep down the hostile strafing 

and dive bombing that is largely responsible for breaking up all attempted 

advances by ground forces.”67 Anderson expressed his attitude in 1st Army’s 

situation report for December 3: 

Unusually heavy dive bombing in the morning. The attempt will definitely be 

made tomorrow to operate fighters from Medjez el Bab aerodrome in the hope 

of alleviating the burden this continued dive bombing places on very tired 

troops whom I cannot relieve for at least three days. Until this air threat can be 

properly dealt with, there seems no possibility of lessening the effort which I 

must demand from the R.A.F. and US. Squadrons now supporting me.68 

Spaatz and the other air commanders argued for a partial pause in the air effort 

in order to arrange for the completion of advanced airfields, the arrival of additional air maintenance troops in the forward area, the positioning of spare parts 

and supplies in the advanced airfields, and the provision of radar warning and 

antiaircraft defenses for the forward area.69 

The current scale of operations could not continue, the airmen contended, if 

the ground forces wished to have any planes left to support them for the next 

attack. The EAC, for instance, reported on December 2 almost 100 percent 

wastage of its Spitfire squadrons. Eisenhower agreed to wait while his air forces 

improved their logistics and to accept reduced air operations. The bombers, as 

Spaatz had promised his AAF colleagues, switched to the ports. The fighters 

would mount a counterair campaign against German airfields. This pause would 

last until December 9, when the offensive would renew. 

144 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

Unfortunately, this delay proved the first of many. The rainy season arrived 

with a vengeance, turning the North African terrain-roads and airfields in particular-into viscous mud that quickly sapped the Allies’ desire to advance. As 

early as November 29, one of the Twelfth’s main airfields, Tafaraoui, located a 

short distance from Oran, had a hard-surface runway but no hard-surface dispersal 

areas. It reported 285 planes mired in the mud,70 giving rise to a ditty about 

“Tafaraoui where the mud is deep and gooey.” 

In the three weeks from the December 3 meeting to Christmas Eve, Spaatz 

drove himself and his staff to prepare for a renewal of the Allied offensive. He 

called the theater’s four aviation engineer battalions from Oran and set them to 

work east of Algiers. Despite the loss of two battalions’ worth of equipment in 

ships that did not reach North Africa and despite confused unloading at the overcrowded North African ports, the engineers performed well. By December 12, 

the 809th Aviation Engineer Battalion had finished a single well-drained airstrip 

at Telergma, the start of a medium-bomber airfield complex. Spaatz sent the 

heavy bombers to Biskra at the end of a spur of the French rail system, on the 

fringes of the Sahara desert. There an engineer company completed a field in 

four days.71 Spaatz ordered every available air transport to ferry bombs, ammunition, fuel, and supplies of all sorts to the front in order to keep his forward 

fields supplied. As usual, he traveled, visiting Maison Blanche on December 15 

(where he noted little improvement since his November 18 inspection), to 

Anderson’s headquarters on December 20 (where Anderson expressed concern 

that Welsh would not properly support Lawson), and to Biskra on December 21 

to check bomb supplies. To increase the effectiveness of planning he prodded 

his chief of intelligence to get photo reconnaissance in order, especially in front 

of the 1st Army, so that both the army and air forces could determine bombing 

targets. Next, he ordered daily early-morning flights over the front line to give 

air planners some idea of the weather. He did his best not only to improve communications between his headquarters and forward airfields but also to establish 

links that would enable a unified air command for the theater. All this attention 

to detail had little immediate effect. Spaatz did not command “general weather.”72 

On December 24, after three days of rain had rendered all forward airfields unserviceable,73 Eisenhower postponed any major offensive for six weeks. 

By the end of December, Allied air had not gained air superiority or established effective air support arrangements. Air attempts to cut down the flow of 

supplies across the Mediterranean to the Axis bridgehead also had encountered 

difficulties. From November to December, Axis seaborne supply tonnage 

received in Tunisia increased by 60 percent from 12,627 tons to 21,437; airborne 

supply tonnage grew sixfold, from 581 tons to 3,503. But because a portion of 

this increase represented a partial diversion of shipping from Libyan ports overrun by the British, whose supply tonnage dropped by 19,000 tons in December, 

the total amount of supplies received by the Axis forces in Africa actually 

decreased by 8,000 tons or almost 25 percent.74 

145 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Despite the increase in Axis tonnage to Tunisia, Allied interdiction of Axis 

shipping to Tunisia improved, too--from no Axis supplies shipped to Tunisia 

lost in November to 23 percent lost in December.75 Throughout the Mediterranean 

the Allies sank 17 ships of over 500 tons deadweight in November (12 by air) 

and increased that total to 32 (14 by air) in December.76 Apparently most of the 

shipping losses to air occurred on runs to the Libyan ports. American heavy and 

medium bombers concentrated their attacks on Tunisian ports, causing disruption, delays, and some damage. Because Tunisian dock workers refused to 

unload under the constant bombing,77 debarking troops had to spend a day at the 

docks unloading supplies before marching to the front-an irritating but not 

damaging loss of time. Allied air power had a measurable, but not an immediately decisive, effect on Axis supplies. 

As the forward movement, but not the fighting, stopped in the Tunisian hills, 

Eisenhower struggled to set up an effective air organization.78 In doing so he 

turned not only to Spaatz, but also to Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder, the Air 

Officer Commanding, Middle East, and one of the premier airmen of the RAF. 

In May 1941, at the age of fifty-one, Tedder became Air Officer Commanding in Chief, Middle East. He found himself in the midst of crises on several of 

the fronts he oversaw. Rommel swept all before him in the Western Desert; the 

Italians still held out in Abyssinia; dissident Arabs attacked RAF airfields in 

Iraq; daily air raids struck Malta; and the final stage of the Commonwealth evacuation from Greece had begun. The disastrous battle of Crete and stem fighting 

in the Western Desert lay ahead. By December 1942, Tedder had already served 

more than two years fighting the Axis in the Mediterranean. He had learned the 

bitter lessons of Crete and Tobruk and supplied lessons of his own at El Alamein 

and during the Axis retreat to Tripoli. No American air commander at that stage 

of the war matched Tedder’s combat experience and practical knowledge of conducting air operations in the face of the German and Italian air forces. Under his 

and his subordinates’, particularly Air Vice-Marshal Arthur Coningham’s, leadership, the RAF in the Middle East had become the Allies’ most effective 

ground support air force. Tedder placed himself at Eisenhower’s disposal-a display of inter-Allied cooperation much appreciated by the American commander.79 

Before joining the British army in 1914, Tedder had taken a degree in history from Cambridge and won the Prince Consort Prize for an essay on the 

Royal Navy during the 1660s. In 1916, he transferred to the Royal Flying Corps. 

After the war, he served as an instructor at the RAF Staff College; in 1934, he 

served on the Air Staff as Director of Training in charge of the Armaments 

Branch; and in 1936, he commanded the Far Eastern Air Force in Singapore 

where he observed firsthand the interservice disputes that presaged the mismanaged defense of Malaya in 1941-1942. 

In 1938, he became Director General of Research and Development and virtually deputy to Air Marshal Wilfred Freeman, in charge of all RAF aircraft production until 1940. Upon leaving the Ministry of Aircraft Production, Tedder 

146 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

joined Air Marshal Arthur Longmore as Deputy Air Officer Commanding in 

Chief, Middle East. For the next five months he assisted in the operations and 

administration throughout the vast theater under Longmore’s purview. From 

December 1940 through January 1941, Tedder had direct command of the air 

forces assisting Lt. Gen. Richard O’Conner’s Western Desert Force in its 

destruction of the Italian Tenth Army and the conquest of Libya. When Churchill 

and Portal lost patience with Longmore’s inability to do the impossible, they 

relieved him and appointed Tedder.80 

Unlike Harris or Spaatz, Tedder was not identified with a particular type of 

aviation. Instead, during his wartime service in the Mediterranean, he had spent 

more than two years in the pit of joint army-navy-air action. He had learned how 

to balance the conflicting demands of the services while maintaining his own 

and his service’s integrity. He became, out of self-defense, an expert in unified 

command, acquiring a deep-seated belief in the necessity of joint service operational planning and unity of command for air power under air leaders. After the 

war he said simply, 

Each of us-Land, Sea, and Air Commanders-had our [sic] own special war 

to fight, each of us had his own separate problems; but those separate problems 

were closely interlocked, and each of us had responsibilities one to the other. 

Given mutual understanding of that, you get mutual faith; and only with mutual 

faith will you get the three arms working together as one great war machine.*’ 

Tedder had definite opinions on the North African command situation. A 

visit to Algiers in late November left him deeply disturbed. Eisenhower and his 

American staff had taken up quarters in a large hotel. The British had taken residence in the naval commander’s flagship because of its excellent communications facilities. The two air forces had occupied headquarters miles from each 

other and from Eisenhower’s AFHQ. On November 27, Tedder, after having 

observed that Doolittle refused to cooperate on a mission requested by the EAC, 

objected to the “almost crazy” existing air organization. The two separate air 

forces needed a single commander, preferably an American with a “first class” 

British deputy. Tedder obviously realized that the Americans, who furnished the 

majority of the aircraft, would not consent to an overall British air commander. 

He hoped to bolster the American head with a proven British backup.82 

In late 1942, Tedder rendered more than advice to the Americans. When he 

returned to Cairo from North Africa on December 17, he took Brig. Gen. Howard 

A. Craig with him “for the purpose of furthering his education.”83 In Cairo, Craig 

visited the Combined War Room and the Joint Operations Staff, where Royal 

Navy, Army, and Air Force, staffs worked hand-in-hand on operations, intelligence, and planning. When engine trouble delayed Craig’s return flight, Tedder 

urged him to visit Air Vice-Marshal Arthur Coningham, Air Officer Commanding, 

Western Desert Air Force (WDAF), at Marble Arch, Tripolitania. The WDAF 

provided close air support to General Bernard Montgomery’s British 8th Army.84 

147 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Air Chief Marshal 

Arthur W. Tedder, Air 

Officer Commanding, 

Mediterranean Air 

Command, RAF, 

1941-1943. 

8 p 

I 

Coningham, a New Zealander who had fought in the Australian-New 

Zealand Army Corps in World War I, had earned the nickname “Maori,” which 

was soon corrupted by pronunciation to “Mary.” large man with a surprisingly 

high voice, he impressed most observers with his physical presence and his fervent championship of newly developed British air support doctrine, which he 

claimed as his own. Before his posting at Tedder’s request to the Western 

Desert, in July 1941, he had commanded No. 4 Group in Great Britain and had 

been exposed to the machinery of air support being studied and developed by 

officers of the RAF Army Co-operation Command.85 

Although many airmen consider Coningham the father of air support doctrine-and he did serve as a conduit of that doctrine to the AAF-the method 

and technique of air-ground cooperation he used in the desert did not originate 

with him. As two modem British military historians have pointed out, the growth 

of cooperation necessary to form and successfully operate a combined-arms 

team of any sort-be it artillery-infantry, tanks-infantry, or air forces-armywas slow and delicate, requiring time, copious amounts of goodwill, constant 

human contact, and careful training. Combined-arms cooperation did not 

become fully functional instantly or merely by decree.86 

In their excellent history of British military theory, Shelford Bidwell and 

Dominick Graham present a thorough history of the development of British air 

support. They begin by noting that the RAF had begun the war with the inten148 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

tion of intervening on the battlefield only in ground emergency. The dividing 

line between ground and air operations would be the range limit of army 

artillery.87 When this plan proved unworkable during the campaign in France, it 

was discarded in favor of closer air force-army cooperation, which the RAF 

fostered by forming the Army Co-operation Command. Its commander, Air 

Marshal Arthur Barrett, and his two chief subordinates, Army Lt. Col. J. 

Woodall and Group Captain A. Wann, produced an outstanding solution to the 

problem based on an army-air control system created entirely by Woodall as a 

result of logical analysis.88 

Woodall’s system had four chief components: 

1. The requirement for a properly equipped air formation reserved for the 

direct support of the field army but under RAF control. This formation would 

have two tasks: to shield the army from air attack by offensive action against 

enemy air and to apply airborne firepower on the battlefield itself, coordinating 

closely with ground operations. 

2. A specially trained army staff (Air Liaison Officers-ALOs) able to 

explain air methods and limitations to soldiers and army methods of operation, 

planning and situation to pilots assigned to the missions. 

3. A joint command post or control center, the Army Air Control Center 

(AACC), staffed by army and air force officers. 

4. A communications network of two links, one from the joint air-army headquarters directly to brigade or lower-level subordinate fighting formations in the 

Air Vice-Marshal Arthur 

Coningham, Air Officer 

Commanding, Western 

Desert Air Forces, RAF, 

1941-1943. 

149 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

field, which bypassed intermediate headquarters, and another link direct from the 

joint command post to the airfields, where the ALOs had access to it. This linking 

of ground units to the air formations supporting them through only one intervening 

element greatly speeded up the delivery of air support to the forces needing it. In 

addition, each headquarters in an army had a signals section, called a “tentacle” 

(because of its appearance on an organization chart of the communications network), with a signals officer and a staff officer trained in air support.8~ 

When Coningham arrived in the desert, he found the WDAF and the British 

8th Army smarting from the rough handling they had received in a costly, failed 

attempt to relieve the Axis siege of Tobruk (Operation BATTLEAXE). Both services saw the need to integrate their efforts. Into the breach stepped “Mary,” who 

added the newly created air-ground method to ongoing joint exercises. In 

September the British army and the RAF published “Middle East Training 

Pamphlet No. 3: Direct Air Support.” The communications network envisaged by 

this pamphlet mirrored the network proposed by Woodall and even called the 

jointly staffed Air Support Control Headquarters (ASCs) established at each 

corps and armored division headquarters “tentacles.” Coningham had apparently 

gone Woodall one better by providing joint RAF-army staffing for the forward 

links in the system. The ASCs accompanied the 8th Army for Operation 

CRUSADER, which relieved Tobruk in late November 1941.90 

In May 1942, the RAF joined the rest of the British forces in the retreat to El 

Alamein. Once there, the new system proved its worth during early September, 

in the defense of Alam Halfa, Montgomery’s first battle as commander of the 

8th Army. Before the battle, Montgomery, a firm believer in army-air cooperation, and Air Vice-Marshal Coningham had moved their headquarters to a common site, which allowed the AACC to remain in close touch with both army and 

air staffs. By October 1942, the British 8th Army had virtually perfected the system and used it with decisive effect in the Battle of El Alamein and the pursuit 

of Rommel’s defeated forces.91 

By the end of the campaign in the desert, Coningham had modified 

Woodall’s system, which had been originally designed to insulate the RAF from 

army command while providing the army with air support. In the desert the most 

difficult problem was not preventing the army’s command of RAF units but, 

rather, coordinating the operations of the RAF units themselves. The control of 

the air and of aircraft in the air revolved around the fighter. As Coningham said, 

“The fighter governs the front.”92 The fighter gained air superiority over the 

enemy’s fighters, defended against the enemy’s strikes, and escorted friendly 

bombers. As a result, Coningham created a fighter group with a headquarters 

and an air control center and placed it at a command level directly below the 

adjacent 8th Army/Western Desert Air Force Headquarters. The fighter group 

relieved Coningham’s headquarters of the burden of detailed operational control, 

leaving WDAF Headquarters free to concentrate on planning and overall direction of operations. 

150 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

The fighter group control center contained an army gun operations room,” 

an air controller, a duty signals intelligence officer (“Y”), an operations officer, 

and two forward bomber control officers. They plotted aircraft tracks on their 

operations table and had the radio equipment for controlling aircraft. All bomber, 

fighter-bomber, and tactical reconnaissance missions were coordinated through 

the control center. The fighter group headquarters and control center were 

located as close as possible to the majority of the airfields, which enabled rapid 

communications by secure ground lines.93 This modification curtailed the role 

of the AACC and the tentacles, reducing them to the status of a specialized communications network divorced from command. 

Coningham’s cardinal principle was that the enemy air force had to be driven 

from the sky before any other air operations could succeed; hence maximum 

force must be focused on an initial counterair campaign. He deplored the employment of air assets in scattered groups and small numbers, called “penny 

packets,” tied closely to ground troops and conducting purely defensive functions. Penny packets prevented the concentration of force necessary to win the 

crucial counterair battle. The achievement of air superiority by aggressive offensive action against enemy aircraft and airfields freed friendly air forces to exercise their flexibility and capacity for rapid concentration at the decisive point. 

When conditions did not require concentration, an air force which possessed air 

superiority could roam over and behind the battlefield at leisure, harassing or 

destroying enemy ground formations and supply lines. As a corollary, Coningham 

believed in the centralized control of air operations by an airman working 

closely with, but not directly under supervision of, the ground commander. 

Although Coningham put his air headquarters in a tent adjacent to Montgomery’s own, he maintained that air officers had trained for their task and ought 

to be allowed to do it without kibitzing from soldiers with little idea of, or sympathy with, air problems. The RAF’s independence from the army greatly assisted 

Coningham in the realization of his ideas.94 Coningham lost no time inculcating his 

strictures to Craig, who proved a willing convert. Criag’s initial report gave Spaatz, 

and through him the AAF hierarchy, additional insight into British methods. 

Unfortunately, Coningham’s and Montgomery’s newfound skills made little 

difference in the early stages of the North African campaign. The Americans had 

yet to put their doctrine into practice, and the British had not yet fully assimilated the lessons of the Western Desert. Not until February 1943, did the hardlearned experience of the Western Desert Air Force begin to influence all the 

Allied forces in Africa. 

* The army gun operations room coordinated RAF activities with army artillery to prevent guns 

and aircraft from interfering with each other’s missions and from attempting fire missions better 

suited to either air or ground capabilities. For instance, aircraft could not safely fly into an area 

already under artillery fire, but could fly sorties beyond artillery range. There was no need to send 

aircraft to attack a target undergoing the more accurate fire of artillery. 

151 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Within a few days after Christmas 1942, Eisenhower concluded that the lull 

in intensive air activity provided the opportunity to jettison the temporary command arrangements of early December. This decision resulted in a short lived, 

but significant, reorganization, which increased Spaatz’s authority and revealed 

the complexities of inter-Allied politics as they concerned high-level personnel 

assignments. Eisenhower informed Marshall after careful study and discussions 

with Tedder, Spaatz, and Coningham, “I have come to the conclusion that a single air commander is necessary.”95 Eisenhower at first wanted Tedder for the 

position, but upon further consideration chose Spaatz. Eisenhower noted of 

Spaatz: “He is a sound organizer and has gained, through operating as my 

deputy commander for air, a very fine picture of our problem here, as well as its 

relationship with the Mideast and with Great Britain. He is a fine officer and 

will do a good j0b.”96 

If Marshall approved of the proposal, Eisenhower intended to present it to 

the U.S.-British Combined Chiefs of Staff (CCS). Eisenhower did not expect the 

British to object to the naming of an American to the position because they 

knew Spaatz and because the Americans would supply the bulk of the bombers 

and a considerable portion of the fighters to the new command.97 Two days 

later, writing to Marshall, Eisenhower explained that he considered it essential 

for his air commander to retain control of the U.S. heavy bombers in Britain.98 

As long as Spaatz remained the Commanding General, AAF, in the European 

Theater of Operations, he could call down reinforcements from Britain, whereas 

a British commander, because of the need to ensure the protection of his homeland, would have a more difficult time doing this. Eisenhower wanted to guarantee his ability to obtain timely air reinforcements. 

Churchill and Portal did not care for the appointment of a man with little 

field experience in the command and administration of a mixed air force to the 

command of all Allied air forces in North Africa.99 After some grousing, however, they consented on condition that Spaatz appoint a British officer as his 

deputy and that his staff contain a British officer experienced in maintenance 

and supply.100 Their acquiescence also hinged on their perception that the 

proper air command arrangements in North Africa would soon be reconsidered 

at the meeting of President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill, and their 

Combined Chiefs of Staff at Casablanca in mid-January.101 

Eisenhower found the British stipulations acceptable. On January 5, 1943, 

he appointed Spaatz Commander of the Allied Air Force and Air Vice-Marshal 

James M. Robb as deputy. Eisenhower attempted to follow British suggestions 

on the internal structure of the Allied Air Force. The British recommended that 

all their own and U.S. aircraft, irrespective of nationality, be grouped according 

to their functions, logistic possibilities, and tactical requirements. Because both 

British and U.S. statutes tied military promotions, discipline, and other functions 

to the existing Twelfth Air Force and EAC, Eisenhower did not wish to dispense 

with those organizations. Consequently, he gave the EAC control of general 

152 
THE RACE FOR TUNISIA 

reconnaissance, a striking force to hit enemy shipping, and an air support force 

to cooperate with the British 1st Army. The Twelfth was assigned the tasks of 

conducting strategic heavy-bombing missions and providing close air support to 

the U.S. I1 Corps in Tunisia. The two existing organizations had by now solved 

many of the tough administrative and logistical problems facing them in North 

Africa and their dissolution might reopen Pandora’s box. 

These new arrangements, which lasted until mid-February 1943, did not 

ease the Twelfth’s basic logistics problem. Spaatz reported to Eisenhower on 

January 1 that lack of transport prevented any air buildup to support a ground 

offensive. Two days later, Spaatz repeated to Eisenhower that stockpiles of supplies and preparations were needed at the front. He also asked for a higher priority xn allocation of supplies sent forward. The day before his departure for 

Casablanca on January 19, Spaatz instructed his forces to take advantage of the 

lull in fighting to strengthen the buildup of repair and maintenance capability 

and to get replacement aircraft to the front as rapidly as possible. On January 20, 

he inspected Marrakech, the African terminus of the AAF South Atlantic air 

ferry route, to clarify the responsibilities of the rear area services of supply and 

training. All these actions helped to ensure maximum effort in the task of untangling the knotted logistics situation.102 

The Germans halted the Allied drive on Tunis twenty-five miles short of its 

goal, a margin of Allied defeat so narrow that a slight change in any of several 

factors might have brought a different outcome. The men on the spot could not 

hold back the rainy season, or overcome an overloaded transport system, or 

build hard-surface airfields in an instant, or correct badly loaded ships. For both 

air and ground forces, the first phase of the Tunisian campaign was a logistical 

nightmare. By the end of November, the forward airfields were so overloaded 

that Eisenhower’s Assistant Chief of Staff for Air, Air Vice-Marshal A.P.M. 

Sanders, reported that it was “imperative that no more U.S. air squadrons should 

be brought to the East from the Oran and Casablanca areas until the situation 

regarding airfields and supplies to them can be improved.” Sanders added 

sternly, “It is useless to send operational air units to them [forward airfields] 

until transportation and communications to keep them effectively supplied and 

controlled can be established’ [emphasis in original]. 103 

In December 1942, Spaatz made solid, if unspectacular, progress toward 

solving logistical problems, but because of those problems he made less headway in the gaining of air superiority, the provision of close air support, and the 

interdiction of enemy supply. Successful tactical air operations required superiority in aircraft at the front-and superiority could be achieved only by having 

an overwhelming number of aircraft at all points or by concentrating the planes 

available at key points. Both necessitated better logistics. More planes needed 

more fields and supplies. Concentration at key points needed better command 

and control of available aircraft. 

The Allied Air Force was created to clarify lines of command and thereby 

153 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ease the ability to concentrate both air forces on one objective. Control of aircraft in the air, which would greatly increase the offensive and defensive power 

of Allied fighters, awaited the delivery and installation of adequate radio and 

radar equipment, another function of the logistics system. 

In the next phase of the campaign Spaatz directly addressed the problem of 

tactical air. 

154 
Chapter 5 

Failure and Reorganization 

(January-March 1943) 

I have mentioned the need for mutual understanding and 

mutual faith. This, in the ultimate, comes down to personalities. One thing I have learnt in this late war is that the personality of the few men at the top-commanders and 

staff-matters far more than conceived.’ 

Sir Arthur Tedder, January 9,1946 

The Casablanca Conference 

From January 14 to 24, Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, and their 

Combined Chiefs of Staff met at Casablanca, in French Morocco, to settle the 

Western Alliance’s war strategy for 1943. They decided, after putting aside 

American alternative suggestions, to continue the main effort against the Axis 

powers in the Mediterranean and to postpone the major invasion across the 

English Channel into France until 1944. This decision affected both the forces 

then fighting the Axis in North Africa and the buildup of forces in Britain. 

The conference divided Allied forces fighting the European Axis powers 

into two separate theaters, North Africa and England. Thereupon, the Americans, 

for their own administrative purposes, formed a separate North African Theater 

of Operations (NATO) to support the campaign in Tunisia and subsequent operations in the Mediterranean, while maintaining the previously established 

European Theater of Operations (ETO) to support the strategic bomber offensive 

against Germany and to prepare for the cross-channel invasion. An AAF officer, 

Lt. Gen. Frank M. Andrews, replaced Eisenhower as Commanding General, 

U.S. Army, ETO, and Eisenhower became Commanding General, U.S. Army, 

NATO. Eisenhower also retained his position as overall Allied Commander in 

North Africa. Andrews’s responsibilities included the prosecution of the U.S. 

portion of the U.S.-British Combined Bomber Offensive. This offensive, 

155 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Lt. Gen. Frank M. 

Andrews, Commanding 

General, European 

Theater of Operations, 

1943. 

directed against Germany and occupied Europe, received the endorsement of the 

conferees, who called for “the heaviest possible bomber offensive against the 

German war effort,”;? with the ultimate goal of “the progressive destruction and 

dislocation of the German military, industrial and economic system, and the 

undermining of the morale of the German people to a point where their capacity 

for armed resistance is fatally weakened.”3 

The selection of Andrews to fill this post disappointed Spaatz. He wanted to 

direct the Combined Bomber Offensive himself and had even asked Arnold at 

Casablanca whether he could return to the Eighth to do so. Arnold told him no, 

because the new assignments had already been planned at the “very highest levels.”4 Spaatz did not allow this setback to weaken his efforts in North Africa. 

The Casablanca Conference spawned yet another reorganization of Allied 

air power in North Africa, this one along the lines suggested by the British in 

their earlier proposals. Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder became Air Commander in Chief, Mediterranean, in charge of Allied air forces in both the North 

African and the British Middle East theaters of war. He had two principal subordinates-an air commander for the Middle East (Air Commander in Chief, 

Middle East, Air Chief Marshal Sholto Douglas) and an air commander for 

Northwest Africa (Spaatz). Spaatz’s combat elements, the U.S. Twelfth Air 

Force and the British Eastern Air Command (EAC) plus the Western Desert Air 

Force (WAF) (including the U.S. Ninth Air Force), which had not yet arrived 

156 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

from Tripolitania, would split to form three functional commands. Doolittle, 

recently promoted to major general, would oversee the Northwest African 

Strategic Air Force (NASAF), composed of heavy and medium bombers and 

their escorting fighters. This force would bomb Axis ports in Italy and Tunisia, 

attack Axis shipping in transit, and assist the other two air forces if necessary. 

Air Marshal Arthur Coningham would head up the Northwest African Tactical 

Air Force (NATAF), composed of Allied fighter-bombers, light and groundattack bombers, and a force of fighters. This force would provide ground support 

for the newly formed 18 Army Group, which would take command of all Allied 

ground forces in Tunisia. Air Marshal Hugh P. Lloyd would command the 

Northwest African Coastal Air Force (NACAF), composed of fighters, longrang,e reconnaissance aircraft, and antisubmarine planes. This force would protect Allied shipping and p0rts.5 

At the Casablanca Conference Arnold had an opportunity to propound the 

AAF’s strategic views before Roosevelt, Churchill, and their combined military 

staffs. The AAF also had to stave off a last British attempt to shunt the U.S. 

bomber force from daylight bombing to night operations. This proposal had the 

support of the Prime Minister, who became Arnold’s major target in a campaign 

to preserve daylight precision bombing. 

The AAF’s inability to mount a single bombing raid on the German homeland in the thirteen months since the United States had entered the war had stimulated the Prime Minister’s doubts. As late as mid-September 1942, Churchill 

expressed unreserved support of Spaatz and U.S. daylight heavy bombing. In a 

personal message to Roosevelt he asked for more B-17s, observing, 

A few hundred fortresses this autumn and winter, while substantial German Air 

Forces are still held in Russia, may well be worth many more in a year’s time 

when the enemy may be able greatly to reinforce his Western Air Defences. I 

am sure we should be missing great opportunities if we did not concentrate 

every available fortress and long range escort fighter as quickly as possible for 

the attack on our primary enemy.6 

Within a month, however, the Prime Minister began to take the opposite 

tack. Opinion within the Air Ministry split. Portal expressed skepticism at the 

claims of fighters downed by the B-17s and the chances of successful bombing 

of Germany. “It is rash to prophesy,” he told Churchill, “but my own view is 

that only very large numbers (say 400 to 500) going out at one time will enable 

the Americans to bomb the Ruhr by daylight with less than 10% casualties and I 

doubt even then the bombing will be very accurate.”7 Portal indicated a willingness to delay tackling the problem with the Americans until the end of the year, 

after the U.S. elections and after the AAF had had a chance to ride out a press 

uproar over the inferior quality of its fighter aircraft.8 

‘The Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Policy), Air Vice-Marshal John Slessor, 

the RAF senior officer with perhaps the clearest understanding of U.S. determi157 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

nation to carry through with daylight precision bombing, and the civilian head of 

the RAF, Secretary of State for Air Archibald S. M. Sinclair, warned of the dangers of appearing to thwart U.S. designs. While admitting that Spaatz and his 

other American friends were “a bit unwarrantably cockahoop” over the success 

of their early raids, Slessor spoke of their professionalism and resolve to succeed, concluding, “I have a feeling they will do it.9 

On October 16, Churchill sent a message to Harry Hopkins that the achievement to date by the B-17s’ shallow penetrations, under mainly RAF escort, 

“does not give our experts the same confidence as yours in the power of the day 

bomber to operate far into Germany.” Churchill asked Hopkins to look into the 

matter “while time remains and before large mass production is finally fixed.”lo 

The Prime Minister expressed himself more bluntly within his own government. 

In a note on air policy he predicted a disaster for the Americans as soon as they 

ventured out from under British escort. Churchill suggested diverting the Americans to antisubmarine patrols and night bombing. As for U.S. aircraft production, Churchill urged that the Americans take up night-bomber production on a 

large scale.11 

Sinclair immediately took up the challenge. The Americans had come to a 

critical point in their allocation of air priorities, he said, and if the Prime Minister pressed for conversion to night bombing, setting himself “against their cherished policy of daylight penetration,” he would confound the very groups in the 

U.S. military that wished to build up big bomber forces in England during 1943 

and 1944: 

It would be a tragedy if we were to frustrate them on the eve of this great 

experiment. To ally ourselves with the American Navy against General Spaatz 

and General Eaker and the United States Air Force in this country, and to force 

them into diverting their highly trained crews to scaring U-Boats instead of 

bombing Germany would be disastrous. It would weaken and alienate the very 

forces in the United States on which we depend for support in a European as 

opposed to a Pacific strategy and for the production of heavy bombers as distinct from the types which it is so much more easy to produce in quantity.” 

The Prime Minister replied that Sinclair’s impassioned plea had not convinced 

him of the “merits” of daylight bombing or of the tactics to pursue toward the 

Americans.13 

A few days later, Sinclair, speaking for himself and Portal, reiterated his 

arguments: 

We feel bound to warn you most seriously against decrying the American plan 

for daylight attack of GERMANY. We are convinced that it would be fatal to 

suggest to them at this of all times that the great bomber force they are planning 

to build up is no good except for coastal work and perhaps ultimately night 

bombing. 

Sinclair pointed out the difficulties Spaatz had encountered in training and keep158 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

Archibald Sinclair, 

British Secretary of State 

for Air, 1940-1945. 

4 

ing an adequate force and spoke of his determination not to fly over Germany 

with inadequate numbers and half-trained gunners.14 

In November Portal advised the Prime Minister against premature scuttling 

of the U.S. effort: “I do not think we can decide what to do until we have balanced the probability of success, which may not be very high but is not negligible, against the results of success, if achieved.” Success would have tremendous 

consequences in wastage for the Luftwaffe fighter forces and destruction of 

German industry: “It is solely because of the great prizes that would be gained 

by success that I am so keen to give the Americans every possible chance to 

achieve it.” 

Portal suggested that the Americans also be encouraged to press on with 

night adaptations and alternative day methods in case daylight precision bombing failed. He, too, repeated the fear that premature opposition to daylight 

bombing would lead to the commitment of U.S. resources to other theaters.15 On 

November 21, Portal took the additional step of asking the RAF Delegation in 

Washington to press Arnold for an attack on Germany “at the earliest possible 

moment without waiting for the build-up of a very large force.” The inability of 

the AAF to bomb the Reich weakened Portal’s defense of not only the shipping 

priorities for the aviation fuel, personnel, and supply requirements of the Eighth 

Air Force but U.S. bombing policy as we11.16 

Churchill remained unconvinced. In mid-December he noted that the effect 

159 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

of the U.S. bombing effort judged by the numbers of sorties, bombs dropped, 

and results obtained against the enormous quantities of men and material 

involved “has been very small indeed.” During the previous two months he had 

“become increasingly doubtful of the daylight bombing of Germany by the 

American method.” If his ally’s plan failed, “the consequences will be grievous.” 

The collapse of daylight bombing would stun U.S. public opinion, disrupt an 

industrial effort increasingly committed to production of bombers unsuitable for 

night work, and render useless the tens of thousands of American air personnel 

and their airfields in Britain.17 Perhaps for domestic political reasons (a certain 

percentage of the British population objected to the ubiquitous presence of their 

Allies*), the large, seemingly useless mass of AAF personnel in Britain (which 

would eventually be dwarfed by the million Americans in Britain before the 

Normandy invasion) particularly raised the Prime Minister’s ire. He returned to 

it time and again in the course of the debate. Nonetheless, Churchill had fixed 

his policy: 

We should, of course, continue to give the Americans every encouragement 

and help in the experiment which they ardently and obstinately wish to make, 

but we ought to try to persuade them to give as much aid as possible (a) to sea 

work and (b) to night bombing, and to revise their production, including instruments and training for the sake of these objects.I8 

Churchill’s persistence in recommending antisubmarine work reflected the 

uncertain status of the Battle of the Atlantic in late 1942. The British were losing 

merchant shipping faster than they could replace it. British import tonnage, the 

life’s blood of an economy not blessed with overwhelming native supplies of 

raw materials and agricultural resources, had fallen from a prewar annual average of 50 million tons to 23 million tons in 1942. Even the most stringent shipping measures could not close the gap between imports and domestic requirements, which forced the British to consume internal stocks, reducing them to the 

minimum needed to support the British war effort. In early November, the 

British came hat in hand to Washington to plead for an additional 7 million tons 

of U.S.-built shipping, a request Roosevelt granted without even consulting military leaders.19 But it would take months for American yards to deliver the ships. 

In the meantime, Churchill felt that a diversion of the U.S. bombing effort to sea 

work would pay greater dividends in saved shipping, while a reduction in U.S. 

forces stationed in Britain would conserve tonnage. 

* The British reduced this resentment to a single phrase: The Yanks were “overpaid, oversexed 

and over here!” At the end of August 1942, Eighth Air Force personnel in Britain numbered approximately 30,000. By the end of November 1942, transfers to the Twelfth Air Force left only 23,000 

AAF personnel in England. The January 1943 rolls carried 36,000 personnel. See Craven and Cate, 

Torch to Poiniblank, pp. 599-600. American forces as a whole dropped from 228,000 in October to 

135,000 at the end of the year, and to 105,000 by the end of February 1943. See Leighton and 

Coakley, Global Logistics, p. 487. 

160 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

Sinclair continued to resist what he considered a doubtful policy. He admitted that the RAF might be wrong in its perception that the Americans would 

pick up their toys and go to the Pacific if threatened, but his officers were convinced that “any attempt to divert the American Air Forces from the function for 

which they have been trained to a subsidiary role over the sea or in secondary 

theaters would be fiercely resented and vigorously resisted.” If daylight bombing proved unsuccessful, the Americans themselves would abandon it and turn 

to night action. “They will not turn aside from day bombing,” estimated Sinclair, 

“till they are convinced it has failed; they will not be convinced except by their 

own experience.”Zo Writing just a few days before the Casablanca Conference, 

Sinclair counseled patience, advising that at the present stage it would be wrong 

to discourage the Americans from what might still be a successful experiment.21 

,411 this drew an exasperated retort from Churchill. The Americans had not 

even begun their experiment and when they did, it could take four or five months 

to convince them one way or the other: 

Meanwhile I have never suggested that they should be “discouraged” by us, 

that is to say we should argue against their policy, but only that they should not 

be encouraged to persist obstinately and also that they should be actively urged 

to become capable of night bombing. What I am going to discourage actively, 

is the sending over of large quantities of these daylight bombers and their enormous ground staffs until the matter is settled one way or the other.** 

Churchill had not decided against daylight precision bombing, but the time 

was obviously fast approaching when daylight precision bombing must begin to 

justify itself by deed rather than potential. Without results the Prime Minister 

could no longer accept the expenditure of resources devoted to the project. But 

his threat to halt the buildup of U.S. heavy-bomber groups could, in the end, 

jeopardize the entire experiment. The precision bombing concept, whatever its 

emphasis on bombing accuracy, included a large measure of attrition, for both 

friend and foe, in its formula for success. Without sufficient logistical backup, 

including large numbers of air crews and bombers, the U.S. effort could not succeed. 

The Americans probably first learned officially of Churchill’s attitude in an 

exchange of memorandums between the American and British Chiefs of Staff in 

late December and early January. Within these memos, which served as the 

basis of initial discussion at Casablanca, each staff expressed its view on the 

most advantageous strategy for the Allies to follow in 1943. The Americans 

wished to hold the North African and Pacific theaters to minimum commitments 

while mounting a large-scale invasion from England into France. The British 

favored a continued offensive in the Mediterranean and a more gradual buildup 

of ground forces in Britain.23 The clash between the Allies’ positions constituted the major story of the conference. The British, who had the majority of 

troops under arms, aircraft, and shipping, won the dispute, much to the chagrin 

161 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

of Marshall and the Americans. Overall, U.S. air power in 1943 played a minor 

role in the struggle between U.S. advocacy of the direct strategy versus British 

support of the indirect approach. 

In their initial policy memos, both countries called for air offensives against 

Germany and Italy. The Americans urged “an integrated air offensive on the 

largest practicable scale against German production and resources, designed to 

achieve a progressive deterioration of her war effort.”24 The British Chiefs 

echoed that call and recommended a combined U.S.-British heavy- and mediumbomber force of 3,000 planes in Britain by the end of 1943. Although the British 

fully endorsed night bombing, they questioned the efficacy of day bombing: 

In spite of the progress made during recent months by the United States 

Bomber Command in the bombing of targets in occupied territory, it is still an 

open question whether regular penetration of the defenses of Germany by daylight will be practicable without prohibitive losses. While every effort should 

continue to be made to achieve success by day, it is important to arrange that, if 

the daylight bombing of Germany proves impracticable, it will be possible to 

convert the United States Bomber Command from a primarily day to a primarily night force with the least possible delay and loss of efficien~y.~~ 

If he had not earlier received warnings from friends on the RAF staff, Arnold 

must have quickly learned from them after receiving the memo that it reflected 

the Prime Minister’s opinions. 

The abandonment of day bombing, the rock on which all AAF hopes stood, 

was unthinkable. No matter how reasonable the British suggestion at least to 

consider and prepare for the possible failure of the experiment may have 

appeared, it could not be accepted lest it in any way undermine the concept. 

Once Arnold learned of Churchill’s determination to question U.S. bombing, he 

marshaled some of his biggest guns-Spaatz, Andrews, and Eaker-to help persuade “Big BOY” (Churchill’s code name in the preconference planning) to 

change his mind. The night before the conference opened, January 13, Eaker 

was ordered to Casablanca. There he worked frantically to prepare a brief to present to the Prime Minister, who had consented to see him.26 On January 20, 

Spaatz, Andrews, and Eaker all met Churchill. 

Eaker proved by far the most convincing. Writing his memoirs eight years 

after the event, Churchill admitted his frustration with U.S. bombing: “It was 

certainly a temble thing that in the whole of the last six months of 1942 nothing 

had come of this immense deployment and effort, absolutely nothing, not a single bomb had been dropped on Germany.” The intensity of Eaker’s defense, 

which included a promise to attack Germany proper with 100 bombers a minimum of two or three times before February 1 and frequently thereafter,27 and the 

telling point he made concerning the advantages of round-the-clock bombing of 

Germany, changed the Prime Minister’s mind. “Considering how much had 

been staked on this venture by the United States and all they felt about it,” stated 

162 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

Churchill, “I decided to back Eaker and his theme, and I turned around completely and withdrew all my opposition to the daylight bombing by the 

Fortresses.”28 Eaker recalled that Churchill merely agreed to allow the AAF 

more time to prove its case.29 

Eaker’s recollection seems more probable. As Churchill had said ten days 

before the conference, he was not opposed to daylight bombing; he simply 

wished to encourage nighttime bombing as a reasonable alternative. What 

Spaatz, Andrews, and Eaker accomplished was to confirm the advice the Prime 

Minister had already obtained from the RAF Staff and the Secretary of State for 

Air. The Americans would not abandon daylight bombing until they were convinced it had failed-and they were willing to devote vast amounts of human 

and material resources to ensure success. And an attack on daylight bombing 

could not help alienating the AAF, jeopardizing British aircraft allocations, and 

slowing the bomber buildup in Britain. The Americans had bet enormous stakes 

on daylight bombing and the Prime Minister, who always felt that night bombing would offer a quicker payoff, realized that they could not be asked to hedge 

their bet at this particular time. Having won the main point of the conference by 

keeping the Mediterranean front open (discomforting the U.S. Army and its 

Chief of Staff in the process), the British knew it would be folly to risk the good 

will of the AAF and create hard feelings over a matter that would prove itself 

one way or the other in a few months. 

On January 27, Eaker partially fulfilled his promise to the Prime Minister. 

He dispatched ninety-one heavy bombers against the Emden U-boat yards. Four 

more raids into Germany, none of which was carried out by more than ninetythree planes, followed in February.30 

During his twenty-four-hour stay at Casablanca, Spaatz talked to both heads 

of government. He apparently left his meeting with Churchill and went directly to 

Roosevelt, with whom he met from 1O:OO A.M. to 11:30 A.M. No official record of 

the meeting exists, and Spaatz did not refer to it in his records. Only Elliott 

Roosevelt, one of the President’s sons, left an account. According to the younger 

Roosevelt, Spaatz explained the operational difficulties encountered in Tunisia, 

such as the lack of replacement planes and hard-surface runways, and spoke of 

the problems of combined command and the difficulty of serving under Tedder.31 

The reference to Tedder does not ring true. In fact, as of January 20, 1943, Spaatz 

had yet to come under that officer’s command. What Spaatz may have explained 

was the difficulty of coordinating the operations of the EAC and the Twelfth Air 

Force around inadequate signal organizations and different staff procedures. It 

seems likely that Spaatz also spoke of daylight bombing, given (1) the British 

threat to it, (2) his familiarity with the AAF’s troubled efforts in Europe, and (3) 

Roosevelt’s, Churchill’s, and Portal’s questioning of Arnold during the conference on the Eighth Air Force’s failure to bomb Germany.32 If Churchill continued to press for conversion to night bombing, Roosevelt would have to be persuaded to resist. Churchill’s reversal, however, eliminated the need for special 

and immediate support from the President. 

163 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

While at Casablanca, Spaatz also discussed operations and organization with 

Marshall, Portal, and Amold.33 Arnold, no less frustrated than Churchill over 

the Eighth Air Force’s inability to bomb Germany, had hard questions. Spaatz 

did his best to lance his chief‘s frustration before it came to a head. Years later 

Spaatz recalled, ‘‘I remember having a heart to heart talk with Hap, walking 

along the beach. We talked very, very frankly about daylight bombing and whether 

it should be carried out or not.”34 Spaatz went on to predict that, in time, British 

night losses would exceed American daylight casualties. Amold did not find 

Spaatz’s or Eaker’s arguments completely convincing. A month later he complained to Stratemeyer that both “gave the usual and expected reasons for not operating against Germany. Their reasons for not operating more frequently, however, 

seemed very weak.”35 

On January 21, the Combined Chiefs of Staff issued their first directive on 

the bomber offensive from Britain. They ordered British and U.S. bomber commanders to “take every opportunity to attack Germany by day, to destroy objectives that are unsuitable for night attack, to sustain continuous pressure on 

German morale, to impose heavy losses on the German day-fighter force, and to 

contain German fighter strength away from the Russian and Mediterranean theLt. Gen. Henry H. Arnold, Commanding General, U.S. Army Air Forces, and Air 

Chief Marshal Charles A. Portal, Chief of the Air Staff, RAF, at the Casablanca 

Conference, January 1943. 

164 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

aters of war.” The directive specified five targets in priority order: the Germans’ 

submarine construction yards, aircraft industry, transportation, oil plants, and 

otheir targets in the German war economy. The directive also authorized attacks 

on Berlin, “which should be attacked when conditions are suitable for the attainment of especially valuable results unfavorable to the morale of the enemy or 

favorable to that of Russia.” Finally, the directive ordered the Allied bomber 

commanders to support the Allied armies when it came time for the cross-channel invasion.36 

Eaker had gained his chance to conduct the daylight bombing experiment. 

Unfortunately for him, the calls of other theaters for shipping and planes effectively reduced the Eighth Air Force to the lowest priority, starving him of resources and hamstringing him throughout his tenure in England. 

Operations, Personalities, and Teamwork 

The postponement of the Allied offensive in late December because of bad 

weather, exhaustion of front-line troops and aircraft, and the need to bring up 

reinforcements, most of them American, led to the formation of an overall U.S. 

ground command in Tunisia, the U.S. I1 Corps, which would occupy central 

Tunisia, taking a position to the right of the Allied line. The British 1st Army 

occupied the Allied left, while the under-equipped French XIX Corps occupied 

defensive positions in the relatively impassable center of the Allied lines. If all 

went well, Eisenhower hoped to have I1 Corps drive to the coast, separating the 

Germans in Tunisia from Rommel’s forces retreating from Libya. Eisenhower 

exercised direct operational control over the U.S., British, and French national 

contingents. At the front no unified ground command existed. (For a view of the 

terrain in Tunisia, see Map 6.) 

The air organization paralleled the ground forces’ division into national contingents. Spaatz ordered the EAC to support the British 1st Army and the 

Twelfth Air Force to support U.S. I1 Corps and all U.S. land forces in North 

Africa.37 The French had a small air force but depended on their Allies for air 

support. Neither the EAC’s No. 242 Group nor the Twelfth’s XI1 Air Support 

Command, the subordinate organizations charged with cooperating with the land 

forces, was assigned directly to the land forces they assisted.38 In fact, at no time 

during the campaign were AAF combat units, as opposed to observation and 

reconnaissance units, ever directly assigned or attached to U.S. Army units. 

When the Allies began to contemplate moving a large U.S. ground formation into the front line, they may have considered creating an American army 

rather than an American corps to control the U.S. ground forces in Tunisia.39 On 

December 30, Spaatz and Lt. Gen. Mark Clark, the Commanding General of the 

American Fifth Army, then forming and training in the western TORCH area, 

toured the battle area. Political considerations probably scotched the move. An 

American army would have competed for prestige with Anderson’s 1st Army 

165 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall, Commanding General, U.S. I1 Corps, North 

Africa, January-March 1943. 

and if defeated would have lost a commensurate amount for the inexperienced 

Americans. Furthermore, the size of the contemplated U.S. force, little more 

than a reinforced division to start with, hardly justified an army headquarters. 

Therefore, Eisenhower decided to assign a corps to the area. He then faced the 

problem of selecting an officer to head the largest American unit to fight the 

European Axis to date. 

Eisenhower quickly narrowed the choice to two men close at hand, the commanders of the U.S. invasion task forces-Maj. Gen. George s. Patton in 

Casablanca and Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall in Oran. Both had some experience in corps commands and in actual combat against the Germans. Patton, 

fifty-six years of age, had served in the cavalry after graduating from West 

Point. After his service in World War I, he had transferred to the armored forces. 

He played a large part in the great prewar (1941) Carolina and Louisiana 

maneuvers and, at the time of his selection for TORCH, commanded the 

I Armored Corps at the Desert Training Center. It was during Patton’s tenure 

there that Devers and others had become dissatisfied with the AAF support 

given to training. 

Patton, scion of one of the wealthiest families in California and a thoughtful, 

extremely well-read student of his profession, was a man of extraordinary 

strengths and failings. Perhaps the finest American combat ground commander of 

167 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

World War 11, he was also an egomaniac and a mystic. Subject to violent emotions, he was a great actor who was not above throwing tantrums or kisses to get 

his way. At this stage of the war his eccentricities, such as rabid Anglophobia, 

seemed to outweigh his potential, so Eisenhower picked Fredendall instead.40 

Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall, at age fifty-eight, had done well in the 

Army, despite his failure to complete West Point. His specialty was training, and 

he had previously commanded the I1 Corps before it went overseas. It was during his command of I1 Corps in May 1942 that the AAF had botched a largescale air-ground exercise at Fort Benning. Marshall had recommended him for 

TORCH and Eisenhower had asked for him. He, like Patton, was senior to 

Eisenhower in service, but seniority never seemed to have been a serious problem. The short, stocky Fredendall projected a gruff image every bit as rough as 

Patton’s. He was outspoken and did not hesitate to criticize either his superiors 

or his subordinates. He formed judgments rapidly, often with insufficient or 

inaccurate information, but was impatient with the recommendations of his subordinates. He had a habit of issuing bombastic, colorful, but imprecise messages. 

At a key point in the Kasserine engagements, for example, he told a subordinate, 

“I want you to go to Kasserine right away and pull a Stonewall Jackson. Take 

over up there.” Although he did not lack personal courage, Fredendall, for reasons that are still obscure, ensconced himself in an elaborate dug-in headquarters 

established far behind the front, which he seldom left. The complex amazed and 

disgusted almost all outside observers.41 Soon after taking over on January 1, he 

developed extremely bad relations with Maj. Gen. Orlando P. Ward, the commander of his principal combat unit, the 1st Armored Division. He soon began 

to ignore Ward to deal directly with one of Ward’s subordinates, Brig. Gen. Paul 

M. Robinett. Nor did Fredendall have any affection for the French or the British; 

he particularly disliked General Anderson.42 (See Chart 1, Allied Chain of 

Command, January 6, 1943.) 

Fredendall certainly appears to have been misjudged by Eisenhower given 

his failure in battle seven weeks later and his replacement by Patton. On 

December 10, Eisenhower rated Fredendall behind Patton, remarking, “Patton I 

think comes closest to meeting every requirement made on a commander. Just 

after him I would rate Fredendall, although I do not believe the latter has the 

imagination in foreseeing and preparing for possible jobs of the future that 

Patton possesses.”43 On February 4, Eisenhower recommended promotions to 

lieutenant general for both Patton and Fredendall, after assuring Marshall that he 

had “now eliminated from my mind all doubts I had as to Fredendall.”44 Yet, 

also in a February 4 message, Eisenhower critized Fredendall’s complaints 

about the British, his command’s lack of road discipline which caused extensive 

traffic jams and offered tempting targets to Axis aircraft, and the “habit of some 

of our generals in staying too close to their command posts.”45 The letter indicated that Eisenhower may not have rid himself of doubts after all. 

Fredendall, surprisingly, had no problems getting along with the successive 

168 
Chart 1 

Allied Chain of Command 

January 5,1943 

Allied Air Force 

Maj Gen 

C.A. Spaatz 

British 1st Army 

Lt Gen 

K.A.N. Anderson 

AFHQ 

Lt Gen 

D. D. Eisenhower 

US. II Corps French XIX Corps 

Maj Gen Lt Gen 

L.R. Fredendall A. Juin 

. . 

Twelfth 

Air Force 

Brig Gen 

J. H. Doolittle 

Eastern 

Air Command 

Air Marshal 

* 

W. Welsh 

I I' 

ClNC Naval Forces 

Adm A. Cunningham 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

commanding officers of the XI1 Air Support Command (XI1 ASC), the Twelfth 

Air Force unit charged with I1 Corps air support. Because he did not move his 

headquarters, the commanders of the XI1 ASC, who had co-located their headquarters with Fredendall’s, had no problem maintaining contact with him or setting up semipermanent communications facilities with their subordinate air 

units. And despite his refusal to help the French, Fredendall did not interfere 

unduly with the operations of the XI1 ASC. Col. Paul L. Williams, who led the 

XI1 ASC from late January to the end of the campaign, noted in an official 

report, “General FREDENDALL and General PATTON both stated in substance, ‘Don’t wait for us to order air missions, you know what the situation is, 

just keep pounding them.”46 

The lack of air-ground teamwork between I1 Corps and XI1 ASC was more 

the fault of XI1 ASC than of I1 Corps. Frequent changes of command, assignments, and stations robbed the XI1 ASC of the continuity of training and cooperation with familiar ground units necessary for ground support work. Doolittle 

had hastily formed the XI1 Air Support Command, under the command of Brig. 

Gen. John K. Cannon, even later than the rest of the Twelfth Air Force when the 

Casablanca invasion was added to TORCH. Once ashore in Casablanca, more 

than 1,000 miles from Tunis, the XI1 Air Support Command trained with Clark’s 

Fifth Army. When I1 Corps entered Tunisia, XI1 ASC split in two, part going 

with I1 Corps and a small part, XI1 ASC Detachment, staying with Clark. 

Cannon took over XI1 Bomber Command, and Brig. Gen. Howard A. Craig left 

Spaatz’s headquarters to take over XI1 ASC. This would seem to have been an 

inspired choice, because Craig had just received the tablets containing the commandments governing the application of close air support from the hands of 

Coningham, but Craig failed to gain Doolittle’s confidence. In the midst of the 

German counterattack of January 18-25 (described later), Doolittle wrote to 

Spaatz that although Craig was a brilliant staff officer and one of the AAF’s 

exceptional planners and organizers, his current job did not suit his capabilities. 

Doolittle suggested that Craig move to the XI1 ASC Detachment with Clark and 

that Col. Paul L. Williams replace him. Of Williams, Doolittle said, “Williams is 

better suited as a result of experience and temperament to command and lead 

combat units in support of ground troops in an extremely active forward area.”47 

The next day, January 21, Spaatz sent Williams to the XI1 ASC, noting that 

Craig would become Tedder’s chief of staff in the coming Casablanca-dictated 

air reorganization.48 The XI1 ASC now had its third commander in three weeks, 

two of whom had had no chance to become acquainted with its personnel, its 

condition, and the troops and ground commander it supported. This switch 

occurred precisely when a German counterattack against the French XIX Corps 

contributed to the Allies’ disjointed air response. 

Beyond its unfamiliar leaders the XI1 ASC suffered under many operational 

handicaps. The rainy season limited operations and turned the airfields to mud. 

The airfields themselves were too distant from the front lines and meagerly 

170 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

equipped. Insufficient logistics and lack of experience, already cited, contributed 

to a very low operational ready rate, subtracting even more planes from the command’s order of battle. The XI1 ASC had two further problems. (1) It lacked 

radar coverage of its front. This cut down its warning and reaction times to 

German air operations and forced it to rely on chance sweeps to catch German 

aircraft aloft or on their fields. The Germans, who had complete radar coverage, 

avoided these sweeps. Their dive-bombers would merely land for five minutes 

or so until the Allied aircraft passed and then resume their deadly work. (2) By 

mid-January the command had already fought several of its units to exhaustion. 

Doolittle reported to Spaatz that the Twelfth’s entire striking force consisted of 

nine groups with a total of 270 planes4nly 48 percent of their full strength.49 

Doolittle’s figures included the Twelfth’s heavy bombers. The XI1 ASC operations report showed only twenty-six P-~OS, nineteen P-39s, and thirty-eight A20s operational on January 13-numbers that rose to fifty-two P-~OS, twentythree P-39s, twenty-seven A-20s, and eight DB-7s by January 26.50 Under these 

circumstances the chances that I1 Corps and XI1 ASC could form an effective 

air-ground team in a few weeks were nil. 

The British half of Spaatz’s Allied Air Force suffered from many of the 

same problems, but personalities played an even greater role in disrupting its 

operations. Lt. Gen. Kenneth A. N. Anderson, because of his wartime experiences, had simply never acquired an understanding of air operations. During the 

fall of France, he had served as a brigade commander in the British Expeditionary 

Force. Shortly before Dunkirk, he took over a decimated division and, for the 

next two and one-half years, he trained troops in England. His only memories of 

air were searing ones of the overwhelming ground-support effort of the 

Luftwaffe and the inadequate response of the RAF. His first experiences in 

North Africa confirmed these memories as his supply ships went down at 

Bougie, his forward lines were dive-bombed incessantly, and the Luftwaffe 

maintained air superiority over his front. Understandably, he tended to be defensive-minded as far as air was concerned. 

Nor did Anderson’s personality facilitate cooperation. He was an unusually 

reserved and reticent Scot, stubborn in his opinions and congenitally pessimistic 

in his assessments of military operations.51 During the preparations for TORCH, 

these qualities occasionally manifested themselves. He clashed with the British 

navy over use of landing craft. His American subordinate for the Algiers invasion, Maj. Gen. Charles W. Ryder, was warned, upon receiving his assignment, 

to get along with Anderson “no matter how difficult it may be.”5* Anderson’s 

chief of staff, Brigadier C.V.0”. McNabb, had all of Anderson’s poor qualities, in spades. He was reticent to the point of secretiveness, and few Americans 

could approach him, let alone come to know him.53 

Anderson’s relations with the RAF commanders proved particularly acrimonious. RAF semiofficial histories admit that Air Marshal William Welsh’s and 

Anderson’s mutual antipathy took precedence over the conduct of their duties.54 

171 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Almost immediately after the EAC and 1st Army landed in North Africa, 

arrangements between the two men broke down. Anderson and Welsh were to 

arrange air support together, but they soon went their separate ways. Welsh 

stayed in Algiers to supervise air defense and convoy protection while Anderson 

moved forward to a Spartan headquarters, deficient in signal organization but 

close to the front. Welsh’s failure to follow disappointed Anderson. Instead, Air 

Commodore G. M. Lawson, with a small RAF command post, moved forward 

with Anderson and attempted to meet his air-support demands. Further forward, 

EAC had a wing commander with the 78th Division and with British 5th Corps, 

which took over the British front at the end of November. Both men had insufficient rank for their task of cooperating with Army counterparts who outranked 

them by at least two grades. The formation of No. 242 Group, a headquarters 

unit commanding all British aircraft assigned to the support of the 1st Army, its 

placement under Lawson’s command, and its co-location with 5 Corps improved 

the system slightly. However, EAC Headquarters failed to maintain close liaison 

with No. 242 Group. In addition Welsh, consumed by his other duties, made few 

planes available to No. 242 Group and when Lawson ordered his fighter 

squadrons out on ground strafing missions, Welsh stopped him. By January 4, 

1943, Lawson had only a handful of fighter-bombers available to him.55 

Neither the Americans nor the British had a fully functioning air-ground 

support team. By the middle of February this lack of air-ground cohesiveness 

would hamper the Allied response to the German counterattack at the Kasserine 

Pass. 

As I1 Corps came into the line during the first two weeks of January, the 

Allies planned to use it for a drive to the coast to separate the Axis forces in 

Tunisia from Rommel’s retreating forces. Fredendall made preparations for that 

attack until mid-January, when logistical difficulties and an unexpectedly rapid 

approach by Rommel led Eisenhower to order him to assume a defensive stance. 

From January 18 to 25, a counterattack by the Axis forces in Tunisia on the tenter of the Allied line gained important mountain passes and alarmed the Allies 

before it was contained. Allied tactical air flew several useful missions in the 

course of this assault.56 A few days later, from January 30 to February 3, the 

sparring between Allied and Axis forces shifted to the south. Once again, the 

Axis gained key passes from the French, especially the Faid Pass, which could 

serve as a jumping-off point for attacks on I1 Corps’ main supply depot at 

Tebessa and the airfields at Thelepte. Sandy soil conditions, which promoted 

excellent drainage, allowed Thelepte to operate in any weather, a crucial factor 

in Tunisian air operations. Axis dive-bombing attacks harassed the Americans, 

particularly during an unsuccessful U.S. attack on the village of Maknassey. One 

German air attack on January 31, 1943, struck a U.S. infantry battalion aboard a 

truck convoy in daylight, causing substantial casualties.57 

The Allies remained on the defensive at the beginning of February as 

Rommel’s forces joined their comrades in Tunisia and prepared to take the 

172 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

offensive before Montgomery’s British 8th Army could come to the assistance 

of Eisenhower’s forces. The Germans began the so-called “Battle of the 

Kasserine Pass” by breaking out of the Faid Pass and seizing the important 

crossroad at Sidi Bou Zid. They continued forward, capturing several positions, 

including Thelepte, by February 17. On February 20, under the eyes of Rommel 

himself, Axis forces stormed the Kasserine Pass, badly damaging several units 

of the U.S. 1st Armored Division. At that point Allied defenses stiffened. The 

Axis, concerned about the approach of Montgomery and their own lack of supplies, began to withdraw from the Kasserine Pass on February 22. They were 

pursued only hesitantly by Allied ground forces, who reoccupied the entire pass 

by February 24. This withdrawal ended the largest Axis attack of the campaign 

and gave them a tactical victory but produced no strategic effect. The Allies 

soon replaced their heavy losses in men and matiriel. 

This summary of ground operations outlines the campaign’s events in the 

winter of 1942-1943. The activities of Spaatz and of Allied air-ground operations during the period are the subjects of the following pages. 

Before the decisions affecting air organization made at Casablanca could 

take effect, the German counterattack of January 18 to 25 struck the boundary 

between the British and French forces in Tunisia, forcing them to give ground 

and, in the process, revealing serious deficiencies in overall coordination among 

the different Allied forces. In one instance, the XIIth Air Support Command, 

acting under Fredendall’s orders, refused to send planes over an area for which 

RAF No. 242 Group had responsibility.58 

Spaatz, after inspecting facilities in Marrakech, returned to Eisenhower’s 

headquarters (AFHQ) in Algiers on January 2 1. There he participated in an 

emergency conference on the German attack against the French, during which 

he informed Eisenhower of the new air arrangements mandated at Casablanca.59 

The conference minutes noted, “It was evident also that collaboration by air 

forces was faulty to date, due particularly to the absence of an air headquarters 

with executive authority as far forward as Advanced Headquarters [General 

Anderson’s headquarters in Constantine].”60 Eisenhower remedied this problem 

by directing Spaatz “to place at Advanced Headquarters immediately an officer 

who will be in executive control [in command of] the air forces supporting 

General Fredendall and General Anderson.”61 Eisenhower authorized that air 

officer to secure the assistance of the Northwest African Strategic Air Force if 

specifically requested, but required him to “receive his instructions for battle 

from General Anderson so far as they affect all air forces allotted to the support 

of the ground armies.” 

Eisenhower had taken a large step toward improving air support, but in making the air commander subordinate to the ground commander he overlooked an 

essential piece of the more successful British method developed under Coningham--the equality of land and air. In his own mind, at least, Eisenhower 

remained faithful to the strictures of FM 31-35. As late as January 15, 1943, he 

173 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

could write, “We have a published doctrine that has not been proved faulty.”62 

On January 22, Spaatz assigned Brig. Gen. Laurence S. Kuter as Acting Chief of 

the Allied Air Support Command (AASC). When Coningham arrived, he 

relieved Kuter. (See Chart 2, Allied Chain of Command, January 30, 1943.) 

In another action resulting from the emergency conference, Eisenhower 

charged Anderson with the task of “co-ordinating” the entire front. Three days 

later, on January 24, Eisenhower made Anderson responsible for the employment of U.S. forces, and that evening the French commander, General Alphonse 

Juin, agreed to place his forces under Anderson. The western Tunisian front now 

had one overall ground and air commander. It did not yet have an air-ground 

team. 

At this point, Spaatz replaced Brig. Gen. Howard A. Craig with Col. Paul L. 

Williams as Commander of the XI1 Air Support Command. Williams, who had 

specialized in attack and observation aviation before the war and had commanded air support formations in the prewar maneuvers, stayed with XI1 ASC 

until the campaign’s end. Spaatz had brought him to Britain and then to North 

Africa precisely because of his experience in army cooperation. The XI1 ASC 

and No. 242 Group made up the bulk of Kuter’s new command.63 

In Algiers, Spaatz began a round of meetings that would take him to Cairo and 

back. On January 24, he met Arnold, who had come directly from Casablanca. 

They decided to equip all AAF fighter units in Britain only with P-47s-a decision that would free all P-38s then based in Britain for deployment to Africa. This 

key decision, based in part on operational necessity and in part on logistical considerations, deprived the Eighth Air Force of the long-range escort fighters it would 

need to protect its deep-penetration operations over Germany. It demonstrated the 

Am’s refusal to accept the need for long-range escort for strategic bombers as the 

highest priority. Late on January 26, Spaatz left Algiers for Cairo and, upon arriving the next morning, joined in three days of discussions with Tedder, Arnold, 

Andrews, and Maj. Gen. Louis H. Brereton, the Commanding General of the Ninth 

Air Force, to settle the details of the new Allied organization in the Mediterranean.@ He returned to Algiers on January 3 1. 

On February 4, in the wake of another Axis thrust, Spaatz flew to Constantine. 

That evening he and Brig. Gen. John K. Cannon called on Maj. Gen. Lucian K. 

Truscott, Eisenhower’s representative at the front, to inform him of their intention to visit Fredendall’s I1 Corps Headquarters the next day. During their visit, 

Spaatz elaborated on his own views toward the use of aviation in conjunction 

with ground operations: “It was a mistake to use up all of one’s force in an indecisive operation; the air force should be used to hit the soft parts of the enemy 

and in return to protect the soft parts of one’s own force; and only in the event of 

an all-out decisive engagement was the loss of a whole force to be risked.”65 

The next day, Spaatz and his party traveled to Tebessa to meet Anderson, 

who had apparently come south to discuss future operations with Fredendall.66 

Once again, the conversation turned to air support. Brigadier McNabb, 

174 
Chart 2 

Allied Chain of Command 

January 30,1943 

Twelfth 

Air Force 

Brig Gen 

J. H. Doolittle 

Lt Gen 

D. D. Eisenhower 

Eastern Allied Air 

Air Command support 

Air Marshal Command 

W. Welsh Brig Gen 

L.S. Kuter 

---- 

Allied Air Force British 1st Army US. II Corps French XIX Corps 

MajGen 1 I LtGen 1.1 MajGen 1 1 LtGen 

C.A. Spaatz K.A.N. Anderson L.R. Fredendall A. Juin 

I I, ~~~ ,I I I r- ..... ........................................... I . I II I I1 I:, 

ClNC Naval Forces 

Adm A. Cunningham 

. . . . . . . . . Operational Control 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Anderson’s chief of staff, referring to a local Allied counterattack planned for 

the next day,67 gave the 1st Army’s views: 

. . . General Anderson wanted the whole air effort put on the ground positions 

immediately in front of our troops in the coming offensive, in as much as the 

ground striking force was weak in artillely. General Anderson had stated the 

day before that this should be the main effort of all air strength available, that 

this was the primary job to be done and that he was not interested in the bombing of enemy airdromes such as that at Gabes.68 

Here was an airman’s b&te noire. Anderson wanted to ignore counterair operations to use support aircraft as artillery pieces. 

After lunch, the party proceeded to General Fredendall’s dug-in command 

post, where they encountered more evidence of the Allied ground commander’s 

parochial view of air support. Generals Spaatz, Fredendall, Truscott, and Kuter 

and Colonel Williams all participated in an informal discussion. Fredendall, no 

doubt recalling the Axis dive-bombing against his troops in the recent attack on 

Maknassey, wanted full air cover for the first two days of his attack in order to 

protect his troops and artillery. Spaatz observed: “He wanted his men to see 

some bombs dropped on the position immediately in front of them, and if possible, some dive bombers brought down in sight of his troops.” Spaatz had practically used up his medium-bomber and P-40 fighter groups in air support, and the 

replacement rate of both pilots and machines would not allow for continued 

wastage on such an extravagant scale. He preferred that the air force hit enemy 

airfields, tank parks, troop convoys, and motor transport concentrations while 

protecting Allied vulnerabilities such as supply lines. If he “maintained a constant ‘umbrella’ over one small section of the front, with only shallow penetration by [his own] bombers and fighters, then [his] available force would be dissipated without any lasting effect.” Spaatz insisted that the “hard core” of any 

army ought to have the ability to defend itself against dive-bombing. Fredendall 

granted the last point, but admonished that if he did not get forty-eight hours’ air 

cover from the start, the offensive would fail.69 In any case, Eisenhower canceled 

the contemplated offensive, and the exact nature of air cover for the land forces 

was unresolved. 

This was not the first run-in between Spaatz and Fredendall. On January 17, 

Spaatz had flown to Tebessa, at Doolittle’s urging, to straighten out air support 

matters. Doolittle had passed word that Craig, the Commander of the XI1 ASC, 

could not “adequately” handle the situation. Spaatz discovered that Craig would 

have brought the situation under control if it had not been for the interference of 

Fredendall who, among other things, willfully compromised the security of the 

highly secret radar on the night-fighting British Beaufighters. He had ordered 

them to patrol over Axis air space-an action contrary to Anglo-American 

agreements. Spaatz went on to I1 Corps Headquarters to try to hammer out some 

modus vivendi. He laconically noted in his diary: 

176 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

Informed him that the arbitrary decisions made by him with reference to the use 

of air forces by Craig at Tebessa resulted in confusion, and recited the 

instances. Told him that the only logical place for the Ground Support 

Commander was alongside of him to prevent him from making damn fool decisions. 

Fredendall agreed temporarily to abide by Craig’s decisions.70 

When Spaatz returned to Algiers the following day, he flew on the same aircraft as Brig. Gen. Ray E. Porter, an infantry officer returning from Fredendall’s 

staff for reassignment as the Assistant Chief of Staff, Organization and Training 

Division, G-3, in Washington, D.C. This was a key post for the approval of official War Department doctrine, and Porter would later have a hand in incorporating the North African experiences into new air doctrine. Porter expressed views 

on air support that Spaatz must have found refreshing. He noted that the vast 

majority of all U.S. casualties attributable to dive-bombing resulted from the 

single Axis raid near Maknassey in which an incompetent battalion commander 

had brought his men forward, in daylight, in a truck convoy jammed nose to tail. 

Porter “further stated that after one or two dive bomber attacks, the men could 

take care of themselves and were no longer seriously affected in their morale.” 

Finally, Porter echoed an opinion becoming increasingly common at the front: 

“He believed a defensive fear complex was being built up at 2nd Corps as evidenced by their elaborate bomb proofs for their Headquarters, which in its initial 

location was so well concealed as to present very little chance for a bombing 

attack.”71 

After three months of combat operations, the top Allied ground commanders 

and the top Allied air commander were still unable to agree on a satisfactory 

ground-support method. Fredendall, backed by his interpretation of War 

Department doctrine, and Anderson, untutored in the air-ground experiences of 

the British 8th Army, wanted to use aircraft either as artillery or as an aerial 

defensive garrison over key points. The airmen rejected these ideas as impracticable. They wished to employ their forces to attack the enemy air force and 

other vulnerable areas behind the front lines. At the point of combat, the airmen 

reasoned, the ground troops had the equipment and training to fend for themselves; in their view, infantry, armor, and artillery did not constitute the “soft 

points” of the army. The ground commanders found this stand unacceptable. 

The logjam would continue until mid-February when the major German attack 

at the Kasserine Pass and Coningham’s arrival to command the Northwest 

African Tactical Air Force would offer the beginnings of a solution. 

177 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Reorganization and the Kasserine Pass 

Spaatz remained hard at work on the air reorganization until its implementation. He wrote to Arnold on February 8 that he hoped to have the first stage in 

place in a few days. His staff had already prepared the orders and they were only 

awaiting Tedder’s return from London to issue them.72 To the Chief of the Air 

Staff, Maj. Gen. George Stratemeyer, Spaatz confided: 

The most serious difficulty which I see confronting us is the different conception which obtains in the RAF and in our own War Department as to the place 

of aviation. It is difficult to have aviation treated as a co-equal with the Army 

and Navy in our set up, whereas the RAF will not submit to being considered in 

any other way. A number of instances have developed indicating that the 

ground general considers his air support as a fundamental part of his forces, 

even to the point of dictating as to how to do the job. Such employment, I am 

afraid, will not be accepted by the RAF. With Coningham, a full-fledged veteran of the Battle of the Mediterranean with all of his prestige behind it, at the 

head of our Air Support command, it can readily be seen that something is 

bound to break out in a very short period.73 

Tedder and Coningham returned from London on February 14, the same day 

the Germans launched their greatest attack of the campaign. In the midst of this 

series of engagements, which included the sanguinary American defeat at the 

Kasserine Pass, the Allies instituted the command changes agreed on at 

Casablanca: Fleet Adm. Andrew Cunningham became Naval Commander in 

Chief, Mediterranean; General Harold L. Alexander became Deputy Commander 

in Chief of the Allied Force and head of the 18 Army Group, comprising the 

British 1st and 8th Armies, the French XIX Corps, and the U.S. I1 Corps; Tedder 

became head of the Mediterranean Air Command (MAC). (See Chart 3, 

Organization of Allied Air Power, February 18, 1943.) 

MAC Headquarters consisted of a small policy and planning staff, “a brain 

trust without executive authority or domestic responsibilities.”74 In the North 

African Theater, MAC’S operations came under AFHQ’s control. There MAC 

operated through its own subordinate command, the Northwest African Air 

Forces (NAAF), under the command of Spaatz. NAAF began operations on 

February 18, when the Allied Air Force disbanded. The U.S. Twelfth Air Force 

and British Eastern Air Command, joined on February 21 by the AngloAmerican Western Desert Air Force, made up NAAF’s major subelements: the 

Northwest African Tactical Air Force (NATAF), the Northwest African Coastal 

Air Force (NACAF), and the Northwest African Strategic Air Force (NASAF). 

Spaatz’s own headquarters was transferred virtually intact from the Allied Air 

Force. Spaatz set up an operational headquarters in Constantine, near Doolittle’s 

and Coningham’s headquarters, and left an administrative section in Algiers. 

Throughout the NAAF and its subordinate air forces, AAF and RAF personnel 

occupied alternating command and staff positions down to, but not including, 

178 
Chart 3 

Organization of Allied Power 

February 18,1943 

I I RAF Mideast 

Northwest African Northwest African Northwest African 

Strategic Air Force Air Service Command Training Command 

Maj Gen Brig Gen Brig Gen 

J. H. Doolittle D.H. Dunton J. K. Cannon Ninth Air Force 

Maj Gen 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

I 

The new Allied leadership, February 18, 1943. Bottom row, left to right: General 

Dwight D. Eisenhower, Air Chief Marshal Arthur W. Tedder, General Harold R. L. 

G. Alexander, and Admiral Andrew B. Cunningham; top row, lefi to right: Harold 

Macmillan (British Minister, AFHQ), Maj. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, Commodore 

Royer M. Dick, and Air Vice-Marshal H. E. P. Wigglesworth. 

the individual combat unit level. This interleaving greatly expanded the practice 

of combined British and U.S. headquarters that the Allies had begun with the 

establishment of AFHQ before the North African invasion.75 

The concept of dedicating entire air forces to separate, yet cooperating, tactical or strategic roles became AAF standard operating procedure throughout 

the European and Mediterranean Theaters of Operations. In the case of NAAF, 

however, it should be noted that the designation Strategic was something of a 

misnomer, in that the Northwest African Strategic Air Force did not attack 

strategic industrial targets but confined itself to what could be called grand tactical targets, enemy lines of supply, and logistical support. 

NAAF also absorbed the British air cooperation doctrines conceived by 

Woodall and employed by Coningham. Allied ground leaders would henceforth 

grudgingly concede the principle that a single airman must command all the air 

forces committed to the ground battle, because aircraft, unlike other combat 

arms, had free rein over the combat zone and should deploy in overwhelming 

force at the decisive points and not fritter away their strength in penny-packet 

formations at the ground commander’s whim. 

180 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

The organization of a combined Allied staff to the lowest feasible level 

served as a template for the organization of the Allied Expeditionary Force, 

which later conducted the cross-channel invasion into France. This close association with the RAF had an important side benefit for the AAF, which managed 

to cloak itself in the RAF’s independent status and thus free itself from some of 

the more irksome restrictions inherent in its role as a subordinate part of the U.S. 

Army. Spaatz, for example, participated in Allied command conferences as an 

equal to his ground and naval opposite numbers rather than as an air adviser to 

the American ground force commander. 

The reorganization also embraced the logistical support of Allied air power in 

North Africa. Brig. Gen. John Cannon became the head of the Northwest African 

Training Command, and Brig. Gen. Delmar Dunton formed the Northwest 

African Air Service Command from the XI1 Air Service Command and the maintenance organization of the Eastern Air Command.76 

In one of their first actions after establishing the NAAF, Spaatz and Tedder 

me1 Eisenhower on February 17 and gained his agreement 

that air support should function very much along the principles previously in 

operation with 8th Army and Alexander. It was understood that this means in 

general that the decision and needs of the ground army are of paramount importance, and that the element of decision as to type of operation must rest with the 

Army commander. 

Eisenhower, however, allowed the air commander to determine all matters of 

technique and forces employed.77 This concession by Eisenhower gave XI1 ASC 

more operational flexibility. 

Coningham’s arrival at 18 Army Group Headquarters on the same day, 

February 17, allowed Allied air power to widen this initial and significant concession by Eisenhower. Upon assuming command on February 23, the New 

Zedander promptly put the Northwest African Tactical Air Force into operation 

according to his own principles. The flying of defensive umbrellas over ground 

formations was to cease at once. All future missions would be offensive and 

would be conducted as aggressively as possible. Furthermore, the prime target 

would be unarmored motor transport and troops; there would be no more concentration on “tank-busting.”78 These directions, however, did not come into 

force until March 2, after the Kasserine fighting had ended.79 The location of 

Coningham’s headquarters with Alexander’s ended Anderson’s de facto control 

of tactical air. 

General Alexander’s assumption of the command of the 18 Army Group 

also proved beneficial. Alexander, the British Army Commander in Chief, 

Mediterranean, and Eisenhower’s deputy in charge of land forces, had served as 

Montgomery’s and Coningham’s commanding officer in the El Alamein campaign. He, too, had absorbed the new methods of air support, and his acceptance 

of them greatly eased the heretofore strained relations between the ground and 

181 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR Ih’ EUROPE 

Air Marshal William L. Welsh, Air Officer Commanding, Eastern Air Command, 

1942-1943, inspecting an honor guard before his departure to the United States as 

head of the RAF’s delegation in Washington, D.C. 

air forces. On February 23, Spaatz’s diary noted with satisfaction: “General 

Alexander supports the Air Force fully in their objection to the air umbrella 

rather than air offensive operations. This is a complete reversal of the previous 

attitude of the Army under Anderson and FredendalL”80 

The assumption of command by Coningham, the centralization of control of 

tactical air under him, and his location with Alexander solved the personality 

problems of the old EAC. Anderson, with his defensive attitude, was removed 

from his position in charge of allocation of tactical air. Welsh and Lawson were 

replaced and sent elsewhere. Welsh spent the rest of the war exiled to the United 

States as head of the RAF Delegation. When Spaatz took over the Allied Air 

Force in the beginning of January he had recognized the pair’s inability to cope 

with Anderson. Because Spaatz controlled them and not Anderson, he had recommended their replacement then and there. Portal, who apparently assumed 

that Spaatz wished to dispose of Welsh because Welsh outranked him, objected 

to U.S. interference in internal RAF matters,81 reprieving Welsh and Lawson for 

six weeks. By that time Tedder presumably had informed Portal about the true 

state of affairs. 

182 
FAILURE AND REORGANIZATION 

No matter how effective the experienced Alexander-Coningham air-ground 

team would prove in the long run, it could not change the situation in a day. 

Allied tactical air did not make its presence felt during the Kasserine engagements until after the Germans had begun their voluntary withdrawal. On the first 

day of the offensive, February 14, the XI1 ASC mounted 391 sorties as opposed 

to 360 to 375 German sorties.82 The Germans were more effective, but the large 

number of U.S. sorties gave a hint that the balance might soon tip in the Allies’ 

favor. By February 16, the XI1 ASC reported a total operational strength of seventy-six Spitfires, twenty-seven P-39s, and twenty-four A-20s. The 33d Fighter 

Group and its P-40s had withdrawn to refit on February 9. The Spitfires of the 

31st Fighter Group and two-thirds of the 52d Fighter Group replaced it.83 Both 

air forces maintained their effort through February 16, but bad weather for the 

next five days hampered Allied air operations. On February 18, the enemy 

advance forced the XI1 ASC to evacuate its forward fields at Thelepte, requiring 

it to destroy thirty-four unserviceable planes and 50,000 gallons of aviation fuel. 

In two days the Americans had lost forty-two planes. The clouds and rain finally 

cleared on February 22, when the XI1 ASC, disorganized by its retreat from 

Thelepte and operating from one overcrowded field (Youks-les-Bains) with only 

a single steel-plank runway, flew 304 sorties and lost only eleven planes. 

On the evening of February 22 the Germans began their retreat, and for the 

next few days British and U.S. aircraft punished their retiring columns with 

increasing effect. Rommel later recorded, “The bad weather now ended and 

from midday [February 231 onward we were subjected to hammer-blow air 

attacks by the U.S. air force in the Feriana-Kasserine area, of weight and concentration hardly surpassed by those we had suffered at Alamein.”84 During the 

critical period of February 20 to 24, Coningham had also had the strategic 

bombers placed at his disposal. Instead of complaining about delays imposed by 

enemy air, ground leaders began to note improvement. On February 25, 

Eisenhower observed, “The Air Force is now better organized, is well sorted out 

and operating efficiently.”85 

In January and February 1943, Allied ground and air leaders sought to 

answer the question of who should have ultimate control of the theater’s limited 

air assets. Later in the war such a question would not have arisen because the 

overwhelming number of aircraft then available to the Allies made it possible to 

supply simultaneously the need of the ground commanders for battle-line support and the need of the air commanders for counterair and supply-line strikes. 

The Casablanca Conference imposed an air command structure on the theater 

that supplied an air chain of command separate from the ground forces. This formal structure, however, would have meant little if Eisenhower had continued to 

allow his ground commanders to set air priorities. He who sets priorities controls 

the allocation of resources. Spaatz, alone in January, and, with Tedder’s help in 

February, persuaded Eisenhower to allow air commanders a greater voice in the 

control of their own forces. Eisenhower probably assented in part because he 

183 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

had lost confidence in his American ground force commander, Fredendall, 

whom he relieved on March 6. 

Once the air commanders could determine their own priorities, the Casablanca reorganization became decisive because it provided an efficient means to 

control available air power. Coningham’s ability to call in all the Allied power 

needed (an ability denied his predecessors) allowed him to contest the air over 

the Kasserine Pass and to heavily attack the retreating German columns. In the 

next eleven weeks, the air commanders’ ability to coordinate all of their resources 

on key points would prove important to Allied success. 

184 
Chapter 6 

The Collapse of the Axis Bridgehead 

(February-May 1943) 

So far as I know, Spaatz and I see eye to eye on every single 

thing that comes up; and we believe that we have learned 

lots of things that were, before the war either not understood, or not fully appreciated, either by our Ground Forces 

or our Air Forces.' 

-Eisenhower to Arnold, May 2,1943 

The reorganization that produced the Northwest African Air Force (NAAF) 

and introduced the air support team and new procedures enhanced the efficiency 

of Allied air power. It was the catalyst that enabled the disparate air elements 

present in North Africa to redirect their efforts to the task at hand-defeating the 

enemy. The improved logistical situation, which occurred at approximately the 

same time as the reorganization, proved an equal factor in advancing Allied air 

fortunes. The end of the rainy season in mid-April allowed the Allies to greatly 

accelerate operations from their forward fields. At the same time, increasingly 

effective Allied interdiction of Axis supplies forced the Luftwaffe in North 

Africa to cut back its operations. All of the factors that had previously favored 

the Axis air effort no longer weighed heavily in the scales, while Allied air 

power had overcome the obstacles in its path. 

Spaatz spent his energies late in the winter and spring of 1943 reinforcing 

and employing the new strength derived from the final restructuring, the 

exploitation of fresh doctrine, and the improvement of overall logistics. He nurtured the new organizational arrangements; won over recalcitrant air and ground 

commanders to the new theories; and attempted to perfect the procurement, 

maintenance, and transportation of his men, matkriel, and facilities. 

In the aftermath of Kasserine, the Allies refitted and prepared for the offensive that would drive the Axis into the sea. On March 1, in addition to his post 

as Commander, NAAF, Spaatz became Commanding General of the Twelfth Air 

185 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Force. This new title did not add to his duties, because the Twelfth had virtually 

ceased to exist except on paper, but it did regularize his position in the formal 

War Department hierarchy. Spaatz also worked to increase the proficiency of the 

NAAF. 

Signal intelligence revealed that more than 80 percent of the Axis supplies 

(49,600 tons) dispatched to North Africa in February had arrived safely.2 The 

NAAF was thus compelled to improve its antishipping effort, which depended 

on the Northwest African Strategic Air Force (NASAF). On March 1, Spaatz, 

Tedder, and Doolittle inspected the Telergma area airfields assigned to the 

NASAF. Spaatz wanted the flow of “all intelligence data” and results of all 

photo reconnaissance, including Malta flights, promptly sent to Doolittle’s command. Evidently, he wanted to ensure that Doolittle received a full and timely 

share of ULTRA intercepts, some of which revealed the movement of Axis shipping between Italy and North Africa. To track this movement, the Allies routinely used aerial reconnaissance. Aerial reconnaissance was the perfect cover. It 

verified the intercepts and kept their source a secret. Spaatz also wanted the lateral 

communication links with the Northwest African Tactical Air Force (NATAF) 

and the Northwest African Coastal Air Force (NACAF) strengthened, as well as 

a radio intercept station at NASAF HQ to intercept spotting reports from Malta 

and Coastal Air Force reconnaissance aircraft.3 

From the NASAF fields around Telergma, Spaatz moved forward to the 

NATAF airfields around BBne in the north and Youks-les-Bains in the south. 

These visits played up the importance of one of the technological components of 

the new air-support doctrine-the need for radar coverage of the battlefield and 

beyond. Radar coverage allowed the air-support commander to form a quick and 

accurate picture of the position of his own and of the enemy’s frontal aviation. 

Complete coverage enabled the air commander to divert or abort tactical bomber 

and reconnaissance flights from enemy fighters and, at the same time, made it 

possible for him to use friendly fighters either defensively to break up incoming 

enemy air attacks or offensively to strike enemy aircraft on or over their airfields. This made the centralization of control of air-support forces not only necessary but easier and more effective. 

During the initial rush from Algiers to Tunisia, the Allies sent forward as 

many aircraft as they could. They neglected, however, to send forward their 

ground-based early warning radar. Spaatz, who had seen its effectiveness in the 

Battle of Britain, moved at once to get ground control intercept (GCI) and early 

warning radar sets deployed as rapidly and as far forward as possible. In his 

diary he emphasized the importance and urgency of radar coverage at the front 

in obtaining effective use of fighters on both the defensive and the offensive: 

The nearer the RDF [radio direction finding or radar] coverage can read the 

enemy airdrome areas and check them up on take off, the more effective our 

operations will be. This makes the location of sites for RDF stations of almost 

186 
COLLAPSE OFTHE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

as great importance as the terrain for airdromes as an objective for the ground 

forces. This necessity has been lost on our buildup of units, and must be 

emphasized in order that our Air Forces can be properly balanced? 

Spaatz reiterated the point in a letter to Arnold, dated March 7: 

The ability of the enemy to attack our troops with dive bombers indicates that 

the enemy has control of the air or our forces are improperly controlled or that 

essential equipment is lacking. The solution lies in an acceptance of the principle that the first prerequisite to the support of the ground army or armies is the 

establishment of a fighter defense and offense, including RDF, GCI and other 

types of Radar equipment essential for the detection of enemy air~raft.~ 

The arrival of the radar-equipped U.S. 3d Air Defense Wing and additional 

British radar for XI1 ASC and No. 242 Group allowed the NAAF to establish a 

radar net covering the front by April.6 

Continuing his inspection of tactical fields, Spaatz lunched with Colonel 

Williams and General Fredendall at Le Kouif, a field northeast of Youks-lesBains, on March 3. He found the attitude of the soon-to-be-relieved Fredendall 

concerning air altered: “General Fredendall, in contradiction to the last visit . . . has considerably broadened in his viewpoint of air importance. He realizes the 

necessity of seizing and holding airdrome areas and high or dominating ground 

necessary for proper RDF coverage.”7 Fredendall had learned, too late, the role 

of tactical air. In his after-action report he wrote: 

Ground forces should have it explained to them that it is not necessarily true that 

the air should furnish them with a visible “umbrella,” but that air is being furnished in the average operation even when our planes are not visible from the 

ground. Also that this air support includes not only cover and reconnaissance over 

them, but also bombardment of enemy troops and airdromes.* 

From Williams, Spaatz received a testimonial on the efficacy of air support 

parties-AAF liaison teams with the forward elements of the ground troops, 

each equipped with a VHF radio mounted on a l%-ton truck. These units had 

supplied the higher commanders some of the quickest and most accurate information on combat situations. AAF formations had made it a habit to pass within 

range (fifteen miles) of the air support parties in order to get exact information 

on conditions in the target areas. At least once, an air support party (ASP) called 

down a strike on enemy forces in close contact with its own forces.9 

Spaatz’s front-line inspections revealed a morale problem in NASAF as 

compared to NATAF. Acute shortages of replacement planes and crews 

accounted for much of the problem in NASAF’s medium-bomber and fighter 

groups.10 This issue had become particularly severe in February, but thanks to 

increased ferrying of new aircraft from the United States and the unsnarling of 

the replacement pipeline through France’s African possessions, the AAF corrected half of the problem by the end of March, when Spaatz could report to 

187 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Marshal of the RAF Hugh M. Trenchard, Brig. Gen. 

James H. Doolittle, and actress Vivien Leigh Gfar right) enjoying a light moment in 

North Africa. Brig. Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg is seated directly behind Spaatz. 

Stratemeyer, “Tell the Boss that there is a very, very noticeable improvement in 

the airplane situation.”ll The lack of replacement crews, unlike the airplane 

shortage, did not lend itself quite so readily to a production-line solution. In fact, 

the problems of war-weariness and the rotation of experienced crews continued 

to haunt Spaatz and the AAF’s other numbered air force commanders until the 

war’s end. Initial rotation policies seemed to imply that crews could go home 

after fulfilling a minimum of 30 combat missions or 200 hours of combat flying. 

Many crews who felt they had fulfilled their duty were dismayed when circumstances required additional missions. Their morale plummeted.12 

Spaatz did what he could to improve their spirits. On several occasions he 

ordered “more attention to awards and decorations.” He attempted to ensure that 

daily AFHQ press communiques gave the NAAF its full share of credit and did 

not subordinate its activities to ongoing naval and ground actions. Spaatz even 

ordered the photos of bombing results released to the crews.13 This action 

relieved the fear “that the missions were a waste of time, material, and life”l4 

common among men who flew over the same target mission after mission, yet 

never saw the damage they did because of the smoke of their own bombs or 

because of their own evasive action to avoid enemy antiaircraft fire. 

Like Union General Joseph “Fightin’ Joe” Hooker, who faced a similar 

morale problem in the Army of the Potomac after its defeat in the Battle of 

188 
COLLAPSE OFTHE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

Fredericksburg, Spaatz took simple, but apparently well-calculated, measures to 

improve the camp life of his soldiers and to supply them with the creature comforts dear to American fighting men. He replaced unfamiliar and unpopular 

British tents and rations in the combat units with American versions.15 He 

ensured that flying personnel had cots and he established messes and recreation 

rooms. He set up separate rest camps for officers and enlisted men, improved 

facilities in all camps, and requested greater Red Cross support. He also tried to 

place motion picture projectors in each station,l6 made sure each unit had religious services available to it, and ordered his surgeon’s section to survey the 

entire area for malaria. Morale, according to his staff, took a decided upturn.17 

After completing his tour of the front, Spaatz inspected the rear echelons. He 

flew to Marrakech on March 6. There he decided to keep the airfield complex 

under the control of the NAAF rather than to transfer it to the Air Transport 

Service. Thus, control of the terminus of the transatlantic ferry route would stay 

in his hands. He also issued a standardized set of specifications for airfield construction. As a result of this action, plus aviation engineer reinforcements, the 

arrival of heavy construction equipment above the normal table of organization, 

and a decision to retain all aviation engineers under the control of the NAAF, 

the size and number of forward airfields greatly increased18 and multiplied the 

force available to Coningham and Spaatz. 

By March 12, Spaatz returned to Algiers, where he learned of his promotion 

to lieutenant general. He appreciated the honor and the increased status it gave 

him. Coningham, as an air marshal, had, until then, technically outranked him, 

but as Spaatz noted in a letter on the total AAF personnel situation in North 

Africa, “I have been much less concerned about promotion for myself than adequate promotion for a number of officers who are doing a General’s job without 

the rank.”*9 This remained a problem until June 1943, when Eisenhower, after 

repeated requests from Spaatz, promoted four AAF officers.20 

The Air War Against Axis Supply Lines 

In the middle of March 1943, NAAF Headquarters moved from Algiers to 

Constantine. The move placed it closer to the front and enabled it, in Spaatz’s 

words, “to control the Strategic and Tactical Air Forces during the Tunisian 

Battle.”21 In Constantine, on March 17, Spaatz, Doolittle, and Allied air officers 

of the Coastal Air Force met to analyze the effectiveness of the antishipping 

campaign. From ULTRA sources they knew the daily unloading returns from 

Tunis and Bizerte.22 These confirmed that “the shipping strikes have not been 

sufficient to bring down the amount of supplies into Tunisia below the danger 

point to the Germans.”23 Spaatz recommended singling out tanker shipping and 

concentrating all forces on it. Photo reconnaissance and “other intelligence” 

would show the tankers’ locations. 

189 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

By January, ULTRA could already determine the full details of 60 percent of all 

cargoes.24 Of course, it could not supply the Allies every detail necessary to theirplans of attack. The conference hammered out responsibilities for photo reconnaissance (NACAF), minimum forces exclusively devoted to antishipping (two 

squadrons of the NASAF), and chain of command (the NACAF would notify 

NASAF Headquarters of targets and the NASAF would decide composition of 

the force). The conferees also agreed to strengthen communication links 

between the two air forces. 

The settling of jurisdictions, better flying weather in March and April, and 

the end of the crisis on the ground which had diverted the NASAF’s strength to 

ground-support strikes, combined to greatly increase the ship-killing opportunities for Doolittle’s command. Adding to the strength and effectiveness of 

Doolittle’s antishipping blows were improvement in aircraft replacement rates; 

reinforcement by one medium-bomber group and two heavy-bomber groups; 

and the transfer, in March, from Cairo to Algiers, of an intelligence group that 

specialized in the study of the enemy supply situation and the selection of shipping targets.25 

British aircraft flying out of Malta and night patrols by Royal Navy ships 

and submarines put further pressure on the Axis which, in March, unloaded 

43,125 tons of supplies, as compared with 49,600 tons in February. In the following month unloadings plunged to 29,233 tons.26 Postwar figures show that 

in March and April, 41.5 percent of seaborne cargoes dispatched to Tunisia 

failed to reach North Africa; loss of Axis shipping in March, not made good in 

April, accounted for that month’s lower tonnage. Only four ships exceeding 

3,000-tons dead weight reached Africa in April. Furthermore, daily unloadings 

steadily declined throughout the period from 1,300 to 700 tons.27 By the end of 

April, the Allied tactical air forces had joined the fray and they, too, began to 

fly antishipping strikes. 

Naturally, the Axis increased their resupply effort in the face of the Allies’ 

onslaught. They diverted as much high-priority seaborne supply as possible to 

small ferries, landing craft, and naval vessels. The Axis also turned to air transport. As a British official history states, “Enigma [ULTRA] made it plain that his 

higher rate of fuel consumption [the principal air transport cargo] and the 

increasing destruction of his shipping had made the enemy critically dependent 

on air supply.”28 

Throughout the Tunisian campaign, German air transport ferried large 

numbers of personnel and amounts of supply to the Axis bridgehead in North 

Africa. This transport proved an invaluable aid in November and December 

1942, when the surprise Allied landings called for a rapid response. In those two 

months the Luftwaffe brought in 37,000 men and 9,000 tons of matkriel. After 

the initial surge, traffic declined to between 50 and 20 landings a day at the end 

of the year. German transport landings then began to climb until they reached 

150 a day by late March 1943. In February 1943, air transport brought in 11,000 

190 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

personnel and 4,000 tons of supplies. In all, excluding March, this airlift conveyed 71,000 troops and 23,000 tons of supplies to North Africa.29 

No one appreciated this herculean effort of the Luftwaffe more than Spaatz. 

On January 16, he instructed his staff to draw up plans “to get after” the daily 

parade of Junkers Model 52 (Ju 52) traffic across the straits.* Two days later, 

January 18, he “told Cannon to send out a strong fighter force occasionally to 

swat the Ju 52 daily procession coming across the Straits.”30 

The British, too, developed plans to disrupt Axis air transport. Eastern Air 

Command drew up plans for such an operation on February 5 and expanded the 

plans to include the XI1 Bomber Command. This operation, code-named FLAX, 

ran afoul of the exigencies of the Kasserine crisis, which siphoned off all available air, causing the cancellation of the strike.31 In March, Spaatz returned to the 

scent. At an NAAF staff meeting on March 4, he directed the NASAF to include 

in its priorities attacks against Axis air transportation.32 When the NAAF drafted 

a plan to ruin any attempted Axis evacuation from Tunisia, the destruction of 

German air transport received first priority.33 

At the beginning of April, Tedder, Spaatz, Doolittle, and Coningham met for 

a “Dunkirk” conference to complete plans for action against the expected 

attempt by the Axis to withdraw completely from Tunisia. Spaatz, supported by 

Coningham, disagreed with Tedder about whether the chief target priority 

should be air or sea transport. Spaatz said, “At the present time we are in doubt 

as to whether we are justified in getting away from sea transport and hitting air 

transport; but on the evacuation, unless we can believe air is the most important, 

we will be continuously in doubt as to what to do.”34 As the discussion continued, it turned to implementing FLAX. Tedder agreed “emphatically” with FLAX 

as a separate operation, but not as a general or continuing plan. He remarked that 

Eisenhower would probably agree to FLAX as a specific operation to take priority over everything. 

Tedder objected to waging an air campaign exclusively against air transport 

and rejected Spaatz’s suggestion that air transport be assigned first priority; 

instead, Tedder “insisted” that shipping remain the prime target. ULTRA intercepts 

tended to confirm Tedder’s judgment. They showed that shipping carried eight 

to ten times more tonnage than aircraft to the bridgehead in February and 

March.35 Once Tedder had driven that point home, he gave his subordinate 

authority to attack “air transport when specific targets arise.” That satisfied 

Spaatz, who observed that in any case of sea versus air transport, the value of 

the individual target would always determine its selection.36 

Eisenhower apparently accepted the plan. On April 5, the NASAF conducted 

the first FLAX strike. A morning fighter sweep splashed eleven Ju 52s and five 

escorts into the sea. Next, B-17s struck Tunisian landing fields, where the transport shuttle terminated, with fragmentation bombs. Around noon more B-17s and 

* The Germans used the trimotor Ju 52 as their chief transport aircraft. 

191 

I 

The end of two Axis supply ships off Bizerte, Tunisia, March 1943. 
A six-engine Messerschmitt Me 323 Gigant transport (above) and low-flying Junkers 

(Ju 52) tri-motor transport (below). The ubiquitous “Tunte Ju” was the workhorse 

of Luftwaffe airlift. 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

B-25s finished off the affair by dropping fragmentation bombs on the Sicilian 

airfields at Boccadifalco, Trapani, and Borizzo, where the second daily flight for 

Tunisia usually formed up. These actions totally disrupted service, because an 

afternoon P-38 sweep found the straits empty. The bomber raids caught Axis 

aircraft bunched together on their fields and inflicted heavy damage. The 

Luftwaffe acknowledged losses of 14 Ju 52s shot down, 11 transports destroyed 

on the ground, and 67 transports damaged. The AAF claimed 201 enemy aircraft 

destroyed, and admitted its loss of 3 aircraft with 6 unaccounted for. Additional 

attacks on April 10 and 11 resulted in claims of 67 transports and 13 escorts 

destroyed.37 

Spaatz wrote to Eaker in England describing the carefully set trap. Before 

executing FLAX, the Allies had observed enemy air transport activity via photo 

reconnaissance and radar coverage, but had not interfered with daily flights. As 

a result, the methodical Germans were lulled into establishing a regular schedule 

and became more vulnerable to the initial Allied attacks.38 Because of extremely 

sensitive ULTRA information, Spaatz avoided mentioning its contribution to the 

success of the operation. The breaking of the code used by the Luftwaffe’s 

Enigma cipher machine gave details of cargoes, variation of convoy routes, 

flight cancellations, and German defensive measures. RAF “Y,” the RAF’s tactical intercept service added more information with its readings of local Luftwaffe 

and Italian Air Force (IAF) air transport radio traffic. “From the study of this 

traffic the intelligence staffs derived their familiarity with points of arrival and 

departure, the time taken to unload and turn around, the normal routes, and the 

strength of the escorts.”39 The signal security of the German air force was notoriously poor. 

After April 17, the Western Desert Air Force (WDAF) took over the execution of FLAX from the NASAF. The following day, the WDAF, operating from 

newly captured airfields around Sousse, a coastal city on the Gulf of Hammamet 

only 90 miles from Cape Bon (one-third of the distance from NASAF fields), 

staged the “Palm Sunday Massacre.” WDAF P-40s and Spitfires attacked a 

homeward-bound air convoy and sent between 50 and 70 of the 100 transports 

and 16 escorts spinning into the Mediterranean. The next day they added 12 out 

of 20. The Axis, in desperate condition on land and sea, persevered in the face of 

this pounding. They brought in air transport reinforcements and kept flying. 

Even instructor crews participated in the one-sided fight.40 On April 22, the 

Germans lost an entire flight of 21 Messerschmitt Model 323s (Me 323s). These 

six-engine converted gliders had four times the cargo capacity of Ju 52s but little 

maneuverability; they generated barely enough speed to keep themselves airborne, lacked armor and self-sealing gas tanks, and had no chance against the 

Allied fighters which pounced on them. Three days later, ULTRA revealed the 

order of the Commander in Chief of the Luftwaffe, Reich Marshal Hermann 

Goering, to switch all transport flights to night. This step greatly reduced air 

resupply into Tunisia and ended FLAX.^^ 

195 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Throughout the FLAX operation the NASAF had continued its raids on Axis 

staging airfields. These raids completed the destruction of the German air transport fleet and resulted in the loss of numerous Axis escort and antishipping aircraft as well. Of the 263 German transports available at the beginning of April, 

the Luftwaffe had lost 157 by April 27,42 not including Italian transports and 

Axis bomber aircraft pressed into transport service. One estimate placed total 

losses at 432 aircraft. These losses, combined with casualties suffered by the 

German Air Transport Service in its attempts to supply the German Sixth Army 

in the Stalingrad pocket of southern Russia, crippled German air transport for 

the remainder of the war.43 

Operation FLAX and the equally successful strangulation of seaborne traffic 

doomed the Axis land forces in Africa. Only forty tons of diesel and motor fuel 

remained in the bridgehead at the time of their surrender.4 Allied intelligence 

had selected its shipping targets so carefully that the only surplus remaining was 

food, which the Allies had purposely not sunk in anticipation of feeding Axis 

prisoners of war.45 

The interdiction campaign, like the adoption of British air-support techniques, provided an example of the victory of wartime improvisation over prewar doctrine. Neither subject had captured the imagination of the interwar Army 

Air Corps theorists, yet both these aspects of the Tunisian campaign have served 

as models for future AAF and USAF doctrine. Never again has U.S. air power 

participated in such an effective supply interdiction effort or had so many advantages over the enemy. The Allies broke almost every major cipher used by the 

enemy; they had overwhelming air and naval superiority, which they could 

freely apply to the restricted area of the Cape Bon-Sicily narrows; and they 

fought an overextended and, to some extent, disheartened enemy. 

Spaatz contributed to the success of the operation in two ways. He insisted 

that airborne as well as water transport be interdicted, thereby closing a vital 

supply line that specialized in the delivery of petroleum products-a necessity 

for the Axis forces in the bridgehead. Second, like other senior air officers, he 

seized the opportunity to demonstrate air power’s effectiveness against the Axis 

forces’ vulnerability to an aggressive air interdiction campaign. 

Heavy-Bombardment Aviation in Tunisia 

The pride of the AAF, heavy-bombardment aviation, performed well and 

sometimes spectacularly well during the Tunisian campaign. From November 

1942 through May 1943, the B-24s of the Ninth Air Force and the B-17s of the 

Twelfth Air Force flew 7,041 combat sorties, only 900 fewer than the medium 

and light bombers of the two air forces,46 and lost only 81 aircraft (1.1 percent) 

to combat or accident.47 The B-17s suffered only 24 combat casualties; enemy 

fighters accounted for 8 of them, flak and other causes taking the other 16.48 In a 

letter summarizing the campaign, Spaatz wrote to Arnold, “The impact of the 

196 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

well flown B- 17 formation into the European air picture has been tremendous 

and, in my opinion, will be the decisive factor, unless the Germans find some 

means of opposing it better than they have now.”49 

After a slow start, the heavy bombers made their first raid beyond North 

Africa on February 7, 1943, when they hit a major airfield in Elmas, Sardinia. 

This raid, according to its planners, damaged a large percentage of the Axis antishipping capability stationed at Elmas, thereby enabling an Allied convoy to 

escape further losses.50 Two more raids in February struck port facilities in 

Cagliari, Sardinia, and Palermo, Sicily. These missions established the pattern 

for subsequent months; NASAF medium bombers (B-25s and B-26s) concentrated on shipping, while heavy bombers (B-17s and B-24s) attacked the loading 

and unloading facilities at both ends of the Axis supply lines. Occasionally, the 

B-17s went after convoys or ships in harbor. 

Two raids produced dramatic results that helped enhance the AAF’s faith in 

the destructiveness of its preferred weapon system. On April 10, B-17s sank the 

Italian heavy cruiser Trieste with 1,000-pound bombs dropped from 19,000 feet. 

The same raid damaged the Goriza, one of Italy’s two remaining heavy cruisers. 

Dramatic before and after pictures received full circulation during the war, and 

even the postwar U.S. Army and Air Force official histories selected them for 

publication.51 Four days earlier, B-17s had blown up an ammunition ship in 

convoy to Tunisia; that pyrotechnic display also earned wide coverage. 

As usual, Arnold pressed Spaatz and his other combat commanders to provide the public and the President with evidence of destruction by bombing. 

Spaatz’s and Doolittle’s unprecedented permission given to the glamorous Life 

magazine photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White to fly a B-17 combat mission 

over Tunisia and the resultant story failed to assuage Amold,52 nor did Time 

magazine’s cover story of March 22 on Spaatz.53 The AAF commander was 

concerned that an unsophisticated public would not understand why “our early 

units were not as well trained as units committed to combat should be,” why 

“we did not suddenly have a great striking force prepared to operate against 

Germany,” and why the AAF required “a necessary ‘feeling out’ period.”54 

Arnold needed proof of accurate and devastating bombing. On April 10, he cautioned Spaatz that “many people in high places” were asking hard questions 

about the exact details of damage inflicted by Spaatz’s forces. “It will help US a 

great deal in defending your operations,” noted Arnold, “and in building up a 

correct picture of the results being accomplished if you will make a special 

effort to have a summary on the subject gotten back here about every two 

weeks.”55 

Eleven days later, in response to an earlier request by Amold for information 

on Kasserine Pass and antishipping operations, Spaatz wrote that he hoped 

Arnold had received his daily operations reports, the weekly intelligence summaries, and “the special folders of significant heavy bomber operations.”56 

Spaatz cited four special folders already sent: (1) the March 22 Palermo raid, 

198 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

which Spaatz earlier called one of the most destructive of the war;57 (2) the 

April 6 ammunition ship strike; (3) the sinking of the Trieste; and (4) an April 

13 mission against the Castelvetrano airfield in Sicily. These four special folders 

should have helped Arnold greatly in his defense of precision bombing. 

Spaatz did not mention a devastating raid by the 97th Bombardment Group 

on airfields in the Souk el Arba area on February 22, the high point of the 

German Kasserine attack. In an interview more than thirty years later, General 

Kuter still remembered the incident well-the B- 17s used “anti-personnel 

bombs, hundreds of them all over, and killed a lot of people.”58 Unfortunately, 

the base belonged to the RAF; the bombers had missed their intended target by a 

hundred miles. Prompt apologies and a thorough investigation by the NASAF 

mollified the British, who chalked up the incident to the fortunes of war.59 It 

was no wonder Spaatz did not send a special folder on this mission. 

Appropriately, when Spaatz quietly chose to join a limited number of combat missions, he flew on the heavies-on at least three occasions that can be verified in his diary and probably two or three more times. On March 3 1, he rode in 

the nose of one of the 97th Bombardment Group’s B-17s on a mission over 

Decimonannu airfield in Sardinia. Next, he flew with the 301st Bombard-ment 

Group on the April 13 Castelvetrano airfield raid. Two weeks later, on April 27, 

he observed the bombing of Villacidro airfield from one of the 97th Bombardment Group’s fortresses.60 The Castelvetrano raid lost one airplane to antiaircraft 

fire. According to Eisenhower’s personal naval aide, Capt. Harry Butcher, who 

knew Spaatz well and often participated in his late-night poker games, Spaatz 

told him, but not Eisenhower, that he had flown on a raid over Palermo on April 

14 in which three planes were lost, two to fighters and one to flak. That trip 

“wasn’t the first by any means.”61 Given the information in Spaatz’s papers and 

Butcher’s diary, Spaatz apparently flew no fewer than four or five missions. It 

appears reasonable to conclude that he flew a strike with each of the heavy-bombardment groups in his command: the 2d, 97th, 99th, and 301st. 

Spaatz’s flights demonstrated bravery, but did they demonstrate another 

quality essential to command-wisdom? If the casualty figures can be accepted, 

he personally witnessed one-sixth of all B-17 combat losses for the campaign. 

He did not choose milk runs. In fact, he appears to have exposed himself to great 

danger and to have run real risks. If his plane had gone down and he had been 

captured, the enemy might have forced the ULTRA secret from him, to the significant detriment of the Allied effort. His loss in battle might also have damaged 

AAF prestige and shaken faith in the possibility of daylight bombing. 

But Spaatz’s flights do demonstrate a cardinal principle of good commandleadership. He had a morale problem in the NASAF. What better way to help 

ease it than to let his men know “the old man” shared their risks? How better 

could he understand the physical, mental, and organizational problems of flying 

a wartime raid? Military history abounds with examples of leaders who failed 

because of plans based on absolute physical impossibilities. One need only 

199 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

remember the apocryphal tale of the World War I British staff officer who burst 

into tears on his first visit to the front when he realized the hopelessness of the 

attacks he had helped to plan. 

Nor did Spaatz, in this instance, take absurd chances. B-17 strikes had far 

lower loss rates than antishipping or ground-support attacks. He apparently participated as an observer only and did not interrupt normal crew procedure or put 

himself in the cockpit. By confining himself to raids on coastal targets he lessened the danger of capture should he and his crew be forced to abandon their 

plane. They could parachute from it or ease it into the water with the hope of 

encountering Allied rescue parties. Moreover, recent evidence shows that the 

ULTRA secret had become known at levels far lower than his. Because he was 

usually not the only one who knew about it on the missions that he flew,62 he 

probably did not jeopardize it unduly. On balance, Spaatz’s combat missions 

seem to have been justified. He achieved a positive effect on his own and his 

men’s morale and gained invaluable insight into the day-to-day workings of his 

command. As a commander he had a duty to lead by example in combat. He fulfilled that duty without indulging in it to the extent that he compromised his 

capacity to carry out higher responsibilities. Of course, if he actually had been 

lost, his flights could be condemned as ill-considered and foolish-such is fate. 

Spaatz, in this instance, had at least stacked the deck in his favor. 

Such experiences did not dampen his belief in precision bombing. In late 

May he summed up the performance of the heavy bombers this way: “In our day 

to day operations at the present time, we feel any area can be completely neutralized, even blown into oblivion, by high altitude attacks, without incurring 

any serious losses on our part.” He went on to bemoan the loss of a year in 

mounting a massive strategic campaign against Germany-an attack that would 

have been decisive, in his view, had it been properly followed up.63 

Ground Operations and Air Support 

As the NASAF tightened its grip on Axis supply lines, Allied ground forces, 

assisted by the newly formed NATAF, shattered enemy land forces in a nineweek-long assault on the Italian-German bridgehead. Under the able leadership 

of Coningham, the U.S. XI1 Air Support Command, the Western Desert Air 

Force, and No. 242 Group soon gained air superiority. Fighter-bombers and light 

bombers of the NATAF roamed the battlefield unhampered by the Luftwaffe. 

Coningham’s appointment to head the NATAF improved the performance of 

the tactical forces but did not provide a universal nostrum to the ills of airground cooperation in North Africa. Not all ground or air commanders succumbed to the New Zealander’s messianic expressions of the new support 

arrangements. Nor did “Mary’s” combative temperament ease his path. In his 

view, the Americans, with less than six months’ wartime experience, had nothing to teach him. In the subsequent campaign in Sicily, he made his view abun200 
COLLAPSE OFTHE Axis BRIDGEHEAD 

dantly clear to Spaatz in a scene that one observer described as “the first time I 

saw personal Anglo-American relations go wrong at that leve1.”64 

Coningham had begun to develop an obsessive and splenetic hatred of 

Montgomery, believing that he had filched from him and the air arm the laurels of victory at El Alamein.65 As a result, Montgomery began to place 

increasing reliance in the abilities of Air Vice-Marshal Harry Broadhurst, 

Coningham’s replacement in command of the WDAF. The MontgomeryBroadhurst collaboration proved extremely effective in supplying tactical air 

support to the ground troops under Montgomery’s command through North 

Africa, Sicily, Italy, and Normandy-and served as proof of the importance of 

personal compatibility in the air-ground equation.66 Spaatz, while scrupulously declining to interfere with Coningham’s overall direction of the tactical 

battle, spent a great deal of time calming the waters in Coningham’s wake and 

convincing American officers of the value of the new doctrine, if not of the 

value of its bearer.* 

Although Coningham’s appointment to head the NATAF improved the performance of the tactical forces, neither Spaatz nor the AAF in North Africa 

accepted his system in toto. The Americans disagreed with his orders of March 

17, which forbade NATAF planes from communicating with air-support parties 

(as mentioned, AAF-manned liaison teams equipped with a VHF radio on a 1%- 

ton truck that traveled with the forward ground elements and provided immediate contact with planes overhead). To Coningham, the practice by which U.S. 

aircraft checked in with the air-support parties smacked of excessive control of 

air by the ground commander and thus violated the principle of unity of air command. It also threatened to short-circuit the whole British system by providing a 

direct link between pilots and individual ground units. Such a link abbreviated 

the functions of the Fighter Wing Control Room, reducing control by the overall 

air commander.67 

Colonel Williams, the commanding officer of the XI1 ASC, after discussion 

with his group leaders and pilots, advised his superior that the air-support parties 

did not command or control his planes, but merely provided a quick and valuable communications link with the ground forces at the point of combat.68 

Spaatz intervened in support of Williams’s position, and the air-support parties 

continued to provide their useful services.69 

American use of air-support parties illustrated certain differences in Allied 

air coordination practices. Although the Americans absorbed many lessons from 

the British, the two organizations did not form mirror images. The Americans 

regarded the air-support parties as the equivalent of British “tentacles,” but they 

did not follow the example of assigning an air liaison officer at each forward airfield. Instead, the ground unit receiving support sent one of its own officers to 

the airfield to brief the air commander. In the WDAF/8th Army scheme, the 8th 

~- ~~ ~ 

* See discussion of the RAF’s and Coningham’s air support doctrine in Chapter 4. 

20 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Army processed air requests from subordinate units, decided on priorities, and at 

that point presented requirements to the WDAF, which had control over all 

operational aspects of the mission. 

The Americans also used different communication channels. Instead of I1 

Corps Headquarters developing air requests from its subordinate units, XI1 ASC 

Headquarters developed requests received directly from the air-support parties. 

The air-support party’s commander not only served as air-ground liaison but 

doubled as a member of the ground unit’s staff. After allocating its aircraft to 

specific strikes, XI1 ASC then confirmed its decisions with I1 Corps G-3 

(Operations). If G-3 approved, XI1 ASC carried out the missions according to its 

own plans and force available. The Americans believed in the superiority of 

their procedure since it introduced qualified air opinion at the beginning of a 

request process, thereby preventing air commitment to unsuitable or impossible 

tasks. Coningham had learned from the Americans through Williams that aircraft command and control was technically reserved to XI1 ASC Headquarters 

and not to the air-support parties, but he was, apparently, either uninformed or 

uncomprehending of the essential role played by those parties in the American 

scheme of ground support.70 

Coningham’s original order, had it remained in effect, would have totally 

disrupted American air-ground cooperation. The Americans resisted this attempt 

to impose British methods from the top. In practice, however, both the British 

and the American schemes worked equally well. In 1944 Spaatz took the 

American procedures with him to Britain where they were applied by the U.S. 

Ninth Air Force. With Spaatz’s departure in 1944, the Mediterranean Theater 

adopted British procedures. 

Even before Coningham’s arrival to command the NATAF, Spaatz had 

observed to Stratemeyer that with Coningham “at the head of our Air Support 

Command, it can readily be seen that something is bound to break out in a very 

short time.”” Air-ground relations remained tranquil until April 1. After the 

Kasserine crisis, Allied ground and air units prepared to renew attacks on the 

Axis. The logistical situation improved dramatically after early December and 

January. Spaatz could report that the forward fields had sufficient bombs and 

gasoline for operations.72 The NAAF needed only one item to remove the principal bottleneck remaining in its logistics-motor transport. On March 30, 

Spaatz complained that I1 Corps still had 450 AAF trucks. Seven days later, he 

asked Eisenhower for more transport to move the air force forward, even if it 

had to come from I1 Corps.73 

After a pause to reorganize following the defeats of mid-February, I1 Corps 

resumed the offensive. Although Coningham now held operational control of 

XI1 ASC, he followed the earlier and logical practice of ordering each of his air 

contingents to support its own land forces. In keeping with his ideas, however, 

XI1 ASC gave first priority to counterair operations rather than to ground support for I1 Corps. 

202 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

On March 17, following intensive artillery and air preparation, Patton’s I1 

Corps took Gafsa and began to attack toward the sea coast, seventy-five miles 

away. By then, XI1 ASC’s operational strength had risen to 116 Spitfires, 49 P39s, and 4 photographic reconnaissance planes.74 The Support Command’s 

medium bombers had transferred to the Tactical Bomber Force, a centralized 

tactical bomber command directly under Coningham’s control. Spitfires had 

short endurance and could not drop bombs. The P-39s served only as fast 

ground-attack planes because of their inability to compete in dogfights with 

superior Axis fighters in the theater. The XI1 ASC had two responsibilities for 

this phase of the battle: (1) to protect the forward move of I1 Corps and (2) to 

obtain and hold air superiority over opposing air forces to free the entire WDAF 

for the 8th Army attack on Rommel at the Mareth Line. The Tactical Bomber 

Force, composed of both British and American medium bombers, would supply 

striking power to XI1 ASC for hitting Axis airfields. Coningham also had the 

power to require Strategic Air Force missions on enemy fields during critical 

days of the offensive.75 

Rain grounded portions of the NATAF and mired I1 Corps in mud, postponing the offensive until March 29. For the next twelve days I1 Corps made little 

progress against heavy German resistance. A number of fruitless and costly 

attacks, which gained negligible results, made the period between March 28 and 

April 2 particularly frustrating for Patton. On the morning of April 1, a German 

air attack killed one of his personal aides, Capt. Richard N. Jenson, and landed a 

bomb within a few feet of Maj. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, deputy corps commander.76 Jenson’s death upset Patton greatly;77 he manifested his grief, in part, 

against Allied air support, which he felt had abandoned him. 

This attitude represented a volte-face for Patton. Just before the attacks, 

Spaatz, on a trip to the front, had elicited from him on March 24 and from Maj. 

Gen. Terry Allen, Commander of the 1 st Infantry Division (the “Big Red One”) 

on March 25 expressions of approval concerning their air support;78 on March 

23 and 24, XI1 ASC had successfully bombed and strafed enemy tanks, motor 

transport, and troops in the El Guettar (1st Division) sector.79 Neither general 

may have been fully aware that XI1 ASC’s priority mission was conducting 

counterair operations, not ground support.80 

By April 2, however, Patton, as on other occasions during the war, could no 

longer contain his anger. He proceeded to issue a situation report (“sitrep”) highly 

critical of the air effort. “Forward troops,” the sitrep stated, “have been continuously bombed all morning. Total lack of air cover for our units has allowed 

German Air Force to operate almost at will.”Sl Patton gave the report wide circulation. Predictably, Coningham reacted by giving even wider circulation to a choleric message of his own. After first noting that XI1 ASC had provided 260 

sorties on the day in question and that, furthermore, enemy air action had resulted 

in only four killed and a small number wounded, he stated: “On receipt of sitrep 

it was first assumed to be seasonal first April joke.” then he continued: 

203 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

It is assumed that intention was not to stampede local American air command 

into purely defensive action. It is also assumed that there was no intention to 

adopt discredited practice of using air force as an alibi for lack of success on 

the ground. . . . It can only be assumed that Two Corps personnel concerned are 

not battleworthy in terms of present operation. . . . [Finally NATAF’s commander requested] that such inaccurate and exaggerated reports should cease. XI1 

ASC have been instructed to not allow their brilliant and conscientious support 

of Two Corps to be affected by this false cry of wolf.x2 

Coningham angrily complained at Tedder’s headquarters that Patton’s provocations were “particularly intense,” consisting of “a solid 48 hours of sitreps, 

signals and telephone calls, three of them being to General Alexander.” In the 

meantime, “there were no communications to General Williams commanding 

American air, nor to my headquarters, but all the other addresses of my signal 

were included. They were all based on false information because General Patton 

is living 40 miles away from his airmen and does not know the air position.”83 

Because the Patton-Coningham fracas was potentially damaging to both airground and inter-Allied relations, Spaatz, Tedder, and Eisenhower reacted 

sharply. Tedder, in his memoirs, claimed that he corrected the situation himself. 

After receiving a copy of Coningham’s message, Tedder phoned Eisenhower 

and explained that as Air Officer Commanding, Mediterranean Air Command, 

he had instructed Coningham to cancel his message and to accompany him to 

Gafsa to apologize to Patton in person. This meeting, Tedder claims, resolved 

the situation and converted Patton to a friend. Tedder added that his prompt handling of the problem prevented Eisenhower’s resignation.84 

Spaatz’s command diary entries, recorded at the time of the event, contradict 

Tedder’s account. Spaatz and, presumably, Tedder had received copies of 

Patton’s original message as they were leaving a joint MAC-NAAF staff meeting that put the final touches on the “Dunkirk” plans. The “inaccuracy” and 

“unjustness” of the sitrep and its wide distribution had provoked “great concern.”85 The next morning Spaatz and Tedder, in the midst of preparing to fly to 

the front, received Coningham’s intemperate reply. They flew to Thelepte, met 

Kuter and Williams, and investigated the lack of air support reported by Patton. 

The WDAF, they found, had scheduled 160 fighter sorties for April 1, but 

weather had interfered. The XI1 ASC had not attacked a tank concentration 

because the ground forces had canceled their planned attack when artillery 

moved into range of the tanks. Finally, they discovered a lack of radar coverage 

to the east of Gafsa, which prevented effective employment of the fighters stationed there.86 

The four then motored from Thelepte to visit Patton at his headquarters in 

Gafsa. They must have been dumbfounded when he informed them of his satisfaction with current air support. Nonetheless, they expressed their misgivings 

over his having moved too far forward of Williams to communicate with him.87 

The separation of Patton and Williams violated the spirit of the new doctrine, 

204 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, 

Lt. Gen. George S. 

Patton, and Spaatz’s 

Chief of Intelligence, Col. 

George C. McDonald, 

Constantine, Algeria, 

March 1943. 

which required the co-location of air and ground headquarters for the proper 

supervision of forces. 

By a quirk of fate, two to four German aircraft suddenly interrupted conversation, strafing and bombing Patton’s headquarters area and prompting one of 

his guests to remark, “I always knew you were a good stage manager, but this 

takes the cake.” Patton replied, “If I could find those sonsabitches who flew 

those planes I’d mail them each a meda1.”88 In a far less celebrated incident, the 

airmen had a measure of revenge on the Luftwaffe the same day, when XI1 ASC 

fighters intercepted a Stuka (dive-bomber) formation and shot down thirteen of 

sixteen planes.89 

That afternoon Tedder and Spaatz flew on to visit the WDAF at Medinine, 

behind the 8th Army’s front. Spaatz saw, firsthand, that the 8th Army had much 

more effective air support than the other Allied land forces in Tunisia. With 

Williams and Patton’s chief of staff in tow, Spaatz provided some on-the-job 

training by inspecting joint WDAF/8th Army Headquarters. He noted that 

Montgomery, unlike Patton, left his main headquarters adjacent to air headquarters, even if he personally moved an advanced command post closer to the fighting.90 The German masters of the blitzkrieg, Generals Irwin Rommel and Heinz 

Guderian, employed similar methods in directing their own armored attacks. 

During their visit to the front, Spaatz and Tedder talked at great length about 

Coningham’s reply to Patton. When they returned to Williams’s headquarters on 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

April 4, Tedder wrote a reprimand to Coningham, which he sent to Spaatz, who 

forwarded it to NAAF Headquarters for transmission to its recipient. Tedder 

then called Eisenhower with an explanation and directed Coningham to see 

Patton post haste.91 Coningham met Patton at noon the same day, and the two 

immediately engaged in a shouting match, both protesting their faith in their 

own men. Once it stopped, the atmosphere cleared and the two officers got down 

to business. Coningham, as ordered, apologized. Patton graciously accepted as if 

he himself had done no wrong, and they both agreed to cancel and withdraw their 

respective messages. Patton recorded in his diary, “We parted friends, and I 

think we will now get better air support thy ever before.” As Patton well knew, 

In a contrite letter to Tedder’s deputy, Air Vice-Marshal H.E.P. Wigglesworth, Coningham said of Patton, ‘‘I like him very much, he is a gentleman and 

a gallant warrior. But on the slightest provocation he breathes fire and battle, 

and as I also like fighting I could not resist the challenge when he turned the barrage on to me.”93 Coningham sent out a new message, in which he expressed 

regret that his original signal might have been interpreted as a slight to U.S. 

forces and laid the cause to an egregious error in transmission: “Two Corps” had 

been wrongly substituted for “Few corps.” The new signal concluded with the 

withdrawal of his offending message and an indication that he considered the 

matter closed.94 

Eisenhower, however, had the last word. As Spaatz’s chief of staff, Col. 

Edward (Ted) Curtis, recalled, the Coningham-Patton dispute angered Eisenhower 

considerably.95 His steam was still up on April 5 when he wrote Marshall, “The 

past week has been a very trying one and was notable for one incident that disturbed me very much. This involved a very unwise and unjust criticism of I1 

Corps by a senior member of the British Air Force.” Eisenhower concluded, 

“There was really no excuse for the thing happening.”96 Later that morning, 

Spaatz and Eisenhower met in conference, where the incident became the chief 

topic of conversation. Spaatz defended Coningham, arguing that Patton had initiated the affair with a sitrep so accusative that notice had to be taken of it; 

Patton should restrict his “grousing” ta proper channels. Moreover, Patton’s 

movement of his headquarters to a spot inaccessible to Williams’s headquarters 

could only have decreased the possibility of effective support. Spaatz pointed 

out that, in any case, Patton had obtained 160 sorties from the WDAF. Eisenhower responded by suggesting a large-scale air operation in support of I1 Corps, 

a suggestion Spaatz forwarded to Coningham.97 The squeaky wheel had gotten 

the grease. 

This meeting apparently changed Eisenhower’s view of the affair. That 

afternoon he wrote to Patton suggesting that the matter be dropped in the interest 

of “the great purpose of complete Allied teamwork” [emphasis in the original]. 

He chided Patton for demanding an additional “pound of flesh” and observed, 

“In connection with this matter I am since informed that there was a certain 

the squeaky wheel gets the grease.92 / 

206 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

amount of unwise distribution of your sitrep.” He warned Patton that in future 

any criticism of another service or collaborating agency should be made by 

means of a “confidential” report through the proper chain of command or, better 

yet, with “a friendly and personal conference with the man responsible.” He 

concluded: 

You and Spaatz, with your respective subordinates, are at the moment carrying 

the burden of battle command for the American side of the house. In both of 

you I have the most tremendous confidence and I therefore feel that you have 

every right to have my opinions on these matters as accurately as I am able to 

express them.98 

Patton noted, “Ike told me later that he could not punish Coningham because he 

was a New Zealander and political reasons forbade.”99 This ended the incident, 

but the problem of perfecting air-ground cooperation remained. 

On several occasions in April and May, Spaatz went to the front to try to 

correct close air support arrangements. He was incensed by what he found on his 

visit to the U.S. 34th Infantry Division on April 8. This untried division, recently 

detached from I1 Corps and assigned to the British 9 Corps, had failed to reach 

its objective, partly because of confusion over a planned air attack. The 9 Corps 

canceled the air attack around midnight April 7-8 and so notified 34th Division. 

At 8:OO A.M. Maj. Gen. Ryder, 34th Division Commander, realizing that his 

infantry had not advanced so far or so quickly as planned, tried to reinstate the 

air attack for 8:30 A.M., but no planes appeared and at 9:30 A.M. the division 

called off the air attack once more.100 In following up the lack of support for the 

34th, Spaatz discovered that air-ground communications had failed. The 34th 

had not realized that it could call for air support directly to XI1 ASC through its 

own air support party. The XI1 ASC, assigned to support I1 Corps, had just 

moved seventy-five miles to the northeast (from Thelepte to LeSers), too far 

from both American I1 and British 9 Corps Headquarters. Nor had XI1 ASC 

been aware of its continuing responsibility for the 34th Division. To make matters worse for the pride of the 34th Division, the British assault went well and at 

its end the British 9 Corps commander recommended the withdrawal of the 34th 

from combat and the retraining of its junior officers at the rear under British 

guidance. 101 

Spaatz attributed the air-ground problem to the ground forces’ own confusion about lines of authority: XI1 ASC could not effectively cooperate with two 

widely separated masters. Upon his return to Constantine, Spaatz suggested the 

formation of a new army headquarters to supervise both corps. This headquarters, sited alongside Williams’s headquarters, would allow XI1 ASC to do its job 

effectively. “Any organization which had air forces available but could not get 

their machinery in motion to apply them was faulty,” Spaatz wrote in his diary. 

Williams had had the forces to aid the 34th, but because of poor control could 

not apply them.102 Eisenhower rejected Spaatz’s suggestion. Because a new 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

army headquarters would have had to be American, and he may not have felt 

that the time was right to discuss its formation. 

Meanwhile, Montgomery continued his pursuit of the retreating ItalianGerman army group. His march along the Mediterranean coast, from the Mareth 

Line to Enfidaville, moved the southern boundary of the bridgehead one hundred 

miles north. This left the U.S. I1 Corps with no front to occupy. Anticipating this 

“pinching out,’’ Allied commanders had already ordered I1 Corps to prepare to 

transfer to the far northern edge of the bridgehead, where it could advance on 

Bizerte. This move, begun on April 12, placed I1 Corps under Anderson’s 1st 

Army. The shrunken size of the Axis-occupied area left room for only two air 

control sectors, and because XI1 ASC supported I1 Corps, now under the operational control of the 1st Army, XI1 ASC joined No. 242 Group, the 1st Army’s air 

support formation, as a subordinate unit. WDAF had the other air control secAs I1 Corps completed its move across the 1st Army’s entire line of communication and the 8th Army’s drive stalled at Enfidaville, a lull in the fighting 

ensued. Spaatz, mindful of previous deficiencies in cooperation between I1 Corps 

and XI1 ASC, used this breather to try to strengthen the bond between the two 

organizations. He observed the air liaison officer at I1 Corps, found him unimpressive, and replaced him.104 

This personnel move did not halt the flow of complaints from General 

Bradley, who had replaced Patton as the Commander of I1 Corps, or from 

Anderson. The 1st Army initiated its new offensive on April 22, the same day the 

Luftwaffe began a general withdrawal from its African bases. From that point on, 

the Luftwaffe ceased to play a significant role in North Africa, and the Tactical 

Air Force discontinued airfield attacks as a matter of policy, turning instead to 

ground support.lOs Because this offensive was the major effort of the theater, 1st 

Army had a great say in the allocation of air on its front and had the responsibility of joint planning with air for its attacks. Anderson proved he had learned nothing new about air operations. For the final breakthrough Coningham placed the 

entire NATAF and all the medium bombers the Strategic Air Force could spare 

under the operational control of No. 242 Group, the air headquarters co-located at 

1st Army headquarters.106 

In preparing the final plan for the defeat of the Axis forces in Tunisia, the 1 st 

Army never consulted No. 242 Group-not even about zero hour. It chose dawn 

but Allied tactical aircraft could not take off from their primitive airfields before 

first light and, thus, could not bomb their first objective targets in time to assist 

the ground assault. The bombing of second and third objectives played a great 

part in the army’s breakthrough. This, however, was a case of good fortune 

because the target, the Medjez Valley, normally had a seasonal morning mist 

from 9:OO to 1O:OO. For each of the four days before the attack the mist had 

come and had obscured the second and third objectives.107 

t0r.103 

208 
COLLAPSE OFTHE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

According to No. 242 Group, Allied air made every effort to satisfy the 

ground forces and even employed several nonstandard procedures. Provided the 

Army limited its requests to one or two attacks a day, No. 242 Group would 

attack any target, regardless of suitability. The group also placed at 1st Army’s 

disposal a considerable force for its use as artillery, with little result; No. 242 

Group claimed that 1st Army dissipated the force made available in seventy different attacks against forty-four separate targets.108 

On April 29, Eisenhower visited Spaatz at his villa in Constantine to discuss 

Bradley’s and Anderson’s dissatisfaction with their air support. Spaatz concluded that the generals’ complaints resulted from their inability to get exactly 

what they wanted when they wanted it. He told Eisenhower that he would go 

forward to straighten out the matter the next day, April 30.109 During his visits 

to both headquarters, Spaatz found the conditions he expected: lack of communication, not aircraft, proved to be the problem. 

Anderson needed reassurance. The appearance of newly identified German 

units on his front had convinced him that the air force had not done enough to 

stop enemy movement. He did not realize that these German groups were actually remnants of units already broken by Montgomery in the south. Spaatz 

pointed out that the chief priority of the NASAF and, more recently, of the 

WDAF was the interruption of enemy reinforcements and supply. No doubt the 

latest ULTRA intercepts, which reflected the steep decline in unloadings, 

strengthened Spaatz’s defense of the effectiveness of the air effort.110 

At I1 Corps, the NAAF’s commander found dissatisfaction with photo 

reconnaissance and the level of air support received. He traced both problems to 

1st Army Headquarters, rather than to a lack of desire by XI1 ASC to provide 

assistance to I1 Corps. Bradley’s command did not get all the air missions it 

requested because 1st Army, which set air priorities for all the forces it controlled, did not approve all of I1 Corps requests. Spaatz had no authority to 

change that arrangement, although he did attach XI1 ASC’s tactical reconnaissance squadron directly to I1 Corps and tied I1 Corps G-2 (Intelligence Staff) 

into reconnaissance pilot briefings.111 In attaching one of his air units directly to 

the ground unit it supported, Spaatz, of course, violated the doctrine of concentration of air assets. Once again, he demonstrated his refusal to allow doctrine to 

overcome common sense. He thought it better to bend a rule than to adhere to 

theory and leave the army blind. 

Spaatz could do nothing, however, about 1st Army’s allocation of air missions. The 1st Army denied I1 Corps’ requests because all available air strength 

was being employed in front of the 1st Army’s British troops to help them blast 

through stiff German opposition. A return visit by Spaatz on May 4 revealed 

improvements in the situation and greater satisfaction with air support.112 Spaatz 

checked the time elapsed from a I1 Corps request for air and its clearance 

through army headquarters and discovered no great delay. He did find, however, 

that 1st Army Headquarters had refused requests when its judgment of particular 

209 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

needs and conditions differed from that of I1 C0rps.113 

Later, Spaatz reminded Eisenhower of his previous warnings that the 

arrangements for the new battle would prove unsatisfactory. Because matters 

would not improve until his forces had their own independent army or corps 

commanders with their staffs located alongside XI1 ASC’s headquarters, he recommended no change. Bradley’s corps would have to continue under the current 

structure. Spaatz also informed Eisenhower that the heavy sortie rate of tactical 

aircraft demonstrated that 1st Army had used its available air resources to the 

maximum.114 The collapse of the bridgehead and its final surrender on May 13, 

1943, ended the Tunisian campaign. This speedy finish obviated the need for 

further tinkering with the air-ground relationship. 

At the conclusion of the North African campaign, Tedder and Spaatz 

thought it necessary to formalize NAAF and MAC command arrangements. But 

the British and American staffs separately drew up complicated organizational 

charts, began bickering over respective rank and seniority, and insisted on instituting procedures unique to their own service. Tedder’s “back hairs began to 

bristle.” At his morning meeting on May 12, disagreements came to a head. 

Spaatz complained that Mediterranean Air Command would usurp NAAF headquarters’ functions by going direct to NAAF’s subordinate commands. This, 

Spaatz said, indicated improper organization. Tedder shot back, “If you want a 

divorce, you can have one here and now, repeat now!” Only a few moments 

later, reason returned, and the parties agreed to shelve their draft documents and 

to get on with fighting the war.115 

This exchange undoubtedly influenced Spaatz’s final judgment on headquarters’ arrangements. On May 24, 1943, he wrote to Arnold that the organization 

had been made to work and had proved adequate for the job at hand, “but it is 

too dependent on personalities to be sound.” Nonetheless, Spaatz believed that 

the Americans had learned much from the British, particularly the handling of 

administration, operations, and intelligence. 116 

Spaatz and Changes in AAF Air Smart Doctrine 

The AAF emerged from the campaign in North Africa with a new and clearly 

defined doctrine of air support, much of which stemmed from RAF developments. Spaatz absorbed this doctrine, expounded it to Arnold and the AAF hierarchy, and oversaw its development in his command. In addition to the constant 

stream of information he sent back in his numerous letters and reports to Arnold, 

Spaatz found time, while on an inspection trip to Marrakech on March 7, to write 

a long and thoughtful letter in which he described the shortcomings of current 

official AAF doctrine on air support and suggested seminal changes: 

I cannot believe that the situation here is of such a special nature that it requires 

a peculiar form of organization, but rather that it approximates the conditions 

210 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

under which our land forces will be confronted at least during the European 

phase of the war. It has become evident that what we considered the Air 

Support Command and the air support forces are not adequate for the purpose 

either in composition or organization, and by their very term give an erroneous 

impression to the ground army. 

Spaatz argued that the air support command needed access to heavy- and 

medium-bombardment units when the situation required them, that the ASC 

could not operate effectively, and that the army could not advance until the air 

force had achieved air superiority. Because air formations could move freely in 

flight, ignoring terrain, the control of air should be centralized and not divided 

into small packets among armies or corps. Spaatz listed five requirements for 

support of the ground army: 

1. The establishment of a fighter offense and defense, including a complete 

2. The use of the fighter force to protect the army and to gain air superiority; 

3. The creation of a tactical reconnaissance force to meet the needs of the 

4. The creation of a fighter-bomber force to attack targets in the battle area; and 

5. The employment of a bomber aircraft capable of operation at altitudes up 

radar network 

my; 

to 10.000 feet. 

Once those five elements were achieved, they could be combined to form a 

tactical air force. In fact, Spaatz suggested eliminating the term air support command altogether. In a postscript, Spaatz also mentioned the invaluable role 

played by the air support parties and commented on the importance of personalities in the coordination of air and ground efforts: “It must be based on the principle that the airman knows his job and the ground man knows his job, with a 

mutual respect for each others’ capabilities and limitations. . . . The ground or 

the air commander should be eliminated who cannot get along with his opposite 

number.”l17 

Arnold gave wide circulation to this and other letters from Spaatz describing 

operations and lessons learned.118 Some of the new air doctrine even reached 

the American public when Time magazine in its March 22, 1943, issue quoted 

Tedder: 

Air war is a separate war, though linked to those on land & sea. . . . [sic] 

Command of the air determines what happens on land & sea. . . . [sic] The 

essential lesson learned in the Middle East is that an air force is a separate 

offensive entity, striking at the enemy in cooperation with the army.”9 

Spaatz’s March 7 letter to Arnold echoed many of the principles found in 

War Department Field Manual (FM) 100-20, Field Service Regulations, “Command and Employment of Air Power,” issued July 21, 1943. FM 100-20 institutionalized many of the lessons of the North African campaign drawn by Spaatz 

21 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

and disseminated by him to the War Department. The proximate cause of FM 

100-20, however, was a note from Assistant Secretary of War for Air Robert A. 

Lovett to Marshall. Lovett sent Marshall a copy of a pamphlet published by 

General Montgomery. Montgomery, because of his ballyhooed victories over 

Rommel in the desert, had a prestige that no other Allied ground commander 

could match at this stage in the war, thus his statements on the art of command 

took on a particularly authoritative air. 

On February 16, 1943, he and Coningham addressed an assemblage of 

Allied admirals and generals in Tripoli. Montgomery distributed a pamphlet 

entitled “Some Notes on High Command in War,” in which he spelled out several tenets concerning the use of air power. Air power’s greatest asset was flexibility, which enabled it to be concentrated for use as a striking force of prime 

importance. To gain concentration, air control must be centralized, and command should flow through air force officers. Montgomery specifically forbade 

the dissipation of air resources into “small packets.” He suggested that each 

army commander have an air headquarters with him to command all aircraft 

allotted to army support. These air forces would not, however, be under the 

“direct command” of the army commander.120 

Coningham added some RAF clarification to Montgomery’s remarks. He 

put the WDAF/8th Army experience into its simplest form saying, “The soldier 

commands the land forces, the airman commands the air forces; both commanders work together and operate their respective forces in accordance with a combined Army-Air plan, the “whole operation being directed by the Army 

Commander” [emphasis added]. The difference between “direct command” and 

“direction” had been solved for a time in the Western Desert. The difference 

between the two remained to be resolved between the AAF and the Army 

Ground Forces (AGF). Coningham also pointed out that the air force had two 

tasks: first, to gain air superiority, and afterward, to apply 80 to 90 percent of its 

hitting power to the enemy ground forces.121 Within days Spaatz sent Arnold a 

copy of the pamphlet.122 

On April 18, Lovett sent a copy of the pamphlet to Marshall, claiming that 

on page 2 it confirmed the principles of the War Department reorganization of 

June 1941, which established the Army Air Forces as a semiautonomous entity 

within the Army. Lovett then observed, “General Montgomery’s statement with 

respect to the use of air power contains much material which, although accepted 

by the Army in principle, has not been formally embodied in our written doctrine, as far as I know.”123 Marshall apparently referred the matter to the War 

Department General Staff’s Organization and Training Division, G-3, asking 

were the doctrines acceptable to the Army, should they be embodied formally in 

Army literature, what action had been taken so far by G-3, and what did G-3 

recommend? 

G-3 replied that the AAF and the AGF held opposing views on Montgomery’s 

doctrine, none of which had been incorporated into official U.S. Army proce212 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

dures. It also pointed to previous attempts by an AAF-AGF air support board 

appointed on December 2, 1942, to reconcile those views and to create an 

entirely new air doctrine. The board failed to agree and postponed any reconsideration of FM 31-35 pending further proof gained by combat. If anything, the 

board revealed a hardening of positions. The AAF insisted on change in the 

direction of RAF air support doctrines as tested in the Western Desert, whereas 

the AGF wished to decentralize air control to levels below division and to 

emphasize close-in, on-call missions which would expand the zone of friendly 

artillery fire. In view of the AAF-AGF failure to compromise, G-3 recommended the revision of FM 3 1-35 and other appropriate War Department publications. 124 

The Operations Plans Division (OPD), the Army’s Washington command 

post, approved but, noting G-3’s concentration on the air-ground view, addressed 

the larger question of overall command and employment of air units at the combat theater level. The OPD told Marshall that in its opinion the theater supreme 

commander should exercise his command through the senior officer of each service and, in all cases, the “direct” [emphasis in original] command of AAF forces 

must be exercised by the AAF commander. Nor should the supreme commander 

attach AAF units to units of the ground forces except when ground units were 

operating independently or were isolated by distance or lack of communication.125 OPD recommended a position far closer to the AAF’s than the AGF’s. 

The Training Division began informal work on doctrinal revision in early 

May. Despite the objections of AAF officers in the General Staff,l26 elements of 

the AGF were polled, and they denounced any change. Not only was FM 31-35 

basically sound, but British air support methods, “particularly those of the Eighth 

Army” had been fully considered and their best features adopted in FM 31-35. 

Likewise, the U.S. air mission request system came from a study of the tentacle 

system. The AGF, reading between the revision’s lines, raised the following 

objections: 

1. Ground and air forces would be more widely separated. 

2. There would be little or no air support without air superiority. 

3. Air support, when available, would be furnished on a basis dictated by 

4. Air units would not be attached to ground units, and 

5. Air support would not be decentralized. 

the air commander. 

The AGF rejected the placement of air superiority at the highest priority, 

calling the deferment of air support until its attainment an unsound practice 

which “would impose a serious and at times insurmountable handicap on the 

ground force commander concerned.”l27 

The AGF’s protest had no effect on the General’Staff. On May 31, a career 

air officer, Lt. Gen. Joseph T. McNarney, the Deputy to the Chief of Staff, acting for Marshall, instructed the Training Division to change the necessary train213 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ing publications. McNarney specified that the U.S. Army’s new doctrine concerning command and employment of air power would include the following 

four points: 

1. Land and air forces were co-equal and independent, 

2. Gaining of air superiority was the first requirement for the success of 

any major land operation, therefore air would concentrate against the 

enemy’s air forces until the obtainment of air superiority, 

3. Flexibility was air’s greatest asset allowing concentration of the whole 

weight of air power on a specific target, and 

4. Control of air power must be centralized and exercised through air 

channels of command; the theater commander would exercise command of the 

air force through the air force commander; and the theater commander would 

not attach AAF units to the ground forces unless the ground forces were operating independently or were isolated.’28 

The first section of FM 100-20, when published, consisted entirely of these 

four points and repeated almost exactly the wording in McNarney’s instructions 

to the Training Division.129 By the end of June, McNarney and Arnold had personally approved a draft of the new manual.130 Eight officers (including five 

generals) representing the infantry (2), the field artillery (l), the coast and antiaircraft artillery (l), and air (4) had also carefully reviewed and approved the 

draft.131 Three of those general officers (Stratemeyer, Kuter, and Porter) either 

had acquired combat experience in North Africa or had recently visited the theater. All three had had extensive discussions with Spaatz on the changes needed 

in air doctrine.132 

FM 100-20 reflected several of the thoughts Spaatz had expressed in his 

March 7, 1943, letter to Arnold: “In order for the Army to advance, the air battle 

must be won.” FM 100-20 stated, “The gaining of air superiority is the first 

requirement for the success of any major land operation.”l33 Spaatz had 

observed, “The control of the air units must be centralized and command must 

be exercised through the Air Force commander. . . .” FM 100-20 specified, 

“CONTROL OF AVAILABLE AIR POWER MUST BE EXERCISED 

THROUGH THE AIR FORCE COMMANDER.”134 Spaatz had suggested a 

tactical air force composed of fighters, fighter-bombers, medium bombers, 

reconnaissance aircraft, and radar warning and control equipment; so did FM 

100-20.135 FM 100-20 also accepted almost word for word Spaatz’s admonition 

concerning the necessity of establishing a fighter-radar network: “The first prerequisite for the attainment of air supremacy is the establishment of a fighter 

defense and offense, including RDF [radio direction finder], GCI [ground control interception], and other types of radar equipment essential for the detection 

of enemy aircraft and control of our own.”136 

FM 100-20 reversed the strictures of earlier manuals. For example, FM 31- 

35 (April 9, 1942), “Aviation in Support of Ground Forces,” allowed the army 

commander specifically to allocate aviation units to the support of subordinate 

214 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

ground units whenever operations required it.137 FM 100-20 severely circumscribed that prerogative: “The Superior Commander will not attach Army Air 

Forces to units of the Ground Forces under his command except when such 

Ground Force units are operating independently or are isolated by distance or 

lack of communication.”~38 The new manual also followed Spaatz’s injunction 

that, in times of vital and decisive action, the strategic air force may join the tactical air force and be assigned tactical objectives.139 In practice FM 100-20 did 

not significantly change the methods of air-ground cooperation established by 

the U.S. Army in Tunisia because, thanks to Spaatz, Tedder, Coningham, and 

Eisenhower, they were already being used. 

So well had Spaatz educated Arnold and the War Department that, when 

Kuter arrived back in the States shortly after the end of the campaign, he wrote 

to Spaatz, “My fiery conviction that air support to be effective must come from 

an air force co-equal and cooperating with the top ground force meets with practically no excitement.” According to Kuter, the War Department’s Bureau of 

Public Relations had released the subject to the press “without batting an eye.”140 

A month later Arnold informed Spaatz, “With particular respect to the 

Tactical Air Force, the ideas you have worked up and forwarded to me are being 

implemented by Kuter and happen, at present, to be going full ball [sic] throughout the Air Forces and the War Department.” He also noted that the War 

Department would issue FM 100-20 in the Field Service Regulation format 

which would be theoretically binding on the theater commander, rather than in 

the field-manual format, which had served as a guideline only.141 

The perfection of their own version of air-ground support doctrine was not 

the only item on Arnold’s and the Air Staff’s agenda. They also wished to 

enhance the position of the AAF in the postwar fight for air force independence. 

After the war Kuter, for instance, admitted that “my own writing during the 

period was slanted toward the formation of a separate air force.”142 He added 

that because his primary focus was on independence, he had slighted the tactical 

air power position. The AAF authors of the manual could not resist the opportunity to integrate this agenda with the lessons of North Africa. Thus FM 100-20 

became a vehicle proclaiming the independence of air power. Its entire first section, cast completely in capital letters, was a unilateral declaration of independence. It began by stating, “LAND POWER AND AIR POWER ARE 

IARY OF THE OTHER.”143 

The manual’s assignment of missions to the Tactical Air Force named close 

air support as the third and last priority after attainment of air superiority and the 

prevention of the movement of troops and supplies into or within the theater of 

operations. In its discussion of this third priority the manual noted, “In the zone 

of contact [between the opposing land forces], missions against hostile units are 

most difficult to control, are most expensive, and are, in general, least effective,” 

and “only at critical times are contact zone missions profitable.” Finally, the 

CO-EQUAL AND INTERDEPENDENT FORCES; NEITHER IS AN AUXIL215 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

manual prescribed adjacent or common headquarters for the air and ground 

forces only when third and last priority targets were attacked.144 

The Army Ground Forces, as noted, did not concur in the publication of FM 

100-20.145 They feared that centralization of all air power under an air commander might fatally damage the AGF’s concept of a combined-arms force in which 

all Army strength, including air and ground, could be massed at a decisive 

point.146The AGF found it significant and almost insulting that FM 100-20 

would supersede the recently published revision of the AAF’s principal manual, 

Army Air Forces Field Manual (FM) 1-5, “Employment of Aviation of the 

Army,” dated January 18, 1943. This manual, which was not widely circulated, 

was certainly known to the AGF and AAF Headquarters and just as certainly 

unknown to most, if not all, of the U.S. forces in North Africa. Based in large 

part on information gathered by prewar observers in England, this manual authorized two practices banned by FM 100-20. It stated that when early warning 

facilities and communications were lacking, air defense aviation must conduct 

patrols. The manual added, 

In some situations, and particularly along the line of contact between opposing 

ground forces, such patrols may also be employed to afford some measure of 

general protection for friendly aircraft in flight. The primary purpose of such 

patrols is, however, the protection of surface objectives rather than protection 

of friendly aircraft in flight.’47 

The manual further noted that such patrols demanded an excessive number of 

planes and that issuance of antiaircraft artillery to such units was a better alternative. Nonetheless, the manual authorized the penny-packet employment favored 

by the ground forces, albeit as a last resort. FM 1-5 allowed for the practice of 

“control or target designation by certain units directly from an air support control, or air support officer to uircruft inflight” [emphasis addedl.148 

FM 1-5 of January 1943 was the wartime culmination of the entire series of 

prewar manuals. It took an evolutionary rather than a revolutionary approach. 

More than the earlier manuals, it addressed the conduct of strategic air operations in a manner close to that advocated by air power enthusiasts. It spoke of a 

strategic air offensive, emphasized the necessity of staying with a single strategic target system and avoiding diversions, and discouraged using heavy and 

medium bombardment in direct ground support.149 FM 1-5’s treatment of 

ground support, as mentioned, reflected the views of the AGF. Yet, it emphasized the interdiction mission of tactical air power rather than that of close air 

support: “The hostile rear area is the most profitable zone of action for air support aviation. . . . Support aviation is not generally employed against objectives 

which can effectively be engaged by available ground weapons within the time 

required.”lsO The manual recognized that the aircraft was a theater-level weapon best 

employed under centralized control; it allowed the direct attachment of air to 

ground units only under abnormal circumstances. But at the crucial point of the 

216 
COLLAPSE OF THE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

land battle, and only then, “would the requirements of the supported force be 

paramount.”l51 These provisions attempted to satisfy the ground commander’s 

need to employ every available asset when necessary, against the airman’s 

desire to conduct independent counterair and interdiction missions. The AGF 

was loath to abandon FM 1-5 for FM 100-20. 

Observations from North Africa must have confirmed this reluctance. The 

report of AGF personnel in North Africa revealed anything but the satisfaction 

Kuter and Spaatz reported back to Washington. Maj. Gen. Walton H. Walker, 

Commanding General, IV Armored Corps, arrived in Algiers on April 21 and 

left about May 8, a period when the Allies had almost complete control of the 

air. Just when Spaatz went forward to make last-minute inspections and adjustments Walker reported, “Air-ground cooperation as envisaged in training and 

maneuvers of ground force units in the United States appeared to be non-existent 

in the North African Theater.”152 Both Patton and Bradley informed him that air 

support had been unsatisfactory, but Bradley did note recent improvement. 

Particularly criticized were the quantity and frequency of air photographic 

reconnaissance and the AAF’s reliance on planned as opposed to on-call air 

strikes-two areas of perennial ground force dissatisfaction that still defy agreement between air and ground.153 

When Spaatz observed that the ground commanders seemed dissatisfied 

because they could not get all the air support they wanted when they wanted it, 

he had hit the nail on the head. Both Coningham’s and FM 31-35’s cumbersome 

communication links, which required ground requests for air to go from the 

ground to an air headquarters and from there to an airfield, lent themselves to 

concentration and centralization of air command and control by airmen. By the 

same token, this communication system did not lend itself to speedy response to 

immediate ground requests for air support. Throughout the campaign, ground 

combat officers complained of the lack of on-call, or immediate-response, air 

strikes. Brig. Gen. Paul M. Robinett, Commander of the 1st Armored Division’s 

Combat Command B, which suffered heavy casualties under British command, 

wrote to Marshall: “The coordination of tank attacks with infantry and air 

attacks has been perfect on the German side. On our own side it has yet to be 

achieved.” Robinett strongly implied that placing all air and ground forces 

attacking an objective under the ground commander could solve the problem.154 

At the campaign’s end, Col. William B. Kern, a battalion commander of the 1st 

Armored Division, remarked, “I believe that we will have to come to some simple system of requesting air support. The present system of going back through 

so many channels is wrong. We haven’t time for it.” Maj. Gen. Charles W. 

Ryder, Commander of the 34th Infantry Division, added, “The system of calling 

through two or three different headquarters for air support simply will not give 

the support desired at the time desired. Adequate air support can only be 

obtained by direct call from the division to the air. Any other system,” observed 

the general, “is too slow and will result in loss of opportunities.”155 

217 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Given good two-way radio communication between pilots in the air and 

ground observers (a practice that Coningham forbade and that technology, at 

that point, could not then guarantee) and a great many airplanes available for 

ground support missions (not available until later in the war), the close air support problem could be overcome in wartime. During the campaign in northwestern Europe, for instance, overwhelming numbers of fighter-bombers and 

innovations such as two-way radios installed in the leading tank elements of 

attacking Allied armored units allowed Allied tactical air forces to supply massive amounts of airborne firepower to the battlefield. FM 100-20 replaced 

FM 1-5, not FM 31-35. It left in place the clumsy, slow methods of air-ground 

communications found in FM 31-35, which stayed in effect until postwar revisions. In practice, however, the troops in the field appear to have ignored FM 

31-35 in favor of local air-ground arrangements. 

The high-level centralization of “photo recon” tended to delay the timely 

dissemination of its products for use in fluid combat situations. Spaatz attempted, 

but only at the end of the North African campaign, to solve this problem by 

attaching XI1 ASC’s photo reconnaissance squadron directly to I1 Corps.” The 

AGF’s nonconcurrence gave the promulgation of FM 100-20 the aura of an 

AAF putsch. As Kuter remarked to Coningham, “More people were defeated in 

Tunisia than Germans and Italians.”l56 Why Marshall agreed to sign the manual 

remains a mystery. Perhaps he felt that this concession to the AAF would mute 

its increasingly public agitation for independence. 

Although he fully understood the new doctrine, Spaatz did not regard it as 

the last word in the Army versus the AAF. In summing up their relationship he 

said, “The situation is normal. If it was not for the disturbance which would 

ensue, I would probably announce the urgent necessity of a separate Air Force.” 

Even the most understanding contacts and intentions at the high command level 

could not offset the ground-air difference, “which permeates the entire structure.” In Spaatz’s opinion, the minor day-to-day problems, not the strategic or 

tactical application of forces, proved the stumbling block of interservice relations. “I will emphasize,” he told Arnold, “that air operating under the command 

control of a ground officer will most probably be improperly used.”157 In an 

interview in 1965, Spaatz restated this point in answer to a question about the 

major lessons of World War 11: “I think the first lesson was the one about air 

being indivisible and in order to develop effectively, it must be controlled by air 

people that developed it, and not under the Army or any other form of organization other than the Air Force.”15* 

At the beginning of the campaign in North Africa in November 1942, the 

AAF and its commander encountered three problems that hampered their efforts 

* In addition to its employment difficulties, air reconnaissance presented a “political” problem 

to the AAF in North Africa because the commander of the chief photo reconnaissance unit was one 

of President Roosevelt’s sons, Elliott Roosevelt. 

218 
COLLAPSE OFTHE AXIS BRIDGEHEAD 

to defeat the Axis: faulty organization, poor logistics, and the lack of an effective air-ground team. By the time of the fall of Tunis and Bizerte in May 1943 

the Allies had built an organization, the NAAF, capable of employing air power 

in a flexible and coherent manner against the enemy. The functional separation 

of the Northwest African Air Force into a ground support force and a long-range 

bomber force necessitated by British experience in air-ground cooperation on 

the one hand, and the AAF’s virtual theaterwide monopoly on long-range 

bombers on the other hand, proved so sensible that the practice continues in the 

USAF to this day. The relatively smooth functioning of its combined staff 

served as a model for later Allied organizations. 

Spaatz played no small role in the success of the NAAF. Perhaps his supreme 

ability as a commander was his willingness to delegate authority and responsibility. He resolutely refused to interfere with the day-to-day operations of either 

Doolittle or Coningham. He trusted them to do the jobs they had trained for, 

while he served as a theater-level air spokesman. With Tedder, Spaatz kept 

Eisenhower aware of the needs and limitations of air power. On several occasions he served as Eisenhower’s air troubleshooter. When the campaign was two 

weeks old, Eisenhower ordered him to North Africa to bring order to the chaotic 

air situation. When the campaign had only two weeks to go, Eisenhower sent 

him forward to solve Anderson’s and Bradley’s air support problems. 

The Americans, despite claims to the contrary, did not develop an air-ground 

team. Spaatz himself had to spend days at the front during the campaign’s finale, 

tinkering with arrangements and dealing with Army complaints. Complaints continued into the Sicilian campaign. Brig. Gen. Paul L. Williams, XI1 ASC’s 

Commander and therefore the senior officer most closely connected to the ground 

forces, apparently identified with his mission of close air support rather than with 

air independence. In one of his reports he made the mistake of saying: “I am thoroughly convinced that the organization of an Air Support Command based on the 

principles of FM 31-35, is sound, workable, and I strongly recommend that all 

such commands be organized in this manner with certain modifications as indicated herein.” He added, “I and my principal staff officers lived and operated with 

the Corps Commanders during most of the period. This is absolutely essential.”l59 

Not surprisingly at the end of the campaign Williams found himself transferred from the XI1 ASC to a troop carrier wing where he could cooperate to his 

heart’s content with Army airborne troops while not being allowed to overidentify with close air support. After the war an Air Staff officer who had reviewed 

FM 100-20 before publication and had gained experience in North Africa 

described the publication of Williams’s report as “premature” and ascribed it to 

a misguided chauvinistic adherence to American concepts. The officer noted 

that Spaatz neither supported nor endorsed the report.160 But in fact, Spaatz suggested to Arnold that the report be “given the highest consideration”l61 and 

demonstrated that, as a combat officer, he did not take so hard a line on airground doctrine as the AAF staff in Washington. 

219 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Perhaps the most telling statistic on the AAF’s attitude toward close air support concerned the training status of the U.S. Army’s ground divisions in the 

United States on January 1, 1944, six months before the invasion of France. 

Thirty-three still needed aviation for joint training and initial air-ground tests, 

twenty-one had not witnessed a recognition demonstration of the various types 

of aircraft, and forty-eight had had no opportunity to participate in the comparative air-ground firepower demonstrations required by regulations. 162 

Although close air support still did not quite meet the mark, it had improved 

from the beginning of the campaign. The interdiction and counterair phases of 

tactical air power proved spectacularly successful once the command and control arrangements of air improved enough to allow flexibility. This flexibility 

allowed (1) the concentration of all forces at the crucial time and place, as with 

FLAX or the close air support effort for Anderson’s April offensive; (2) the 

encouragement of specialized functions, such as daily antishipping strikes by the 

Strategic Air Force; and (3) the day-to-day supply of close air support by the 

Tactical Air Force. 

For the relatively modest butcher’s bill of 1,433 casualties (277 killed in 

action, 406 wounded, and 750 missing, interned, or captured),l63 and 666 aircraft of all types lost on combat missions,l64 the AAF acquired a revision of airground support doctrine and gained recognition of the principle of equality 

between air and ground on the battlefield. More important, the AAF had gained 

valuable combat experience and demonstrated its ability both to overwhelm the 

Luftwaffe and to interfere with the operations of German ground forces. Carl 

Spaatz was instrumental in that watershed development of U.S. air power. 

220 
Part Three 

Mediterranean Interlude 

From Pantelleria to London 

May-December 1943 

Part Three 

Mediterranean Interlude 

During the second half of 1943, Spaatz and his command fought to maintain 

a significant role in determining air strategy in the Mediterranean, to assert AAF 

independence from the U.S. Army and RAF, and to participate in the Combined 

Bomber Offensive aimed at the German heartland. During late May and early 

June, the NAAF conducted operations against Pantelleria, a small Italian-occupied island in the straits between Tunisia and Sicily. The surrender of this island 

on June 11, 1943, demonstrated that, in certain instances, air power alone could 

force the surrender of a fortified position. Pantelleria also provided a case study 

in combined operations, air-ground cooperation, and AAF-RAF relations. 

The AAF and Spaatz contributed to the success of the Anglo-American 

invasion of Sicily on July 10, 1943, and of Italy at Salerno on September 9, 

1943, by providing air-ground support and air cover for the invasion fleets. 

During the Allied drive up the Italian peninsula to the Cassino Line, American 

air power in the Mediterranean continued to provide air-ground support and 

began to prepare to participate in the Combined Bomber Offensive against 

Germany by forming a new U.S. air force with a strategic bombardment mission-the Fifteenth. 

In early December 1943, Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt met in Tehran, 

Iran, where they agreed on future strategy for the conduct of the war against the 

Nazis. The planned cross-channel invasion of France was scheduled for spring 

1944, and Eisenhower received the top command of the invasion, code-named 

Operation OVERLORD. Tedder became Eisenhower’s deputy. 

The British and American Chiefs of Staff also approved both the appointment of an American strategic bomber commander to command and coordinate 

the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces and the transfer of Spaatz to fill the post. 

The move coincided with Arnold’s replacement of Eaker with Doolittle as 

Eighth Air Force Commander. Arnold had become increasingly disenchanted 

with the Eighth’s combat performance and had assigned Eaker to replace Tedder 

in the Mediterranean. By January 1, 1944, Spaatz had arrived in London to 

assume his new command. From there he would direct U.S. participation in the 

Combined Bomber Offensive and assume de facto direction of U.S. air-ground 

support of OVERLORD and the subsequent campaigns through to the final defeat 

of Germany. 

223 

Chapter 7 

Pantelleria and Sicily 

(May-August 1943) 

If the fates decree what I would love most is to have the old 

gang reassemble at Rehoboth. Whatever is happening now 

is a nightmare, with some few pleasant inter1udes.l 

Spaatz to a friend, June 18,1943 

General Spaatz came to see me. As usual he was dirty and 

unshaved.2 

At. Gen. George S. Patton's diary, August 5,1943 

Pantelleria 

After the Axis surrender in Tunisia on May 13, 1943, and before the Allied 

invasion of Sicily, on July 10, 1943, the Northwest African Air Force (NAAF) 

concentrated its force first against Pantelleria (code-named Operation 

CORKSCREW) and then against the German and Italian air forces in Sicily, 

Sardinia, and the lower half of the Italian Peninsula. (See Map 7, Pantelleria.) 

Pantelleria occupied a key position between Tunisia and Sicily, fifty-three miles 

from the former and sixty-three miles from the latter. German radar on the 

island, which had a range of eighty miles, could detect any large movement of 

shipping or aircraft from Tunisia to southern Sicily. Pantelleria also had an airfield capable of holding eighty fighter aircraft, as well as the capacity to serve as 

a base for Axis reconnaissance aircraft and as a fuel and munitions depot for 

submarines and motor torpedo boats. Allied capture of the island would not only 

deny it to the enemy, but would gain a forward base for one group of short-range 

P-40 or Spitfire fighters to cover the Sicilian invasion fleets and landing 

beaches. Fighters based at North African fields had insufficient range to reach 

Sicily, and the Malta fields could hold no more aircraft. In addition, crippled 

225 

PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

Allied aircraft would be able to use Pantelleria’s airfield if they could not return 

to their own base. The neutralization of the island became even more important 

when the final plans for the Sicilian invasion required an assault on the southern 

beaches near Licata and Gela. The U.S. invasion forces headed for those beaches 

would have to sail within easy range of Pantelleria.3 

Pantelleria, a military zone forbidden to unauthorized persons by the Italian 

government since 1926, presented a potentially tough nut. Its one small beach 

suitable for amphibious assault had tricky offshore currents and high surf. The 

island’s surface of volcanic lava and ash could not support vehicular traffic and 

was cut by numerous ravines. The Italians had reinforced these natural defenses 

with more than a hundred concrete gun emplacements supplemented by fortified 

positions and pillboxes imbedded in the cliffs. Sturdy peasant farmhouses and 

hundreds of high, thick stone walls, which delineated each farmer’s fields, presented further military difficulties. But Pantelleria had a weak spot-its defending garrison. Before the invasion, Allied intelligence judged the morale of the garrison doubtful-a surmise strengthened by the poor performance of Pantelleria’s 

antiaircraft batteries during the end of the Tunisian campaign.4 The island’s 

approximately 12,000 defenders were mostly overage and inexperienced; many 

had homes and families on the island.5 In addition, the island was effectively 

deprived of help from the mainland because Allied air superiority over the entire 

area prevented resupply and reinforcement. 

After the fall of Tunisia Operation CORKSCREW became the Allies’ chief priority. Allied planners in charge of the invasion of Sicily had begun to consider 

an assault on Pantelleria as early as February 1943.6 On May 9, Eisenhower 

started preliminary preparations. He ordered Tedder to make the full strength of 

Spaatz’s NAAF available for action to remove Pantelleria as a bottleneck to 

Allied ambitions in the Mediterranean. He further directed Admiral Andrew 

Cunningham of the Royal Navy to provide naval striking force and protection 

for the movement of a division to the island.7 Finally, he set up a combined 

command consisting of Spaatz, Maj. Gen. Walter E. Clutterbuck, Commander of 

the British 1st Division, which would land on the island, and Rear Adm. R. R. 

McGrigor of the Royal Navy, commander of the naval forces in the assault, to 

oversee the operation. Eisenhower authorized his commanders to postpone the 

landing, but he reserved the right to abandon the project if losses or opposition 

grew too heavy.8 By virtue of his recent promotion, Spaatz outranked the British 

officers heading up the other sections of the combined operation. This fact, at 

least, made the air component primus inter pares. 

Two days later Eisenhower informed the U.S.-British Combined Chiefs of 

Staff (CCS) that he desired to take Pantelleria in order to use its airfield to support the western portion of the invasion. In the same message he noted that he 

thought the Allies could “crack this place” because its garrison consisted entirely 

of Italians.9 ’ 

Operations against Pantelleria presented an excellent opportunity to display 

227 
Maj. Gen. W. E. Clutterbuck (right), General Officer Commanding, 1st British 

Infantry Division, 1943. 

Rear Adm. R. R. McGrigor, Royal Navy, 1943. 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

the prowess of air power. The island required a heavy and sustained bombardment to reduce its defenses. Air had to supply this firepower because army 

artillery could not reach the island and Allied naval commanders would not risk 

their heavy units in the submarine- and mine-infested narrows, which remained 

subject to attack by the still-respected Axis air forces. In contrast, the island lay 

well within striking distance of Northwest African Strategic Air Force (NASAF) 

fields in Cape Bon. On May 13, Eisenhower told Marshall, 

I want to make the capture of Pantelleria a sort of laboratory to determine the 

effect of concentrated heavy bombing on a defended coastline. When the time 

comes we are going to concentrate everything we have to see whether damage 

to material, personnel and morale cannot be made so serious as to make a landing a rather simple affair.’” 

Spaatz meant to pass his superior’s test of air power. He committed to the 

assault the entire Strategic Air Force and part of the Tactical Air Force, an 

armada of four heavy-bomber groups, seven medium-bomber groups, two lightbomber groups, and eight fighter groups, a total of slightly more than 1,000 

operational aircraft. 1 1 Against this concentration the Axis had 900 operational 

combat planes within range of the island, most of them committed to tasks other 

than defending Pantelleria.12 

Spaatz met with his British Navy and Army colleagues on May 16 and presented the air plan of operations. It called for three days and nights of increasingly violent attacks, at the end of which the Navy would approach the island to 

test the remaining strength of enemy defenses. On the fourth day, the Allies 

would summon the garrison to surrender. Refusal by the garrison would be followed by a “high order” of air attack on the afternoon and night of the fourth 

day and the landing of troops on the morning of the fifth day. Apparently the 

Army and Navy accepted the plan, although General Clutterbuck expressed 

great concern about the amount of residual resistance his troops might have to 

overcome.13 Spaatz discounted Clutterbuck’s complaints and, in the privacy of 

his personal headquarters mess, began to refer facetiously to Clutterbuck as 

“Clusterbottom.”~4 

The next day, May 17, Spaatz expressed to Eisenhower his belief that the air 

component ought to control the operation, while the Army and Navy should 

conform to the air commander’s decisions. He also emphasized that the current 

bombing of Pantelleria constituted only part of a larger Allied air effort to suppress the German and Italian air forces in anticipation of the battle for Sicily.15 

The preparatory bombing of Pantelleria began on May 19. Fifty mediumbomber and fifty fighter-bomber sorties a day struck Pantelleria’s airfield and 

port in an effort to prevent any resupply of the island. These attacks, supplemented by a naval blockade, increased in tempo on May 23 and by the end of 

the month had almost completely cut the island’s supply lines. Additional raids 

against Axis airfields in Sicily, Sardinia, and the toe of Italy helped to prevent 

229 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Axis air interference with the Pantelleria operation and the all-important invasion of Sicily.16 

Just before the initial bombing of the island got under way, Spaatz started an 

inspection trip of the NAAF’s rear echelons. He flew from Eisenhower’s headquarters in Algeria to Casablanca on the evening of May 17. There he met Brig. 

Gens. John K. Cannon and Delmar Dunton, who commanded the Northwest 

African Training Command (NATC) and the Northwest African Service 

Command (NASC) respectively. The next day, Spaatz inspected the air depot at 

Casablanca and found it well stocked and efficient, a far cry from its state during 

his initial inspection in November 1942. Later that day, the three generals flew 

to Marrakech where they decided to release the facilities there from the purview 

of the NAAF and place them under the Air Transport Command. On the following day, the party flew from Marrakech east to Oujda, where they inspected the 

99th Fighter Squadron (Separate).l7 

The 99th was the first all-black AAF combat unit to reach an overseas combat theater. Its thirty-year-old commanding officer, Lt. Col. Benjamin 0. Davis, 

Jr., a West Point graduate and son of Brig. Gen. Benjamin Davis, the first black 

general in U.S. history, caught Spaatz’s eye. Spaatz’s diary recorded that 

“Lieutenant Colonel Davis impressed me most favorably, both in appearance 

and intelligence.” Spaatz also noted that the squadron would be attached to the 

33d Fighter Group for use in ground support and would receive the same treatment as any similar white squadron.18 

On May 20, Spaatz returned to Oujda and reviewed troops of the 82d 

(Airborne) Division. He hosted a lunch followed by a meeting with Lt. Gen. 

Mark W. Clark, Commander of the U.S. Fifth Army, Clark’s chief of staff, Maj. 

Gen. Alfred M. Gruenther, and Maj. Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway, Commander of 

the 82d Division. They agreed on the advisability of employing a battalion of the 

82d in the upcoming Sicilian invasion. When talk began to drift to further operations, Spaatz expressed some wildly unorthodox viewpoints on future courses of 

action. To avoid slogging through Sicily, Sardinia, and Italy the Allies could, he 

suggested, buy Spain off very cheaply and secure the necessary control of the air 

to cross the Pyrenees. Once they crossed the Pyrenees and reached the Bay of 

Biscay, they could eliminate the submarine threat, “the only chance Germany 

had of still winning the War.” An invasion “through Spain was the best way of 

putting an Army on the continent of Europe.”l9 Spaatz did not stop there. He 

suggested that the Americans exclude the ritish from the Iberian operation and 

thus more easily persuade the Spanish to cooperate. 

Clark not only agreed with Spaatz but added that on an earlier occasion he 

had discussed a similar idea with Marshall, who had proved sympathetic. 

Marshall had told Clark that Churchill opposed the idea. The generals concluded 

their session after deciding that, because the Americans were supplying the 

majority of combat forces, their plan for invading Spain ought to have priority 

over operations in the Mediterranean, which supported purely British national 

B 

230 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

interests. Clark said he would present the results of this brainstorming to 

Eisenhower that very afternoon.20 

If he did, they went no further. Whatever his limitations, if any, as a field 

commander, Eisenhower had far too much political and diplomatic talent and 

knowledge to seriously consider any such plan. It revealed an abysmal ignorance 

of Spanish politics and demonstrated a cavalier disregard of the numerous logistical and geographical difficulties involved. Nonetheless, it reflected the impatience of some Americans in the higher military echelons toward the strategic 

direction of the war forced on them by the necessities of coalition warfare. 

On May 22, Spaatz flew to meet Eisenhower, Cunningham, Alexander, and 

Tedder. Among other matters they discussed preparations for the Pantelleria 

operation. Admiral Cunningham, with certain reservations, backed Eisenhower 

in approving them.21 Alexander, the top ground commander in the theater, had 

his doubts.22 The consequences of failure, such as raised Italian morale, worried 

him greatly. Spaatz replied that if the Allies could not accomplish the reduction 

of the island, “we might as well pack up and go home.”23 

Later the same day Spaatz met with Clutterbuck and McGrigor to discuss 

operational specifics. At the end of the meeting, the three agreed to draw up a 

final plan and present it to Eisenhower. Spaatz went over its outlines with 

Eisenhower the next day and received his approval to go ahead with it.24 It followed the original recommendation that an increasing level of air bombardment 

culminate with a final intensive bombing attack on the five days prior to landing, 

scheduled for June 1 1. Apparently, Clutterbuck still had objections because 

Eisenhower noted in a letter to Marshall on May 25 that some of those responsible for carrying out the invasion “are shaking their heads.”25 In fact, Clutterbuck 

visited Eisenhower to tell him of his doubts about the attack and said that he 

“feared that he would have a great number of his men slaughtered.”26 

On May 24, at his forward headquarters in La Kroub, Spaatz again met with 

McGrigor and Clutterbuck to conclude their plans for convoys and lines of communication. They also scheduled rehearsals for three days (D-3) and one day (D1) before the actual invasion. Two days later, Spaatz flew to Malta and met its 

air commander, Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park, who agreed to allow NAAF 

planes to use Malta as a refueling point and to cooperate fully in mounting the 

operation. 

On his return from Malta, Spaatz found that Professor Solly Zuckerman, a 

medical doctor and research anatomist who had temporarily vacated an appointment at Oxford to conduct studies on the effects of bomb damage, had arrived at 

NAAF Headquarters in Constantine. The British Chief of Combined Operations, 

Lord Louis Mountbatten, had brought Zuckerman into his organization. There 

the professor became friends with the Deputy Chief of Combined Operations for 

the air element, Air Vice-Marshal James Robb, who later became Deputy 

Commander of the NAAF under Spaatz. Robb had introduced Zuckerman to 

Spaatz in March 1943, and the two apparently hit it off. Zuckerman wrote about 

23 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

his first dinner with Spaatz’s staff that “they were men who were learning, as I 

was learning, and unlike some professional military people whom 1 had met, 

there was no assumption of superior knowledge, and no assurance that they 

knew how Germany was going to be defeated.”27 

Two months later, Zuckerman, then in London, received a request by telegram from Robb to go to North Africa. Upon his arrival on May 22, Zuckerman 

met Tedder, another old friend, who sent him to Spaatz’s headquarters with 

instructions to comment on the feasibility of the forthcoming Pantelleria operation. After a two-day study in which he applied the statistical and quantitative 

methods he had employed in his scientific and anatomical studies, Zuckerman 

replied that the forces available could silence Pantelleria’s shore defenses.28 

From then until he issued his final report on the island’s damage in July 1943, 

Zuckerman became a part of Spaatz’s staff. He roomed with Brig. Gen. Lauris 

Norstad,29 Assistant Chief of Staff for Operations, NAAF, and attended all planning sessions.30 

Zuckerman’s first task after demonstrating the feasibility of the operation 

was to help prepare a detailed bombing plan. He had constant exchanges with 

Spaatz, Robb, Norstad, and McDonald, who, according to Zuckerman, made it 

plain that they had every confidence in his ability to produce an effective and 

precise bombing plan of a kind that had not been designed before.31 The professor repaid the airmen’s confidence by producing one that (1) provided precise 

aiming points; (2) called for detailed reports and analysis of each sortie; (3) 

required extensive photo reconnaissance; and (4) demanded the plotting of every 

bomb burst on a grid, with attention paid to the relationship of bombs identified 

to total dropped, the position of burst in relation to gun positions, and any damage caused. As a last proposal, Zuckerman called for an extensive ground survey 

of the island after it was captured.32 

Even before the professor presented his plan’s final draft, Spaatz’s forces 

began to execute it. Photos and reports poured into the schoolroom where 

Zuckerman, with a small staff and photo interpretation experts, assessed damage 

and assigned new targets. The plan called for enough bombs to be dropped on 

each battery to destroy only one-third to one-half of its guns; peripheral bomb 

damage would inactivate the rest of the battery by damaging gun sights and 

communications and storage facilities and would bury everything in rubble. 

Once the analysts had determined that a battery had received sufficient explosives, they redirected their effort. On each of the twelve days prior to the invasion, Zuckerman submitted a report to Norstad, who forwarded it, with appropriate changes of orders, to each command.33 

While the professor orchestrated the bombing, Spaatz coordinated other 

aspects of the invasion within the NAAF and with the Allied ground and naval 

forces. On May 28, he met with Brig. Gen. Elwood R. Quesada, Deputy 

Commander of the Coastal Air Force, and with a representative of Air Marshal 

Arthur Coningham, Commander of the Tactical Air Force. Spaatz made it clear 

232 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

to both that the Pantelleria invasion would have priority over any other task facing their commands and that he would accept no excuses for failure.34 When difficulties arose on June 3-4, during a preinvasion test exercise involving the 

Royal Navy command ship, HMS Largs, a five-year-old, 4,500-ton vessel designated a Landing Ship Headquarters and packed with communications gear, 

Spaatz flew to Sousse on the coast of northeastern Tunisia, the location of invasion task force headquarters. 

Clutterbuck and McGrigor reported an almost complete failure in air cooperation with both army and navy elements of the invasion force. Although final 

test results indicated three satisfactory communication links-between the ship 

and individual planes, between the ship and NAAF headquarters, and between 

the ship and task force headquarters at Sousse-the communication links 

between the ship and the Tactical Air Force and the XI1 Air Support Command 

(XI1 ASC) failed. Spaatz ordered the air inspector to investigate. The XI1 ASC, 

at Spaatz’s orders, would begin flying a daily mission against Pantelleria under 

the sole direction of the naval command ship and was to maintain constant communication with it at all times. In addition, Coastal and Tactical Air Forces 

would henceforth maintain full-time liaison officers at task force headquarters. 

Spaatz returned to Constantine convinced that much of the doubt in the minds of 

the British Army and Navy commanders stemmed from their own interservice 

rivalry with the RAF.35 Upon returning to his headquarters Spaatz instructed 

Robb to “inform Coningham that my impression was that he was a trifle too 

indifferent in his arrangements for CORKSCREW, particularly in connection with 

exercises.”36 

Meanwhile, the bombardment of Pantelleria steadily increased in fury. On 

June 1, the first B-17s attacked the island. Together with P-40 fighter bombers 

they dropped 141 tons of high explosives; on June 4, heavy, medium, and fighter 

bombers unloaded an additional 200 tons of bombs. Between May 18, when the 

bombing began, and June 4, the NAAF flew 1,700 sorties flinging 900 tons of 

ordnance, many of them 250- or 500-pound high-explosive bombs, on the harbor and airfield and 400 tons on Pantelleria’s gun positions.37 Starting with June 

7, D-day minus four (D-4), the level of attack increased daily, especially when 

General Doolittle, Commander of the Strategic Air Force, lowered the bombing 

altitude after disappointing results.38 

On June 7, Spaatz flew back to Sousse. At 5:30 the next morning, (D-3), he 

boarded Admiral McGrigor’s flagship, a small Hunt Class destroyer-escort, 

HMS Whaddon, for a personal look at the effects of bombing and naval gunfire 

on Pantelleria. Clutterbuck and Zuckerman were also on board. In addition to the 

eight destroyers of McGrigor’s task force, five cruisers from the British Mediterranean Fleet joined in the shelling. One of them, HMS Aurora, had Eisenhower 

and Admiral Andrew Cunningham on board. They, too, wished to view the proceedings.39 

As the Whaddon approached the island around 1O:OO A.M., Clutterbuck 

233 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

became visibly upset, complaining about the spasmodic nature of naval fire and 

what he considered excessive intervals between air strikes.40 When the Whaddon 

joined in the bombardment, firing 36-pound shells from its twin 4-inch guns, 

Spaatz muttered to Zuckerman, “What the hell kind of damage do they think 

these small shells will do?”41 This sentiment was echoed by the professor, who 

noted in his memoirs that photo interpretation throughout the campaign never 

revealed any significant damage by naval fire.42 A little before 11:OO A.M. the 

medium bombers attacked two gun batteries. Then came the pibce de rksistance. 

Doolittle’s B-17s rumbled over Pantelleria at 12,000 feet; their bomb salvos, 

aimed at two of the island’s batteries, completely obscured the coastline with 

smoke and dust. This sight even encouraged Clutterbuck.43 

Throughout the bombardment of June 8, only three Italian batteries attempted to engage the ships offshore, and the garrison did not put up a heavy 

barrage against the attacking aircraft. After the B-17s completed their mission, 

fighter-bombers dropped surrender leaflets and the Allies declared a unilateral 

six-hour cease-fire. These overtures elicited no response from the Italians, and 

so the attack resumed in the afternoon. The ships returned to harbor. Eisenhower, 

who had spent the day on a 6,000-ton cruiser, reported to Marshall that he and 

Cunningham “were highly pleased both with the obvious efficiency of the air 

and naval bombardments, and with their coordination achieved as to timing.”44 

Those who had spent their day baking in the Mediterranean sun on an unstable 1,000-ton destroyer-escort returned to port in a much more irascible frame of 

mind. Spaatz grumbled in his diary, 

This particular show has been 95% air, and would have been difficult under any 

circumstances, but has been doubly so by the reluctance of AFHQ 

[Eisenhower] to place an Air Officer in complete charge of the show. It has 

been only by virtue of my outranking the other officers that air has been able to 

take control, but it could have been easier. . . had this authority been vested in 

me, or an Air Offi~er.4~ 

Spaatz also directed that the next time Eisenhower observed an air attack he 

should have an air officer at his side to prevent his getting too big a dose of navy 

attitude. Apparently upon disembarking, Clutterbuck immediately fired off messages to Tedder and Eisenhower, complaining that communication failures in 

the test exercise and the XI1 ASC’s “lack of interest in” the operation had jeopardized the success of the invasion.46 

Eisenhower and Tedder responded promptly to Clutterbuck’s signals. 

Eisenhower sent his chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, and Tedder 

sent two men, his chief deputy and his chief of staff, Air Vice-Marshal H.E.P. 

Wigglesworth and Brig. Gen. Patrick W. Timberlake, to invasion force headquarters at Sousse, apparently with instructions to investigate the operation’s airground cooperation arrangements. When the extra stars arrived on June 9 (D-2), 

Spaatz noted tartly in his diary that “having so many fingers in the pie at the last 

234 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

minute does not lend much help to the operation at this stage of the game.”47 

Tedder’s men tested the signal arrangements, found them satisfactory, and 

returned to Tedder’s headquarters in Algiers with what Spaatz hoped was a 

“clearer picture of the trouble which can be caused by one nervous ground force 

man.”48 Bedell Smith stayed to the end of the operation, partly because 

Eisenhower had begun to be apprehensive regarding its ultimate conclusion-a 

case of nerves caused in some measure by “a number of long faces” at his own 

headquarters.49 

Over and above his meetings with Bedell Smith, Timberlake, and Wigglesworth, Spaatz double-checked arrangements for the invasion. He talked with 

AAF Brig. Gen. Aubry C. Strickland, one of the supporting aircraft pilots in the 

Question Mark flight who now commanded the NAAF Air Service Command 

troops scheduled to prepare the island’s airfield for its new Allied occupants. 

Strickland’s 2690th Base Command would also tend to the occupation chores 

involving Pantelleria’s civil population.50 Strickland reported that he had collected his troops and, at the moment, had that no further problems. Spaatz also 

instructed his supply officers to make sure that no stoppages occurred in the air 

supply line. He wanted definite assurances that NAAF planes had sufficient 

bombs, ammunition, and fuel to maintain maximum effort on both D-day and 

the days immediately preceding and following it.51 

By 11:OO the next morning, June 10, Spaatz and his staff boarded the HMS 

Largs, from which they observed the last day of air activity and the dispatch of 

the invasion fleet. By 8:30 the next morning on D-day, June 11, the Largs had 

sighted Pantelleria and within an hour had sailed to within ten miles of it. By 

10:30 A.M. the assault boats had formed up and awaited only the signal to start 

their final run to the beach, timed to coincide with the end of the naval bombardment and a last B-17 strike. The Tactical Air Force completed its bombing by 

1O:OO A.M., and the Strategic Air Force’s heavy bombers pounded the island one 

last time at 11:30 A.M., an instant before the first troops hit the beaches. On 

board the Largs, Clutterbuck continued to exhibit unease, even though the ship’s 

display boards showed that all bombing had followed schedule and that 300 

additional sorties had punished the island since 1O:OO A.M. Spaatz’s command 

diary noted scornfully, “Timidity on his part has been prevalent throughout the 

entire operation.”s2 

The landing itself proved anticlimactic. As troops hit the beach, offshore 

observers noted a white flag flying over the island. During the night of June 

10-11, Vice Adm. Gino Pavesi, the Italian military governor of Pantelleria, had 

informed Rome that the Allied bombing was unendurable.53 On the morning of 

June 11, Pavesi held a staff meeting. All present agreed that the situation had 

become untenable. There was no water (bombing had destroyed the water plant), 

no communications, and nearly no ammunition. In addition, almost all 24,000 

people on the island were exhausted. Before he sighted the invasion fleet, Pavesi 

had already made the decision to surrender by 1 1 :00 A.M. on June 1 1. 

235 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The already low morale of the defenders had crumbled under incessant bombardment and the shortages of basic supplies. Many of the local militia, who 

manned the antiaircraft batteries, had deserted in order to assist their families.54 

From May 8 to June 11, the NAAF had dropped 6,200 tons of bombs and had 

flown 5,285 sorties, with the loss of fourteen aircraft destroyed or missing. AAF 

planes accounted for 5,000 tons of bombs and 4,387 sorties.55 Naturally, Spaatz 

was pleased, as was Robert A. Lovett, Assistant Secretary of War for Air, who 

had come to North Africa in late May and had stayed to witness the conclusion 

of the operation. The two sent a telegram to Arnold briefly describing the battle 

and concluded by saying, “The boys have really done a grand j0b.”56 

The Allies transferred their attention and air strikes to the Pelagies (a group 

of three small islands: Lampedusa, Linosa, and Lampione also located between 

Africa and Sicily), which surrendered the next day. 

A day after the surrenders, Spaatz sent Zuckerman to Pantelleria to prepare a 

thorough report on the exact nature and effectiveness of the bombing. This 

prompt action reflected Spaatz’s concern that studies by the ground forces or 

navy hostile to air might downgrade the effectiveness of the air effort.57 While 

waiting for the professor’s final report, which he did not receive until July 20, 

Spaatz drew some immediate conclusions from the experience which led him to 

recommend three improvements: (1) longer-range radar for command ships; (2) 

manning of opposite ends of communications links by members of the same service and country; and (3) coordination of all bombing, whether tactical or strategic, with and through the control ship.58 

In Spaatz’s mind, at least, Pantelleria had confirmed the most extreme theories of air power enthusiasts: air power alone could defeat a major power. While 

still in the afterglow of the Pantelleria success, Spaatz wrote to a friend: 

The application of air power available to us can reduce to the point of surrender 

any first class nation now in existence within six months from the time that 

pressure is applied. In applying the pressure, any or all of the air must be 

directed against anything which can prevent or interrupt our air effort. Any 

conception of modem Warfare which does not fully recognize the foregoing is 

marking time in place.59 

Two days later, Spaatz forwarded to Tedder the preliminary analysis of 

damage by Zuckerman and in his cover letter expressed his conclusions a little 

less boldly: “Precision bombing deserves a precise plan, and air forces properly 

employed can destroy or reduce the operational effectiveness of defenses to a 

point where the will to fight ceases to exist.” In a bow to Zuckerman, Spaatz 

acknowledged, “Air force operations must be planned to employ scientifically 

forces adequate to secure the degree of material destruction necessary to reduce 

the objective. A by-product of such operations will almost certainly be complete 

demoralization.” Again referring to Zuckerman’s application of the scientific 

method, Spaatz wrote, “The force necessary to destroy communications and to 

isolate a given area is a matter of mathematical calculation. In this instance, the 

236 
Pantelleria, June 1943. Wrecked Italian Fiat and Macchi aircraft litter a field 

(above) on the island of Pantelleria after an Allied raid. The entrance to an underground hangar (below) indicates the protection such aircraft were afforded. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

force employed succeeded in paralyzing what can be regarded as a front of fifteen miles, with a reasonable factor of safety.” 

Spaatz had two more points: (1) an ascending and continuous scale of bombardment coupled with deliberate and successive elimination of strong points 

will markedly affect the defenders’ morale and paralyze their repair facilities 

and services; and (2) “unless topographical features exist, which allow the precise definition of targets and bombing lines, the air cannot be expected to provide a precise barrage immediately in front of ground or naval forces.”60 

These were the views of an air power zealot. Fortunately for himself and the 

AAF, Spaatz reserved most of them for his Command Diary. The Pantelleria 

operation merely confirmed his long-held opinion that air, in order to exert its 

dominant role in warfare, required equality with the army and the navy and that 

equality could come only with independence for the air forces. As Spaatz 

explained to Zuckerman, “There was one ‘A’ too many in the designation 

U.S.A.A.F.”-the ‘A’ that stood for Army-and Pantelleria would help get rid 

of it.61 

The operation also provided an opportunity for one of the pioneering efforts 

in the application of scientific analysis and quantification to combat, particularly 

in operations research for the AAF and the closely related field of operations 

analysis. Zuckerman’s methods and results predisposed airmen, such as Spaatz, 

to seek more opportunities to apply them. Zuckerman’s work received mention 

in Eisenhower’s dispatch on the fall of Pantelleria: 

A less intense bombardment might, in the light of later knowledge, have subjugated the island, but there would have been lacking essential data for the study 

of the tactical possibilities of scientifically directed air bombardment of strongpoint[s], and the most economical disposal of available air strength. Professor 

Zuckerman’s exhaustive report on the subject may prove of as much value in 

the fight against the Axis as the capture of the island.” 

Zuckerman’s final report showed that although the batteries received bombing on a scale of 1,000 tons of bombs per square mile, the amount of firepower 

lost to each battery ranged from 10 percent to 75 percent, with an average of 

more than 40 percent lost for all batteries.63 Only two batteries received direct 

hits and the attacks neutralized forty-three of the eighty guns, ten of them permanently.64 

Not all analysts of Operation CORKSCREW have agreed with Spaatz’s most 

extreme conclusions. Clutterbuck pointed out the failure of the XI1 ASC and the 

Lugs command ship to establish satisfactory communications links during practices. He argued that communications between the two would have failed disastrously had they been needed.65 

Montgomery’s recent biographer, Nigel Hamilton, condemned the effort 

expended in the conquest of Pantelleria as an “unfortunate distraction” and 

bemoaned the casualties “sacrificed to this airman’s fantasy of how the Axis 

238 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

enemy could be defeated by air power alone.”66 Hamilton implied that the effort 

could have been better spent by softening up Sicily, as if the initial German 

counterattack on the Sicilian beachheads could have been totally prevented by 

air power. To blame many of Montgomery’s problems in Sicily on inadequate 

preinvasion air bombardment does air power and Montgomery no service. 

Without the presence of the 33d Group’s P-40s and Spitfires flying from Pantelleria’s field, Montgomery would have had even less support. 

As the AAF official history admitted, “In the final analysis the morale of the 

defenders was the determining factor in the failure of Pantelleria to put up a 

strong and prolonged resistance. The air assault not only hurt the enemy’s ability 

to resist; it broke his will.”67 The AAF’s conclusions were literally true, but the 

extremely low morale of the garrison was not so much the product of air bombardment as of other factors. The air bombardment probably provided a facesaving excuse for an action the garrison would have taken in any case. A more 

resolute defending force, despite the damage inflicted by Allied air power, 

would certainly have made the landing a far bloodier affair. 

Preinvasion Planning and Air Preparations for Sicily 

At the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, the Anglo-American allies 

decided to continue their campaign in the Mediterranean by invading the island 

of Sicily after the fall of Tunisia. Planning for HUSKY, the code name for the 

operation, began in February 1943. The Allies did not complete the main elements of the plan until May 13. Before that date they had intended to land on 

two widely separated points on the island. The Americans would land on the 

northwest near the key port of Palermo, and the British would land in the southeast near the port of Syracuse. However, thanks in part to the strenuous objections of General Montgomery,68 Commander of the British 8th Army which 

would conduct the British portion of the landing, the final arrangements called 

for the Americans to land on the left flank of the British at Licata, Gela, and 

Scoglitti, with the immediate seizure of the large airfield complexes of Ponte 

Olivo, Biscari, and Comiso as their first objective. The British would land near 

the port of Syracuse and move inland. Spaatz’s Northwest African Air Force 

would carry the brunt of the air responsibility for the invasion. 

The NAAF first had to destroy or neutralize Axis air power prior to the 

assault. Next, it had to provide close air support to the naval, ground, and airborne assault forces. It also had to shield the invasion area, ongoing naval operations, and the assault convoys from enemy air attack while taking the offensive 

against enemy shipping and naval forces. Additional air units based in Malta and 

the Middle East would aid the NAAF in its endeavors.69 

The NAAF’s plans placed all units in Malta under the command of the Air 

239 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Officer Commanding, Malta, who in turn came under the general direction of 

the Commander of the Northwest African Tactical Air Force, Arthur 

Coningham. Air plans further ensured the maximum amount of flexibility by 

arranging for a high degree of coordination between the Northwest African 

Tactical and Strategic Air Forces; depending on the situation, either air force 

might come under the operational control of the other.70 

The air plan had three main phases. The first phase, from the defeat of the 

Axis in Tunisia to July 3, called for the NAAF to bomb systematically Axis air 

forces and Italian industry over a widely dispersed area so as not to give away 

the invasion target. The heavy bombers would bomb airfields in Sardinia, Sicily, 

and southern Italy, along with the ports of Naples, Messina, and Palermo and 

industrial targets in southern Italy. Harris’s Bomber Command would strike targets in northern Italy, in the hope of keeping some Axis air forces out of the 

invasion area. The second phase of the bombing, the week before the invasion, 

would switch attacks to enemy communications with Sicily and concentrate on 

enemy airfields with round-the-clock bombing. This phase ignored landing 

beaches in the hope of maintaining tactical surprise. The third phase, after the 

invasion, would keep the Allied air forces continuing their counterair attacks 

while maintaining air superiority over the island.71 

The AAF official history notes that “the air plan dealt for the most part with 

broad policies and it had not been integrated in detail with ground and naval 

plans. This was deliberate and the result of sound strategic and tactical considerations.”72 Unlike the North African campaign, the Sicilian operation would 

ensure the air forces the maximum flexibility in their employment and prevent 

the immobilization of air resources caused by parceling air out to specific units 

or sectors. As the operation began, 4,900 operational Allied planes faced 990 

German and 700 Italian air force operational aircraft.73 

As the invasion approached, the photographic and signal intelligence section 

at Spaatz’s headquarters in La Marsa put together the products of both sources 

of information on an hourly basis.74 Spaatz, as usual, paid special attention to 

ensuring rapid dissemination and use of the fruits of the intelligence effort. On 

June 18, he ordered a direct communications link set up between the NAAF War 

Room in La Marsa and the forward command posts of the Tactical, Strategic, 

and Coastal Air Forces. He also directed that each air force’s forward command 

post have present for duty at all times an officer with the authority to make binding decisions for that air force.75 These measures increased his control over subordinates and helped to enable all elements of the NAAF to respond quickly to 

the latest German moves. 

Throughout the Sicilian campaign, the NAAF performed its many tasks successfully. Before the invasion, its heavy- and medium-bomber groups, aided by 

the bombers attached to the U.S. Ninth Air Force and by its own fighterbombers, kept up their attacks on the Axis air forces. These attacks, which 

started with strikes assisting the NAAF’s April 1943 assault on German air 

240 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

transport into the Tunisian bridgehead and continued through and after the antiair strikes supporting the Pantelleria operation, rose to a crescendo in the week 

preceding July 10 (D-day). Spaatz firmly believed in the necessity of conducting 

a vigorous counterair offensive before other land, sea, or air operations began. 

On June 24 he observed to Arnold, “The German Air Force becomes very cocky 

when it has a few successes. It then becomes necessary to give them a thorough 

beating on their airdromes as well as in the air.”76 

By the beginning of June, the Luftwaffe had started to transfer bombers from 

Sicily and southern Italy to southern France and northern Italy. This move diminished its ability to attack the ports where the Allied invasion forces assembled. 

ULTRA, however, revealed an increase in Luftwaffe fighter and fighter-bomber 

activity on Sicily, which continued until July 3. At that point the NAAF began a 

final week of intensive bombardment, which reduced the number of fighters by 

one-third and caused the fighter-bombers to withdraw. Diversionary and counterair raids on Sardinia in the week before the invasion reduced the 130 

Luftwaffe fighter-bombers there to 35 percent serviceability and denied them the 

aviation fuel necessary for sustained operations. Added to the invaluable information gained from signal intelligence was detailed aerial photographic reconnaissance. NAAF aircraft took special photos of industrial areas and communication lines and daily pictures of the Corsican, Sardinian, Sicilian, and Italian airfields and the ports berthing the major surface combat units of the Italian fleet.77 

By July 10, only two airfields on Sicily remained entirely serviceable. Also, 

NAAF strikes against communications lines had totally disrupted the Sicilian 

rail network by destroying rolling stock and repair facilities. As a final fillip, on 

July 9, NAAF Spitfires shattered the Hotel San Domenico at Taormina, the Luftwaffe’s headquarters on Sicily. This raid, prompted by the pinpoint accuracy of 

signal and other intelligence, dislocated the Luftwaffe’s response on the day of 

the invasion.78 The NAAF’s effective preinvasion attacks of Sicily helped to 

limit to 12 ships the losses among the invasion fleet of 3,000 craft as a result of 

Axis air action, as opposed to the original estimate of possibly 300.79 

When the Allied troops reached the shore, Coningham’s Northwest African 

Tactical Air Force once again shouldered its responsibilities for air-ground 

cooperation. Allied air had an equal voice in air-ground arrangements. It had not 

in the invasion of North Africa in 1942. Montgomery’s 8th Army continued its 

excellent relationship with Air Vice-Marshal Harry Broadhurst and the Western 

Desert Air Force. On the U.S. side Spaatz had spent considerable energy providing support for Lt. Gen. George S. Patton’s U.S. Seventh Army. 

On May 13, Spaatz, Tedder, and Coningham met and agreed on new command arrangements for air support and cooperation. Col. Paul Williams, 

Commander of the XI1 Air Support Command (XI1 ASC), the principal U.S. 

component of the Tactical Air Force, was to move over to Troop Carrier 

Command (TCC), a unit charged with the delivery and supply of airborne troops 

in the combat zone. Col. Lawrence P. Hickey would take command of XI1 ASC 

24 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Headquarters, which would become a glorified air support party attached directly to 

Patton’s headquarters. The fighter units of XI1 ASC would join the Third Air 

Defense Wing directly under Coningham’s command, while Brig. Gen. John K. 

Cannon replaced Kuter as Coningham’s second in command and principal 

American deputy. Finally, Tedder was to meet with all army commanders and senior 

air officers before the invasion in order to completely clarify arrangements. The conferees also agreed that when U.S. forces had fmly established themselves on Sicily, 

the Xu ASC would reconstitute itself as a major combat unit.80 According to Spaatz, 

these moves resulted from his feeling that the Tactical Air Force had not given the 

U.S. 11 Corps enough help in the just-completed campaign.81 

The new arrangements left Patton unsatisfied. He noted in his diary on May 

22, “Tedder controls the air with Spaatz, a straw man, under him. . . . Conyngham [sic] commands the tactical air force and the close support air force 

by another British Vice Air Marshall [sic]. Our close support force is commanded by a Colonel. . . . The U.S. is getting gypped.”82 Patton took his complaints to Alexander, who passed them on to Spaatz. For his part, Spaatz assured 

Alexander that he had placed Cannon in Coningham’s headquarters precisely 

because Patton had more faith in Cannon than in any other air force officer. 

Spaatz promised to send Cannon to Patton as soon as the former had a chance to 

become familiar with his new j0b.83 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz receiving a report from members of the 90th Photographic 

Intelligence Wing, North Africa, July 1,1943. 

242 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

Two days later on May 24, Spaatz met with Cannon, told him of the earlier 

promise to Alexander, and instructed him to see Patton within the week. Spaatz also 

noted that Patton had expressed apprehension to Eisenhower as well and instructed 

Cannon to inform Patton that the air reconnaissance squadron attached to his headquarters would receive its orders directly from XI1 ASC and not Coningham.84 

Before the landing Spaatz made one major change in the implementation of 

the air support command arrangement. He replaced Colonel Hickey, who had 

apparently never gained the confidence of Coningham,85 with Maj. Gen. 

Edward J. House. This change mollified both Coningham and Patton while making the rank of the Commander of XI1 ASC equal to that of Air Vice-Marshal 

Broadhurst’s, Air Officer Commanding the Western Desert Air Force.86 

Air Power and the Invasion of Sicily 

With few exceptions, air power performed successfully throughout the 

Sicilian campaign. Although the NAAF’s efforts minimized friendly ground and 

naval losses to enemy air power, air-ground cooperation again proved unsatisfactory to the U.S. ground forces. For most of the campaign on-call air support 

remained non-existent. Maj. Gen. John P. Lucas, Commander of VI Corps, 

voiced an apparently widespread opinion: “Air missions took too long to accomplish even after the planes had been moved to Sicily. Authority to fly this mission could be obtained in about three hours whereas the mission itself took only 

20 or 30 minutes.”87 

Near the end of the fighting, however, the Allies introduced the “Rover Joe” 

(in British usage, the “Rover” tentacle), a communications unit located with 

front-line divisions or brigades or sometimes smaller units, consisting of an 

armored scout car equipped with radio sets and a joint staff of army officers and 

one RAF officer. It communicated with the Army Air Support Control, the joint 

Army-RAF communications group at the WDAF/8th Army Headquarters; with 

the Air Liaison Officer at the wing or group airfield; and, by means of a VHF 

radio, directly with aircraft over the target area. The staff of the tentacle kept in 

close touch with the local army unit commander. If he approved an air strike, the 

liaison officer at the wing was briefed. When the planes arrived, the tentacle’s 

RAF officer directed them to the target. The U.S. Seventh Army and XI1 ASC 

used a similar system based on the jeep.88 

The partial failure of airborne operations as well as the failure to prevent the 

Axis evacuation of Sicily by completely interdicting the Straits of Messina 

marred the air effort. The initial paratroop and glider forces landed on D-day 

(July 9), seized many of their objectives, and caused great confusion to the 

island’s defenders. Nonetheless, the landings proved costly in terms of manpower; and, because the troops were so widely scattered, their effect on operations was disappointing. 

243 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Subsequent missions did not remedy initial problems, and one reinforcement 

mission flown on the night of July 11 resulted in heavy losses for little discernible 

gain. This mission was scheduled to drop the 504th Parachute Regiment’s 2,300 

soldiers into the friendly American beachhead at Gela at about 11:OO P.M. Its 

approach route took it over friendly ships offshore and then over American-occupied positions in Sicily. Generals Patton, Bradley, and Matthew B. Ridgway (the 

parachutists’ commander) all took extreme care to inform the Army, especially 

the antiaircraft crews, of the drop and instructed them to hold their fire. They 

also received assurances from the Navy that guaranteed antiaircraft-free passage 

over ships offshore. 

Unfortunately, the mission arrived on the heels of the last Axis air attack of 

several that had hit the area during the day. An earlier attack had blown an 

ammunition ship sky-high. A gunner in the fleet, confused and nervous from a 

day of Axis bombing and perhaps uninformed of the drop, opened fire on the 

slow, low-flying, troop-carrying aircraft. Within seconds every antiaircraft gun 

on ship and shore joined him. They slaughtered the unprepared and ungainly 

transports, shooting down 23 and damaging 60 of the 144. The 504th Regiment 

reported 81 dead, 132 wounded, and 16 missing.89 Pilots lost formation and geographical bearings and proceeded to scatter the paratroops from Gela to the east 

coast.90 

Eisenhower demanded an immediate investigation by both Patton and 

Spaatz, exclaiming, “If the cited report is true, the incident could have been 

occasioned only by inexcusable carelessness and negligence. . . . You will institute within your command an immediate and exhaustive investigation into the 

allegation with a view of fixing responsibility.” Eisenhower also asked for a 

complete statement of disciplinary action taken, if any proved necessary.91 

Spaatz visited both the 51st and 52d Troop Carrier Wings on July 13 and 

met with all group commanders who had led missions on the nights of July 9 

and 11. As he informed Arnold in a letter the next day, he found morale high 

despite the losses. Spaatz had several pertinent observations for Arnold, who 

enthusiastically supported airborne operations: (1) airborne operations can avoid 

excessive casualties only by achieving surprise; (2) excessive losses will occur if 

troops are dropped on organized battle positions; (3) ground and naval units 

need extensive training to prevent them from firing on friendly aircraft; and (4) 

surface forces should get ample warning before an airborne overflight of their 

positions and should be forbidden to fire on any planes during the designated 

time of the overflight.92 Tedder endorsed the report, adding, “A.A. firing at 

night is infectious and control almost impossible.”93 The lessons Spaatz, 

Eisenhower, and the advocates of airborne operations gleaned from the Sicilian 

operation paid dividends in the planning for the airborne phase of the crosschannel invasion. 

In addition to the supervision of combat operations, which, of course, 

required much of Spaatz’s time and effort, two other related matters received 

244 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

significant attention: the question of a separate postwar U.S. Air Force and the 

establishment of an all-American, all- AAF, Mediterranean-wide command. In 

summing up the Tunisian campaign, Spaatz had written to Arnold, “If it were not 

for the disturbance which would ensue, I would probably announce the urgent 

necessity of a separate Air Force.”94 This comment reflected not only his opinion 

of the just-completed campaign but also the experiences and conclusions over his 

entire career. In 1925, at Brig. Gen. William “Billy” Mitchell’s court-martial, 

Spaatz had stated that the air arm could not function properly under the aegis of 

the War Department, and the eighteen years after the trial had only served to reinforce that opinion. On June 1, Spaatz, in a conference with Doolittle and Maj. 

Gen. Follett Bradley, who commanded one of the U.S. continental air forces 

charged with training and had just arrived from Eaker’s Eighth Air Forces 

Headquarters in Britain on a trip at Arnold’s behest, agreed that, although the current air organization was adequate for the defeat of Germany, the final campaign 

against Japan would require the separation of the U.S. Army Air Forces from the 

U.S. Army. Spaatz added that the AAF ought to disentangle itself from the British 

Army and the RAF as well. This action would enable the AAF to set up all-U.S. 

strategic and tactical air forces whose commanders would have equal rank with 

the Army Ground Forces commander. The overall air commander would outrank 

the ground force commander.95 These musings did not leave AAF circles. 

Spaatz also believed that air power should have a preeminent place not only 

in the Sicilian invasion but in any amphibious operation. Before the Sicilian 

landings he observed, “The next operation will be successful, but the same mistake is being made which was made in the Pantelleria assault-that of placing 

air as a secondary power to the ground forces and not giving them the top 

command when air success is first in importance in making the operation a success.”96 A few days later, on July 5, he codified his ideas on the proper role of 

air power in future operations as follows: (1) air power isolates the area where 

the ground forces will attack (2) air power will attain air supremacy over that 

area; (3) enemy forces and fortifications will be reduced by a rising scale of 

attack la Pantelleria; and (4) only after the completion of the foregoing actions 

will ground forces, fully supported by tactical and strategic air, begin their 

assault. Spaatz added that, in operations having a further lead time for planning 

than HusKY/Sicily, the air commander should have the supreme command and 

army and navy forces should start their combat operation only after the air commander had given the go-ahead.97 

It should also be noted that Spaatz did not view the Strategic and Tactical 

Air Forces as units that operated entirely independently of one another. Many 

times he made it clear that strategic forces should be employed in roles that provided direct support to the ground forces when requiredduring, for example, 

preinvasion and breakthrough operations. On at least one occasion he complained to Eisenhower that Tedder tended to overcompartmentalize strategic and 

tactical air activities.98 

245 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

In August, Spaatz had another opportunity to advance the AAF’s drive for 

independence and equality. U.S. Senators of the Select Committee to Visit the 

War Theaters, after spending time in England with Eaker’s Eighth Air Force, 

flew into Marrakech to tour the North African Theater. On August 13, Spaatz 

and Tedder met with Sen. Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., of Massachusetts, the committee’s Republican member. Two days later, Spaatz met with three Democratic 

members, Sens. Richard B. Russell of Georgia, Albert B. Chandler of Kentucky, 

and James M. Mead of New York, and with Sen. Bennett C. “Champ” Clark 

who, although not appointed to the select committee, had apparently attached 

himself to it. At both meetings Spaatz emphasized the necessity of separating 

the air force from the ground army.99 He even asked General Wilson, the 

group’s escort, to keep that thought “foremost” in any conversations he had with 

the Senators.100 

Spaatz’s papers contain a rather florid draft of a statement that he apparently 

used in his conversations with the committee members. Entitled “Separation and 

Efficiency,” dated August 3, 1943, the ten-page draft, which may or may not 

have been personally written by Spaatz, presents an AAF insider’s argument for 

the division of the U.S. armed forces into three equal branches for the purposes 

of combat and economic efficiency. “Why,” asks the paper, “does the one major 

service that has demonstrated its powers remain a divided weapon, existing in 

many forms under several services but consolidated and coordinated nowhere?” 

After a lengthy examination of the differences in the handling of air power 

between the Army Air Forces and the Navy, in which the latter is found wanting, the paper suggests a reform of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff which would 

grant to the air force an equal vote with the two other services and to the head of 

the Joint Chiefs the power and responsibility to make final decisions. The paper 

also recommends the establishment of theater commands on the same joint 

bases. The complete separation of the AAF Air Staff from the War Department 

General Staff would accompany reform.101 The select committee proved infertile soil for such proposals. As Spaatz probably realized, serious congressional 

consideration of the proper position of the AAF in the U.S. military hierarchy 

would have to wait until after the war. Upon its return to Washington in October 

1943, the committee merely noted, “Close integration of our land, sea and air 

forces has been accomplished in most theaters and works extremely well. It 

points the way to a sound post-war military policy.”l02 

Along with his desire for the eventual independence of a U.S. air force 

within the U.S. military structure, in the summer of 1943 Spaatz had a more 

immediate goal-independence from the Royal Air Force. The February 1943 

reorganization of Allied air power in North Africa had set up the Northwest 

African Air Forces and had provided the NAAF with a combined U.S.-British 

staff from Spaatz’s headquarters down to, but not including the combat group 

level. From the Kasserine Pass crisis to the Axis surrender in Tunisia, the 

NAAF’s arrangements had worked well, although Spaatz believed that the good246 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

will of the individuals involved had been more responsible than any intrinsic 

merit or stability in the structure itself.103 

Spaatz also found the air arrangements between the NAAF and Air Chief 

Marshal Arthur Tedder’s Mediterranean Air Command (MAC) less than perfect. 

he “expressed the fear that MAC was becoming too operational, and that there 

was an increasing tendency for that command to go direct to elements of the 

NAAF.”l04 The practice of bypassing Spaatz’s headquarters, especially in communications between Tedder and Coningham, rankled the Americans. On May 

24, Spaatz had a conference with Coningham’s American deputy, Brig. Gen. 

John K. Cannon: Spaatz stated that “the Tactical Air Force has the tendency to 

consider itself an independent air force” and that he expected Cannon to keep 

him “informed of any tendencies or concrete action in this direction.” Spaatz 

added that he ultimately aimed to group all American tactical units under 

American command. In the meantime, Spaatz cautioned Cannon, the reconnaissance squadron attached to the U.S. I1 Corps should not come under the command of Western Desert Air Force, a British command, or Tactical Air Force, 

nor would he permit the reorganization or breaking up of any American 

groups. 105 

On June 1, Spaatz told Doolittle that he preferred to have all American 

Tactical and Strategic Air Force units under a U.S. commander and that he 

thought it best to “extricate” the AAF from the RAF. Three days later Spaatz 

noted in his diary a disagreement between himself and Coningham about which 

particular American officer should command the XI1 ASC, an all-US. unit. On 

June 6, Spaatz became extremely irked when Coningham treated the Pantelleria 

operation in a particularly offhand manner. Later, through his deputy, Air Vice 

Marshal Robb, he advised Coningham that a change of attitude would be desirable. On June 12, at the conclusion of the Pantelleria operation, Cannon and 

Spaatz met again at Sousse. Cannon reported that MAC had sent a signal moving the U.S. 33d Fighter Group from the Tactical to the Coastal Air Force three 

days prior to the final assault. This action had clearly intruded into Spaatz’s 

realm of authority as Commanding General, Twelfth Air Force, and Commanding General, NAAF. Spaatz instructed Cannon to tell Coningham that “if he carried out any future orders received direct from MAC he would be relieved of his 

command-that all orders should come direct from NAAF.” Spaatz further 

spelled out his view in person to Tedder on June 21: “MAC does not have the 

right to exercise control over units under the command of NAAF,” Spaatz 

claimed, “unless [that] order is coordinated through HQ, NAAF.”lo6 

The establishment in mid-June of a joint MAC-NAAF advanced command 

post at La Marsa blurred further the lines of authority. This command post, 

which served as the control center for the Sicily operation for both Tedder and 

Spaatz, had direct radio links to all of the NAAF’s and MAC’S subordinate commands. It also served as a collection and analysis point for photographic and 

electronic intelligence. Access to this communications network and intelligence 

247 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

made it easier for MAC to assume a larger operational role at Spaatz’s expense. 

By June 27, Spaatz’s American chief of staff, Brig. Gen. Edward P. Curtis, had 

begun to suggest that the joint command post wasted too much staff. Spaatz 

replied that he expected an early break, with NAAF Headquarters moving forward while MAC stayed behind.107 

By July 12, Spaatz apparently had decided to ensure his control of U.S. air 

units even if it meant completely bypassing the British. On that date he ordered 

the creation of a new communications network manned entirely by Americans. 

The system, which would operate only between senior U.S. officers, would have 

no central filing system; copies of messages would be kept only by sender and 

recipient. Spaatz wanted the system, which soon became known as REDLINE, in 

effect by August 1. The first link was to be established between Cannon and XI1 

ASC, presumably to give XI1 ASC a way to circumvent Coningham. Spaatz also 

wanted the network so flexible that even missions already airborne could still be 

recalled. When established, the system would give Spaatz complete control, 

without British interference, over all AAF units and personnel in the Mediterranean. 

Spaatz planned to go even further in separating his forces from the RAF. On 

July 12, he instructed Generals Cannon and Quesada “to have officers in training so that you will have them ready to take over. I want the 12th Fighter 

Command built up so that key personnel will be trained when the Americans are 

in complete control.” Spaatz also wanted American officers in each function of 

the Tactical and Coastal Air Forces who could take over at a moment’s 

notice.108 The next day Spaatz told Doolittle that future plans for the NAAF 

were unstable.109 

Eventually, REDLINE grew into a swift and effective all-American communications system. REDLINE traffic reveals that the most voluminous message 

files deal with Cannon at the Tactical Air Force. Spaatz used this link as a 

means of asserting his control over the U.S. units in Coningham’s command, 

where responses to his regular orders were consistently delayed. He simply 

had copies repeated to Cannon over REDLINE. An early exchange of messages 

typifies the traffic. On August 7, Spaatz testily wired Cannon, “It is stated in 

the Tactical Air Force Operations Report for August 5 that Desert Air Force 

sent three A-36 missions to toe of Italy et cetera. On my visit yesterday I was 

assured that A-36 groups are operating under command control of 12 Air 

Support Command. Answer immediately as to what circumstances Desert Air 

Force gives orders to A-36 groups?”llo Three hours later Cannon replied, 

“Tactical Air Force Operations Report for August 5 is in error. Desert Air 

Force never repeat never under any circumstances gives orders to A-36 groups 

or to any other organizations assigned to 12 ASC.”III In contrast, Spaatz and 

Doolittle seldom resorted to REDLINE since their regular channels had no 

British middlemen and, of course, Doolittle responded to Spaatz, his American 

248 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

commanding officer, with a great deal more alacrity than he did to Coningham. 

Cannon, for his part, could not use regular channels because they ran straight 

through Coningham. 

On the morning of July 18, Spaatz and Eisenhower met to discuss the reorganization of the AAF in the Mediterranean Theater. Butcher, Eisenhower’s 

naval aide, described in his diary how Allied Force Headquarters viewed 

Spaatz’s status: “This situation has resulted in Spaatz being virtually squeezed 

out of his job, yet the vast majority of all aircraft in operation are American. 

Ike is keenly aware that there may be American reactions against the current 

arrangement.”’ 12 

Later in the day Spaatz visited Eisenhower with a long message for Marshall 

which, after some discussion, Eisenhower sent. “After careful examination and 

test of the U.S. air organization in the Mediterranean, Spaatz and I,” wrote 

Eisenhower, “have concluded that the Ninth Air Force should be abolished as a 

separate entity and incorporated into the Twelfth.” Eisenhower gave six considerations that influenced his decision. The first three concerned the advantages in 

having only one AAF headquarters with a single logistical and administrative 

organization. The last three addressed Spaatz’s and the AAF’s problems with the 

RAF. Eisenhower explained: 

Under the existing setup the entire air force is under the strategic control of the 

Air Chief Marshal [Tedder], yet his principal American assistant [Spaatz] has 

direct control over only part of the American force. In other words the 

American Air Force and principal American commander do not have that prestige that should be theirs. 

In his next point Eisenhower explained that recent operations had shown the 

need for the consolidation of Tedder’s and Spaatz’s headquarters, in order “to 

permit the constant and instant coordination of all air forces in the Mediterranean.” 

Furthermore, in the heat of intensive fighting, tactical and strategic air force operations merged into one problem that was virtually impossible to coordinate 

through more than one headquarters. Thus, if Spaatz had a secure position as 

commanding general of all AAF forces in the Mediterranean, the NAAF could 

disappear and Spaatz could serve as Tedder’s deputy. This post would give 

Spaatz “a position of great strength, prestige, and influence,” while allowing the 

British to maintain the overall strategic responsibility for the theater allotted to 

them by the directives of the Combined Chiefs of Staff. The scheme would also 

“provide absolute continuity of American command of all American units from 

top to bottom.”ll3 

In his reply to Eisenhower’s message, Marshall accepted the outline of the 

plan. Eisenhower asked Spaatz to prepare a response, which he sent out under 

Eisenhower’s signature on July 26.114 On August 22, Eisenhower joined the 

249 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

units of the U.S. Ninth Air Force to those of the U.S. Twelfth Air Force.* This 

action placed every AAF unit in the theater under Spaatz and administratively 

moved the units belonging to the defunct Ninth Air Force from the control of the 

British Desert Air Force to the U.S. Twelfth Air Force. In practice the Ninth’s 

units continued to perform their old roles in the Strategic and Tactical Air Forces. 

The move did not solve the problem of overlapping functions between MAC and 

NAAF which continued to plague the two organizations until they joined to form 

Headquarters, Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (MAAF), on December 10, 1943. 

Eisenhower and Spaatz met in Algiers on August 4 where Spaatz informed 

his superior that he and Tedder disagreed on air reorganization “primarily 

because of the extent to which I insist that American units be commanded by 

American commanders all the way up to the highest command.” Eisenhower 

agreed to return Tedder’s headquarters from La Marsa to Algiers, to separate 

Tedder from day-to-day operations while keeping him where he could supply 

advice on air matters close at hand. Back at his headquarters, Spaatz told his 

staff that the NAAF had just reverted to its status prior to the establishment of 

the NAAF-MAC Combined Command Post-in other words, the NAAF had 

direct control of operations. He added that Tedder would accept this arrangement before they returned to Algiers.115 

This state of affairs lasted five days and then Eisenhower reversed himself. 

In Tunis, on August 9, in a meeting with Eisenhower, Tedder, Coningham, and 

Alexander on planning for the invasion of Italy, Spaatz had an opportunity to 

present organizational problems. He noted that the current situation left 

Coningham in doubt as to the chain of command. The situation could be corrected if orders to Coningham and Doolittle came from the NAAF, not from a 

combined NAAF-MAC headquarters or from MAC alone. In addition, MAC 

Advance Headquarters should be disbanded, and morning meetings between 

MAC and NAAF no longer held. 

After the meeting, Eisenhower told Spaatz that he had changed his mind, 

perhaps succumbing to urgings from Tedder. As a result, Spaatz and Eisenhower 

were back to the position they had taken in their July 18 message to Marshall. 

Eisenhower “stated that he did not want anything to develop which would indicate that the RAF and the USAAF could not operate together.” He wanted MAC 

as the “top over-all’’ headquarters, with the Twelfth Air Force as an administrative head for all U.S. units. Spaatz complied and directed his staff to send to 

MAC all nonadministrative functions of the NAAF. Spaatz noted in his diary, 

“This is a compromise organization and will be successful only if senior staff 

officers are very careful to consider the proper prerogative of staff officers of 

other headquarters.”l*6 

* Headquarters, Ninth Air Force, was transferred to England to lead the U.S. tactical air force 

intended to support the cross-channel invasion. The Ninth Air Force had been part of the Northwest 

African Air Forces. 

250 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

In fact although not in name, Spaatz became Tedder’s deputy. He maintained a voice in overall strategic direction and zealously championed the 

administrative separation of the British and U.S. air forces in all but the top 

command levels. Yet despite his stand, day-to-day operational control of Allied 

air power in the Mediterranean increasingly tended to become Tedder’s preserve. Spaatz would have found much to agree with in the postwar statement of 

his successor as deputy, John Slessor: 

The position of deputy commander is not an easy one: he is rather liable to be 

neither fish, flesh, fowl nor good red herring and his responsibility is not easy 

to define. As in all these things, it depends largely on personalities, and on 

friendly arrangements between the commander and his deputy about who does 

what-an arrangement easier to agree upon than to make known to all subordinate commanders.’I7 

Spaatz had succeeded in gathering the disparate AAF elements in the theater 

under a single U.S. commander, and he remained Eisenhower’s principal 

American air adviser. But he had failed to separate the AAF from the RAF completely, and the two would remain harnessed together, thanks to Tedder’s preeminent position as overall Air Commander in Chief. 

This squeezing out of Spaatz left Coningham with what amounted to independent control of the theater’s tactical air forces. Spaatz could not and Tedder 

did not control him. Several errors in judgment by Coningham, which went 

uncorrected by higher air authority, may have contributed to the unsuccessful air 

interdiction of the Axis evacuation from Sicily across the Straits of Messina to 

Italy. From August 11 to 17, the Germans and Italians, working independently, 

evacuated more than 100,000 men, 9,800 vehicles, 47 tanks, 150 guns, and 

17,000 tons of munitions and stores.1’8 Three German divisions escaped to fight 

again. The Allies had made no plans as they had in the Tunisian campaign to 

halt this retrograde movement, which earned the Allied command structure and 

each of the three services equal shares of the reproaches from postwar analysts. 

Land forces, particularly the British, did not press the Axis forcefully 

enough to prevent them from disengaging the vast majority of their troops. The 

naval forces would not risk the loss or damage of their heavy units by bringing 

them into the confined waters of the straits in order to sink the evacuation ships. 

The Allied high command structure, influenced perhaps by Hitler’s previous 

refusal to evacuate Tunisia, not only did not anticipate the evacuation but failed 

to realize it had begun until very late in its progress. Neither Eisenhower nor his 

three chief subordinates, Alexander, Cunningham, and Tedder, pushed hard 

enough or coordinated readily enough with their colleagues to mount the combined ground, naval, and air effort necessary to close the Straits of Messina.119 

Finally, the air forces, under Coningham, made several mistakes. Coningham 

assumed that the evacuation would take place largely at night, and he anticipated 

heavy air opposition over the straits. Both these reasonable assumptions proved 

25 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

wrong, but he did not abandon them. Although he had the authority to request 

the assistance of Strategic Air Force’s heavy bombers, medium bombers, and 

fighters, with twelve hours’ advance notice, subject to Doolittle’s approval, 

Coningham apparently never requested the American daylight bombers after 

August 9. From July 29 to August 17, NAAF heavy bombers flew only 142 sorties over Sicily.120 Most of the NASAF therefore devoted itself to attacks on the 

Italian mainland distant from the straits, in preparation for the upcoming invasion of Italy. On the day the main German withdrawal began, Coningham notified Tedder that, should a big withdrawal develop, “we can handle it with our 

own resources and naval assistance.”121 In fact, Coningham overestimated the 

ability of the NATAF to halt the evacuation. The Axis powers had brought up 

numerous heavy and light antiaircraft guns to defend the crossing. These put up 

such intense fire that NATAF’s light bombers and fighter-bombers could not 

operate effectively against Axis shipping, which also carried heavy antiaircraft 

armament.122 Nor did Coningham press home his attacks, perhaps because he 

and his superiors sensed no emergency. On August 16, the last full day of the 

evacuation, with an available force of 970 aircraft, he sent only 317 sorties 

against the straits.123 After the war, Coningham himself concluded, “The escape 

of a large number of the enemy at Messina proved that a density of flak can be 

provided so lethal that air attack can be held off sufficiently to maintain communications.”l24 

Coningham apparently believed that his orders should come from Tedder 

rather than Spaatz. This was the view that Spaatz, who at the time of the evacuation had lost much of whatever control he ever had over Coningham, expressed 

to Eisenhowever on August 9.125 Tedder had taken over strategic direction and 

allocation for theater air power, thereby forcing Spaatz to concentrate primarily 

on purely American administrative matters. 

Spaatz’s papers contain no references at all to the Axis evacuation. Given 

his intense interest in the details of the operation against supply lines in Tunisia 

and in the bombing of Pantelleria, it seems reasonable to conclude that he had 

become detached from day-to-day operations, especially the tactical sphere of 

responsibility. Instead, during the time period of the evacuation he found time to 

campaign for air force independence with visiting senators and to inspect bomb 

groups in North Africa. In addition, he oversaw the AAF in the Mediterranean’s 

first Combined Bomber Offensive mission-against fighter assembly plants in 

Wiener-Neustadt, Austria, on August 13-and discussed plans for AAF reorganization and the coming invasion of Italy with Eisenhower and Tedder.126 

In short, Spaatz had no hand in stopping the evacuation. There were indications that if he had he would have, at the very least, used the U.S. heavy bombers 

more frequently on evacuation targets. On August 4, shortly before the evacuation, he said, in Eisenhower’s presence, at a general officers’ meeting, “It is my 

belief that it [air] should have been used exclusively in Sicily to expedite the 

battle there.” In his diary Spaatz added, “Too much insistence exists in the mind 

252 
PANTELLERIA AND SICILY 

of Tedder that there be a differentiation between Tactical and Strategic Air 

Forces. Under certain battle conditions they should be considered as one Air 

Force and should be applied [together] as was done in the case of Pantelleria.”l27 

Spaatz’s remark on Tedder’s mindset found an echo in the criticism of the 

air effort in official Royal Navy and U.S. Army histories.128 Both point out 

shortcomings in Tedder’s and Coningham’s performances. The U.S. Army history, in particular, takes Tedder to task for continuing to employ the heavy B-17 

and B-24 bombers of the NASAF too far from crucial evacuation ports. 

Coningham contributed by releasing the heavy bombers from interdiction 

responsibility on August 11 and by overestimating the effectiveness of his own 

tactical forces. If Spaatz had had more responsibility for this phase of the operation, he might have been more flexible in his use of heavy bombardment, which 

in any case would not have been the panacea that U.S. Army historians implied 

it might have been, because the Germans evacuated over open beaches, targets 

much less suitable to heavy bombers than the local ports at each end of the 

straits. 

During July and certainly by the beginning of August, Tedder supplanted 

Spaatz as Eisenhower’s chief air adviser, although propinquity rather than ulterior purpose accounted for much of the change in Spaatz’s status. By the nature 

of his job, Tedder stayed physically closer to Eisenhower and occupied a link in 

the chain of command between Spaatz and Eisenhower. As a result, Eisenhower, 

who based his entire command philosophy on Allied unity and teamwork, not 

only listened more often to Tedder, but went out of his way not to appear to seek 

Spaatz’s views because they were American, Nor did Spaatz make Eisenhower’s 

task easier. As Spaatz began to lose influence on Allied operations, he naturally 

began to concentrate more and more on a sphere over which he had greater control-the administration and strategic policy of the AAF in the Mediterranean. 

Fortunately, Eisenhower, Tedder, and Spaatz liked and respected one another 

personally and professionally. This triangle, which could have produced emotional and institutional fireworks, eventually became a sound working relationship, with occasional tiffs and disagreements, instead of a Mycenaen epic with 

heroes sulking in their tents while the battle raged outside. 

253 

Chapter 8 

Salerno and London 

(July-December 1943) 

It was very dark indeed on September 13, but thanks to a 

full effort by Air, enemy counterattacks were slowed up 

and finally on the 14th pretty much knocked in the head.’ 

4paatz to Eaker, September 18, I943 

The Invasion of Italy 

On July 26, the day after Mussolini fell from power, the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff (CCS) directed Eisenhower to proceed with the plans his command had 

drawn up for an invasion of Italy at Salerno, a city just south of Naples. The 

Allies chose Salerno chiefly because their relatively short-range fighter aircraft 

in Sicily could not operate effectively farther north. The Germans made the 

same calculations and marked the area as a likely invasion spot. They based a 

panzer division there, and a good road network enabled them to reinforce the 

area rapidly if the Allies did indeed arrive. 

After taking power, Mussolini’s successors began secret peace negotiations 

with the Allies. Marshal Pietro Badoglio’s government agreed to a secret 

armistice timed to coincide with the invasion. The Allies hoped that chaos 

within the Italian armed forces and in their relationship with their German partners resulting from the surprise cessation of hostilities would ease the way for the 

invading forces. Allied air power also sought to smooth the path. The Strategic 

Air Force, in particular, spent much of the five weeks prior to the invasion in 

counterair and supply and in the communications line interdiction strikes that had 

become standard. By the time of the invasion on September 9, the Luftwaffe and 

the Italian rail network had suffered severely. 

Once again the Northwest African Air Forces (NAAF) protected the invasion fleet effectively, despite a temporary resurgence of Luftwaffe activity. Only 

255 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

five major Allied ships were sunk and nine were heavily damaged.2 When the 

German counterattack against the beachhead reached its peak on September 13 

and 14, the Northwest African Strategic Air Force (NASAF) joined the Northwest African Tactical Air Force (NATAF) in a maximum effort against German 

units, strong points, and communications on the front line or immediately behind 

it. Because all of the NAAF’s striking forces were directly supporting the beachhead, Eisenhower requested the CCS to transfer three heavy-bomber groups from 

the Eighth Air Force to the NAAF. In addition, he asked the CCS to order the 

Eighth to bomb Northern Italian communications from England. The CCS 

promptly complied.3 In all, from September 12 to 15, the NAAF dropped 3,500 

tons of bombs and flew 6,000 sorties over the Italian battlefront.4 

Allied naval support forces also played an important part in repelling the 

counterattack. During the entire Salemo operation they pumped 11,000 tons of 

shells, the equivalent of 72,000 field artillery shells (105mm), into German positions.5 Given the advantage in accuracy of naval gunfire over bombing, Allied 

navies contributed somewhat more than Allied air in breaking up the German 

assault. Nonetheless, Eisenhower, Alexander, and Clark, Commander of the 

U.S. Fifth Army, which had operational control of the invasion, had nothing but 

praise for the air support given by the NAAF. Alexander wrote to Spaatz on 

September 17 that the air attacks had greatly aided the morale of the ground 

units and inflicted heavy losses on the enemy. In addition, said Alexander, the 

air strikes “have seriously interfered with his movements, interrupted his communications and prevented his concentration of the necessary forces to launch 

large scale attacks. You have contributed immeasurably to the success of our 

operations.”6 Alexander also passed on Clark’s “acclaim of the close and continuous air support given his army.” And Eisenhower told Lt. Gen. Joseph T. 

McNarney, U.S. Army Deputy Chief of Staff, on September 16, “I cannot say 

too much for our Air. . . . Our airmen hit what they are aiming at, and their 

effect in this campaign has been remarkable.”7 

Following this activity the U.S. air effort in the Mediterranean began to fall 

off, mainly because of weather and manpower problems. The wet fall and winter 

of 1943-1944 caused the cancellation of many missions, which, of course, 

reduced the effect of air power on land operations and on the interdiction of 

enemy supplies and communications. Fine flying weather in the summer contributed to the shortage of manpower by allowing aircraft to undertake almost 

daily missions; as a result, air crews completed their fifty-mission combat rotation more quickly than anticipated.* The ability to fly almost incessantly also 

* The number of required combat missions for air crews varied throughout the war depending 

on theater, type of aircraft, and intensity of combat. In the summer of 1943, heavy-bomber crews in 

the Mediterranean, where enemy opposition was light, had to fly fifty missions before returning 

home. At the same time, heavy-bomber crews in Britain, who faced much heavier opposition (and 

hence had a shorter life expectancy), had a combat tour of twenty-five missions. 

256 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

led to increased fatigue among air and ground crews, causing more depletion of 

the human resources needed to conduct the air battle.8 The replacement situation 

had become severe even before the invasion of Italy. Spaatz reported to Arnold: 

As the extent to which air has assisted the ground action becomes more widely 

known increasing demands are made for its employment. We are faced with a 

rather difficult problem in this respect in that weather almost never interrupts 

flying and between 70% and 80% of our airplanes are kept in commission. 

Combat crew fatigue has become the main problem? 

The following day Eisenhower sent, at Spaatz’s behest, an “Eyes Only” 

cable to Marshall in which he pleaded for an immediate increase of the replacement rate from 15 percent per month to 25 percent per month. Eisenhower 

noted, “It now appears that we must either fail to meet demands or gradually 

reduce our groups’ effectiveness as a result of attrition.” Alluding to the surrender 

negotiations with Italy and the worsening Axis position on Sicily, Eisenhower 

added, “We have reached a critical position in this area which requires that any 

favorable development, military or political, be fully and immediately exploited. 

Air forces, of course, provide our most effective means of rapidly applying pressure where necessary.”lO 

The Salerno operation only exacerbated the shortfall. At the height of the 

German counterattack, Spaatz wrote to Arnold: 

In addition to communications, the biggest worry at present is the old one of 

replacement crews. Our frequency of operation in spite of all efforts to hold it 

down to a minimum, is continuously greater than the replacement rate warrants, 

and crews are becoming war weary faster than replacements will arrive to 

relieve them.” 

Eisenhower, too, pleaded with Marshall for more men: “Our actual use of air 

has greatly exceeded that which was planned. I consider that reducing the scale 

of our present air effort might prove disastrous.” Eisenhower urged Marshall to 

take remedial action at once; otherwise “our strength will drop below that essential for conduct of operations.”l2 

Arnold and Marshall, however, could do little to meet these appeals. They 

temporarily sent down eighty B-24s (two groups) from the Eighth, but the 

vagaries of U.S. military manpower recruitment and procurement, especially in 

the AAF, had produced a manpower crisis that particularly affected air crews. 

The low point in the supply of trained manpower for the AAF occurred in the 

summer of 1943, leaving Arnold and the AAF unable to meet more than the 

minimal planned replacement flows.13 

During this replacement crisis Spaatz confronted another delicate personnel 

problem-evaluating the performance of the pilots of the 99th Fighter Squadron, 

the only black AAF unit then in combat. In an “Eyes Only” cable on August 17, 

Spaatz alerted Arnold to a possible problem. General Cannon, Deputy Com257 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

mander of the NATAF, reported that the 99th was “beginning to show evidence 

of tiring.” Cannon compared the unit’s performance unfavorably to that of the 

33d Fighter Group, which was operating from the same airfield under the command of Col. William W. Momyer, and noted, “It is indicated that the colored 

pilot cannot stand up under [the] same pressure as [the] white pilot.” Cannon, 

however, noted the mitigating fact that although Lt. Col. Benjamin 0. Davis, Jr., 

the 99th’~ commanding officer, reported that he had been promised four 

replacement pilots per month when he went into action in May 1943, he had 

received a total of only four replacements by mid-August. As Spaatz and 

Cannon well knew, a shortage of replacement pilots meant that a unit had to 

work overtime to maintain its sortie rate. The 99th, operating under added strain 

for a continued period, was worn out compared with white units with more 

replacements. Spaatz personally requested “that no conclusion be drawn until 

further study and experience.”l4 

Even as Spaatz warned Arnold, Time magazine began to prepare a story on 

the 99th. Both apparently had gotten advance warning of the story, which 

appeared in the September 20, 1943, issue. The story accurately stated that 

“unofficial reports” from the Mediterranean suggested that “the top air command was not altogether satisfied with the 99th’~ performance” and was thinking about transferring the unit to the Northwest African Coastal Air Force 

(NACAF).15 

On September 10, either in response to Spaatz’s warning or to the impending story in Time, Arnold requested the preparation of “as detailed a confidential 

report as the facts now in your possession warrant” on black pilots without delay. 

Arnold further noted, “We have received from many unofficial sources second 

hand tales of the fact that the Negro pilot tires very easily, and that he loses his 

will to fight after five or six missions.” Arnold knew that Spaatz would realize 

“the urgency required for this information in view of the fact that we contemplate 

building additional Negro units at once.”l6 

As ordered, Spaatz directed Cannon, despite his involvement in the fighting 

associated with the Salerno invasion, to expedite the completion of a comprehensive report on the 99th.17 On September 18, Cannon replied by forwarding a 

report prepared by the Commanding General, XI1 ASC, Maj. Gen. Edwin J. 

House. Citing an unnamed officer18 “who has been in the best position to 

observe carefully the work of the 99th squadron over its entire combat period,” 

House severely censured the 99th’~ performance. Although the unnamed officer 

noted that the 99th’~ “ground discipline and ability to accomplish and execute 

orders promptly are excellent,” he concluded: 

Based on the performance of the 99th Fighter Squadron to date, it is my opinion that they are not of the fighting caliber of any squadron in this group. They 

have failed to display the aggressiveness and desire for combat that are necessary to a first class fighting organization. It may be expected that we will get 

less work and less operational time out of the 99th Fighter Squadron than any 

squadron of this group. 

25 8 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

House added his own observations. He recommended that the squadron be 

reequipped with obsolescent P-39s and reassigned from the XI1 ASC to the less 

active NACAF. He also remarked: 

On many discussions held with officers of all professions, including medical, 

the consensus of opinion seems to be that the Negro type has not the proper 

reflexes to make a first-class fighter pilot. Also, on rapid moves which must be 

part of this Command, housing and messing difficulties arise because the time 

has not yet arrived when the white and colored soldiers will mess at the same 

table and sleep in the same barracks. 

Finally, House suggested, “If and when a colored group is formed in the United 

States, it be retained for either the eastern or western defense zone and a white 

fighter group be released for overseas movement.”l9 

In his endorsement of the report to Spaatz, Cannon wrote, “The pilots of the 

99th Fighter Squadron fall well below the standard of pilots of other fighter 

squadrons of this Command,” in categories such as eagerness for combat, 

aggressiveness, will to win or reach the objective, stamina, and ability to fight as 

a team. Black pilots had “no outstanding characteristics in which they excel in 

war over the pilots of other squadrons of this Command.”2o 

The report contradicted what Spaatz had recorded in early June 1943, that 

Colonel Davis had told him the “men have lost a little of the eagerness they had 

before any combat missions, but are proving themselves.”21 In any case, Spaatz 

forwarded the report to Arnold, expressing his “full confidence in the fairness of 

the analysis” made by Cannon and House, observing: “I feel that no squadron 

has been introduced into this theater with a better background of training than 

had by the 99th Fighter Squadron.”22 

The report came to the attention of the McCloy Committee, a special committee established by the War Department to oversee black troop policies. On 

October 16, Colonel Davis testified before the committee and effectively refuted 

House’s and Momyer’s criticisms.23 The 99th remained in combat in Italy and 

was eventually joined by the all-black 332d Fighter Group. 

At the very least, the foregoing report demonstrated the inability of the 

Army hierarchy to conduct an objective evaluation of black soldiers in the U.S. 

Army of World War 11. The incident may have affected Spaatz’s evaluation of 

them. After the war he told the Gillem Board, which was investigating the possible future roles of black soldiers in the AAF, that they should not serve in integrated units and that they would be more effective in support and service units 

than in combat units.24 

Throughout World War 11, the War Department specified a policy of strict 

segregation requiring separate but equal accommodations, training, and treatment. Spaatz, accordingly, did not brook egregious discrimination. In the 

autumn of 1943, he became aware that AAF rest facilities on the Island of Capri, 

in the harbor of Naples, were not admitting black officers. He had the situation 

259 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

rectified.25 The AAF built a separate rest facility on Capri for black AAF combat officers (the approximately thirty black pilots assigned to the 99th). Not until 

May 1944 did the AAF in the Mediterranean begin construction of a rest camp 

for the enlisted personnel of the 99th or for black officers and enlisted men 

assigned to AAF service organizations.26 

The Mediterranean Theater and Strategic Bombing 

Once it had defeated the Nazi counterattack on the Salem0 beachhead, the U.S. 

Fifth Army captured Naples on October 1. On the same day, the British 8th Army, 

advancing from the toe of Italy, occupied the great airfield complex of Foggia, eighty 

miles to the northeast of Naples. The capture of Foggia gave the AAF the capability 

to open up a second front in the Combined Bomber Offensive against Germany by 

putting it well within range of Austrian and south German industrial targets. 

This new aspect of the air war had been part of the AAF’s plans since the 

promulgation of AWPD/1 in September 1941. AWPD/1 had provided for a 

bomber force of very long-range B-29s (still on the drawing boards in 1941) 

operating against Germany from bases in the Suez region. Similarly, at the 

inception of the North African invasion, Arnold and Spaatz had persuaded 

Eisenhower as the European Theater Commander to agree tentatively to a single 

air force for Britain and North Africa, which would allow the strategic bombing 

of Germany from both areas. 

At the end of the Tunisian campaign, Eisenhower forwarded to Marshall a 

suggestion from Spaatz that “this theater would offer a very fine region from 

which to use some of the new B29s.”27 Eisenhower also sent the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff his recommendations on the course of action to follow after the 

fall of Sicily. To this document (CCS No. 223) Tedder added a statement in 

which he pointed out the advantages of launching strategic bomber missions 

from Italy. These feelers went unnoticed by Marshall and the rest of the Combined 

Chiefs, who met in Washington, D.C., from May 12 to 25, 1943. There they 

accepted Eaker’s plan for the Combined Bomber Offensive (CCS No. 217), 

which called for a rapid buildup of an Eighth Air Force powerful enough to 

defeat Luftwaffe fighter forces and bomb key German industries.28 

At Arnold’s insistence, however, the Combined Chiefs authorized a onetime-only, low-level B-24 raid against the Romanian oil fields and refinery complex at Ploesti, provided Eisenhower approved, which he did in early June. In 

addition to two B-24 groups (the 376th and 98th) from the Ninth Air Force, the 

CCS diverted one group (the 389th) scheduled to reinforce the Eighth and two 

of the Eighth’s own groups (the 93d and 44th) to the Ploesti raid (code-named 

TIDALWAVE). These 177 bombers launched the first Mediterranean raid to participate in the Combined Bomber Offensive by attacking the Ploesti oil targets on 

August 1. They lost 54 aircraft and 532 crewmen and inflicted heavy, but not 

decisive, damage to their targets.29 

260 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

Before flying the Ploesti raid, these groups joined the NAAF and flew several hundred sorties in the Sicilian campaign. They also participated in two other 

strategic missions before leaving the theater, one before and one after the Ploesti 

raid. On July 19, with the medium bombers and B-17s of the Twelfth Air Force 

(more than 500 planes in all), they also bombed airfields near and two railroad 

marshaling yards in Rome. They damaged the fields and the rail yards severely, 

but one bomb landed a thousand feet from one of the yards in the nave of the 

Basilica of San Lorenzo where it caved in the roof and front facade, destroying 

thirteenth- and fourteenth-century frescos and mosaics.30 Reported casualties 

were 700 killed and 1,600 wounded.31 

This raid in the classical terms of Douhet, the Italian air theorist, was aimed 

against the will of a nation. Few other single strokes could have produced the 

blow to national pride and spirit or so forcefully demonstrated the failings of 

Mussolini’s ramshackle Fascist state to the Italian people than this raid. On 

August 13, 259 heavy and medium bombers returned to Rome’s marshaling 

yards and inflicted heavy damage, closing the line to Naples for five or six days 

and killing 221 persons and wounding 565 more. The next day, the Italian government declared Rome an open city.32 

Spaatz and the NAAF had planned the initial raid many weeks before its 

execution. On June 1, Spaatz discussed the prospects of bombing Rome with 

Churchill, Marshall, and Alan Brooke, British Chief of the Imperial General 

Staff, who had come to the Mediterranean to obtain Eisenhower’s views on postSicilian operations. In his description of the Prime Minister’s visit, Eisenhower 

related that “long discussions were carried on regarding the desirability of 

bombing the marshalling yards near Rome.” The CCS authorized the raid on 

June 15.33 In addition, Spaatz emphasized the necessity of capturing northern 

Italy for use in air operations against Germany.34 

Two weeks later Spaatz and Tedder, while planning support operations for 

the upcoming Sicilian assault, decided to interdict rail yards in both Naples and 

Rome as part of the overall campaign to disrupt supply and communications in 

Italy. Spaatz suggested that Naples should receive not only bombs but surrender 

leaflets as we11.35 He did not make clear whether he thought the latter might render the port susceptible to a coup de main or prove effective as a psychological 

ploy in the war against Italian morale. Spaatz may have felt that a hard double 

blow at those two key cities might undermine Italian morale and weaken opposition to the invasion. He noted that if air power could not be concentrated against 

those two targets, the entire effort should fall on Sicily itself. In private, Spaatz 

had earlier expressed great faith in the psychological impact of bombing. On 

May 8, he wrote to a friend in Washington, D.C., that, in the B-17, the United 

States had discovered the principal weapon for concluding the war successfully. 

“We have ample evidence,” remarked Spaatz, “to clearly indicate they can blast 

their way through any defenses and destroy the will to fight in any nation which 

may oppose us.”36 

26 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Nine days after the Sicilian landings the AAF struck Rome in a raid that 

showed precision bombing at its best and helped to topple Mussolini’s regime 

six days later.37 Naturally, Spaatz sent a special report to Arnold: 

It [the raid] should prove of particular interest to our air force supporters, but 

definitely has very little interest from an air force standpoint. It was too easy. 

Seven other raids are now under study and of these the one on NAPLES is certain to hit them in the eyes, especially the “Sunday-morning quarterback^."^^ 

Arnold and Spaatz usually tried to stay a step ahead of any critics of air power. 

Shortly before their return to England, the Eighth’s three groups, joined by 

the Ninth’s two groups, executed a strategic mission against German fighter 

plants at Wiener Neustadt, Austria. On August 13, the groups left their bases 

around Benghazi, Tripoli, and flew more than 1,200 miles to their target. They 

achieved complete tactical surprise and inflicted severe damage on hangars and 

grounded aircraft and on the fighter construction and assembly plants of WienerNeustaedter Flugzeugwerke A.G.; for much of the remainder of the year, production at the plants slowed noticeably.39 This was the first time that Allied 

bombers based in the Mediterranean had attacked a target in Greater Germany. 

The attacks on Rome, Ploesti, and Wiener Neustadt strengthened Spaatz’s 

conviction that bombers based in his command should participate in raids on 

Germany. A week after the Wiener Neustadt raid Spaatz wrote to Lovett, “I am 

increasingly convinced that Germany can be forced to her knees by aerial bombardment alone. The process can be accelerated by us if suitable bases are available in the Mediterranean area as well as those now available in England.”40 

This statement reflected views that Spaatz had expressed for months. On June 

24, he had written to Arnold that the fate of the air forces after the next two 

operations (Sicily and Salerno) concerned him greatly. He also believed that the 

heavy-bomber effort against Germany ought to come from more than just one 

base area: “If we can establish ourselves in Italy, much of Germany can be 

reached from there with better weather conditions at our airdromes than prevail 

normally in England. This would immediately, when applied, force a dispersion 

of the German fighter and anti-aircraft defenses.”41 Spaatz suggested that the 

necessary heavy-bomber force could be obtained by converting his existing 

B-25 and B-26 groups to B-17 groups. The excess medium bombers could then 

go to the French. 

After talks with Doolittle, Spaatz reiterated most of his foregoing suggestions in a July 14 letter to Arnold. Spaatz did modify the proposal slightly by 

observing that not all of his medium-bomber groups could convert because 

ground support missions required aircraft with the medium bombers’ operating 

characteristics. Again he pointed out the advantages of strategic bombing from 

Italy: 

I am confident we will progress up the Italian Peninsula, and before too many 

weeks have passed, will be in a position to bomb the fighter production plants 

262 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

in the vicinity of Vienna and other places now beyond the effort out of U.K. I 

believe points we can reach amount to 97% of their prod~ction.~~ 

Arnold held different views. In late July, he told a member of the RAF 

Delegation in Washington that the fall of Sicily and potential fall of Italy did little for the Allies against Germany. Because the bombing offensive against 

Germany must come from Britain, the three B-24 groups on loan to Spaatz 

should be returned immediately. The best way to finish the war was to attack by 

the shortest way-across the channel. Arnold regarded Eisenhower’s call for 

reinforcements in the Mediterranean as an extravagance that could compromise 

the cross-channel invasion.43 When the RAF Delegation reported these opinions 

to Portal, he instructed his mission in Washington to present the RAF’s case for 

strategic bombing from Italy, especially from the central (Rome) and north (Po 

Valley) Italian areas. Portal, like Spaatz, pointed to the advantages of spreading 

German fighter defenses and placing more vital targets within easy range. He 

believed that without question the Allies should create in Italy the largest 

bomber force that a logistical base could support. He accepted the fact that the 

limiting element of logistics would mean a smaller total force in Italy than the 

one stationed in Britain.44 

Air Marshal William Welsh, the head of the RAF Delegation, discussed 

Portal’s ideas with Arnold on August 1 and reported considerable modification 

of Arnold’s views. Arnold agreed completely on the need for a bomber force 

flying from northern Italy. A decisive factor in changing Arnold’s mind may 

have been British intelligence indicating significant dispersal of German fighter 

assembly and manufacturing capacity to Austria and other southern European 

targets beyond the range of the Eighth Air Force’s heavy bombers.45 But Arnold 

added a new wrinkle. He suggested that the Allied bomber offensive required a 

single overall commander to coordinate the strategic bombing forces in both 

Italy and Britain in order to avoid competition, overlarge liaison staffs, and constant appeals to the Combined Chiefs of Staff for decisions. Welsh warned 

Portal that Arnold would bring up the matter of command when they next met.46 

In the meantime, AAF Headquarters rejected Spaatz’s proposals to reequip 

his medium-bomber groups because it wished neither to delay the B-17 buildup 

in Britain nor to deprive Eisenhower of support.47 Similarly, the CCS rejected 

Eisenhower’s request for a loan of four of the Eighth’s B-17 groups for the 

Salerno operation. Lt. Gen. Jacob L. Devers, U.S. European Theater Commander, and Eaker, the Eighth Air Force Commander, strongly supported the 

turndown because they feared that such a transfer would wreck the current 

Combined Bomber Offensive.48 Marshall also refused to transfer four mediumbomber groups from Britain, and Arnold rejected the request by Eisenhower, 

Spaatz, and Tedder to keep the Eighth’s three B-24 groups that had bombed 

Ploesti in the Mediterranean theater.49 On September 2, Arnold informed Spaatz 

that he would receive no more P-38 replacement aircraft for six weeks.50 These 

actions enraged Eisenhower,sl but Marshall and Arnold pointed out that the 

263 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

NAAF already outnumbered the entire Luftwaffe and that the needs of 

POINTBLANK*-the U.S. daylight precision bombing portion of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive against Germany that was a prerequisite to the cross-channel 

invasion-overrode all other considerations.52 

If Eisenhower and Spaatz had lost their campaign to acquire some of 

Eaker’s assets, at least they had helped to gain recognition of the point that Italy 

would serve as an admirable base for future attacks on Germany. At the Quebec 

Conference, August 14 to 25, 1943, Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Combined 

Chiefs agreed on “strategic bombing operations from Italian and Central 

European bases, complementing POINT BLANK."^^ The British Chief of the Air 

Staff, Portal, remarked, “If we could have a strong force of Heavy and Medium 

Bombers there [northern Italy] in the near future, Germany would be faced with 

a problem insoluble.”54 Arnold, in the midst of the conference, wrote to Spaatz 

that “a planned and sustained strategic bombing attack on German key industrial 

targets from Mediterranean bases” warranted the top priority.55 

Two days after the conference, Arnold requested Spaatz to return to Washington for ten days to two weeks. With Eisenhower’s approval, Spaatz scheduled a 

trip to Washington for the beginning of October. He told Eisenhower that he 

would emphasize the replacement crew problem and the “utilization of the 

Mediterranean base area for heavy bombers including B-29s.”56 

Once the CCS had accepted Italy as a base for strategic bombing, details of 

command, control, strength, and coordination with the Eighth Air Force needed 

attention. Eisenhower signaled Marshall on September 19, “Forward movement 

into Italy necessitates immediate planning on my part for extension of bomber 

effort into Germany.” He went on to inquire about the exact number of aircraft 

to be sent and, after stating his own and Spaatz’s belief in the effectiveness of 

that aspect of the Combined Bomber Offensive conducted from Italy, informed 

Marshall that Spaatz would arrive in Washington prepared to discuss numbers 

and “the overall organization and control of strategic air forces as Tedder, 

Spaatz, and I see it.”57 

By October Arnold and his staff had drawn up plans for a new strategic air 

force-the Fifteenth Air Force. On October 9, the day Spaatz landed in 

Washington, Arnold submitted to the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) his design 

for turning the Twelfth Air Force into a tactical air force and establishing the 

Fifteenth as a strategic air force. Both forces would operate under the theater 

commander, but the Fifteenth would occasionally receive directives from the 

CCS for employment in the Combined Bomber Offensive. The Fifteenth would 

receive the Twelfth’s six heavy groups and fifteen more from the continental 

United States. 

* POINTBLANK’S first objective was to destroy the German daylight fighter forces, after which it 

would attack the German aircraft industry, the ball-bearing industry, and other high-value economic 

targets. 

264 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

Eaker and Devers objected vigorously, arguing that the plan diverted forces 

from Britain and sacrificed the principle of concentration of force, thereby jeopardizing POINTBLANK and OVERLORD. The JCS, after discussions with Bedell 

Smith and Spaatz, approved Arnold’s plan. The JCS then submitted the matter to 

the Combined Chiefs of Staff, who had overall control of the Combined Bomber 

Offensive. The CCS agreed with a proviso inserted by the British that if logistical problems prevented the stationing of heavy-bomber groups in the Mediterranean, then the excess bombers would go to Britain.58 The CCS directed 

Eisenhower to employ the Fifteenth Air Force against strategic targets. They 

allowed him to use units of the Fifteenth that had been reassigned from the 

Twelfth Air Force (six heavy-bomber groups, and two long-range fighter groups) 

primarily against political targets in the Balkans and in support of the land forces 

in Italy rather than against PONIBLANK objectives, until the land forces secured air 

bases north and east of Rome.59 

Spaatz, who had returned to La Marsa on October 22, the same day the CCS 

approved the formation of the Fifteenth, quickly assured Arnold on the logistical 

capabilities of southern Italy. Spaatz immediately obtained an authoritative statement on logistics from a West Point classmate, Lt. Gen. Brehon B. Somervell, the 

crusty Commanding General, Army Services of Supply. Somervell, the Army’s 

chief logistics and supply officer with a status virtually equal to Arnold’s, had 

visited the Italian theater and Spaatz at the end of October. Armed with Somervell’s estimate and the results of a recent inspection of Foggia and its supply line 

back to Taranto, Spaatz sent out a telegram, over Eisenhower’s signature, minimizing supply difficulties. Eisenhower appended a staff report from Bedell 

Smith which indicated somewhat more soberly that Italy could support the 

planned influx of bombers and escorts. Smith’s report gave Arnold the ammunition he needed to refuse to discuss the issue when the British again questioned 

the capability of Italy to support additional strategic groups.60 

For their part the British had come to question not the eventual need for the 

Fifteenth, whose existence they had already approved, but the timing of its 

increase. Portal had always favored strategic attacks from Italy because he 

assumed that the central and northern portions of the peninsula would be available for bases. Hitler’s decision to defend Italy south of Rome and Field Marshal 

Kesselring ’s successful execution of that policy upset his calculations, however, 

and he began to question the effectiveness of basing bombers at the Foggia 

fields in the south.61 In London, Eaker took issue with the rate of the Fifteenth’s 

bomber and fighter group buildup specified in Eisenhower’s instructions. He 

privately protested to the British that the nine heavy-bomber groups scheduled 

to go to Italy in November, December, and January should come to Britain, even 

if Italy could support them logistically.62 

On October 26, the British Chiefs of Staff, reflecting Portal’s and Eaker’s 

positions, suggested to the CCS in Washington that the fifteen heavy-bombardment groups scheduled for Italy be redirected to their original destination265 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Britain. They further asked that the six heavy-bombardment groups already in 

Italy be assigned primarily to POINTBLANK even before the fall of Rome.63 

Churchill seconded these suggestions. He instructed Portal not to allow the 

strategic buildup to interfere with the battle for Rome but to give the armies and 

their tactical air support first priority. Churchill emphasized that the goal from 

the British must be “saturation” or overwhelming strength for the American daylight attacks.64 

When the British Joint Staff Mission in Washington presented that position 

to the CCS, the Americans brushed it aside. At the October 29 meeting, Arnold, 

referring repeatedly to assurances given him by Spaatz, said that the buildup of 

the Fifteenth did not interfere with the strengthening of Eisenhower’s tactical air 

or ground forces. Arnold maintained that bombers in Italy would be more effective than those in Britain and renewed his promise to send to Britain all the 

groups that the Fifteenth could not supply or operate effectively. Marshall 

reminded the British that Eisenhower himself had called for a strategic air force 

in Italy, in part to have those forces at his disposal in case of a ground emergency, during which he could decide relative priorities. With the losses during 

the Schweinfurt mission of October 14 in mind, Marshall observed that strategic 

forces in Italy would help reduce “very heavy casualties” incurred in daylight 

bombing over northwest Europe.65 Having already accepted the creation of an 

additional U.S. strategic air force, the British could hardly continue to object to 

the way the Americans divided their own assets, especially in light of assurances 

that POINTBLANK remained the prime objective and that the Americans could 

supply their own forces. 

The creation of the Fifteenth Air Force, whose headquarters would serve as 

the hub of the strategic bombing campaign based in Italy, naturally consumed 

much of Spaatz’s ten-day sojourn in Washington. In addition to the always vexatious problem of replacements, Spaatz and Arnold probably discussed arrangements for the overall control of strategic air forces in Europe-a complex problem of great concern not only to the AAF and the RAF but to the theater commanders and the Combined Chiefs as well. 

The theater commanders, Eisenhower in Italy and Devers in Britain, wanted 

total authority over all air forces in their commands. Had this authority been 

allowed, the coordination of strategic bombing against Germany would have 

been hamstrung, especially if both the Mediterranean and the European Theaters 

of Operation possessed competing strategic forces. The CCS, charged with the 

overall strategic direction of the war, also had a stake in the problem. They had 

decided at the conferences in Washington in May 1943 and in Quebec in August 

1943 that the successful invasion of the Continent required a successful strategic 

bombing campaign. The first objective of such a campaign would be to so damage the Luftwaffe that it could not contest Allied air supremacy over the invasion area. Competing with the requirements for strategic bombing in the eyes of 

the CCS were the equally valid claims of the invasion commanders and ground 

266 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

troops for tactical support of preinvasion preparations, the landings, and post 

invasion operations. 

The AAF and the RAF had separate agendas on the issue of command and 

control. Arnold and the AAF wanted a single Allied Strategic Air Force 

Commander in charge of the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces and Bomber 

Command, with headquarters in London and a status equal-presumably with 

four-star rank-to that of the European and Mediterranean theater commanders. 

This idea, if approved, would in a stroke make the AAF’s and the RAF’s strategic air forces independent of the ground forces’ leaders and allow untrammeled 

pursuit of the strategic bomber campaign against Germany-the ruison d &re of 

both air forces. In addition, the airman who held the post would emerge with a 

prestige that at least matched that of the war’s other theater commanders, such 

as Generals Eisenhower and MacArthur and Admiral Chester Nimitz. Arnold 

probably assumed that the commander would be a member of the AAF, principal supplier of aircraft. Even if an RAF officer got the job, Arnold would still 

have taken a large step toward eventual postwar autonomy for the AAF. 

Next, Arnold wanted a U.S. Strategic Air Force Commander in Europe (also 

based in London) who would take operational control of both U.S. strategic air 

forces (the Eighth and Fifteenth) and administrative control of the U.S. air forces 

in Britain (the Eighth and Ninth). The AAF would thus acquire control over all 

of its heavy bombers directed toward Germany. Without such a headquarters, 

the two strategic air forces, each under a separate theater commander, might 

well fail to coordinate their efforts adequately. Such a command would also be 

at least equal to Bomber Command in prestige and stature and would certainly 

exceed it in numbers of heavy bombers. Because this headquarters would be in 

London, it could still take advantage of British intelligence and cooperate with 

Bomber Command-a unit already headed by an officer with the equivalent of 

four-star rank. His U.S. opposite number would probably have the same rank, 

which would reflect well on the AAF. By giving the U.S. Strategic Commander 

administrative control of the Ninth (Tactical) Air Force, which was slated to 

provide tactical air support for the cross-channel invasion, Arnold may have 

hoped to influence what promised to be the major U.S. land campaign of the war 

and to augment the power and prestige of the head of the U.S. Strategic Bomber 

Command.66 

Although Arnold’s plan stemmed from both his proposal for a combined 

bomber command in the summer of 1942 and his and Spaatz’s advocacy of a 

single theater air force in the fall of 1942, his campaign for the acceptance of a 

new strategic command began no later than August 1, 1943, when he informed 

the head of the RAF Delegation in Washington, Air Marshal Welsh, of his idea 

for an overall commander.67 Arnold continued to explore the idea during a trip 

to visit Britain and Eaker in September 1943. After spending three days inspecting the Eighth, Arnold visited Air Chief Marshal Harris at Bomber Command on 

September 5. That evening he and Harris discussed the subject of a combined 

267 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

command “in generalities.” Arnold favored the plan because it allowed more 

efficient use of aircraft. Harris objected chiefly, as Arnold noted in his trip journal, because the British would then lose control of the bomber offensive. Harris, 

who operated with virtual autonomy from the RAF staff, could hardly be 

expected to accept an American superior when he had already freed himself 

from a British one.68 Arnold also discussed his plan with Portal,69 who probably 

indicated that he found it impractical. 

By early October, Arnold had carried his ideas to Harry Hopkins, Franklin 

Roosevelt’s alter ego, who endorsed them and presented them to the President.70 A 

month later, Marshall, who by and large supported Arnold’s position, advised him 

not to press the question untii after the settlement of the more important questions of 

a unified Mediterranean command proposed by the British and the appointment of a 

single supreme commander for all U.S.-British forces fighting against the Germans31 

Nevertheless, Arnold persevered in his advocacy of new command arrangements. When the President made the first leg of his trip to the initial Big Three 

meeting with Churchill and Stalin at Tehran, Iran, in November 1943, he sailed 

on the brand-new U.S. battleship Zowa. The U.S. Chiefs traveled with him and 

added the finishing touches to their presentations and plans for the Cairo 

Conference with Churchill and Chinese leader Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, 

November 22-26, and the Tehran Conference, November 28 to December 1. 

During the voyage Arnold succeeded in gaining the backing of his fellow chiefs 

and the President for his command scheme. In a JCS memo for the President 

dated November 17, 1943, the JCS stated that from the military point of view 

the operation of the British and American strategic bombers required unity of 

command. The memo, which offered different proposals depending on how the 

British reacted to the American push for a supreme Allied commander in 

Europe, specified a single bomber command whether the British agreed to an 

overall supreme commander or n0t.72 

The next day Arnold obtained the American Chiefs’ agreement for the formation of a new U.S. headquarters to command and control all U.S. strategic 

bomber forces in Europe. The U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe (USSTAF) 

would command both the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces from London, where it 

could coordinate action with British Bomber Command. The theater commanders retained the right, upon notification of the Commanding General, USSTAF, 

to deploy bombers in the event of a tactical or strategic emergency. The JCS 

also agreed to Arnold’s suggestion for a commanding general, Carl A. Spaatz. 

His name went forward to the President with the rest of the package.73 Arnold 

chose Spaatz to head USSTAF for both professional and personal reasons. 

Spaatz had the seniority required for the post; he had the confidence of Portal, 

Tedder, and other high-ranking RAF officers; he possessed experience in conducting strategic bombing operations under wartime conditions; he had demonstrated his ability to function smoothly and effectively in theater-level AngloAmerican operations; and he was personally loyal to Arnold, supporting his 

268 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

beliefs as to the wartime and future roles of the AAF. 

The RAF diametrically opposed Arnold’s proposals. It wished, for the most 

part, to maintain the status quo, which best served its interests. The RAF Chief 

of Staff, Portal, had received from the Combined Chiefs of Staff the task of 

coordinating the Eighth Air Force and British Bomber Command effort from 

Britain. On paper and subject to concurrence by the AAF, therefore, the British 

were in charge of the Combined Bomber Offensive, and Bomber Command 

remained an independent part of the offensive. This maintenance of Bomber 

Command’s role was important, because the balance of heavy-bomber strength, 

heretofore in favor of the British, would swing dramatically in favor of the 

Americans during 1944. The British objected, too, that a new command would 

disrupt the excellent relations between the Eighth Air Force and the RAF, create 

a new unnecessary headquarters staff, and move the responsibility for coordination to Washington from London, which already had intelligence and communications personnel trained and ready to work. As for the Fifteenth Air Force, the 

British asserted that tight, direct coordination between that force and the forces 

in Britain would be impossible to attain and that shuttle bombing when, for 

example, British-based bombers striking a target in southern Germany continued 

on to land in Italy rather than on their home base, was not practical because 

bombers rapidly lost effectiveness when away from their own dedicated ground 

maintenance and supply echelons.74 

On November 20, the Iowa docked in Oran, where Eisenhower met Roosevelt at the quay and flew with him to Tunis. The following day Roosevelt and 

Hopkins went sightseeing; the President went to selected Tunisian battlefields 

with Eisenhower; Hopkins went to Spaatz’s headquarters. Roosevelt and 

Hopkins used their visits to evaluate the two generals with an eye to future reassignment. Hopkins questioned Spaatz closely about his views concerning the 

entire war strategy in Europe and about the feasibility of assisting the Soviets in 

their advance westward. Spaatz cited the Ploesti oil refineries and Balkan targets 

of a “psychological” nature, such as rail centers and depots, but noted that continued destruction of fighter and munitions factories in Germany would advance 

the Soviet cause as much as any other targets.75 

Next, Hopkins asked Spaatz for his views on the Combined Bomber Offensive 

and its relationship to the cross-channel invasion and to operations in the 

Mediterranean. Spaatz replied boldly that once the weather cleared over 

Germany in April and May, thus allowing continuous operations from Britain 

and Italy, Germany would give up in three months. OVERLORD, Spaatz thought, 

was neither necessary nor desirable. From the point of view of air power, further 

gains in Italy would bring the bombers closer to Germany and represented a better investment in men and matCriel than the cross-channel invasion. 

Hopkins was impressed but unconvinced.76 He belonged to the Marshallmar 

Department Operations Planning Division school of strategy, which upheld the 

primacy of the OVERLORD cross-channel invasion over all other operations. But 

269 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

apparently Spaatz’s personality, sincere advocacy of air power, and determination to get the job done at any cost must have persuaded Hopkins that Arnold 

had been wise in championing him for the command of the strategic air forces in 

Europe. 

Once the chiefs of state and their military leaders assembled in Cairo on 

November 23, Arnold’s proposals encountered stiff opposition from the British. 

Although Marshall and Roosevelt, on separate occasions, brought up the issue of 

an overall Allied strategic air force with Churchill, they could not overcome 

British resistance. To Roosevelt’s observation that “our strategic air forces from 

London to Ankara should be under one command,” Churchill replied that a decision on the matter could be deferred until after OVERLORD-and that the current 

system worked well enough.77 The dispute was not resolved until after the 

Tehran Conference, which dealt mainly with inter-Allied relations and assurances to the Soviets of American and British intentions to open a second front 

against Germany in the spring of 1944. 

At the Second Cairo Conference, December 3-7, the Americans and the 

British settled their chief outstanding differences concerning strategy, strategic 

priorities, and operations. On December 6, Roosevelt announced his decision to 

appoint Dwight D. Eisenhower as Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary 

Force (SCAEF), from which position he would direct the invasion of France. 

Marshall, who had wanted the command and had many reasons to think he 

would get it, was disappointed. He was to continue as Army Chief of Staff. The 

President told him, “I could not sleep at night with you out of the country.”78 It 

was the most important personnel decision of the war; Eisenhower achieved 

greatness in his new role as commander of the cross-channel invasion, while 

Marshall continued to perform admirably his taxing and equally important chores 

in Washington. 

At the Second Cairo Conference, the Americans abandoned their quest for 

an Allied Strategic Air Force and a supreme commander. The Allies did agree to 

institute the US. Strategic Air Forces in Europe (USSTAF). The British declined 

to interfere in what they regarded as an unwise, but purely American, decision.79 

USSTAF would establish its headquarters in London and employ its strength 

primarily against POINTBLANK targets in accordance with directives issued by the 

CCS. In so doing it would continue to coordinate activities with RAF Bomber 

Command and ensure that in assignment of supplies and services between tactical and strategic operations POINTBLANK had first priority. Arnold as Commanding 

General, U.S. Army Air Forces, would continue to have direct channels to the 

Commander, U.S. Strategic Air Forces “on matters of technical control, operational and training techniques, and uniformity of tactical doctrine.” The implementing directive to the American theater commanders and Commanding 

General, Strategic Air Forces, stated that the Strategic Air Forces would continue 

under the direction of the Chief of the Air Staff, RAF, as agent for the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff, until coming directly under the control of the Supreme Allied 

270 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

Commander (for OVERLORD only) “at a date to be announced later” by the CCS. 

Should a tactical emergency arise, the theater commanders could employ the 

strategic forces upon notification of the CCS and Commanding General, Strategic 

Air Forces.80 Before accepting this directive the British Chiefs stipulated that 

Arnold should consult Eisenhower, Tedder, and General James Maitland Wilson, 

British Commander in Chief, Middle East, and Eisenhower’s replacement as 

Supreme Allied Commander in the Mediterranean.81 

Also at the Second Cairo Conference, during a meeting of the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff on December 4, Arnold left no doubt in Portal’s or his other listeners’ minds about his unfavorable view of Eaker’s efforts as commander of the 

Eighth Air Force. He complained of a “lack of flexibility in operations” despite 

numerous inspections and reports; a 50 percent aircraft availability rate* (in an 

industrialized country) as opposed to 60 to 70 percent in other (more primitive) 

theaters; and the dispatch of only one 600-aircraft operation in the whole month 

of November. He said, “The failure to destroy targets was due directly to the 

failure to employ planes in sufficient numbers. A sufficient weight of bombs 

was not being dropped on the targets to destroy them, nor was the proper priority of targets being followed.”82 

Arnold found that failure intolerable. The hostile tone in his memoirs 

describing his September inspection of the Eighth revealed a growing disenchantment with Eaker’s progress. He was very angry, for example, as he listened 

to radio reports during his flight to England of B-17s running out of fuel on the 

ferry route through Gander, Newfoundland, and Prestwick. Arnold had worked 

himself into a heart attack to get planes for the AAF and in Eaker’s command 

they, with their needed crews, were lost before ever reaching combat. “I was not 

satisfied,” he remarked.83 Also, while Arnold stayed in England, the Eighth suffered the misfortune of a large raid’s misfiring over Stuttgart. Not a single one 

of 338 B-17s sent out reached its primary target. Arnold noted darkly, “Certain 

features of the operation never did find their way into reports sent up through 

channels.”84 On December 2, 1943, Arnold had a talk with his staff-Kuter, 

Vandenberg, and Hansell. He expressed to them the same dissatisfaction he 

would show two days later to the Combined Chiefs.85 

On December 7, Arnold met Wilson for the first time and lunched with 

Tedder. He discussed the new air arrangements with both and found that neither 

objected to them.86 On December 8, he flew to Sicily where he met the President, Eisenhower, Bedell Smith, and Spaatz, all of whom had traveled on the 

same C-54 aircraft from North Africa to Sicily.87 Arnold consulted first with 

Eisenhower and Bedell Smith, who approved of his choice of Spaatz to command the Strategic Air Force.88 Even though they were still puzzled as to the 

* The availability rate is the number of aircraft and crews officially listed in the theater or unit 

divided by the number of aircraft and crews actually available for combat. A 50 percent rate meant 

that Eaker had only half of the number of his planes ready to fight. 

27 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

exact task and position within the command hierarchy of the strategic air commander, both Bedell Smith and Eisenhower preferred to have a known and 

friendly quantity, such as Spaatz, in the job rather than a stranger who might not 

appreciate the needs of the ground commanders. In his trip notebook Arnold 

noted, “Both agree Spaatz was the man for the job. Wouldn’t take anyone else, 

not even Tedder.”g9 After Eisenhower and Bedell Smith endorsed the selection 

of Spaatz, Arnold presumably obtained a final ratification from the President. 

Roosevelt, who had used his flight and the previous days’ meetings and dinner 

with Eisenhower and Spaatz in Tunis to add to impressions collected earlier, 

raised no objection. 

Then Arnold and Bedell Smith informed Spaatz of his appointment to the 

post of Commanding General, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe. Spaatz himself would have preferred not to set up an overall strategic headquarters,90 but he 

told Arnold that once the new headquarters went into operation “it must come 

under Eisenhower’s control not later than March 1 to be properly tied in with 

oVERLORD.”9* He added that it might be possible to increase the rate of operations in Britain but that congested conditions there might prevent the full use of 

aircraft. Finally, he explained the complicated air command arrangements in the 

Mediterranean to Arnold and warned that the contemplated shift of personnel 

(such as Tedder and himself) might well upset the delicate balance between the 

RAF and the AAF there.92 

This last point may have been the final consideration in Arnold’s decision to 

remove Ira Eaker from command of the Eighth Air Force and transfer him to the 

Mediterranean. As Arnold and Spaatz had confirmed that day, Tedder would 

soon vacate his post as Air Officer Commanding, Mediterranean Allied Air 

Forces (MAAF) to go to England as Eisenhower’s deputy commander (not as 

deputy for air). Eaker’s transfer south would allow the AAF to fill the chief air 

command in the Mediterranean-a position promised to the Americans during 

the general reorganization of the commands in the theater-with a widely experienced combat officer. 

After their meeting Amold and Spaatz talked briefly with Eisenhower; they 

recommended Eaker’s transfer and Eisenhower agreed.93 In addition, Spaatz 

reiterated to Eisenhower what he had told Bedell Smith-when the cross-channel battle began, Spaatz should serve directly under Eisenhower so that all of the 

power of the strategic air forces could assist the invasion.94 The three generals 

left the conference unsure about exactly what form the subordination of 

USSTAF to the Supreme Allied Commander would take and when it would 

occur.95 Two and one-half weeks later, on Christmas Day, Eisenhower confessed to Marshall, “To be perfectly frank, this assignment for Spaatz leaves me 

somewhat puzzled as to purpose and . . . position of such a command in an 

American organization, since we always, in each Theater, insist upon a single 

commander.”96 

After these brief meetings, all of which took place in little more than an 

272 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

hour, Spaatz returned to Foggia and his palatial headquarters with Arnold, where 

they spent the night. The next evening, December 9, Arnold, Spaatz, Doolittle, 

and Cannon met over dinner to discuss the new organization and the future of 

the Twelfth and Fifteenth Air Forces. As for personnel, Spaatz reaffirmed his 

recommendation that Eaker be transferred to the Mediterranean and suggested 

that Doolittle replace him as commander of the Eighth, that Brereton retain command of the Ninth (the tactical air force designated to provide American direct 

support for OVERLORD), andthat Cannon keep the Twelfth while becoming head 

of MAAF’s Tactical Air Force.* Arnold was also finally convinced that the 

Fifteenth could handle the fifteen additional heavy-bombardment groups scheduled for the Mediterranean Theater.97 

On December 12, Arnold completed his talks with Spaatz, finished his 

inspection of the AAF in Italy, and departed for Tunis to complete arrangements 

with Eisenhower. They agreed to the personnel changes recommended by 

Spaatz with the addition of Maj. Gen. Nathan F. Twining, who at that time commanded the Thirteenth Air Force in the South Pacific, to command the Fifteenth. 

By December 15, Arnold had returned to Washington greatly pleased. In his 

memoirs he wrote, “As far as the Army Air Forces were concerned the thing we 

wanted most of all had been gained at the [Cairo] Conference. We had received 

confirmation of our present plans for bombing the interior of Germany to a 

Upon his return to the Pentagon, Arnold set in motion the personnel changes 

to which he, Spaatz, and Eisenhower had agreed. Eaker’s transfer to the 

Mediterranean immediately became a cause cClbbre. Eaker must have known he 

stood on slippery turf. Both before and after Arnold’s inspection tour in September he had received from Arnold’s headquarters an increasingly querulous string 

of inquiries demanding higher rates of operations, greater employment en masse 

of available aircraft, and more spectacular bombing results.99 Only a month 

before, however, he, Spaatz, and Tedder had met at Gibraltar to discuss the 

coordination of the Combined Bomber Offensive between the Eighth, the 

Fifteenth, and RAF Bomber Command. They agreed to put Eaker on Spaatz’s 

REDLINE and to exchange messages at least twice a day. They further divided 

Germany into bombing zones and allocated targets for each American air force; 

and they provided for exchanging target material, posting liaison officers in each 

headquarters, and sharing blind-bombing (bombing through clouds with the use 

of radar) techniques. They also allowed the Fifteenth to station a permanent 

intelligence liaison officer in London as its representative on all British Air 

Ministry intelligence matters.100 At the end of the conference the three Allied airpulp.”98 

* The current MAAF Tactical Air Force Commander, Air Marshal Coningham, had already 

been selected to command the British 2d Tactical Air Force which would support the British ground 

forces in OVERLORD. The Northwest African Air Forces (NAAF) had been redesignated 

Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (MAAF) in the fall of 1943. 

273 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. John K. Cannon, Commanding General, Northwest African Tactical Air 

Force; Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Commanding General, Northwest African Air 

Forces; Lt. Gen. Mark W. Clark, Commanding General, Fifth Army; and General 

Henry H. Arnold, Commanding General, U.S. Army Air Forces, awaiting departure in front of an idling Piper L-4 Grasshopper, after a visit to the Fifth Army 

front in the Pesenzano area, Italy, December 11,1943. 

men sent word to Arnold, “We are in complete cgreement on all matters.”lOl 

Apparently, Eaker had his first intimation that Arnold remained dissatisfied 

with his operation during a visit on December 14 from Portal, who asked him to 

answer the criticisms that Arnold had expressed during the three conferences at 

Cairo and Tehran. Eaker’s defense satisfied Portal, who forwarded it to Arnold 

and concluded, “I found Eaker thoroughly alive to need for earliest possible 

attacks on POINTBLANK targets and to importance of using maximum force available. I am confident you will see great achievements as soon as weather gives 

him a chance.”l02 Four days later Eaker received the official message transferring him to the position of Commanding General of the Mediterranean Allied 

Air Forces. 

Arnold put the best possible face on the move; “As a result of your long 

period of successful operations and the exceptional results of your endeavors as 

Commander of the Air Force in England you have been recommended for this 

position.”lO3 But Eaker objected to being “kicked upstairs.” He felt as if he had 

been kicked in an even more sensitive area. More than twenty years later, he 

remarked. “The darkest hour for me was when I was ordered to the Mediterranean 

274 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

Maj. Gen. James H. Doolittle in front of a Martin B-26 Marauder at Maison Blanche, 

Algeria, October 15,1943. 

and relieved of my command of the 8th Air Force.”la To Maj. Gen. James E. 

Fechet, a former head of the Air Corps and an old friend, Eaker said, “I feel like 

a pitcher who has been sent to the showers during a world series game.”lo5 

Shocked and angry, Eaker fought to retain control of the command that he 

had nurtured over the previous thirteen hard months. With an abundant supply 

of heavy bombers and new P-51 long-range escort fighters filling the supply 

pipeline from the United States and beginning to reach the units in England, 

Eaker knew that he had success within his grasp. He immediately wrote to 

Arnold: 

Believe war interest best served by my retention command Eighth Air Force; 

otherwise experience this theater for nearly two years wasted. If I am to be 

allowed any personal preference, having started with the Eighth and seen it 

organized for a major task in this theater, it would be heart-breaking to leave it 

just before climax.”’06 

Then Eaker went to Devers, his theater commander, who was also ticketed 

for a Mediterranean berth (although he was ignorant of it at the time) and then to 

the U.S. ambassador to Britain, John Winant. Eaker even approached Portal. 

Finally, unaware that they had already approved of his transfer, he telegraphed 

Eisenhower and Spaatz for a reprieve.107 Portal attempted to help Eaker, writing 

frankly to Arnold that he disagreed with some of the impending personnel 

moves. “To move him now that we approach the climax of the air war over 

275 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Western Germany would be a grave mistake. I therefore greatly hope that when 

the final decision is made you will feel able to leave Eaker here.”los Portal also 

thought Doolittle ought to stay with the Fifteenth and, in a backhanded slap at 

Brereton, who already commanded the Ninth Air Force, he said, ‘‘I do not know 

Twining, but if you should decide to send him to 9th Air Force to take 

Brereton’s place I can assure him a warm welcome and a receptive ear for his 

Pacific experience.”l09 All this was to no avail. 

Arnold’s replies to Portal and Devers (written by Kuter) emphasized the 

need for a man of Eaker’s qualities in the Mediterranean (to fill the vacuum left 

by Spaatz). To Devers, Arnold added, “This move is necessary from the viewpoint of world wide air operations.”llo To Portal, Arnold replied that General 

Wilson would find Eaker topnotch in the Mediterranean and “the SpaatzDoolittle-Anderson team a vigorous and effective one in the U.K.”111 Arnold 

did his best to quash any hope Eaker retained of staying with the Eighth: “I 

extend to you my heartfelt thanks for the splendid cooperation and loyalty that 

you have given me thus far and for the wonderful success of your organization, 

but I cannot, repeat, not see my way clear to make any change in the decisions 

already reached.”112 Spaatz, after receiving Arnold’s approval, replied in a variation on the same theme: “Command of an Air Force in either place is relatively 

of less importance as compared to overall requirements, particularly since 

Eighth Air Force under new setup will function as an operating headquarters 

more nearly approximating Eighth bomber command.”ll3 

Eaker’s appeals did not go completely unheeded. On December 23, Bedell 

Smith informed Spaatz, that “strong objections are being raised to the transfer of 

Eaker from the U.K.” Spaatz, who replied that he would not go to England 

unless Ira Eaker came to the Mediterranean, 114 still believed that the AAF in 

the Mediterranean required Eaker’s leadership to replace his 0wn.115 In a postwar interview he said: 

I know this-that I would have been satisfied to have stayed down in the 

Mediterranean and command the Mediterranean Air Force, if I hadn’t had to go 

up on that cross-channel operation. . . . I didn’t look forward at all to England at 

that time. I felt my job down in the Mediterranean was just the job I wanted to 

have.’I6 

From Bedell Smith, Spaatz learned that his position would be clarified by 

Eisenhower in a cable to Marshall, 117 and he recorded in his Command Diary 

his irritation at what he regarded as Arnold’s backsliding on the subject. Arnold 

had not strongly enough sold Marshall on the changes, and now Eisenhower 

would have to bail them both out. “My original estimation of Eisenhower’s fairness has been strengthened,” noted Spaatz, “by the way . . . he is taking this and 

the way he is standing by me in my decision.”lls 

But before Eisenhower could send his explanation, he found a stinging telegram on his desk from Marshall, who had received Eaker’s cri de coeur on 

276 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

December 22, when he returned to Washington from a Pacific tour following the 

Second Cairo Conference.119 Marshall, tired after a long tour and still deeply 

disappointed from his own failure to gain the OVERLORD command, reacted with 

an uncharacteristically emotional display, especially for a man who exemplified 

the Virginia Military Institute tradition, derived from George Washington 

and Robert E. Lee, of complete imperturbability in the face of stress. After 

questioning the tendency to “gut” the Mediterranean theater of leadership, 

Marshall said, “I believe I was more disturbed over the pressure of TEDDER 

and SPAATZ to move EAKER to the Mediterranean because to me he did not 

appear particularly suited for that theater and I am forced to the conclusion that 

their attitude is selfish and not purely objective.”120 Arnold seemed to have created the impression that not he, but Spaatz and Tedder, wanted Eaker ousted. 

On Christmas day in Tunis Eisenhower told Spaatz that he would send a 

message to Marshall in which he would give Spaatz’s views as his own. Spaatz 

again remarked in his diary, “General Eisenhower has [been] and is firm in [his] 

decisions and I consider him one of the finest men I know.”l21 In his “Eyes 

Only” cable to Marshall, Eisenhower gave assurances that he had studied the 

proposed personnel changes for some time and had a “completely objective” 

attitude in recommending them. Then Eisenhower justified the transfer by pointing out Eaker’s ability and noting the waste of talent involved in having him and 

Spaatz in the same theater. The only other air officer he would consider for the 

Mediterranean, Maj. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, had just set up his Ninth Air Force 

in England to serve as the U.S. tactical air force in support of OVERLORD. 

Brereton’s selection might disrupt that vital phase of the invasion. 

Noting Spaatz’s intention to stay in the Mediterranean if Eaker stayed in 

London, Eisenhower implied that he needed Spaatz in London and that he 

accepted conditions concerning Eaker. Eisenhower emphasized to Marshall that 

in Spaatz he had one of the few senior officers experienced in air-ground support, a practice “that is not repeat not widely understood and takes men of some 

vision and broad understanding to do . . . right. Otherwise a commander is forever fighting with those air officers who, regardless of the ground situation, 

want to send big bombers on missions that have nothing to do with the critical 

effort.”l22 

Later in the day Eisenhower wrote to Eaker, stating of the new move that 

Arnold (with no mention of Spaatz) had proposed it during his stopover in Sicily 

and that he had agreed to it “because of the absolute necessity of finding an outstanding man for the post of Air CINC of the Mediterranean.” He then added his 

own opinion that if Spaatz left for Britain, Eaker must come south, for “we do 

not repeat not have enough top men to concentrate them in any one place.”123 

The day after Christmas Spaatz flew from Tunis to Algiers for further discussion about the new posts with Eisenhower, who showed him the message 

from Marshall questioning Eaker’s transfer. At first Spaatz bristled and told him 

that he would write to Marshall to explain; but upon reflection he decided 

277 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

against such a move.124 It would accomplish nothing except to prod Marshall on 

a sore point and make Spaatz appear self-serving. Besides, the transfer had been 

confirmed and Spaatz would leave for England in two days. At the same meeting Spaatz told Eisenhower that in order to prevent disputes, presumably about 

logistical, matkrial, and replacement priorities between the Eighth and Ninth Air 

Forces, Eisenhower needed to appoint a Commanding General, Army Air 

Forces, European Theater of Operations. As in the Mediterranean, a single AAF 

general officer could then arbitrate between the competing demands of the 

strategic and tactical air forces. Spaatz also told Eisenhower that, instead of 

dealing directly with the Fifteenth Air Force, he intended always to go through 

the Commander of the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, in this case, Eaker.125 

In the Eaker incident, Eisenhower had taken a Straightforward position. He 

welcomed Arnold’s and Spaatz’s recommendation because he wanted Spaatz in 

England with him. When objections arose, he backed Spaatz. When Spaatz made 

it clear he would not go to Britain unless Eaker was transferred, Eisenhower persuaded Marshall to bow to the new arrangements. 

Spaatz, too, had taken a straightforward position during the Eaker transfer. 

At no point in his wartime papers or postwar interviews did he criticize Eaker’s 

performance in command of the Eighth. Unlike Arnold, Spaatz had extensive 

personal experience with difficulties involved in the mounting of large-scale 

heavy-bomber missions and with the frustrating and peculiar weather conditions 

in England and Western Europe. Spaatz believed in Ira Eaker’s great ability, 

especially as a military diplomat, and wanted him in the Mediterranean to 

advance the war effort and the AAF’s cause as the new Commander of the 

Mediterranean Allied Air Forces. Knowing that Eisenhower wanted him in 

London, Spaatz told Arnold: “If I go to England, then Ira must have command of 

the air forces in the Mediterranean.”l26 He did not consider Eaker’s move a 

demotion;l27 in fact, Spaatz later credited himself with the original recommendation that Eaker move.128 He wanted Eaker in the Mediterranean because he 

knew that, given the complex and intermingled operational and administrative 

controls over the American air forces in Europe in which he and Eaker would 

operate, he needed a man he knew and trusted.129 

There was no hint that Spaatz advocated Eaker’s transfer in order to remove 

a rival or a possible center of opposition from England. 

Unlike Eisenhower and Spaatz, Arnold had mixed motives in removing 

Eaker. AAF official historians said in 1949, “If Arnold’s dissatisfaction over the 

rate of Eighth Air Force operations entered into the decision, the record apparently has left no evidence of it.”130 The diplomatic record of the Cairo Conference, published in 1961, and Amold’s own memoirs, published in 1949, contradicted them. Arnold probably did feel that Eaker’s talents could be more effectively applied in the Mediterranean, but he did not lose sight of his main goalremoving Eaker from the Eighth Air Force for not fully employing the resources 

supplied him to pursue the ultimate purpose of the Combined Bomber Offensive. 

278 
SALERNO AND LONDON 

He seized on the command shuffle stemming from the Cairo and Tehran conferences to cloak a decision he had probably already reached. In his own mind, at 

least, he had saved face for himself, Eaker, and, most important, for his beloved 

AAF. Eaker might be broken-hearted and a friendship of twenty-five years’ 

standing shattered, but Eaker and Spaatz had been moved to where the 

Commander of the AAF wanted them. 

In February 1944, Arnold explained to Spaatz his reason for assigning him 

to London in a highly emotional and confidential letter. Arnold had advanced 

the Strategic Air Force for a purely military consideration-unity of command 

for the British and Italian portions of the bomber offensive. But he went on: 

Another and perhaps equally important motive behind the formation of the 

United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe was my desire to build an 

American Air Commander to a high position prior to the defeat of Germany. It 

is that aspect particularly which has impelled me in my so far successful fight 

to keep your command parallel to Harris’ command and, therefore, parallel to 

Ike’s. If you do not remain in a position parallel with Harris, the air war will 

certainly be won by the RAF, if anybody. Already the spectacular effectiveness 

of their devastation of cities has placed their contribution in the popular mind at 

so high a plane that I am having the greatest difficulty in keeping your achievement (far less spectacular to the public) in its proper role not only in publications, but unfortunately in military and naval circles and, in fact, with the 

President himself. Therefore, considering only the aspect of a proper American 

share in credit for success in the air war, I feel we must have a high air commander some place in Europe. Today you can be that ~ommander.’~’ 

After an exchange of messages on personnel matters between Eisenhower 

and Marshall, the latter accepted Eisenhower’s recommendations almost in toto. 

Marshall acquiesced in Spaatz’s transfer with the proviso that no large new staff 

organization be created as a consequence of it.132 

On December 28, 1943, Spaatz boarded his B-17 on the first leg of the flight 

to England. For thirteen months he had advanced the effectiveness and importance of the AAF in the war against the Axis in the Mediterranean Theater of 

Operations. His personal involvement in the day-to-day operations of the NAAF 

had waned as Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder actively assumed his own role as 

Eisenhower’s Commander in Chief for Air. Spaatz had directed the bombing of 

Pantelleria, controlling the combined operation’s planning, execution, and air, 

naval, and land coordination. From that high point of broad responsibility his 

influence had steadily diminished until, by the end of the Sicilian campaign, he 

apparently exercised little control over his RAF subordinate commander for the 

Tactical Air Force, Air Marshal Arthur Coningham. 

As a result of the peculiarities of the Allied command structure in the Mediterranean, Spaatz found himself reduced to the de facto position of head of the 

Northwest African Strategic Air Force. After the merger of Spaatz’s and 

Tedder’s operational headquarters by Eisenhower in late summer 1943, Tedder 

279 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

felt free to go directly to the RAF Commander of the Tactical and Coastal Air 

Forces, but constrained to go through Spaatz to give orders to Doolittle, an 

American officer. That this situation did not cause a great deal more anger and 

mistrust than it did is a tribute to the personalities of Tedder and Spaatz, especially Spaatz, who subordinated himself for the mutual good. 

Spaatz concentrated his energies on consolidating the AAF’s position within 

the theater and expanding its part in the Combined Bomber Offensive. He succeeded in both endeavors. By the end of his tenure in the Mediterranean he had a 

fully functional all-American communications network, REDLINE, in place, 

which enabled him, as AAF chief in the Mediterranean, to retain close administrative ties with his units, independent of the RAF or any combined Allied organization. REDLINE also allowed him to retain what minimal control of operations 

he had. 

Spaatz held the strongest belief that an air force based in the Mediterranean 

Theater could, by attacking from the south, increase Germany’s defense burden 

and advance the goal of the Combined Bomber Offensive. His convincing 

Arnold and Eisenhower and, then, the three’s convincing the Combined Chiefs 

of Staff of the soundness of that belief resulted in the establishment of the 

Fifteenth Air Force. He may also have felt, at least until his appointment as head 

of U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, that commanding the Fifteenth rather 

than serving as Tedder’s deputy would give him a chance to contribute more to 

the war effort. 

When Spaatz departed for London he left behind two large, well-organized, 

and well-supplied American air forces. Of course, a year’s worth of combat 

experience and the fruits of America’s vast industrial effort did much to improve 

their status. Spaatz also deserves credit as a military administrator. The responsibility for military administration rested in his headquarters, not in Tedder’s 

Mediterranean Air Command or the Strategic, Tactical, and Coastal Air Forces. 

They dealt only with operations.133 Without Spaatz’s efforts there might have 

been not only one air force, but one air force dominated by the RAF and devoted 

to the close support of the army. Spaatz’s establishment of a strategic air force, 

over the objections of those favoring a stronger heavy-bomber buildup in 

England, would also prove important in the long run. Bombers based in Britain 

did not have the range to hit the vital Axis oil targets of southeastern Europe. 

Without the Fifteenth Air Force, the Allied bombing campaign would have 

achieved substantially fewer results. Arnold might well have refused to consider 

splitting his forces in the face of the enemy and handing part of them over to an 

officer he did not know as well or trust as completely as Spaatz. 

280 
Part Four 

The Point of the Blade 

Strategic Bombing and the 

Cross-Channel Invasion 

January- June 1944 

Part Four 

The Point of the Blade 

Strategic Bombing bears the same relationship to tactical 

bombing as does the cow to a pail of milk. To deny immediate aid and comfort to the enemy, tactical considerations 

dictate upsetting the bucket. To insure eventual starvation, 

the strategic move is to kill the cow.' 

-4,s. Strategic Bombing Survey, November 1945 

On January 1, 1944, Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz officially assumed command of 

the United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe (USSTAF). This new headquarters had operational control of two U.S. strategic air forces, the Eighth in Britain 

and the Fifteenth in Italy. Under the direction of the Chief of the Air Staff, RAF, 

who acted as an agent for the U.S.-British Combined Chiefs of Staff, Spaatz was 

responsible for directing the U.S. portion of the Combined Bomber Offensivethe U.S.-British strategic bombing campaign against the German war economy 

and military machine. At some unspecified future date, before the invasion of 

France from Britain (OVERLORD), Spaatz would come under the command of the 

Supreme Allied Commander of the invasion force. Once under Eisenhower's 

control, USSTAF would apply its forces to the preinvasion air campaign, to the 

assault, and to subsequent phases of the campaign. 

Spaatz would play a far stronger and more prominent role in the deliberations 

of the Allied high command and enjoy greater prestige and autonomy than his predecessor, Ira Eaker, because he was much friendlier with Eisenhower and Tedder, 

because he would oversee a much larger, more generously supplied, more effective, 

and more organizationally independent force, and because, in the last analysis, he 

would exercise a more forceful personality.:! In the beginning of 1944, the focus of 

Anglo-American operations shifted from the Mediterranean to northwest Europe, 

where the decisive ground operation to overthrow Germany would be launched. 

This fact magnified the importance of the commanders and their decisions. 

Spaatz faced two problems: he had to (1) get the maximum number of bombers 

over the target (which meant using escort fighters because not enough unescorted 

bombers would survive to reach their destinations) and (2) get the greatest possible accuracy from bombs delivered. Spaatz was compelled to substitute sheer 

tonnage for precision when his bombers failed to destroy their targets-this 

practice required bombing in less-than-perfect weather conditions and using 

radar for navigation and sighting. 

283 
By January 1944, the Americans' operational plan for their part of the 

Combined Bomber Offensive, known as POINTBLANK, had three high-priority 

targets: (1) single-engine fighter plane production, (2) twin-engine fighter plane 

production, and (3) German antifriction bearing manufacturing.3 As a single 

overriding prerequisite to the neutralization of these targets, POINTBLANK called 

for the destruction of the Luftwaffe's fighter forces in being-the chief obstacle 

to the success of the Combined Bomber Offensive. POINTBLANK had its origins 

at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943, where Roosevelt, Churchill, and 

their military staffs had agreed to a bomber offensive against Germany. In May 

1943, at the Washington Conference, the Combined Chiefs of Staff approved a 

plan for the Combined Bomber Offensive drawn up by Eaker and the Eighth Air 

Force. This plan was based on priorities originated by an AAF-supported study 

group (the Committee of Operations Analysts) and agreed on, with some modifications, by experts of the British Ministry of Economic Warfare and the RAF 

Air Staff.4 

The plan gave the highest priority to German fighter plane production. Early 

elimination of fighter manufacture was essential to the accomplishment of the 

rest of the Combined Bomber Offensive and would heighten the chances of success for the cross-channel invasion by reducing expected air opposition. Allied 

planners had identified antifriction, or ball, bearings as crucial in the production 

of German war matkriel. The effects of their unavailability, although not immeAir Chief Marshal 

Trafford Leigh-Mallory, 

Commander, Allied 

Expeditionary Air Force, 

1943-1944. 

284 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

diately felt in enemy front-line strength, would eventually touch all types of 

high-speed military equipment. The Allies believed from their own experience 

that ball bearings could not be stockpiled and that only large plants could manufacture a complete range of them. In addition, more than half of all German production was concentrated in one locality within range of bombers based in 

Britain-Schweinfurt.5 But the Allies soon learned that the Germans were not 

so dependent on ball bearings as predicted. Moreover, the Eighth Air Force, 

because of heavy losses, had been unable to follow up attacks on Schweinfurt in 

August and October, which had alerted the Germans and led them to disperse 

the industry and redesign their equipment to use less of its vital product. 

While attempting to carry out their mission under POINTBLANK, Spaatz and 

his headquarters became increasingly involved in the planning and the conduct 

of the preinvasion air campaign. A protracted dispute eventually developed 

between Spaatz and the Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Air Force 

(AEAF), Air Chief Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory. Spaatz became, almost by 

default, the chief spokesman for a faction of the Allied high command that 

objected to the massive antirailroad and transportation interdiction plan supported by Tedder and advocated by Leigh-Mallory, who had operational control 

of all tactical combat air forces directly assigned to Eisenhower’s invasion force. 

These two interwoven threads of POINTBLANK and OVERLORD dominated 

Spaatz’s thoughts and actions for the crucial period between New Year’s Day 

1944 and the invasion of France on D-day, June 6,1944. 

285 

Chapter 9 

The Luftwaffe Engaged 

(January-February 1944) 

We look upon our attacks against Germany now as major 

battles that are phases of a campaign. Each of these battles 

has all the elements of a major land or sea engagement, 

involving movement over tremendous distances, involving 

holding forces, involving penetrations and involving envelopments.’ 

4paatz to Arnold, January 10, I944 

Reports of the actual dispatch of over 800 heavy bombers 

against German fighter targets on 2 successive days and 

your ability and intention to repeat on the 3rd day are the 

brightest items that have crossed this desk for a long time? 

-Arnold to Spaatz, January 31, I944 

Upon his arrival in London on December 29, 1943, Spaatz found the Eighth 

Air Force facing a crisis. For two and a half months it had flown no deep-penetration bombing missions into Germany during clear weather.3 As the Army Air 

Forces offical history admitted, “The Eighth Air Force had for the time being 

lost [the battle for] air superiority over Germany.”4 The AAF had learned during 

the October 14 Schweinfurt mission, in which it lost 60 of 320 bombers dispatched, wrote off 7 bombers as not repairable, and counted 138 more as damaged,5 -“that such operations without fighter protection were impossibly 

costly.”6 Portal, in his capacity as the coordinator for POINTBLANK, informed the 

Combined Chiefs of Staff on December 4, 1943, that “the program was, in fact, 

some three months behind [schedule].”7 As of early January 1944, Eighth Air 

Force statistics, only slightly skewed by the disastrous Schweinfurt mission, 

287 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

showed that only 26 percent of those crews beginning operational tours in the 

theater could expect to complete twenty-five missions (the minimum needed to 

return to the States); 57 percent would be dead or missing; and the remaining 17 

percent would fail to complete their tours because of combat fatigue, accidental 

death, transfer, or administrative reasons.8 Arnold reported only slightly less discouraging statistics to Marshall, noting that the Eighth’s 3.8 percent loss rate per 

mission from July through November translated into a loss of 64 crew members” 

out of every 100.9 

Spaatz, however, would soon take advantage of opportunities and resources 

unavailable to his unlucky predecessor, Ira Eaker. In a campaign that bore some 

resemblance to that of Ulysses S. Grant versus Robert E. Lee in the spring of 

1864, Spaatz would use every opportunity to close with the Luftwaffe and force 

it to bleed and die. Similarly, just as the relative contributions of Grant and 

George G. Meade, the actual commander of the Union Army of the Potomac, 

blurred and merged, so, too, did those of Spaatz and his chief subordinate Maj. 

Gen. James H. Doolittle. Grant’s drive from Fredericksburg to Petersburg 

destroyed the offensive potential of Lee’s army and tied it to a trench system 

that it could not successfully defend. Spaatz, in the upcoming campaign, would 

pull the Luftwaffe’s teeth, forcing it to defend only the most preeminently 

important target systems, such as oil, while allowing the AAF daylight air 

supremacy over Germany. Also like Grant, Spaatz benefited through the prodigal output of men and material from an industrial economy whose production 

was overwhelming. 

The pipeline that had supplied Eaker with only a slowly increasing force 

overflowed in late 1943 and early 1944 for Spaatz. The Allied victory in the 

Battle of the Atlantic and massive U.S. merchant shipping production turned the 

constricted flow of supplies that had slowed the U.S. buildup in Britain for the 

first one and a half years of the war into a fast-flowing river. As a consequence 

of delays caused, in part, by a January 1943 decision by Arnold and Spaatz to 

divert P-38s to the North African Theater, Eaker’s first operational P-38 

“Lightning” long-range fighter group (the 55th) of approximately seventy-five 

aircraft became operational the day after the Schweinfurt mission. The P-38s of 

the 20th Fighter Group went into action in December 1943, as did the first longrange P-51B Mustang fighters (the Ninth Air Force’s 354th Fighter Group). In 

March the P-51 began to use new external fuel tanks (drop tanks), which enabled it to go as far as any bombers in the theater.10 

As of December 30, 1943, the Army Air Forces in England comprised 4,618 

* A loss rate of 3.8 percent per mission meant that 3.8 percent of the original force was lost on 

each mission. By the end of 25 missions the cumulative loss suffered by the original 100 air crews 

was therefore 64 air crews, even though only 3.8 percent, on average, were lost in a single mission. 

Reinforcement of the original 100 crews would have no effect on their chances for statistical survival because new arrivals would be lost at the same rate. 

288 
Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Commanding General, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in 

Europe; Maj. Gen. Nathan F. Twining, Commanding General, Fifteenth Air Force; 

and Lt. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, Commanding General, Mediterranean Allied Air Force. 

Maj. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, Commanding General, Ninth Air Force; Lt. Gen. 

Carl A. Spaatz, Commanding General, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe; and 

General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force, 

studying a photograph of a Ninth Air Force medium bomber field, April 22,1944. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

aircraft, 4,242 of them combat aircraft, divided into 453/4 groups (26’14 of heavy 

bombers, 12 of fighters, 4 of medium bombers, 2 of troop carriers, and 1 of 

reconnaissance).l 1 Despite constant attrition from September 1943 to May 1944, 

the number of fully operational heavy bombers in Eighth Air Force tactical units 

rose from 461 to 1,655. During the same period the Eighth’s fighter aircraft also 

jumped from 274 to 88212 and the number of personnel assigned to the Eighth 

went from 150,000 to 400,000. By February 19, 1944, another part of Spaatz’s 

command, the Fifteenth Air Force, would contribute an additional 12 heavy 

bomber and 4 fighter groups.13 

Before taking on the Luftwaffe, Spaatz instituted a system in which operations and administration received equal attention. This arrangement stemmed 

from Spaatz’s dual responsibilities as the Commander of USSTAF, in operational control of the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces, and as the head of the AAF 

in Britain in charge of administration for the Eighth and Ninth Air Forces. The 

Ninth, a tactical air force, made up the U.S. contingent of Air Chief Marshal 

Leigh-Mallory’s AEAF. Spaatz appointed Brig. Gen. Hugh J. Knerr as his 

Deputy for Administration, assigning directorates subordinate to him for personnel, supply, maintenance, and administration.14 Maj. Gen. Frederick L. 

Anderson became Spaatz’s deputy for operations over directorates for operations 

and intelligence. (See Chart 4, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, May 1944.) 

The official AAF history comments that this arrangement “integrated operations 

and logistics in one headquarters to a degree never before attained and represented a triumph for the concept that logistics was of equal importance with 

operations.”ls 

By elevating logistics to the same command level as operations Spaatz 

increased the status and morale of his logistics organizations. He placed his 

administrative control of the Ninth Air Force at the same level as his operational 

control over the Fifteenth Air Force. By tying the Eighth and Ninth together 

administratively, Spaatz made it harder for the Ninth to separate itself completely from his headquarters. He also emphasized the separateness of the AAF 

from both the RAF and the U.S. ground forces. A few months later Spaatz wrote 

to Arnold, “The Maintenance and Supply functions of our Air Forces cannot be 

integrated into the British Maintenance and Supply system for obvious reasons. 

Therein we have a firm foundation upon which to build our effort to regain and 

retain complete control of all U.S. air units in all theaters.” Not only did the new 

organization help to maintain independence from the British; it helped also to 

maintain institutional independence from the U.S. Army Service Forces (ASF). 

In the same letter he added, “We must always be alert that the A.S.F. does not 

extend its control of ground services to the Air Forces through lack of an organization of our own capable of rendering all manner of base services to air units in 

the combat zone.”l6 In keeping with Spaatz’s desire to avoid as much administrative detail as possible, the reorganization reduced the number of people 

reporting directly to him to three-the two deputies and his chief of staff. 

290 
Chart 4 

U. S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe 

May 1944 

U. S. STRATEGIC AIR FORCES IN EUROPE 

Commanding General USSTAF I I Depuly Commanding General 

Administration 

Commanding General Chid of Staff Air Service Command USSTAF 

Adjutant General 

Air inspector Statistical Control Office 

Weather Plans 

Commanding Oeneral Eighth Air Force 

I I I I I 

Director of Director of Director of Directar of Director of Personnel Administrative Services Maintenance Technical 

service0 

American Component 

Commanding General Ninth Air Force 
Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz on an inspection tour, arriving at an Eighth Air Force base. 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz meeting his oldest daughter, “Tattie” (Katharine) (left), a 

Red Cross worker, England, January 1944. 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz and his command plane, a B-17 named for his youngest 

daughter, “BOOPS” (Carla), Italy, 1944. 

Spaatz overcame the worries of Portal and Marshall that his headquarters 

would graft a new and large layer of bureaucratic staff onto already awkward air 

command arrangements in England. His new headquarters simply moved in 

on Eighth Air Force Headquarters, abolished it, absorbed most of it, and sent the 

rump on to the headquarters of VIII Bomber Command, which, in turn, became 

Doolittle’s new headquarters, redesignated Headquarters, Eighth Air Force. 

Maj. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower’s chief of staff, participated in 

the discussions for the new organization. On January 1, he assured Eisenhower, 

who had returned to the United States for a short visit, that “the . . . planned 

Organization represents NO repeat NO increase in personnel and NO repeat NO 

increase in the number of Headquarters.”l7 The same day, Spaatz and Bedell 

Smith agreed to locate Eisenhower’s Supreme Headquarters with USSTAF at 

Bushy Park, code-named WIDE WINGS.^^ Spaatz believed that this arrangement 

overcame one of the basic flaws of the Mediterranean organization, which had 

allowed the different service commanders to locate their headquarters in areas 

widely separated from the theater commanders and each other. 

The decision to co-locate USSTAF and SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters 

Allied Expeditionary Force) together gave Spaatz an advantage over the other 

air leaders. Their very distance from Eisenhower would assure Spaatz greater 

access to the ear of the Supreme Commander. Bedell Smith’s and Spaatz’s 

293 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

agreement ruined the plans of the Commander in Chief of the Allied Expeditionary Air Force, Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory in his complex at Stanmore. 

He had intended to move Eisenhower into Bushey Heath, a group of adjacent 

buildings. Stanmore, the Headquarters of No. 11 Group, had perhaps the finest 

communications network in Britain. Much of the Battle of Britain had been 

directed from Stanmore, and its facilities had since expanded. Before LeighMallory and Lt. Gen. Frederick Morgan, the principal planner for OVERLORD designated Chief of Staff Supreme Allied Command (COSSAC), could explain the 

situation to Smith, however, several battalions of U.S. engineers had descended 

on Bushy Park and erected Eisenhower’s headquarters. When Bedell Smith 

learned that Morgan and Leigh-Mallory had meant to place SHAEF at Stanmore, 

he remarked, “My God, I’ve married the wrong woman.”l9 From the beginning 

of the campaign, Spaatz gained a leg up in the fight over the air command 

arrangements that would plague the Allies until April 1944. 

Spaatz further strengthened his command by supporting and pursuing farsighted personnel management practices. He continued the enlightened racial 

policies of his predecessor, Ira Eaker. As the number of black AAF personnel 

in England began to increase above 3,000, Eaker instructed his staff to “stop 

arguing as to reasons why they [blacks] were sent here and do our best to cooperate with the War Department in making their employment here satisfactory to 

all concerned.” Eaker believed that “90 percent of the trouble with Negro 

troops was the fault of the whites” and told his staff “to give serious thought to 

handling this important problem.”20 As a result, in August 1943, the Eighth Air 

Force reorganized all black AAF units into the Combat Support Wing, a name 

carefully chosen to give black soldiers a feeling of contributing to the war 

effort. This move gave black AAF units a single strong commander with a good 

organization and an efficient supervisory headquarters. The commanding officers of the Combat Support Wing were sensitive to racial problems and they 

recognized the circumstances unique to their black units. Spaatz and Eaker also 

made it clear that they would allow no discrimination and expected their troops 

to avoid derogatory remarks and altercations.21 

Spaatz also enthusiastically supported the assignment of Women’s Army 

Corps (WAC) personnel to USSTAF. So determinedly did he press for WACs 

that in February 1944 General Arnold succeeded in obtaining a USSTAF allocation of them separate from that of the European Theater of Operations. The 

AAF in Europe had a quota of 4,448 WACs as opposed to a quota of only 

1,727 for the ETO. By June 6, 1944, the AAF had female personnel assigned 

throughout its Bomber, Fighter, and Troop Carrier Commands and its bombardment divisions, even down to individual combat wings.22 Spaatz’s own executive officer, Capt. Sally Bagby, ran his unique personal/military headquarters. 

Spaatz was the highest-ranking officer in the theater to have assigned a woman 

to such a position. 

294 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Brig. Gen. Curtis E. 

LeMay, Commanding 

General, 3rd Bombardment Division, Eighth 

Air Force, 1943. 

Initial Operations 

On January 3, Spaatz was briefed on the V-1, a German jet-propelled pilotless bomb, and the threat that it posed. The new weapon badly frightened British 

leaders, who immediately decided to concentrate a special effort on knocking 

out its launch sites and rendering it inoperable. This effort to eliminate the sites, 

code-named CROSSBOW, would divert, over Spaatz’s continued objections, much 

of the AAF’s strength from both strategic and preinvasion bombing. After this 

fist experience with CROSSBOW Spaatz noted, somewhat acerbically, that it was 

“very apparent from all conversations so far” that “everyone” accepted the 

CROSSBOW diversion from the main air effort. Spaatz went on to observe that if 

the Germans considered CROSSBOW soimportant, why had fighter opposition to 

raids on the sites decreased from November to December?23 

From the beginning of January to February 15, the weather and CROSSBOW 

proved almost as adversarial to the U.S. daylight bombing offensive as the 

Luftwaffe. In that period the Eighth’s heavy bombers flew combat missions on 

twenty-one days. Only six of those bombing missions went forward under completely visual conditions, and only two of those six attacked strategic targets in 

Germany. Nine other missions struck V-1 launch sites in France.24 In eleven of the 

thirteen missions over Germany the AAF resorted to bombing directed by an 

early, inaccurate system of radar which enabled the Eighth to conduct only area 

bombing. Area bombing tormented the Germans but did not provide results anywhere close to those obtained by visual means. The Eighth had only twelve B-17s 

296 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

equipped with H2X radar equipment. They arrived in October 1943 with handbuilt equipment and served as pathfinders (PFF), or lead planes, for bomber 

groups.25 Spaatz and Doolittle worked them hard. Their crews became exhausted. 

The American H2X derived from the British-developed H2S radar bombing 

system. H2X was critically important in increasing American bomb tonnage 

dropped on Europe because it enabled operations in overcast conditions. Its contribution to the weight of the U.S. bombing effort in 1944-1945 was second 

only to the success of the U.S. long-range fighter escorts in preserving the 

bombers themselves. That H2X stemmed from British, not American, efforts 

constituted another indictment of prewar U.S. military air thinking. America’s 

failure to anticipate the need for long-range fighter escort and to develop as early 

as possible the ability to locate and bomb targets through clouds left U.S. strategic bombers operable at only a fraction of their strength and almost ruined the 

efforts of the AAF. The Americans owed a great debt to the RAF not only for 

the P-51 but for H2X as well. 

Ever mindful of public perception, Arnold instructed Spaatz to abjure the 

term “blind bombing” for the H2X technique, because it gave “both the military 

and the public an erroneous impression.”26 Spaatz agreed to use such terms as 

“overcast bombing technique,” “bombing through overcast,” “bombing with 

navigational devices over clouds extending up to 20,000 feet.”27 He also pressed 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz and his executive officer, Capt. Sally Bagby, Women’s 

Army Corps, spring 1944. 

297 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Arnold for more radar-equipped planes, explaining that the “results of the past 

two months’ extensive use of Pathfinder (H2X) aircraft in the Eighth Air Force 

have shown the equipment offers enormous possibilities for further intensification of the bombing offensive against Germany.” He drove the point home by 

adding, “The most critical need of the Strategic Air Forces is for more 

Pathfinder aircraft. A few H2X airplanes now will profit our cause more than 

several hundred in six months” [emphasis in originall.28 

The bombing of Germany by nonvisual means continued a policy begun 

under Eaker in the last quarter of 1943. Although nowhere nearly as accurate as 

precision bombing, radar bombing allowed more frequent operations, maintained the pressure on German cities, and forced the Luftwaffe to intercept under 

adverse weather conditions. Its adoption of this policy marked the AAF’s acceptance of the reality that daylight precision bombing alone could not win the air 

war. The implications of this belated acknowledgment were little remarked on at 

the time. Yet, at this point the AAF, without ever publicly or privately admitting 

it, abandoned its unquestioning faith in prewar bombing doctrines. 

Once he assumed command, Spaatz wanted to go after the Luftwaffe immediately. The POINTBLANK directive under which he operated left the means for 

doing so up to him. Spaatz’s approach differed significantly from that of his predecessor. Because of his lack of long-range escort fighters, Eaker had had no 

choice but to rely on a bomber-based strategy. The Eighth under Eaker’s command had attempted to ruin the Luftwaffe fighter force by bombing the German 

air industry. The Americans had hoped that attrition inflicted on all battle fronts 

and by short-range U.S. and RAF fighters out of Britain would destroy the damaged German air industry’s ability to replace losses. Eaker may have focused too 

heavily on his bombers and their task. His fighters appear to have concentrated 

on their escort duties to the detriment of their possible employment in counterair 

and ground sweeps. This philosophy was made clear during an Eighth Air Force 

Commanders’ meeting in September 1943, where the prevailing sentiment was 

that “fighters must escort the bombers whether they bring down any German 

fighters or not.”29 In any case, Eaker had few fighters to waste. 

Official doctrine supported Eaker’s tactics. AAF Field Manual 1-15, 

“Tactics and Techniques of Air Fighting,” of April 10, 1942, and AAF Field 

Manual 1-5, of January 18, 1943, emphasized pursuit’s air defense and escort 

roles, with a bow to ground support. The replacement for the latter manual, War 

Department Field Manual 100-20, sent a mixed message. In addressing the role 

of fighters belonging to a strategic air force, such as the Eighth, it stated, 

“Accompanying fighter aviation, where its radius of action permits, is also used 

to increase [the bomber’s] security. Fighter aviation also furnishes air base 

defense for bombardment bases.”30 That passage offered little encouragement 

for aggressive action. 

The direction given a tactical air force such as the Twelfth, differed radically 

from the advice given the strategic air forces. Whereas the mission of the strate298 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

Eighth Air Force heavy bombers, equipped with H2X radar, dropping four-pound 

incendiary bombs “blind” in overcast skies over Kiel, Germany, December 13,1943. 

gic air force was “the defeat of the enemy nation,”31 the first priority of a tactical air force was the gaining of air superiority “by attacks against aircraft in the 

air and on the ground, and against those enemy installations which he requires 

for the application of air power.”32 Fighters formed the air-to-air component of 

the counterair team, and light and medium bombardment formed the air-toground segment. The manual’s tactical section reflected Spaatz’s experience 

with the AAF in North Africa, as the strategic section reflected Eaker’s experience with the Eighth Air Force in Europe. 

Unlike Eaker, Spaatz and Doolittle decided on or before their amval in 

Britain to intensify the campaign against the Luftwaffe by using their fighters in 

an offensive air-to-air role, instead of purely as escorts. Spaatz also intended to 

use the Ninth (Tactical) Air Force to assist in the counterair effort, despite the 

fact that Leigh-Mallory intended to use it for preinvasion operations. Shortly 

after Spaatz’s visit to Washington two months earlier, Arnold had expressed to 

Marshall similarly aggressive sentiments which were probably reflective of his 

own combative temperament but could have come, in part, from Spaatz. Spaatz 

might have discussed his experiences in the Mediterranean campaign with 

Arnold. In any case, Arnold recommended in a memo to Marshall that the Allied 

air forces “seek out and destroy the Gernian Air Force in the air and on the 

299 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ground without delay. The defensive concept of our fighter commands and air 

defense units must be changed to the offensive.” He called for more imaginative 

use of fighters as ground strafers, as fighter bombers, and as air-to-ground rocket 

launchers to assist the OVERLORD assault.33 Spaatz could be sure of Arnold’s 

support for a more active fighter force. Both men must have realized and 

counted on the fact that a changeover to offensive fighter tactics would impose a 

far higher rate of attrition on both the Luftwaffe and the AAF. Arnold would 

have to support Spaatz with many replacement fighter pilots and aircraft. 

On several occasions, especially in his first meetings with Eighth Air Force 

staff personnel, Spaatz reiterated his desire to close with the Luftwaffe. On 

January 9, he visited the Eighth’s War Room. There he met an old acquaintance, 

Col. Richard D’O. Hughes, Assistant Chief of Intelligence, and the principal 

link between the Eighth Air Force and the Enemy Objectives Unit (EOU) of the 

Economic Warfare Division of the U.S. Embassy, London. The EOU served as 

the de facto target planning staff of the Eighth. Hughes, an expatriate British 

subject with numerous British decorations and long-time service in the British 

Indian Army, served his new country ably not only by applying his considerable 

intellect to the complicated issues of targeting but also by using the British “old 

boy” network to gain entr6e to British intelligence and targeting agencies.34 

Spaatz told Hughes of his main objective to knock out the Luftwaffe by hitting it in the air, on its airfields, and at its fighter factories: 

It is my belief that we do not get sufficient attrition by hitting fighter factories, 

therefore we must place emphasis on airdromes and knocking them down in the 

air. Our mission is destroying the German Air Force, and that we will hit primary objectives when weather permits, but at other times will choose targets as 

stated above, which will bring fighters into the air.35 

Spaatz had voiced this concept of targeting vital economic objectives to force 

Luftwaffe attrition almost two years earlier,36 and it remained one of his guiding 

principles throughout the war. 

On subsequent days Spaatz repeated to Hughes and to his operational commanders, Anderson and Doolittle, that he considered his chief mission the 

destruction of the Luftwaffe and that he would not even wait for “proper 

weather [in which] to bomb the priority targets.”37 Spaatz’s official “Operational Directive” instructed Doolittle to hit the airframe factories and the 

German fighters “in the air and on the ground.”38 On January 21, in the first of a 

weekly series of “Eyes Only” reports to Arnold, Spaatz optimistically wrote that 

he needed only a few days of visual bombing to wreck the remaining fighter and 

ball-bearing factories. Then, “all other attacks will be made on the basis of 

destroying enemy air force in air and on ground. Such attacks will be made so 

far as possible under conditions most favorable to ourselves and normally will 

be against objectives which force German fighters into combat action within 

range of our fighters.”39 

300 
THE LUFTWAFFENGAGED 

By late January, Spaatz had come to the realization that “we must continue 

to attrit the German Air Force on the ground whenever we can operate.” In a letter to Arnold, Spaatz stated his policy: 

I feel you would become very impatient with me if this very large striking force 

spent most of its time on the ground or in training flights, waiting for the few 

days when visual bombing permits hitting our primary targets-the aircraft factories. I also feel sure that to confine our operations to that alone would not 

deplete the German Air Force at the necessary rate.40 

Neither Arnold nor Eaker, who had held similar views while leading the Eighth, 

disagreed with these sentiments. What made Spaatz’s formulation unique was 

his insistence on attacking the Luftwaffe on the ground as well as in the air. 

Thanks to Spaatz’s experience in Tunisia and particularly in Sicily, he had firsthand knowledge of the devastating effect of a prolonged counterair campaign on 

the Axis air force bases in the Mediterranean. Hundreds of German planes, 

many repairable, had littered Sicilian airfields and fallen into Allied hands. 

Spaatz reiterated this point to Arnold: “I feel personally that this matter of hitting airdromes from U.K. requires a shot in the arm, both as to methods of attack 

and frequency of attack. I believe that in our penetration into Germany that 

advantage must be taken of the use of intruder aircraft.”41 Spaatz expressed similar views to the Assistant Secretary of War for Air, Robert A. Lovett: 

I believe that some of the methods applied in the Mediterranean are applicable 

here. . . . My tendency will be to place a little bit more emphasis upon swatting 

the enemy on his airdromes whenever possible and [on forcing] him to fight 

under conditions most advantageous to us.42 

Spaatz also communicated this insistence on attacking the Luftwaffe before 

it could become airborne to Eisenhower and Tedder. On January 22, Spaatz discussed his plans for USSTAF with Eisenhower. They were, first, to attack 

fighter and ball-bearing plants whenever conditions permitted visual bombings 

and, second, to attack “targets in Germany under conditions most favorable to 

obtain maximum destruction of German fighters in the air and on the ground.”Q 

Later in the day Spaatz discussed his plans with Tedder. They “agreed that 

attacks so far on airdromes had been unfruitful here, possibly due to wrong 

method of attack.”44 

By choosing to attack the Luftwaffe rather than to defend against it, Spaatz 

had found the way to break the German fig&er force. After December 1943, the 

number of U.S. fighter aircraft on hand in fully operational tactical units dramatically increased. The AAF had the means as well as the method of taking the 

battle to the Luftwaffe.45 By April 1944, American fighter sweeps and intruder 

missions, which Spaatz and Doolittle had launched once they had sufficient 

long-range fighter aircraft, were disrupting all types of German air activitytrainee pilots could not even be assured of practicing in the air unmolested. The 

301 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

sweeps also caught many German night fighters and bombers on their fields. 

Fortune and the impatience of Arnold also favored Spaatz and Doolittle with 

the right man to command their fighters. In August 1943, Arnold replaced the 

Commanding General of the VIII Fighter Command, Maj. Gen. Frank O’D. 

Hunter, with Maj. Gen. William E. Kepner. Hunter, in Arnold’s opinion, had 

failed to fully support and understand the need for a long-range fighter program.46 Kepner, however, not only firmly believed in the feasibility of longrange fighter escort but had helped to push through the AAF’s range extension 

program in the spring and summer of 1943.47 Kepner subsequently told an interviewer that until Spaatz and Doolittle arrived he had never had enough fighters 

to do other than “stick close to the bombers.” Furthermore, even though he had 

wished to get the fighters out to scour the skies for German fighters, his superiors thought “that the time hadn’t come to do that.” As soon as Spaatz and 

Doolittle arrived, they had “directed that I take such steps as I felt necessary to 

lick the German Air Force. If it meant getting out and scouring the skies, even 

by thinning down the escort, that would be okay with them. . . . It certainly 

wouldn’t have been possible without their help.”4* 

As it had so often before, British signal intelligence greatly helped Spaatz 

accomplish his goals. By the time he arrived in London, ULTRA intelligence 

intercepts indicated that fuel shortages and deficiencies in pilot training had 

already begun to impair the Luftwaffe’s readiness. The Germans had reduced 

their number of reconnaissance flights and had called in test pilots and ferry 

Maj. Gen. William E. 

Kepner, Commanding 

General, VIII Fighter 

Command, at a press conference, London, 

England, late 1943. 

302 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

pilots to operate fighters against U.S. daylight raids. In January ULTRA revealed 

Hitler’s orders to cut back Luftwaffe meteorological operations and shorten the 

recuperation period for wounded pilots. By February 6, ULTRA supplied further 

evidence of a Luftwaffe comb-out of its noncombatants to provide pilots and to 

meet the needs of the land forces.49 The knowledge that the enemy’s resources 

were becoming ever tauter must have added to Spaatz’s determination to maintain and increase the pressure on the foe. 

Spaatz knew that if enough Luftwaffe fighter planes went down, Germany 

could neither defend its industry nor contest the air over the beachhead. The 

requirements of both POINTBLANK and OVERLORD for air superiority necessitated 

knocking out the Luftwaffe by no later than May 1. Spaatz had 120 days in 

which to ruin the offensive power of a large, modern air force. 

An examination of the Eighth’s first mission of the year, on January 11, 

proved typical of many of the missions of the next few weeks. Weather forecasters 

predicted clear weather over key aircraft plants at Oschersleben and Halberstadt 

and in the Brunswick area. The nature and location of these targets, some less than 

a hundred miles from Berlin, asbured a heavy and active defense effort by the 

Luftwaffe. The Eighth’s eleven groups of P-47s, joined by two groups of P-38s, 

provided cover from the Dutch coast to within fifty to seventy miles of the targets. A lone P-51 group would escort the first of the bomber formations all the 

way to and from the target.50 

As the heavy bombers left their bases in Britain, the weather deteriorated, 

making takeoff and assembly difficult. Nevertheless, 663 B-24s and B-17s left 

their fields. Weather continued to worsen, causing the 2d (B-24s) and 3d (B-17s 

and B-24s) Bombardment Divisions to abort their flights short of their primary 

targets. Instead, they bombed targets of opportunity in western Germany. The 

remaining 29 1 bombers hit their targets but suffered severely from fierce 

Luftwaffe reaction. Using improved tactics and fuel tanks developed in the summer and fall of 1943, the German fighters waited until most of the escorts had 

left and then attacked the bombers. Forty-two American heavy bombers failed to 

return-13 percent of the force engaged. All 44 American P-51s fought well, but 

weakened their effort by spreading themselves over too large an area in an 

attempt to defend the widely dispersed U.S. bomber formations. Even so, the 

P-51s were credited with more German aircraft kills than 177 P-47s which had 

escorted the bombers part of the way to the target area. Obviously, the Germans 

had been able to avoid the P-47s but not the P-5ls,51 but the P-51s also reached 

the initial rendezvous point too soon, and thus had insufficient fuel to cover the 

bombers on their return from the targets to the P-47s and P-38s providing withdrawal escort. Meanwhile, the weather over England degraded further, and the 

returning 1st Bombardment Division planes had to land on unfamiliar runways 

belonging to the 2d and 3d Divisions. Subsequent air reconnaissance revealed 

that the plant at Oschersleben had suffered severe damage, and one of the 

Brunswick targets, Waggam, site of an aircraft production complex, had received 

303 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUR~PE 

Early model P-47s over England, summer 1943. 

direct hits on almost every one of its assembly plants.52 

Spaatz and Maj. Gen. Barney Giles, Chief of Staff of the AAF, who had 

come to England to witness the birth of USSTAF, spent January 11 in the VIII 

Fighter Command operations room observing the mission. They shortly discovered for themselves another of the problems that had hampered Eaker-the need 

of AAF Headquarters in Washington, D.C., for favorable reports on the bombing effort. The Eighth Air Force’s report on the mission of January 11 was not 

released in Washington until the morning of January 13. In the meantime, U.S. 

newspapers, working on copy from London that was based on intercepts of 

German propaganda broadcasts, headlined stories in the evening editions of 

January 11 of “123 United States aircraft lost over Germany.” The next day the 

press picked up German claims of 135 U.S. planes lost. The Eighth’s statement, 

scheduled for 9 A.M. that day, did not appear, making it seem that the AAF had 

decided to conceal a disaster. 

When the Eighth’s statement finally came out on January 13, the public, 

according to AAF headquarters, showed greater interest in the dispute over total 

losses than in the damage claims of the AAF. Brig. Gen. Laurence Kuter, acting 

as Arnold’s representative, told Spaatz in a telephone conference, “We adjure 

that future initial releases will come as early as possible to avoid undisputed 

prominence in the U.S. press to items released by German radio.” Kuter also 

“adjured” that future releases should contain graphic references to damage done 

rather than tales highlighting German fighter defenses. If Spaatz objected to 

304 
THE LU~WAFFE ENGAGED 

Filling the pipeline: Replacement B-17s for the Eighth Air Force, England, March 1944. 

“needling” from Washington and wanted to avoid future “embarrassment,” his 

reports had better get to Washington as quickly as possible.53 

The January 11 mission evoked an outburst from Arnold, who, angered by 

its negative coverage in the press, complained about the small number of 

bombers actually attacking significant targets. He felt that the mission had jeopardized the entire principle of daylight bombing: “I cannot understand why with 

the great number of airplanes available in the Eighth Air Force, we continually 

have to send a boy to do a man’s job. In my opinion, this is an uneconomical 

waste of lives and equipment.” Although he realized that because of the recall, 

only forty-seven planes had bombed Brunswick, what deeply worried him was 

“the concept of small forces split up all over Europe instead of some good 

smashing blows.” Instead of pecking away at the German aircraft industry, he 

asked, couldn’t the AAF send out a really large number of aircraft and simply 

level a target? Arnold asked Spaatz for “some new thoughts and new lines of 

approach. ”54 

For eighteen days after the January 11 mission, although high clouds or bad 

conditions over the bases prevented the bombing of Germany itself, USSTAF 

launched three missions against CROSSBOW installations. On January 2 1, Spaatz 

observed to Arnold, “Basically the principal enemy we face is weather.”u Two 

days later Spaatz wrote to Lovett: 

The weather here is the most discouraging of all factors and I am sure that it 

will result in the loss of remaining hairs on my head, or at least will turn what is 

305 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

left of the red into white. Nothing is more exasperating than trying to run an Air 

Force continuously hampered or grounded by weather.”56 

On January 29 and 30, conditions over England improved enough to allow 

the dispatch of large missions against Frankfurt-am-Main (over 800 heavy 

bombers) and Brunswick. Unfortunately, both missions had to bomb through 

heavy overcast with the assistance of H2X. 

By the end of January 1944, little time remained before POINTBLANK’S subordination to OVERLORD. Spaatz had at most two months to devote the full force of 

USSTAF to strategic objectives because by April 1, sixty days prior to the scheduled launching of the cross-channel operation, the needs of the invasion would 

take primacy. On January 26, Spaatz wrote Eaker, “I have reviewed the problem 

of strategic bombing of our enemies, and the thing that has struck me most is the 

critical time factor. We have very little time in which to finish our job.” 

On February 3, the Eighth sent more than 700 bombers in a pathfinder-led 

attack on Wilhelmshaven. Bad weather caused 100 of those bombers to abort 

and another 61 to bomb targets of opportunity in Emden. The next day, another 

pathfinderbombing-through-clouds raid directed at Frankfurt-am-Main suffered 

from weather and navigational problems, and only 233 of 433 bombers sent out 

bombed their primary target. The remainder again bombed various targets of 

opportunity. This pattern, but on a lighter scale, continued until February 19.57 

On February 17, Portal issued a new bombing directive to both Spaatz and 

Harris confirming target priorities agreed on in mid-January. The primary objective remained the destruction of the Luftwaffe. Single- and twin-engine fighter 

airframe and airframe component production and Axis ball-bearing industry targets were again accorded first priority; second priority went to installations supporting German fighter air forces and other objectives such as CROSSBOW, 

“Berlin and other industrial areas,” and targets in southeastern Europe, such as 

cities and transportation targets. The plan further instructed Spaatz and Harris 

that preparation and readiness for the direct support of OVERLORD “should be 

maintained without detriment to the combined bomber offensive.”58 

Two features of this directive are noteworthy: (1) as of mid-February, 

POINTBLANK still had priority over OVERLORD in strategic operations, and (2) 

Berlin was singled out for special attention. This mention of Berlin, in part, was 

an ex post facto authorization of Harris’ Battle of Berlin begun in November 

1943. But the directive also specifically authorized area attacks by U.S. forces 

on the German capital and any other German city within range: 

Attacks should be delivered upon Berlin or other important industrial areas by 

both Bomber Command R.A.F. and U.S.S.A.F.E. (latter using blind bombing 

technique as necessary) whenever weather or tactical conditions are suitable for 

such operations and unsuitable for operations against the primary objective. 

306 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

Leigh-Mallory and the AEAF 

During January, Spaatz had to deal with the frustrations created by the confused Allied command structure as well as those caused by nature. Eisenhower, 

as the Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force (SCAEF), commanded 

all military forces directly assigned to the cross-channel invasion. Tedder was 

Deputy Supreme Commander. Under them came Admiral Berthram H. Ramsey, 

Naval Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; Air Chief Marshal Trafford 

Leigh-Mallory, Commander in Chief, Allied Expeditionary Air Force; and 

General Bernard L. Montgomery, Commander, 21 Army Group. Montgomery’s 

army group, composed of the British 2d Army under Lt. Gen. Miles Dempsey 

and the U.S. First Army under Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, would conduct the 

ground assault. After Montgomery had established and enlarged the beachhead, 

the Allies would create additional Commonwealth and American armies, whereupon Bradley would form an all-American army group (the 12th). Bradley’s first 

additional army would be the U.S. Third Army under the redoubtable Lt. Gen. 

George S. Patton. 

Each of the service components of the Allied Expeditionary Force had a 

clearly defined mission. The naval forces would convoy amphibious assault 

troops to Normandy, prevent German naval interference (minimal at best), keep 

the seaborne supply lines to France open, and provide naval gunfire support to 

the troops. The 21 Army Group would force its way ashore, form and expand a 

beachhead, and, after a few weeks, break out of the beachhead and begin an 

offensive across France and as far as necessary into Germany to defeat the Third 

Reich. The AEAF would maintain air supremacy over the invasion convoys, the 

beachhead, and subsequent operations of the ground forces. It would further 

interfere with and delay as far as possible the movement of German reinforcements toward the beachhead, would transport and supply the airborne assault 

forces, and would provide necessary air support for the ground forces. (See 

Chart 5, Chain of Command, Allied Expeditionary Force, February 13, 1944.) 

To accomplish his mission Leigh-Mallory had two Allied air forces assigned 

to his operational control, the British 2d Tactical Air Force under Air Marshal 

Arthur Coningham and the U.S. Ninth Air Force commanded by Maj. Gen. 

Lewis Brereton. Coningham’s force consisted of three groups: the newly formed 

No. 83 and No. 84 Groups made up of fighters and fighter-bombers taken from 

Fighter Command, reconnaissance aircraft acquired from the dissolution of 

Army Co-operation Command, and No. 2 Group of light bombers and Mosquito 

Intruder aircraft transferred from Bomber Command. These transfers consumed 

two-thirds of Fighter Command, which received the new designation, Air 

Defence of Great Britain (ADGB). Leigh-Mallory also retained his responsibilities for the home defenses, and the new chief of ADGB, Air Marshal Roderic M. 

Hill, reported directly to him.59 

Brereton’s air force consisted of three components: IX Fighter Command 

307 
Chart 5 

Chain of Command, Allied Expeditionary Force 

February 13,1944 

. 

- 

. . . . . . . . Liaison 

Command 

U.S. Tactical 

Air Force U.S. Naval Force British Naval Force 

Combined 

CHIEFS OF STAFF 

SUPREME COMMANDER 

British 

Tactical Air Force 

I 

DEPUTY SUPREME COMMANDER 

I 

CHIEF OF STAFF 

I 

COMBINED STAFF 

---- 

Commander in Chief British Army Commander in Chief 

Allied Expeditionary 

Expeditionary Force I I Air Force 

Allied Naval I I Gro$k%z:nder I I Group Commander 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

(Maj. Gen. Elwood P. Quesada commanding), IX Bomber Command (Maj. Gen. 

Samuel E. Anderson commanding), and IX Troop Carrier Command (Maj. Gen. 

Paul L. Williams commanding), plus assorted service and antiaircraft troops. The 

IX Fighter Command had two subordinate units: IX Air Support Command would 

work with U.S. First Army, while XIX Air Support Command would assist U.S. 

Third Army. The medium and light bombers of IX Bomber Command could aid 

either support group or perform other tasks required by the theater. The IX 

Transport Command would supply theater air transport requirements and provide 

all airlift needed for U.S. airborne operations. (Under Allied agreements, IX 

Transport Command would provide a substantial portion of British combat airlift as 

well.) The chief function of the Ninth Air Force was to give air support to U.S. 

ground forces participating in the OVERLORD invasion. Thus Brereton was the 

American airman responsible to, not under the direct command of, Bradley, the 

overall U.S. ground force commander. Although the Ninth would have eight 

medium-bomber, three light-bomber, fourteen transport, and eighteen fighter 

groups by invasion day, in mid-January 1944 the Ninth had only five groups-four 

of medium bombers transferred from the Eighth Air Force and one of P-5 1 fighters. 

What confused Allied command arrangements was not the organization of 

the expeditionary force, but the role Spaatz’s USSTAF and the large RAF 

metropolitan commands (Fighter, Coastal, and Bomber) would play in supporting the invasion. It would take three months to arrive at a solution that was 

barely satisfactory. At the beginning of 1944, Leigh-Mallory assumed that these 

forces would to a great extent come under his control. This assumption met stiff 

resistance from the independent air leaders, in particular Spaatz and Air Officer 

Commanding, Bomber Command, Arthur Harris. In addition, the Ninth Air 

Force, more than twice the strength of the British 2d Tactical Air Force, served 

two masters: Leigh-Mallory had operational control, but Spaatz had administrative control. Because the two men had very different missions and irreconcilable 

conceptions about the correct employment of the Ninth, this dual control soon 

led to discord. 

At first glance Leigh-Mallory seemed a sound choice as Commander in Chief, 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force. He had specialized in army cooperation (that part 

of the RAF assigned to supporting the ground forces) and in the offensive use of 

fighter aircraft. In World War I he had served as an army cooperation pilot and, 

by 1927, he had become Commandant, RAF School of Army Cooperation.60 

Shortly before World War I1 he transferred to Fighter Command and led No. 12 

Group, which defended the Midlands in the Battle of Britain. At the very end of 

the battle he replaced Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park, a defensive fighter expert, 

as Commander, No. 11 Group, which defended London and southeastern 

Britain. At that point the RAF switched to the offensive, carrying the air campaign to the Germans with fighter sweeps over France.61 

Eventually Leigh-Mallory became Air Officer Commanding, Fighter 

Command and, in November 1943, he officially gained his post as head of the 

309 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

AEAF. His name had been mentioned in connection with such posts as early as 

the summer of 1942, when the British had begun to plan the rearrangement of 

their air commands for future large-scale ground operations in France. On March 

11, 1943, Leigh-Mallory learned privately, from Portal, of his selection as Commander in Chief, Allied Air Force (Designate), by the British Chiefs of Staff and 

its approval in principle by the Combined Chiefs of Staff at Casablanca. By the 

end of June 1943, the CCS had authorized him to begin discussing air matters 

with OVERLORD’S planners. On August 20, he was recognized as interim head of 

the AEAF, but he still had no directive on operations from the CCS.62 

A closer look at Leigh-Mallory reveals weaknesses that hampered his ability 

to participate in coalition warfare. He has been described “as a man of driving 

egoism,” with a habitually haughty manner 63 and “an assertive temperament.”@ 

Even his apologists admit that he “was so typically English, [and] sometimes 

tactless, almost pompous in appearance and naive in character without any 

finesse, that it certainly was difficult for the Americans to assess his ability, and 

they did little to try to understand him.”65 Once Leigh-Mallory absorbed an idea 

it became almost immutable.66 This characteristic proved a grave defect, not 

because he adopted impractical ideas but because he defended his own beliefs 

with an uncompromising ferocity and thus exasperated his opponents. 

During the Battle of Britain he engaged in a heated controversy with Air 

Vice-Marshal Keith Park, Commander, No. 11 Group, and Air Chief Marshal 

Hugh Dowding, Air Officer Commanding, Fighter Command, over the proper 

employment of fighters. Leigh-Mallory favored launching a large force, assembling it in the air, and using it all at once against the enemy. The problem was 

that by the time this “big wing” had assembled, the German raiders, as often as 

not, had delivered their bombs. Nonetheless, Leigh-Mallory stubbornly refused 

to change his tactics. In fact, Dowding had resolved to remove Leigh-Mallory, 

but before he could act, was removed by Churchill.67 Dowding ’s abrupt replacement by Sholto Douglas and Park’s replacement by Leigh-Mallory offended 

many of Fighter Command’s senior officers. Likewise, Leigh-Mallory’s obdurate adherence to his own strong ideas about air preparations for OVERLORD 

would intensify his conflict with other air leaders. 

Leigh-Mallory had little gift for interpersonal relationships. Not only did his 

dispute with Dowding and Park worsen, but, after his elevation to the AEAF, he 

did not get along with his American deputies, Vandenberg and Brig. Gen. 

Frederic H. Smith,68 or with his subordinate air force commanders Air Marshal 

“Mary” Coningham and Maj. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton.69 The fates had dealt 

unkindly with Leigh-Mallory in supplying his associates. He and Tedder differed 

in personality, experience, and outlook. Without his knowledge, Leigh-Mallory ’s 

appointee as the head of the 2d Tactical Air Force, Air Marshal J. H. D’Albiac, 

was replaced by Tedder with Coningham. At the time, Leigh-Mallory assumed 

that Montgomery had consented to this change, but, in fact, Montgomery would 

have picked any air leader over Coningham. Then, the Commander of No. 83 

310 
THE LURWAFFE ENGAGED 

Group, the fighter and fighter-bomber group assigned to cooperate with the British 

2d Army, was replaced with Air Vice-Marshal Harry Broadhurst at Montgomeq’s 

insistence. Leigh-Mallory assumed that Coningham approved of this move, but in 

fact Coningham would have picked any air leader over Broadhurst. Neither 

Broadhurst nor Coningham had much use for Leigh-Mallory.70 

Nor did Spaatz and other American airmen view him without suspicion.71 

They mistook his natural reserve for hostility and were put off by his somewhat 

ponderous and inarticulate speech.72 In general, they returned his abruptness in 

kind. Leigh-Mallory’s first American deputy, Brig. Gen. Haywood S. Hansell, 

was a highly regarded officer and a personal friend of Spaatz, but was promoted 

by Arnold and sent to the Pacific to begin B-29 operations. It might have been 

better for all concerned if he had stayed in London. Leigh-Mallory’s second 

American deputy, Maj. Gen. William 0. Butler, lacking the dynamic personality 

necessary to attract and keep high-quality American staff officers, did not help 

his chief. The American contingent at AEAF Headquarters needed high-quality 

officers to counterbalance domination by Leigh-Mallory ’s appointments from 

Fighter Command. The staffing of AEAF Headquarters called for 150 RAF officers and 80 AAF officers. Butler had purposely kept the American contingent 

small and did not even intend to use all of his authorized billets.73 At one point 

Eisenhower even suggested that Butler be replaced with the more forceful Maj. 

Gen. Frederick L. Anderson.74 

Air Vice-Marshal Harry 

Broadhurst, Air Officer 

Commanding, No. 38 

Group, RAF, 1944. 

311 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

AEAF Headquarters remained an essentially British organization throughout 

its existence, which gave the AAF additional reason to view it with suspicion.75 

The Americans either did not understand or refused to acknowledge that LeighMallory had such a large British staff because he also served as Air Officer 

Commanding the home defenses. If his British staff had merely been equal in 

number to the American staff assigned to Headquarters, AEAF, it would have 

been vastly overburdened.76 

Spaatz’s and Leigh-Mallory ’s disparate personalities added a note of personal 

acrimony to their differences, but their widely divergent views on the employment of air power and of the place of air power in the command structure of the 

Allied invasion force would have brought the two men into conflict in almost any 

case. The gulf between the two became apparent at their meeting of January 3 on 

plans for OVERLORD. Spaatz noted in his diary, “Am not sure whether L-M 

[Leigh-Mallory] has proper conception of air role. Apparently accepts possibility 

of not establishing Air supremacy until landing starts.”77 Spaatz believed that 

delaying the battle for air supremacy until the invasion would be too late not only 

for the invasion but for the bomber offensive as well. Spaatz believed that the 

Luftwaffe had to be crushed as soon as possible. If Allied air forces had to fight 

for supremacy over the beaches, they could provide no support for the ground 

forces and might not be able to provide air cover for the invasion fleet; paratroop 

drops could not be guaranteed without air supremacy. 

In contrast, Leigh-Mallory ’s perspective came from his four years’ experience in successfully defending against Luftwaffe attacks. Since 1941, the Germans 

had refused to engage in daylight combat with Fighter Command, and Fighter 

Command, with its short-range defensive fighters, could not force the Germans 

to fight if they chose not to. Leigh-Mallory welcomed the thought that the 

Germans would once more have to fly into territory he defended. 

A few days later, Spaatz and OVERLORD’S planners, including Leigh-Mallory 

and Lt. Gen. F. E. Morgan, the head of the Allied planning group that had drawn 

up the original plans for the invasion, clashed over command prerogatives. 

Morgan and Leigh-Mallory, who at this stage regarded himself as the commander 

in chief of all Allied air power necessary for the invasion, which included 

USSTAF,78 insisted that three American P-38 long-range fighter groups move 

from the Mediterranean to Britain to help provide air cover. Spaatz objected on the 

dual grounds that only he, and not the Allied planning staff, had the authority to 

order such a move, and that he would not strip the Fifteenth Air Force of its 

escorts and, in the process, weaken it and POINTBLANK for an unnecessary fight 

over the beachhead. Spaatz pointed out to Butler that the matter concerned neither 

Morgan nor Leigh-Mallory and that the decision rested entirely with him.79 

Morgan appealed to Eisenhower in Washington. 

Eisenhower had not yet arrived in London to take up his new command and, 

at Marshall’s insistence, he had returned to the States for rest and consultation 

with the Army Staff. Eisenhower, who had his own ideas about the air situation, 

312 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

apparently backed Spaatz, for the three groups stayed permanently in the 

Mediterranean. Marshall, too, clarified the matter in a January 15 message to 

Spaatz and Morgan in which he confirmed that Spaatz alone had the authority to 

transfer USSTAF units.80 

By the time Eisenhower arrived in London on January 16, air command 

arrangements in the British Isles had become a veritable Gordian knot, and the 

Supreme Commander seemed as confused as anyone. When he had originally 

learned of his selection in early December 1943, Eisenhower had requested that 

Tedder, whom he intended to install as his commander in chief for air, be transferred at the same time. On December 17, Eisenhower had written to Marshall, 

We would go into the operation with an operational organization set up largely 

according to the one we now have here [The Mediterranean]. Tedder would be 

my chief air man and with him I would have Spaatz who would have control of 

the Strategic Air Forces. Under Tedder will be one officer in charge of coordinating the tactical air forces.*’ 

Two weeks later, after receiving a message from Bedell Smith, who had 

already become alarmed at the fuzziness of command arrangements, Eisenhower 

sent a message to Marshall: “I have received information ‘from General Smith in 

London that is disturbing in its implication. He states that the British Chiefs of 

Staff have forwarded to the American Chiefs of Staff a paper which proposes 

that the Combined Chiefs of Staff shall dictate in detail the organization of tactical air forces for OVERLORD."^^ 

Eisenhower objected strongly, asking Marshall to employ his full authority 

to oppose the scheme. He also pointed out that he and other veterans of the 

Mediterranean had learned several hard lessons in air power, which he did not 

want thrown away by “rigid directives.” Eisenhower particularly objected to a 

proposal for two separate tactical air forces: “I simply cannot conceive of such 

an idea.” He had come a long way from the general who had condoned the 

parceling out of air power in Tunisia. Eisenhower continued, “I hear that 

Tedder, who I have assumed to be my chief air man, is really intended to be an 

officer without portfolio, and that a man named Mallory is to be my chief air 

man.”*3 Eisenhower did not object to Leigh-Mallory, whose qualifications as a 

fighter expert, he thought, would be most useful at critical stages of the campaign. What he resented was his being unable to use Tedder as he wanted 

because of high-level British interference.84 

After meetings with Marshall and Arnold in Washington, Eisenhower 

warned Bedell Smith on January 5 that he anticipated trouble in securing the 

necessary approval for the integration of all forces essential to the success of the 

cross-channel invasion. Eisenhower noted, “I suspect that the use of these air 

forces for the necessary preparatory phase will be particularly resisted. To support our position it is essential that a complete plan for use of all available air313 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

craft during this phase be ready as quickly as possible.” Eisenhower therefore 

requested that Tedder proceed to London at once and consult with Spaatz and 

others on the plan.85 

Eisenhower assumed that the British would object to having their metropolitan air forces, particularly Bomber and Coastal Commands, placed under the 

operational control of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Air 

Force. Nevertheless, he intended to ensure the employment of every resource, 

including all air power in Britain, to achieve the ultimate success of his mission. 

After their Stateside meeting, Eisenhower knew he had Arnold’s backing. 

Arnold confirmed that both USSTAF and Bomber Command should be placed 

directly under the Supreme Commander for the “impending operation.” Arnold 

made clear his support, saying, “It is my desire to do all that is possible here to 

further the simultaneous transfer of these two strategic bombing organizations 

from their present status to your command when you feel this transfer should 

take place.”86 

Spaatz and Eisenhower agreed that USSTAF must come under the operational 

control of the Supreme Commander. In December, when they both had learned of 

their new appointments, Spaatz fully expected to be under Eisenhower’s command at least sixty days before the invasion. All subsequent disputes over preinvasion preparations concerned the place and use of strategic bombers under 

Eisenhower, not the basic principle that the invasion required the support of heavy 

bombers to succeed. In fact, during the initial phases of organizing USSTAF, 

Spaatz told the Chief of Staff of the AAF in Washington, Maj. Gen. Barney Giles, 

that Eisenhower had learned through Marshall that USSTAF would not be under 

him operationally. Spaatz, believed that it should be under Eisenhower both 

administratively and operationally. Giles agreed that Spaatz and Eisenhower 

would be left to settle command arrangements between themselves.87 

In the afternoon of Eisenhower’s first day of work as Supreme Commander, 

January 17, he and Spaatz met. Eisenhower admitted that he had received no 

clarification of the “present confused air situation” ‘while in Washington.88 Both 

agreed to soft-pedal any dramatic action and to proceed with the current cumbersome arrangements. Eisenhower directed his chief of staff immediately to publish 

an order giving Spaatz administrative responsibility for all U.S. air units in the 

theater. He also approved the plan to place his own headquarters at WIDEWINGS, 

Bushy Park, putting himself and Tedder near USSTAF Headquarters.89 

On January 22, Spaatz and Tedder discussed air command assignments. 

They both believed that their old Mediterranean methods would serve admirably 

for Operation OVERLORD; Tedder should preside over a joint command post, and 

RAF Bomber Command, the Eighth Air Force, and the tactical air forces should 

all have representatives present at daily meetings held in USSTAF’S War Room. 

These flexible proposals so pleased Spaatz that he told Tedder that all he needed 

to know was what to hit and when.90 On January 24, both confirmed this preliminary discussion and agreed that the “operation must be conducted the same as 

314 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

in the Mediterranean area, no matter what type of organization was directed by 

topside.”91 

While Spaatz and Eisenhower sought to pin down USSTAF’S place in the 

command structure, Arnold, Portal, Spaatz, and others simultaneously tried to 

define its immediate objectives. The Eighth Air Force had not received a new 

bombing directive from Portal since the implementation of POINTBLANK in June 

1943. The advent of USSTAF, the imminence of the invasion, and the effectiveness of the Luftwaffe fighter defenses all indicated the necessity of a new 

directive. After initial proposals had passed back and forth across the Atlantic, 

Spaatz, Portal, Harris, Air Vice-Marshal Norman H. Bottomley (Deputy Chief 

of the Air Staff), Air Marshal Douglas Evil1 (Vice-Chief of the Air Staff), and 

Leigh-Mallory met on January 19 to hammer out a modified bombing directive. 

Targets and priorities remained unaltered. Coordination of effort between the 

Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces, between the Eighth Air Force and Bomber 

Command, and between the strategic and tactical air forces in the Mediterranean could continue as presently constituted. They also chose to continue 

to have Portal coordinate between the tactical and strategic air forces in 

England. This later decision was made over Spaatz’s objections. He advocated, 

instead, an overall air command under the Supreme Allied Commander as a 

necessary condition “for efficient operations in preparation for conduct of 

OVERLORD.”92 This suggestion met the united opposition of the British, who 

had rejected similar actions of the AAF at the Cairo Conference. The RAF 

would not countenance any arrangement that might subordinate it to the AAF. 

Eisenhower, with his usual political acumen, realized this fact and struck the 

suggestion from Spaatz’s report to Arnold.93 He counseled Spaatz to drop the 

idea, observing that “the political situation would not permit an over-all air 

commander at this time.” Eisenhower told Spaatz that he did not require a designated overall commander; all that he required was that operational control of 

all air power, at the proper time for OVERLORD, “be assured by a single air commander.” Spaatz admitted that USSTAF could fulfill its functions without an 

overall air commander, but he believed that its lack might jeopardize the ultimate success of the invasion.94 

Thus, by the end of January, Spaatz had reaffirmed his personal and USSTAF’s 

organizational commitment to placing control of the AAF’s heavy bombers in 

the hands of the commander of the forces assaulting the Continent. This commitment did not mean that he had abdicated his position as the chief proponent 

in England of strategic daylight precision bombing; rather, it meant that, in practice, he would employ those techniques in the way that he thought could most 

effectively contribute to the invasion as a first priority. Spaatz did not abandon 

the theory that air power alone could bring about the defeat of Germany, but, as 

a good soldier, he meant to do all in his power to guarantee the fulfillment of 

OVERLORD’S objectives. He noted with resignation in his diary: 

315 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Launching of OVERLORD will result in the calling off of bomber effort on 

Germany proper from one to two months prior to invasion. If time is as now 

contemplated, there will be no opportunity to carry out any Air operations of 

sufficient intensity to justify the theory that Germany can be knocked out by 

Air power. . . . Operations in connection with OVERLORD will be child’s play 

compared to present operations and should result in very minor losses.95 

The still unsettled air command arrangements prevailing in late January and 

in February complicated operations in no small measure. The Ninth Air Force 

was having difficulty dividing its resources to assist the Eighth’s strategic mission, as it was obligated to, while it carried out its own tactical responsibilities. 

This difficulty would not be easily overcome. Also, the assignment of early- and 

late-model P-5 1 s between the two air forces’ fighter groups, originally decided 

by General Eaker in 1943, was a matter of growing concern. Eaker had sent 

most of them to the Ninth Air Force because of their abilities as fighter-bombers. 

Early model P-51s were limited by their relatively short range. (The P-51 had 

fought in Africa as the A-36 and had formed fighter-bomber groups assigned to 

the Northwest African Tactical Air Force.) Wheddrop tanks, improved internal 

fuel tanks, and other modifications vastly increased the later model’s tactical 

radius of operations and combat ceiling, it became the strategic escort fighter par 

excellence of World War 11. 

Spaatz thus believed that the late-model P-5 1 s’ newfound capabilities as 

escorts far outweighed their capabilities as ground-support fighters, and he felt 

justified in questioning the way the aircraft had been allocated between the 

Eighth and Ninth Air Forces. He had the authority, through enabling directives, 

to order the transfer of aircraft and personnel as he wished, but because the 

transfer of the P-51s to the Eighth Air Force wouldaffect the operations of the 

Ninth, he was required to consult with Leigh-Mallory. 

On January 20, Spaatz discussed his decision to move the P-51s first with 

General Brereton, the Ninth’s commander, who objected to it, and then at a 

meeting with Brereton, Tedder, Leigh-Mallory, Doolittle, and Kepner, Commander, VIII Fighter Command. Spaatz overrode Brereton’s protests, declaring 

that the P-5 Is were “absolutely essential throughout all operations to cover the 

bombers in deep penetration.”w On January 24, the generals finally accepted 

Spaatz’s compromise proposal; of the nine P-51 groups scheduled for the 

European Theater of Operations, the Eighth would get seven and the Ninth 

would retain two. Spaatz commented in his diary, “Leigh-Mallory’s attitude in 

this was surprising to me, since after hearing arguments on both sides, he agreed 

to P-5 1’s going to Eighth Air Force, based on over-all situations.”97 

Leigh-Mallory proved less amenable in matters involving the Ninth Air 

Force’s participation in strategic bombing missions. Strategic missions consisted 

of much more than simply flying the heavy bombers and escorts to their objectives and returning them. Punishing the Luftwaffe as well as destroying targets 

required large-scale assistance from the Ninth. The Ninth’s fighter-bombers and 

316 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

medium bombers would fly diversionary raids or strike Luftwaffe fighter fields 

in missions timed to coincide with the takeoff, assembly, and landing of 

Luftwaffe defensive fighter forces. In addition, the Ninth’s formations would 

help to confuse German fighter controllers by cluttering up the early warning 

system with hundreds of additional planes. 

Spaatz called these coordinated strikes “absolutely essential” to the maximum protection of heavy-bomber formations and the destruction of the 

Luftwaffe. Spaatz took note of the fact that in two major operations at the end of 

January no medium bombers had supported strategic strikes. They bombed 

CROSSBOW (V-1 launch sites in France) targets for which Leigh-Mallory, in his 

purely British capacity as head of Air Defense of Great Britain, had prime 

responsibility. This situation appeared to Spaatz to be symptomatic of the problems the AAF would confront “if and when” USSTAF came under LeighMallory’s control. “Leigh-Mallory’s concern with what is in front of him,” said 

Spaatz “may hamper POINTBLANK Operations.”98 

Spaatz, supported by his Deputy for Operations, Maj. Gen. Frederick L. 

Anderson, continued to press for clarification of control over the Ninth Air Force 

during strategic missions. On February 4, Anderson, Brig. Gen. Earle E. 

Partridge (Deputy Commander, Eighth Air Force), and Maj. Gen. William E. 

Kepner (Commander, VIII Fighter Command) representing the Strategic Air 

Forces, met with Leigh-Mallory, his British deputy (Air Vice-Marshal Arthur 

Saunders), Maj. Gen. W. Butler (his American deputy from the AEAF), Maj. 

Gen. L. H. Brereton (Commander, Ninth Air Force), Brig. Gen. Elwood R. 

Quesada (Commander, IX Fighter Command), and Brig. Gen. Samuel E. 

Anderson (Commander, IX Bomber Command-Medium). Leigh-Mallory 

opened the meeting by observing that the AEAF had done all that USSTAF 

required. Anderson expressed USSTAF’s view that “the Mediums were not paying their way; that they should extend their operating range to the maximum 

which is, at present, 350 miles; that this should be done at least a couple of times 

beyond fighter escort, if necessary to ascertain the Hun reaction.” 

This statement reflected both Anderson’s and Spaatz’s determination to 

bloody the Luftwaffe, whatever their own losses. Leigh-Mallory responded that 

sending a portion of the medium bombers against the Eighth’s targets while 

reserving the remainder for CROSSBOW attacks might satisfy strategic requirements. Anderson insisted that the Eighth’s missions required maximum 

medium-bomber support and that experience had shown that CROSSBOW bombing produced unsatisfactory diversionary raids. Although Leigh-Mallory indicated that he would ask Portal for a final determination, he compromised by 

issuing the medium bombers additional targets to support the Eighth’s efforts. 

Anderson, in turn, reaffirmed the Eighth Air Force’s commitment to CROSSBOW 

when weather over Germany made strikes there impossible.99 

Leigh-Mallory ’s appeal to Portal proved futile. Portal, after receiving LeighMallory’s brief and one from Spaatz, supported by Arnold, voted in the latter’s 

317 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, Deputy for Operations, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in 

Europe, conferring with meteorologists on weather conditions over various targets. 

favor. On February 15, he wrote to Spaatz, “I have had the various directives 

looked up and it seems quite clear that A.C.M. Leigh-Mallory is bound by his 

directive (COSSAC [43] 81 dated 16 November 1943) to lend maximum support to the strategic air offensive.”loo Portal added that Leigh-Mallory owed 

support to the Eighth not only in visual but in overcast conditions; furthermore, 

Leigh-Mallory’s own directives to the Ninth Air Force and the British 2d 

Tactical Air Force gave priority to support of the Eighth’s operations over all 

others. Finally, Portal required Leigh-Mallory to add to his target lists of airfields all of those designated by USSTAF.101 

On February 19, the day before the great week-long USSTAF attack on 

Germany subsequently known as “Big Week”, Spaatz, having already bested 

Leigh-Mallory, clipped Brereton’s wings as well. Brereton, who had visions of a 

Ninth Air Force independent of both USSTAF and the AEAF,lo2 and his chief 

of staff, Brig. Gen. V. H. Strahm, met with Spaatz, Anderson, and Doolittle to 

discuss the “use of 9th Air Force Fighters with the 8th Air Force.” Brereton 

“agreed” that (1) IX Fighter Command would inform VIII Fighter Command 

daily of planes available; (2) VIII Fighter Command would issue “Primary” 

[emphasis in original] field orders giving specific jobs by time and group 

assigned to IX Fighter Command; and (3) whenever the effort might be delayed 

by transmitting orders through Ninth Air Force channels, VIII Fighter Command 

318 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

could deal directly with Ninth Air Force wing commanders after or immediately 

before takeoff.103 

In case Brereton retained any illusions of independence, Spaatz followed up 

this meeting with an official letter stating, “The Commanding General, USSTAF, 

will exercise control of all administrative and training matters pertaining to the 

Ninth Air Force and will assume direct responsibility to higher headquarters for 

the proper performance of those functions.”lo4 Because Spaatz’s administrative 

control of the Ninth and Eighth Air Forces in England included the power of 

promotion, he held the whip hand over any U.S. officer who desired to advance 

his career. 

Of course, Leigh-Mallory and Brereton saw Spaatz as a “noncooperator” 

with preinvasion tactical air plans. Both men had been charged with fielding air 

forces trained in close air support. They could not do so as long as Spaatz 

insisted that they devote maximum effort to supporting POINTBLANK. As usual, 

when training demands and operational necessity clashed, the immediate needs 

of the active forces at the front took precedence. Spaatz was destroying airplanes, killing German pilots, and bombing factories while the tactical airmen 

wanted to conduct training exercises. 

“Big Week” 

The final settlement of the Ninth’s role came at a most opportune moment. 

On February 19, 1944, USSTAF’s weather forecasters predicted an event 

eagerly awaited by the American heavy-bomber leaders in Europe: the breaking 

up of the cloud cover over central Europe for an extended period. Headquarters, 

USSTAF, ordered Operation ARGUMENT to begin the next day. This operation, 

planned since early November 1943, called for a series of combined attacks by 

the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces against the Combined Bomber Offensive’s 

highest-priority objectives. During these attacks, RAF Bomber Command 

agreed to make night area bombing attacks on the same targets. (See Map 8, 

Greater German Air Industry Targets.) 

Because the attacks called for a joint effort by both of its component air 

forces, Headquarters, USSTAF, departed from its normal supervisory and policy-making activities to take direct responsibility for mounting operations. 

Accordingly, as a courtesy to his old friend, Spaatz alerted Eaker* first rather 

than Twining, Fifteenth Air Force Commander, of the impending implementation of ARGUMENT, requesting that forces bomb the Regensburg and Augsburg 

aircraft assembly plants or the ball-bearing works at Stuttgart. Spaatz also 

* Although he was Commander of the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces (Twelfth U.S. Air Force 

and British 1st Tactical Air Force), Eaker had only administrative, not operational, control over the 

Fifteenth. Spaatz, however, always treated Eaker as if the latter had operational control of the 

Fifteenth, in effect making a new line of command. 

3 19 

THE LUFTWAFFENGAGED 

directed that “All forces of the 15th Air Force should use an area attack on 

Breslau as their secondary mission.”lo5 He thus demonstrated his willingness to 

countenance area bombing if it furthered a legitimate military objective. The 

simultaneous attack by the Fifteenth’s twelve heavy-bomber groups and four 

fighter groups, or even a diversionary attack on Breslau, the alternative target, 

would prevent some of the German defenders from concentrating on the Eighth 

as it came from England and give it a better chance of successful bombing. 

Eaker informed Spaatz that the Fifteenth could not fly its scheduled strategic 

mission because he had committed it to the tactical support of the Anzio beachhead, where a German counterattack had come dangerously close to driving the 

Allies into the sea. Eaker believed that if the Fifteenth did not support Anzio, the 

Allied theater commander, British General James Maitland Wilson, might declare 

the situation a ground emergency and exercise his right to take direct control of 

the Fifteenth from USSTAF for the duration of the critical situation. Eaker 

wished to avoid that declaration because it would rob him of all flexibility and 

establish a troublesome precedent. Eaker also objected because his weather forecasters had predicted overcast skies covering the Fifteenth’s targets. The Fifteenth, which lacked H2X equipment, could not bomb them effectively.106 

Spaatz disagreed. POINTBLANK, too, had reached a climactic stage. He and 

Anderson had previously agreed to accept extraordinary risks to ensure the completion of ARGUMENT prior to March 1, even if it meant the loss of 200 bombers 

in a single mission.107 Spaatz went to Portal with a draft telegram for Eaker that 

read, in part, “Because of critical status of POINTBLANK, it is absolutely necessary that we make our maximum effort under visual conditions. Eighth Air 

Force will attack targets as indicated. Therefore, I believe it essential that the 

maximum heavy effort possible be used in southern Germany for diversionary 

purposes.”los Spaatz went on to request that at least some of the Fifteenth’s 

planes fly against their proposed targets or Breslau as a secondary target. Portal, 

after consulting Churchill, who ruled that all available forces should support the 

Anzio battle, told Spaatz that he could not agree to the transmission of such a 

cable to Eaker. Spaatz agreed to cancel the message.109 

The failure to obtain the use of the Fifteenth added to the tension at Spaatz’s 

headquarters on the night of February 19-20. Even as the Lancaster heavy 

bombers of RAF Bomber Command mounted a heavy strike over Leipzig, one of 

the Eighth’s principal targets for the next day, Spaatz’s subordinates debated the 

wisdom of following up the RAF’s effort with a Sunday punch. The meteorologists of the Eighth and Ninth Air Forces had conducted their own auguries and 

arrived at a forecast less sanguine than USSTAF’s. Doolittle and Brereton therefore doubted the feasibility of a large-scale raid for the next day.110 Kepner 

believed that expected conditions would produce icing on the wings of his fighters, cutting the efficiency of the P-38s in half and lowering the efficiency of his 

The P-38, on which great hopes rested, was beginning to prove itself unsuited 

P-47s and P-51s.111 

321 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

for operations over Europe. Its engines reacted badly to the combination of 

extreme cold and high humidity encountered in winter operations. On February 

17, VIII Fighter Command reported that 40 percent of its P-38 force was 

affected by engine trouble.112 In all, more than half of all P-38 losses in the theater were attributable to engine malfunction.113 

Anderson vehemently opposed the naysayers. As each call came in from the 

Eighth or Ninth, he encouraged Spaatz to continue the operation.114 Anderson 

tenaciously scrambled to maintain the viability of the mission throughout the 

long night. Anderson’s deputy, also present that night at Park House, described 

the scene: 

Anderson prepared to stay the night because he knew that he must be there, by 

the telephone, knowing that in all military operations there was the chance of 

something uncontrolled going on and the whole thing fizzling out and being a 

catastrophe, and he was determined to keep the mission on. He knew also that 

the public reaction to the possible loss of 200 bombers would be very strong, 

even though the mission was a 

To Anderson’s deputy Spaatz seemed “on the fence” and less strongly committed to the launch. 

That view misinterprets Spaatz’s position or, at least, his style of command. 

Spaatz allowed his subordinates wide latitude and encouraged them to state their 

opinions. Until the decision had to be made in the early morning, he would naturally have listened carefully to both sides. Nor should silence on his part be construed as waffling. Never a garrulous man, in times of stress Spaatz kept a poker 

face and retreated into quiet. The decision rested squarely on his shoulders. Brig. 

Gen. C. P. Cabell, formerly Commander of the 45th Bomb Wing but at that time 

serving on Spaatz’s staff and present at Park House, told Brig. Gen. Haywood S. 

Hansell, 

Finally, when the last moment for action had arrived, the decision was left in the 

lap of General Spaatz. The risks were so great and the conditions so unfavorable 

that none of the subordinate commanders was willing to take the responsibility 

for the launch. General Spaatz quietly and firmly issued the order to go.’I6 

Sixteen combat wings of heavy bombers (over 1,000 bombers), all seventeen AAF fighter groups (835 fighters), and sixteen RAF fighter squadrons (to 

assist in short-range penetration and withdrawal escort) began their takeoff runs, 

assembled, turned to the east, and headed for twelve major assembly and component plants that constituted the heart of Hitler’s fighter production. As part of the 

largest force dispatched to date by the Eighth, six unescorted bomber wings flew a 

northern route to bomb targets near Posen and Tutow. The rest of the bomber 

force, escorted by the entire fighter force, flew toward Leipzig and Brunswick in 

central Germany. They would show up on German radar screens in time to attract 

the bulk of the fighter reaction to themselves and away from the northern force. 

322 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

In addition, 135 medium bombers from the Ninth Air Force, two-thirds of 

which aborted because of weather, assisted by attacking airfields in western 

Europe. In contrast to the loss of 41 bombers against the same targets on January 

11, only 21 heavy bombers failed to return to base. The raid seriously damaged 

four plants manufacturing Ju 88 (night-fighterbomber) aircraft in the Leipzig 

area and two plants manufacturing Bf 109 (day-fighter) aircraft. The AAF official history, basing its assertions on examination of postwar records, cited a 

delay of one month’s production of Ju 88s and severe damage to about 32 percent of Bf 109 manufacturing capacity. But other official histories admitted that 

the raids, like most AAF raids, damaged the machine tools less severely than the 

buildings that surrounded them. Those tools, when cleared of rubble and dispersed to other parts of Germany, would continue to produce more aircraft.117 

When the results reached Park House on the evening of February 20, Spaatz, 

according to one witness, was euphoric, “on the crest of the highest wave he had 

ever ridden.”lls That evening Spaatz gave all the credit to Anderson for having 

persevered in his fight to save the mission.119 

For the next five days, until the weather once again closed in, the Eighth and 

the Fifteenth Air Forces fought their way to and from targets deep inside the 

Nazi homeland. The Luftwaffe reacted savagely, provoking heavy and prolonged combat with great attrition on both sides. The Fifteenth Air Force, which 

lacked P-51s, lost 89 bombers, compared with 158 lost by the Eighth, but actually suffered a higher percentage loss.120 In all, USSTAF lost at least 264 heavy 

bombers, 2,600 air crew (killed, wounded, or in German hands), and 28 

fighters.121 Almost half of those losses occurred on the last two missions, when 

the Germans took advantage of mistakes that left the bombers unescorted or 

underescorted.122 In February, the Eighth wrote off 299 bombers, one-fifth of its 

force,l23 whereas the Luftwaffe wrote off more than 33 percent of its singleengine fighters and lost almost 18 percent of its fighter pilots.124 

According to the AAF official history, the damage inflicted by the week’s 

missions caused a two-month delay in German fighter aircraft production.125 At 

the end of February, Luftwaffe Field Marshal Erhard Milch, in charge of aircraft 

production, informed Albert Speer, German Minister for Armaments Production, that he expected the March production figures to equal only 30 to 40 percent of the February tota1.126 As a result of this meeting, the two set up a 

“Fighter Staff’ to push through a large increase in fighter production. The 

Fighter Staff estimated that, at the time of its establishment at the end of 

February, 70 percent of the original buildings of the German aircraft industry had 

been destroyed. Damage to machine tools was less severe.127 

The delay in German fighter production was even more significant than the 

actual number of fighters never produced. By the time the aircraft industry 

recovered in late spring and early summer, the Luftwaffe’s situation had totally 

changed. The Eighth Air Force’s attacks on German synthetic oil targets, begun 

in May 1944, produced severe aviation gasoline shortages, which resulted in 

323 
Defenders of the Reich. In increasingly desperate efforts to stem Allied attacks on German 

industries and cities, the Luftwaffe relied on a collection of new and aging aircraft, the older of 

which were pressed into new roles. Clockwisefrom above: The veteran Ju 88 medium bomber, 

shown with the search antenna of Liechtenstein airborne radar, served as a night fighter to 

counter RAF incursions. A second antenna in the starboard wing homed on warning radar in 

the tails of British bombers. Radar also appeared in the night-fighting version of the Bf 110 

(opposite, top), some of which could fire on enemy aircraft overhead with a unique upward-aiming cannon. The Bf 109 (opposite, middle), in production since 1937, had evolved by 1944 into a 

nearly 400-mph fighter armed with machine guns and a 30mm cannon. The lightweight, nimble, and heavily armed FW 190 (opposite, below), introduced in 1941, outclassed the early 

Spitfire but was handily mastered by later Allied fighters such as the P-47 and P-51. The 

world’s first mass-produced jet fighter, the Me 262 Swallow (Schwabe) (below), entered combat 

in June 1944. As an interceptor the Me 262 carried four 30mm cannon and flew at 540 mph. 

Adolf Hitler unwittingly reduced its effectiveness by decreeing that the new aircraft be used 

solely as a bomber. 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the catastrophic curtailment of training programs and operations. By July 1944, 

hundreds of the newly assembled fighters were grounded from lack of fuel. Had 

they been delivered in April or May when fuel was available, they might have 

made POINTBLANK a more risky undertaking. 

Big Week also affected replacement production by persuading the German 

leadership and aircraft industry to undertake a large-scale and immediate dispersal program. This program eventually rendered the aircraft industry relatively 

invulnerable to bombing, but it caused more production delays and increased 

indirect labor costs by 20 percent128 while heightening demands on the German 

railway system. This situation further strained the economy and left production 

even more dependent on uninterrupted transportation.129 

Although postwar research has shown that the missions between February 

20 and 25 accomplished less than was originally estimated by the Allies, what 

made Big Week “big” was not the physical damage inflicted on the German 

fighter industry and front-line fighter strength, which was significant, but rather 

the psychological effect it had on the AAF. In one week, Doolittle dropped 

almost as much bomb tonnage as the Eighth had dropped in its entire first year. 

At same time, Bomber Command conducted five heavy raids over Combined 

Bomber Offensive targets losing 157 heavy bombers for a loss rate of 6.6 

bombers per 100 sorties, which slightly exceeded the American rate of 6 

bombers per 100 sorties.130 In trial by combat, the AAF had shown that daylight 

precision bombing not only operated as claimed, but at no greater cost than the 

supposedly safer and less accurate night area bombing. What is more, USSTAF, 

thanks to its fighter escorts, claimed the destruction of over 600 enemy aircraft, 

while Bomber Command could claim only 13.131 

In their own minds, Spaatz and other high-ranking American air officers had 

validated their belief in their chosen mode of combat. Spaatz fairly glowed in a 

letter he sent to Arnold summarizing the month: “The resultant destruction and 

damage caused to industrial plants of vital importance to the German war effort 

and to the very existence of the German Air Force can be considered a conspicuous success in the course of the European war.”132 Spaatz went on to compare 

the relative contributions of the month by both the AAF and the RAF. The 

Eighth flew 5,400 more sorties than Bomber Command and dropped some 5,000 

more tons of bombs, all with a lower loss rate.133 The AAF had come of age; 

the long buildup in Britain had produced results at last: 

During the past two years as our forces slowly built up and the RAF carried the 

great part and weight of attack some circles of both the Government and the 

general public have been inclined to think that our part in the battle was but a 

small one. I trust that this brief comparison of effort will enable you to erase 

any doubts that may exist in some minds as to the great importance of the part 

now being played by the United States Army Air Forces in Europe in the task 

which has been set us-the destruction of Germany’s ability to wage war.134 

I 

326 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

Although the Luftwaffe fighter force actually increased its bomber kills in 

March and April, Big Week, in the minds of Spaatz and other U.S. airmen, was 

the beginning of the end for the German daylight fighter. Most of the American 

airmen in Europe probably agreed with USSTAF’s Assistant Director of 

Intelligence, Col. Richard D’O. Hughes, who said three weeks later, “I consider 

the result of the week’s attack to be the funeral of the German Fighter Force.”135 

According to Hughes, USSTAF now realized that it could bomb any target in 

Germany at will-a realization that led USSTAF and Spaatz to begin the hunt 

for the one crucial target system to bomb, now that the first objective, the suppression of the Luftwaffe, seemed to have been accomplished.136 In short order 

they agreed on the German synthetic oil industry as that critical target system. 

The Transportation Plan and Air Command Arrangements 

No spent SO-caliber brass shell casings littered the hallways of WIDEWINGS, 

Park House, Norfolk House, Stanmore, or the Air Ministry at Whitehall, nor did 

hospital wards receive a single casualty. Yet from late January to late March, 1944, 

Spaatz and Harris, supported at times by Winston Churchill, engaged in a heated 

dispute with Leigh-Mallory, his AEAF staff, and OVERLORD’S planners over the contribution expected of the strategic air forces in supporting preparations for the invasion of France. Eisenhower and Tedder, as hardly disinterested parties, refereed this 

dispute with varying degrees of impartiality. Each of the contestants took up distinct 

positions, which, depending on the fortunes of his own command, his commitment 

to the invasion, and the imminence of the invasion date, he defended at length. 

Unlike Harris, Spaatz never questioned the basic premise that at some point 

prior to the invasion his force should come under the direct control of the Supreme 

Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force. Naturally, given his personal and professional biases, he differed, at times sharply, with Leigh-Mallory and others over 

the timing, the direction, and the degree of effort demanded of his forces. 

Spaatz insisted that any plan adopted must lead, at least, to air parity over 

the invasion area by the time the troops left their ports to hit the beaches.137 He 

believed that his forces should begin close assistance to the invasion sixty days 

before launching. Support begun earlier would duplicate effort and perhaps neutralize the effects of his strategic bombing campaign against Germany by preventing any follow-up of the blows he intended to deliver. Spaatz also believed 

that USSTAF possessed sufficient forces to devote a large simultaneous effort to 

the invasion and to the strategic campaign. He would resist any invasion plan 

that he believed would require his forces to participate beyond the point of 

diminishing returns. Overconcentration of effort on preinvasion operations 

would threaten the painfully gained momentum of his strategic campaign and 

thereby deny him the chance to try to defeat Germany by air power alone. 

Spaatz’s determination to support the invasion and to do all in his power to 

327 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

achieve its success did not keep him, as an air strategist, from questioning its 

basic utility. In November 1943, according to Capt. Harry Butcher, Eisenhower’s naval aide, Spaatz told President Roosevelt’s adviser, Harry Hopkins, 

that, given three months of clear weather, he could defeat Germany and render 

the invasion unnecessary. Therefore, he favored, as a better investment, the 

strengthening of Allied forces in Italy to gain the Po River Valley and position 

the bombers even closer to Germany. 138 

After the war, Spaatz implied that Butcher had not gotten his argument 

“quite straight” and claimed that, instead of mounting the vast, expensive crosschannel operation, he favored “sweeping around” to and through the Balkan 

states.139 This somewhat Churchillian strategy of attacking upward from southern Europe reflected Spaatz’s doubts about the possibility of gaining and maintaining another successful lodgment in Europe in the face of determined opposition. The Salerno campaign had come close to failure against an enemy not 

nearly so well prepared or fortified as would probably be encountered in France. 

In mid-February, Spaatz, in a private conversation with the U.S. Ambassador to England, John G. Winant, detailed his fear that the Germans would voluntarily shorten their extended defense line on the Eastern Front, freeing fifty to 

seventy-five divisions, “which would have a good chance of destroying any 

force we put on the continent.”l40 At the same time, he expressed his mistrust of 

what he viewed as Leigh-Mallory ’s overconcentration on the invasion’s tactical 

air power. Spaatz did not see the possibility of a successful assault if the ground 

troops had only the benefit of air power applied tactically for their immediate 

support. “Strategic bombing of sufficient intensity is necessary first,” Spaatz 

believed: “The landing of ground troops should be the pushing over of a toppling wall.”141 He would, naturally, resent attempts to cut back the Combined 

Bomber Offensive before it had undermined the German war economy. 

As late as April 10, Spaatz, in a conference with Vandenberg, who had 

arrived in London to assume the post of the senior American officer and Deputy 

Commander of Leigh-Mallory ’s Allied Expeditionary Air Force, questioned the 

whole basis for OVERLORD and suggested alternatives. He characterized the 

operation as “highly dangerous.” Its outcome was “extremely uncertain,” and its 

failure would “have repercussions which may well undo all of the efforts of the 

strategic bombing efforts to date.” H2X enabled USSTAF to bomb through 

overcast, overcoming its greatest obstacle, weather, and, hence, provided one 

more reason not to launch OVERLORD. Spaatz continued: 

If I were directing overall strategic operations, I would go into Norway where 

we have a much greater chance of ground force success and where I believe 

Sweden would come in with us. Then, with air bases in Sweden, we would 

attack Germany from four sides (U.K., Italy, Russia and Sweden) simultaneously. Why undertake a highly dubious operation in a hurry when there is a 

surer way to do it as just outlined? It is better to win the War surely than to 

undertake an operation which has . . . great 

328 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

This curious proposal of Spaatz’s may have had, if successful, the geopolitical advantages of denying Swedish iron ore and ball bearings to the Germans 

and of closing the Baltic, while imposing upon the Germans the requirement to 

defend another large air sector. The proposal revealed not only a complete rejection, if not a basic misunderstanding, of the whole ground strategy behind 

OVERLORD, but also an abysmal ignorance of international relations. The Swedes 

probably would not have declared war on Germany because of the Allied liberation of Norway, nor would the Soviets have regarded such an operation as the 

long-promised Second Front. This implausible scheme, apparently never seriously advocated by Spaatz, illustrates that he hoped to conquer Germany from 

the air and to avoid a large and costly land campaign in northwestern Europe. 

Spaatz also feared that the supremacy the AAF had gained in daylight might 

fade abruptly if the Germans introduced jet-propelled fighters. Spaatz even 

doubted the fighting capacity of U.S. ground forces. His North African experience had “indicated the inability of American troops to cross areas heavily 

defended by land mines, and . . . the beaches of OVERLORD are certain to be 

more heavily mined than any area in Africa.”l43 

Spaatz did not allow his doubts about the utility and feasibility of the crosschannel invasion to handicap him in the performance of his duties. His fears, 

though broad, were not often deep. It is a measure of his self-confidence and 

sense of duty that he did not allow his doubts either to unman him or to cause him 

to slacken his labors on behalf of the ultimate success of the invasion of France. 

Harris held views even less acceptable to Leigh-Mallory: (1) Bomber 

Command’s operational limitations made it tactically incapable of hitting any 

night targets save those in the broad-based area bombing it already pursued, and 

(2) any switch from the current operational program would undo everything 

achieved to date, allowing Germany the time to harden and disperse its industries and to use its production lines in an unintempted period just before the 

invasion. Thus, any subordination of Bomber Command to a detailed tactical 

plan might actually have a detrimental effect on OVERLORD.^^^ 

Two events, however, combined to undercut Harris’s contentions. His winter bombing campaign over Germany encountered increasingly resourceful, 

accurate, and costly interception from the German night-fighter force, which, by 

the end of March 1944, had become tactically dominant. Bomber Command’s 

losses mounted steeply and could no longer be sustained by its machines and air 

crews.145 In the first three months of 1944 its losses from all causes were 796 

aircraft, compared with 348 in the same period in 1943.146 Then, in early March 

1944, Portal ordered a series of experimental night precision bombing attacks on 

French targets, including railway marshaling yards. These attacks produced outstanding results, unequivocally demonstrating the abilities of Harris’s units to 

pulverize the OVERLORD targets scheduled for them.147 By the end of March 

Harris had lost much of his credibility and with it a decisive voice in the preinvasion air debate. 

329 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The target of Spaatz’s and Harris’s fulminations, Leigh-Mallory, indomitably and in his own phlegmatic fashion, pressed for the adoption of the preinvasion plans drawn up by the AEAF. He had originally assumed that, as commander of the air forces in direct support of the invasion, he would also assume the 

command of the strategic bomber forces when they passed to the control of the 

Supreme Commander. This assumption, which soon proved illusory, did not 

endear him to either Spaatz or Harris, nor did their opposition to LeighMallory’s claims endear them to him. The chief architect of the AEAF’s plan, 

Professor Solly Zuckerman, a personal friend of both Tedder and Spaatz, had 

returned to London in January 1944 from the Mediterranean, where he had completed his studies of the bombing campaigns in Pantelleria and Sicily. There he 

reached his own judgments about the effectiveness of the campaigns and the 

ways to improve upon them. In London, Zuckerman read the preliminary plan, 

which he judged inadequate, and he agreed to work with Leigh-Mallory’s staff 

to prepare a new one. By the end of January, he had produced a plan fully 

accepted by Leigh-Mallory. 148 

Zuckerman, like Spaatz, Leigh-Mallory, Tedder, Portal, and most other 

preinvasion planners, started from the assumption that air superiority over the 

beachhead was a sine qua non. Therefore, he recognized the necessity for the 

continuation of POINTBLANK to promote the attrition of the Luftwaffe’s fighter 

force. Similarly, he accepted as a given the diversion of resources to CROSSBOW. 

The professor then divided the remainder of the preinvasion bombing plan into 

three target systems: airfields, coastal defenses, and German lines of communication. The bombing of the ai~ields 130 miles or less distant from the beachhead would begin approximately twenty-four days prior to the invasion: the 

bombing of coastal defenses would begin immediately before the assault. The 

campaign against communication lines would begin on March 1, ninety days 

before the invasion. The bombing of the German transportation system was the 

most controversial element of Zuckerman’s plan. His studies had convinced him 

of the necessity of an intensive attack on the Belgian and northern French railway system, directed in particular at rail marshaling yards and associated maintenance facilities. This attritional attack on the railways would so lower their 

carrying capacity that the German response in units and material to the invasion 

would be fatally slowed. Zuckerman’s transportation bombing required the participation of all Allied air forces because of the large number of targets to be 

destroyed and kept suppressed. It also provided for 45,000 tons of bombs, out of 

an entire preinvasion program of 108,000 tons, to be dropped on the communications system. In his estimates of the bomblift required to neutralize the system, 

Zuckerman called for the Eighth Air Force to supply 45 percent of the preinvasion effort. Bomber Command, with a bomblift capacity 60 percent greater than 

the Eighth’s, would supply 35 percent of the preinvasion effort, and the Ninth 

Air Force would supply the remaining 20 percent. Zuckerman allotted only 20 

percent of the Eighth’s effort to POINT BLANK.^^^ 

330 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

A captured German photo of damage to the Fieseler aircraft plant, Kassel, 

Germany, after RAF and Eighth Air Force raids. 

The AEAF plan’s use of all available air power strongly appealed to both 

Eisenhower and Tedder, who found themselves in the position of having to yoke 

the AEAF, USSTAF, and Bomber Command into the invasion program. 

Eisenhower needed direct control over all available planes in Britain to guarantee their support for the invasion. He therefore sought a preinvasion air plan that 

could employ all available air forces. Tedder agreed. Unlike Leigh-Mallory, 

Harris, and Spaatz, each of whom was identified with a particular type of air 

warfare, Tedder had not risen to prominence through a fighter or bomber background. Rather, he had come to the fore as a leader of large air forces consisting 

of all types of aircraft that cooperated closely, both strategically and tactically, 

with the overall theater command. It was Tedder who had first called Zuckerman to the Mediterranean and then dispatched him to London to assist planning 

there. Tedder fmly believed in the professor’s analysis of the lessons learned 

from the Mediterranean campaign and favored his plan.150 

On January 24, Zuckerman and Leigh-Mallory presented a draft of the 

scheme at a preinvasion air planning conference. Everyone agreed on the necessity 

of bombing the airfields and coastal defenses. This lines-of-communication bombing proposal, or, as all concerned soon called it, the transportation plan, immediately raised USSTAF’s dander. USSTAF Assistant Director of Intelligence, Col. 

Richard D’O. Hughes, told Leigh-Mallory that Spaatz had already said “that a 

large percentage of his available bomber effort was available to assist OVERLORD.” He went on to note that “if it were considered the right course of action,” 

33 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Spaatz was prepared to initiate attacks against rail targets in Germany immediately with a priority second only to POINTBLANK. Leigh-Mallory then said he 

would have the Air Ministry issue a directive instructing the strategic forces to 

bomb such targets in Germany and would add some French rail targets to 

USSTAF’s list, at which point Hughes began to object: the Eighth did not have 

the resources to bomb more than the thirty-nine German rail targets assigned to 

it; CROSSBOW had priority over northwest France when weather permitted; and 

the French rail targets did not have political clearance. Leigh-Mallory discounted Hughes’s assertions. His proposed directive would not place responsibility for bombing the targets on USSTAF. He would consider anything 

destroyed in the next month as a bonus before the plan went into effect (March 

1). As for relief from CROSSBOW obligations and obtaining the political clearances to bomb France, he would arrange them.151 

As Hughes realized, Spaatz did not object to attacking rail yards in Germany. 

Such targets might lure the Luftwaffe into coming up to fight and could serve as 

secondary targets of opportunity when weather conditions over the primary targets made bombing impossible after the start of a major raid. Such a program did 

not represent a major diversion of strategic forces from POINTBLANK. In contrast, 

marshaling yards in northwest France yielded none of the advantages of German 

targets. They interfered with USSTAF’s secondary priority of CROSSBOW and, 

because of their position inland, did not constitute acceptable targets of opportunity for CROSSBOW diversions. Nor would the Luftwaffe be inclined to contest the 

air over French targets in strength. Finally, bombing French targets would have 

detrimental political effects for the Allies. When some bombs missed the yards 

and fell into populated areas, as they surely would, the Germans would gain free 

grist for their propaganda mills, while the Allies might earn the opprobrium of an 

occupied people whose goodwill could greatly benefit the invasion. 

Meanwhile, Leigh-Mallory’s use of the Ninth Air Force in aid of the strategic campaign and his oft-stated belief that the decisive battle for air supremacy 

would occur at the time of the invasion troubled Spaatz, who increasingly 

resisted placing his forces under the AEAF and a commander whose competence he doubted and whose advocacy of the transportation plan he could not 

support. In a message he wrote, but did not send to Arnold, Spaatz remarked, 

“Proposal now under consideration for recommendation to CCS to place 

Strategic Air Forces (AAF) under Eisenhower nominally, actively under LeighMallory, in immediate future. This places CG, USSTAF in impossible position.”152 A week later he informed Eisenhower, “I have no confidence in LeighMallory’s ability to handle the job and . . . I view with alarm any setup which 

places the Strategic Air Forces under his control.”l53 Spaatz and USSTAF 

would take every opportunity to speak out against the transportation plan, sincerely believing that it misapplied their forces. They could not advocate command 

and control over strategic bombers by Leigh-Mallory. The two issues of tactical 

target selection and overall air command and control had become intertwined. 

332 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

On February 15, after telling Eisenhower how he felt about Leigh-Mallory, 

Spaatz attended an air planning meeting at Stanmore, Middlesex, a London suburb and site of Leigh-Mallory’s headquarters. Leigh-Mallory, Tedder, Harris, F. 

L. Anderson, Butler, Hughes, and Zuckerman also participated in what became, 

at times, a heated discussion. Leigh-Mallory began the meeting by presenting a 

definitive version of Zuckerman’s bombing plan, which assigned 41 percent of 

the total preinvasion bomb tonnage to the transportation plan and only 11 percent to POINTBLANK. The Eighth Air Force would provide 45 percent of the total 

preinvasion bomb tonnage on all target systems, with Bomber Command contributing a total of 35 percent.* Spaatz, whose staff had received copies of the 

plan three days before the meeting and had prepared rejoinders, immediately 

said that the AEAF’s plan “did not show a full understanding of the POINTBLANK 

operation.”l54 Spaatz disagreed with the plan’s premise that “air supremacy cannot be assured until the joining of the decisive air battle which will mark the 

opening of the OVERLORD assault.”l55 Air supremacy must be achieved before 

the assault, Spaatz said, adding that the AEAF had not consulted USSTAF in the 

preparation of a plan that called for a massive commitment of strategic forces, 

and that such a plan would not be approved until USSTAF had the opportunity 

to participate in its development. 

Leigh-Mallory argued that the Luftwaffe would rise to prevent the destruction of the rail system. Spaatz did not agree. The German fighter force might not 

take the bait, he said, and if it did not, he had to retain the authority to attack any 

target necessary to make the Germans fight-otherwise he could not accomplish 

his primary task of destroying the German fighter force. In other words, Spaatz 

would not agree to a scheme that allowed Leigh-Mallory to set his targets. 

Leigh-Mallory then suggested that the Combined Chiefs of Staff and the Supreme 

Commander settle the issue.156 

Spaatz reemphasized the different phases of the Combined Bomber Offensive: (1) the destruction of the German fighter force, (2) the exploitation of 

that destruction to reduce the German will and means to continue the war, and 

(3) the direct support of the invasion.l57 Then Spaatz asked when the strategic 

air forces would come under Leigh-Mallory’s operational control. LeighMallory shot back, “March 1.” At that point, according to Zuckerman, Spaatz 

commented, “That’s all I want to know; I’ve nothing further to say.”l58 

According to Colonel Hughes’s minutes of the meeting, Spaatz told LeighMallory that “he could not concur in a paper at cross purposes to his present 

directive.”l59 

Spaatz and Leigh-Mallory also wrangled over when the Luftwaffe would be 

destroyed. Leigh-Mallory again suggested that higher authorities settle the mat- 

* Forty-eight percent of the preinvasion tonnage apparently was assigned to airfields and 

coastal defenses. Likewise, the AEAF would apparently provide 20 percent of the total effort. 

333 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ter. Spaatz said that “until a new directive was issued to him, he felt compelled 

to make recommendations as to the proper employment of the forces under his 

command to higher authority.”l60 

Leigh-Mallory and Harris engaged in an equally unproductive dialogue concerning Bomber Command’s role. Harris reiterated his prediction that the transportation plan would not succeed and that the air forces would be blamed for its 

failure. Finally, Spaatz entered the fray once again to reject the tonnage and 

effort figures in the plan. At this point, Tedder proposed a joint planning committee, as Spaatz had suggested earlier, with representation from USSTAF, 

Bomber Command, and the AEAF “to draw up a plan to suit the capabilities of 

all concerned.”l61 All present accepted Tedder’s recommendation. 

After the meeting, Spaatz and Tedder had more talks in which they agreed 

not to request a change in the current Combined Bomber Offensive directive until 

the planning committee produced a scheme acceptable to all parties; meanwhile 

the current command system would apply. Spaatz also informed Tedder “that 

Americans would not stand for their Strategic Air Forces operating under LeighMallory.”l62 For the Americans the suggestion that they come under LeighMallory’s control was not just a.function of their mistrust of the Commander of 

the AEAF. The shifting of their priorities to OVERLORD byMarch 1 would undercut the strategic bombing campaign. Spaatz had originally assumed that March 1, 

which he had accepted as the date of USSTAF’s beginning operations under 

OVERLORD, would mark a period sixty days before an early May invasion, but the 

possible postponement of the invasion until June confronted him with a ninetyday delay in the strategic campaign if he remained committed to a March 1 date. 

As of February 15 USSTAF had not yet accomplished even its minimum strategic goals. To have the transportation plan proposed to USSTAF before the 

Luftwaffe’s fighter force had been defeated or the destructive effects of bombing 

on the German economy proved was unacceptable. Already frustrated by the 

weather, which prevented his forces from going after the Germans, and pressured by Washington to push the Combined Bomber Offensive home, Spaatz 

naturally reacted sharply to another threat to the success of his strategic mission. 

Two days after the February 15 meeting, Eisenhower met with Spaatz. 

Eisenhower had already explained to Marshall that he intended to have his “Air 

Preparation” plan accepted as “doctrine” by everyone under his control, including Spaatz,l63 whose previous complaints concerning Leigh-Mallory he found 

worrying. Eisenhower, quietly attempting to change Spaatz’s mind, suggested 

that “proper credit had not been given to Leigh-Mallory ’ s intelligence.” Spaatz 

stood firm, indicating to Eisenhower that his views “had not and would not 

change.”l64 

A draft press release from the Ninth Air Force that afternoon added fuel to 

the fire. The release described Leigh-Mallory as the “Air Commander in Chief.” 

Spaatz promptly complained to Tedder, who replied, reasonably enough, that the 

term had already been released previously. This response failed to satisfy 

334 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

An Avro Lancaster, backbone of RAF Bomber Command, 1943-1945. “Lancs” had 

impressive payloads, but weak defensive armament and protection. 

Spaatz. He then called Harris, who supported his position. Through their combined pressure the offending phrase was squelched. 

Later that day, Spaatz, Anderson, Hughes, and Col. C. P. Cabell (one of 

USSTAF’s representatives on the Joint Planning Committee) had dinner at Park 

House with Zuckerman. Unlike many of his staff and other ranking American 

air officers, Spaatz never let his intense opposition to the transportation plan turn 

into antagonism against the plan’s creator. Zuckerman recorded that Spaatz during the dinner asked him why didn’t he stop working “with that man LeighMallory and join us?”165 In a discussion after dinner, the Americans attempted 

to explain their position to the professor. They emphasized the importance of 

continual missions over Germany and expressed their hope to have at least a 

small force over Germany every day and a larger one when weather permitted 

visual bombing. In any case, the small forces, in seeking visual targets through 

the clouds, would hit small German towns and their marshaling yards, destroying both with, they hoped, important effects.166 Their unsystematic method 

failed to convince Zuckerman, whose plans, as the Americans well kpew, 

required extensive bombing of French targets by the strategic forces. 

On February 19, Eisenhower and Spaatz met again to review air command 

arrangements. Eisenhower asked Spaatz how the current system could be made 

to work with Leigh-Mallory in his present position. Spaatz replied that no system that left Leigh-Mallory in command of the strategic air forces would 

335 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

work.167 He recommended as “the only practical solution” the formalization of 

the Joint Planning Committee, which was already working on the POINTBLANK 

program and on a plan to merge it into OVERLORD. After he and Harris had 

ensured that this plan conformed to the limitations and capabilities of their 

forces,l68 the CCS could issue a new bombing directive redefining target priorities and transferring the strategic air forces to Eisenhower’s direction. Spaatz 

implied he would not approve any plan that allowed Leigh-Mallory control of all 

air operations for an extended period prior to the invasion. He conceded, of 

course, that “plans for the employment of Air in the actual assault of OVERLORD, 

including the softening immediately prior thereto, must of necessity be drawn up 

by Leigh-Mallory, with representatives from RAF Bomber Command and 

USSTAF familiar with the capabilities of these forces.”l69 While Spaatz did not 

object to Leigh-Mallory’s operating within his own area of expertise, he was 

determined to have a voice in the use of U.S. forces. 

Eisenhower accepted this plan with two modifications. He asked that Portal 

have representation on the committee, and second, that from time to time the 

plan be checked against actual bombing results and modified if necessary. These 

changes brought the RAF Chief of Staff formally into the process, increasing the 

probability that the RAF and the CCS would approve any plan drawn up by the 

committee. Portal would also balance Harris, who tended to operate semi-independently. Eisenhower’s second change allowed him the flexibility to change 

air plans as events dictated.170 

Spaatz apparently assumed that this agreement with Eisenhower would enable 

him to carry POINTBLANK a step or two closer to completion. Later that day, after 

lamenting, “Operations this week insignificant because of weather,” he summarized for Arnold the February 15 meeting and the new agreement with Eisenhower. Spaatz emphasized his fear of a “premature shifting from POINTBLANK to 

direct preparation for OVERLORD and its consequent indication of willingness to 

delay attainment of air supremacy until air battle over beachhead.” He also 

noted that Eisenhower would insist on putting RAF and AAF strategic forces 

under his own control.171 In his reply, Arnold wholeheartedly agreed with 

Spaatz that “premature diversion of POINTBLANK and failure to achieve air 

supremacy prior to the assault would have tragic results.” Arnold further 

approved of Eisenhower’s gaining some measure of control of the strategic air 

forces.172 Fortified with Arnold’s support, Spaatz prepared to fight for a continuation of the Combined Bomber Offensive. 

As Spaatz and Eisenhower reached their agreement, Harris introduced a new 

complication. He appealed directly to Churchill to prevent the subjugation of 

Bomber Command to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary 

Force, especially if that meant control by Leigh-Mallory.173 

Spaatz’s and Harris’s fractious attitude had so discouraged Eisenhower’s 

second in command, Tedder, that he wrote to Portal on February 22: 

336 
THE LUFTWAFFE ENGAGED 

I am more and more being forced to the unfortunate conclusion that the two 

strategic air forces are determined not to play. Spaatz has made it abundantly 

clear that he will not accept orders, or even coordination from Leigh-Mallory, 

and the only sign of activity from Harris’ representatives has been a series of 

adjustments to the records of their past bombing statistics, with the evident 

intention of demonstrating that they are quite unequipped and untrained to do 

anything except mass fire-raising on very large targets.’74 

Tedder went on to warn Portal that if the British Chiefs of Staff and Churchill 

continued to withhold Bomber Command from Eisenhower’s control “very serious issues will arise affecting Anglo-American co-operation in OVERLORD,” 

issues that would result in “quite irremediable cleavage” between the Allies.175 

On February 28, Eisenhower had dinner at No. 10 Downing Street with 

Churchill, whom he found impatient for progress on air planning and much disturbed at the thought of Leigh-Mallory ’s commanding the strategic air forces.176 

Eisenhower explained that he was waiting for a coordinated plan on which all 

could agree and requested that the Prime Minister refrain from acting on the 

matter. The next morning Eisenhower wrote a memo to Tedder urging him to 

work more quickly to complete a solid plan before the Prime Minister came “in 

this thing with both feet.”177 This memo sounded the death knell for LeighMallory’s claim to command all air power cooperating with the invasion. 

Eisenhower wrote: 

I’m quite prepared, if necessary, to issue an order saying I will exert direct 

supervision of all air forces-through you-and authorizing you to use headquarters facilities now existing to make your control effective. L.M.’s position 

would not be changed so far as assigned forces are concerned but those 

attached for definite periods or definite jobs would not come under his command [emphasis in original].*78 

Even as Eisenhower signified his willingness to limit Leigh-Mallory to command of only the U.S. Ninth Air Force and the British 2d Tactical Air Force 

Churchill waded into the air tangle. On February 29, the Prime Minister voiced 

his own ideas on OVERLORD’S air organization. Tedder should serve as “the 

‘Aviation lobe’ of Eisenhower’s brain,” with the power to use all air forces temporarily or permanently assigned to the invasion in accordance with the plan 

approved by Eisenhower.179 Furthermore, Churchill charged Tedder to draw up, 

with the assistance of Leigh-Mallory ’s AEAF staff, a plan satisfactory to the 

Supreme Commander. Leigh-Mallory would prepare plans and execute orders 

received from Tedder in Eisenhower’s name. As Deputy Commander, Tedder 

would be empowered to issue orders to Spaatz, Harris, and Air Chief Marshal 

Sholto Douglas, head of Coastal Command, for any employment of their forces 

in OVERLORD sanctioned by the CCS.180 This outline would eventually become 

the command structure accepted by the Allies. 

Churchill’s minutes of February 29 may have suggested the solution for the 

chain of command for air, but Eisenhower found other sections of it objectionable. 

337 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Although the minutes admonished that “the ‘OVERLORD’ battle must be the chief 

care of all concerned, and great risks must be run in every other sphere and theater 

in order that nothing should be withheld which could contribute to the success,” 

Churchill, in the same document, proceeded to violate his own dictum. “There can 

be no question,” he ruled, “of handing over the British Bomber, Fighter, or 

Coastal Commands as a whole to the Supreme Commander and his Deputy.” The 

three commands had other functions as well as those assigned by OVERLORD. In 

addition, Churchill felt that the CCS should retain the right to vary assignments 

to the invasion “should overriding circumstances render it necessary.”l81 

Upon reviewing these minutes, Eisenhower accepted Tedder’s command 

role and responsibility for drafting an air plan, but balked at having anything less 

than total operational control of both strategic air forces. Further conversations 

with Churchill proved unfruitful. In the beginning of March, Eisenhower told 

Churchill that if Bomber Command did not come under his control, he “would 

simply have to go home.”182 

Eisenhower conceded that Coastal Command, which occupied a lesser place 

in the invasion plan, could remain under separate control, but he insisted that 

Bomber Command receive its direction through the headquarters of the Supreme 

Commander, as agreed by the Combined Chiefs of Staff at Cairo in December 

1943. Portal, for his part, denied that the CCS had ever intended to place more 

than a portion of Bomber Command under Eisenhower. At this juncture, 

Churchill told Portal to negotiate an agreement with Eisenhower and indicated 

that he would accept whatever arrangement the two men agreed to.183 In the 

end, during April, the strategic air forces came under Eisenhower’s control. 

By the end of February 1944, Spaatz had only partially solved the basic 

problems confronting his command. Two months of bad weather had reduced 

the opportunity for visual daylight bombing of Germany to a handful of days. To 

their credit, Spaatz, Fred Anderson, Doolittle, and their men had taken maximum advantage of those days to damage key German aircraft assembly and production targets. Those strikes, in conjunction with bombing-through-overcast 

missions, had pushed the loss rate of the German fighter force to an unsustainable level. The Luftwaffe lost to all causes 12.1 percent of its fighter pilots in 

January and another 17.9 percent in February.184 Thus, in two months almost 

one out of every three of Germany’s fighter pilots had been killed or disabled, 

including some of its most skilled aviators. Wastage of machines was high, too. 

Luftwaffe fighter units wrote off 33.8 percent of their total strength in January 

and another 56.4 percent in February, a 90 percent turnover in two months.185 

The Eighth, too, had suffered severely, losing 21 1 heavy bombers (19.5 percent 

of its force) in January and 299 (20.2 percent of its force) in February.186 The 

Eighth also lost 172 fighter aircraft in combat and 190 fighter pilots to combat or 

accidents for the first two months of the year.187 

Spaatz, however, thanks to resources of men and materiel reaching him, not 

only sustained such losses but actually increased his strength on hand. His com338 
THE LUITWAFFE ENGAGED 

mand had not brought the Luftwaffe to earth, but had substantially weakened it. 

In those two months a measure of confidence returned to the Eighth, which, 

thanks to increasing numbers of long-range escort-fighters, was no longer afraid 

to fly deep into Germany. This restoration of spirit, the attrition of the Luftwaffe, 

and the damage to Germany’s air industry, although not decisive in themselves, 

were three large steps toward the accomplishment of POINTBLANK. 

In comparison with the steady strides forward on the operational side of the 

war, Spaatz and USSTAF remained enmeshed in disputes concerning the transportation plan and air command arrangements. The latter, at least, gave some 

hope of speedy resolution, while the former would drag on, not completely 

resolved. almost until the invasion. 

339 

Chapter 10 

The Luftwaffe Defeated 

(March-April 1944) 

A concentrated effort against oil, which would represent the 

most far-reaching use of strategic air power that has been 

attempted in this war, promises, I believe, more than any 

other system; a fighting chance of ending German resistance 

in a shorter period than we have hitherto thought possible.' 

Spaatz to Arnold, March 6,1944. 

In the three months before the invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, the 

AAF gained daylight air superiority in the skies above occupied Europe and 

Germany and began a campaign against the Axis oil industry, the success of 

which contributed greatly to preinvasion air preparations. Neither of these tasks 

proved easy. The Germans opposed each step with their usual dogged resistance, 

and disputes among the British and Americans threatened to misdirect the 

employment of Allied air power, dissipating its force and jeopardizing the 

accomplishment of the goals before it. Spaatz, as the senior AAF officer in the 

European Theater of Operations, played a key role in these events by his supervision of the U.S. air effort and by his participation as the chief AAF representative in Europe in the contentious negotiations that worked out Allied air 

command arrangements (See Chart 6, Chain of Command, Allied Expeditionary Force, April 7, 1944.) and U.S. strategic air forces contributions to preinvasion bombing. 

Air Command Arrangements for OVERLORD Are Settled 

In the beginning of March, the Allies settled the air command arrangements 

for OVERLORD. Tedder served as go-between as the British Chief of the Air 

Staff, Portal, and the American Supreme Commander, Eisenhower, wrestled to 

34 1 
Air Ministry 

Chart 6 

Chain of Command, Allied Expeditionary Force 

April 1,1944 

War Office Admiralty 

Supreme Commander AEF 

General Eisenhower 

I 

BOMBER 

Air Chief Marshal 

Harris 

COMMAND USSTAF - - - 

Lt Gen Spaatz 

Fifteenth Eighth 

AF AF 

LtGen LtGen 

Twining Doolittle 

- 

I 

ANCXF 

Admiral Ramsay 

21 Army Group AEAF 

General Montgomery Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory 
R Adrn 

Vian 

WTF 

R Adrn 

Kirk 

I 

Assault 

Force 0 

R Adm 

Hall 

Assault 

Force U 

R Adm 

Moon 

Follow Up 

Force B 

Commodore 

Edgar 

Service 

Force 

R Adm 

Wilkes 

Mulberry A 

r 

Force G 

Commodore 

DouglasPennant 

Assault 

Force J 

Commodore 

Oliver 

Assault 

Force S 

Talbot 

Follow Up 

Force L 

I 

BRITISH 

1st 2dARMY 

ARMY Attached 

CANADIAN and 

LtGen Troops 

Crerar Lt Gen 

Dempsey 

I 

1 

Lt Gen Crocker 

Simonds 

CORPS n Lt Gen 

OConner 

CORPS 

Lt Gen 

Ritchie 

CORPS 

Lt Gen 

Bucknall 

Airborne 

Troops 

Lt Gen 

Browning 

I 

1 st 

AIB Div 

Maj Gen 

Urquhart 

6th 

AI0 Div 

Maj Gen 

Cole 

SAS 

TRS 

FIRST 

Attached 

Troops 

Lt Gen 

Bradley 

CORPS 

Maj Gen 

Middleton 

CORPS 

Maj Gen 

Gerow 

TROOPS 

CORPS r Maj Gen 

Corlen 

AIB Div 

Maj Gen 

AB Brig 

Brig Gen 

Lousada 

AVM AVM Williams 

Anderson 

Comd Comd 

. . . . . . , Operational Direction 

_______ Administrative Direction 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

reconcile their differences. Portal, following Churchill’s dictates, sought to preserve some autonomy for RAF Coastal, Fighter, and Bomber Commands, 

whereas Eisenhower wished for complete control, particularly of Bomber 

Command. By March 9, Portal produced a draft agreement incorporating elements of both positions. Eisenhower described it as “exactly what we want,”2 

and a day later informed Marshall, “All air forces here will be under Tedder’s 

supervision as my agent and this prospect is particularly pleasing to Spaatz.3 

Spaatz wrote to Arnold in a similar vein, “I feel that this is a logical, workable plan and, under the conditions which exist, cannot be improved upon.”4 

Tedder would coordinate the operation of the strategic forces in support of the 

invasion, and Leigh-Mallory, under Tedder’s supervision, would coordinate the 

tactical air plan. Eisenhower accepted the right of the Combined Chiefs or the 

British Chiefs to impose additional tasks on the strategic forces if necessary. 

Finally, once assault forces had established themselves on the Continent, both 

parties agreed to undertake a revision of the directive for the employment of the 

strategic bomber force.5 

The British then passed the draft agreement to the Combined Chiefs. In their 

covering memos, the British stated that when the air plan for support of 

OVERLORD met the approval of both Eisenhower and Portal, acting in his capacity as the agent of the Chiefs for the Combined Bomber Offensive, “the responsibility for supervision of air operations out of England of all forces engaged in 

the program, including the United States Strategic Air Force and British Bomber 

Command, together with any other air forces that might be made available, 

should pass to the Supreme Commander.”6 Eisenhower and Portal would jointly 

supervise those strategic forces not used by the invasion in accordance with 

agreements they had previously reached. The British Chiefs added that, at present, they had no plans to use the reservations inserted into the agreement, and, 

if they did, they would immediately inform the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff.7 

The US. Joint Chiefs balked at once. This proposal did not give Eisenhower 

unquestioned control of the strategic air forces. The British protested that the 

Supreme Commander himself found the plan acceptable-to no avail. Even 

Eisenhower had second thoughts and insisted on untrammeled control of the 

strategic bombers for the invasion period. Once again, he thought of resigning if 

the matter continued to drag on ad infinitum.8 On April 7, barely two months 

before the invasion, the Combined Chiefs agreed that the strategic air forces 

would operate under the Supreme Commander’s “direction.” This was apparently less ambiguous than allotting him “the responsibility for supervision.” At 

the same time, the Combined Chiefs approved, with a few exceptions on targets, 

the air plan developed for the invasion. Formal direction of the strategic air forces 

passed to Eisenhower on April 14,9 confirming the informal command structure 

already in place. 

344 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

The Dispute over Strategic Targeting 

Simultaneously, the strategic air forces, through their representatives on the 

Joint Planning Committee for the OVERLORD air plan, spent much of March 

arguing the merits of Zuckerman’s transportation plan versus USSTAF’s oil 

plan. The strategic air forces would come into the Supreme Commander’s hands 

only after approval of the air preparation plan. Until the airmen could agree on a 

plan, the formalization of the air command structure would hang fire. 

For practical purposes, however, the strategic air commanders had no intention of actually employing their veto. Spaatz and, by now, even Harris accepted 

the necessity of some strategic support for the invasion. Moreover, Eisenhower 

would surely override any veto by appealing to the CCS, who would defer to him 

in any matter directly touching on the success of the invasion. Their veto power 

gave the strategic air commanders leverage in obtaining a command system and a 

plan for air employment more in keeping with their own ideas than might otherwise have been possible. Although their positions were not invulnerable, 

Eisenhower would find it difficult and very disruptive to replace them with more 

malleable commanders, who would probably lack their expertise and prestige. 

By late February, Spaatz and others had recognized that the Combined Bomber 

Offensive had progressed to a point, thanks to the attrition of the Luftwaffe’s 

fighter forces inflicted in January and February, at which time the destruction of 

targets other than the German aircraft industry was not only feasible but desirable. Spaatz thus ordered the formation of a USSTAF planning committee to 

consider future actions. He did so partially in response to the transportation plan, 

which the AEAF had presented to him in February-a plan that USSTAF 

regarded as unsound. He laid down three guiding principles for the committee: 

(1) the plan must provide for air supremacy at the time of the invasion; (2) the 

plan should take into account a possible early collapse of Germany prior to the 

invasion; and (3) if Germany did not collapse, the plan should nevertheless 

make a maximum contribution to the success of OVERLORD.^^ 

With pressure for adoption of the transportation plan gaining momentum 

every day, Spaatz urgently required a viable alternative on which to base his 

opposition. He pushed the planning committee to complete its work; they prepared a final draft in thirty-six-hours,l 1 presenting to Spaatz on March 5, a 

“plan for the Completion of the Combined Bomber Offensive.” 

Quickly dubbed the oil plan it called for a “re-clarification” of POINTBLANK 

directives and, after examining ten discrete target systems, selected three 

German production programs-rubber, bomber aircraft, and oil. To those three, 

it added the already accepted targets of German fighter production and ball bearings. Oil received top priority followed by fighters and ball bearings, rubber, and 

bomber aircraft. The plan emphatically rejected railroad transport as a strategic 

target. Such a system had too many targets, had built in too much noncritical 

civilian traffic and long-term industrial traffic that could be suppressed or 

345 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

diverted before military traffic would be significantly reduced, and its destruction would take too long to have a significant military effect. In contrast, the oil 

plan required fifteen days’ visual bombing for the Eighth Air Force and ten for 

the Fifteenth Air Force.12 

The plan assumed that the destruction of only fourteen synthetic oil plants 

and thirteen refineries would account for more than 80 percent of production and 

60 percent of readily usable refining capacity. These losses would reduce the 

total German supply of fuel by 50 percent, thereby cutting materially “German 

military capabilities through reducing tactical and strategical mobility and frontline delivery of supplies and industrial ability to produce weapons and supplies.” 

Furthermore, the plan contended that the Germans, under fire, would immediately reduce consumption of oil products in order to conserve their stocks.13 This 

postulate, although logical, could not be verified by intelligence before the 

attacks. USSTAF insisted that the immediate cut would have great effects in the 

battle for the beachhead, but the oil plan’s critics countered by claiming that it 

did not guarantee a significant impact on German fighting ability before the 

invasion assault. Almost everyone agreed that the plan had long-range potential 

devastating to the Nazis. Nonetheless, factors that improved the chances of the 

imminent invasion appealed more to Eisenhower than schemes that promised 

important but delayed benefits. 

The oil industry’s configuration added to its suitability as a target system. 

Ploesti, the enemy’s major source of natural petroleum, was vulnerable to the 

increasing power of the Fifteenth Air Force. Once operations there ceased, the 

synthetic oil plants of Germany would become the enemy’s chief source of supply. These plants, most of which were well within bomber range of Britain, constituted a compact target system. Their destruction would produce dramatic 

results before the cross-channel attack and leave an adequate reserve of unused 

American force available for containing the aircraft industry or striking at other 

targets of opportunity.14 

The synthetic oil plants also presented a practical bombing problem, which 

was not as important in early 1944, when strategic airmen had only minimum 

disposable force, as it would become in the winter of 1944-1945, when they had 

enormous bomber fleets. For technical and logistical reasons the Germans had 

chosen to build their synthetic oil plants away from urban areas. These plants 

could only be bombed if they could be located by visual means. The American 

H2X radar’s resolution or return was so inaccurate that it could only locate a city 

area. Although synthetic plants were huge, they were considerably smaller than 

a city. Hence, bombing oil plants meant using the very few days of visual bombing weather to hit targets outside German cities. In the winter of 1944-1945 synthetic oil targets absorbed all visual bombing days. The Americans were left 

with little choice but to resort to H2X-assisted raids on targets within German 

cities for the majority of their bombing effort, with calamitous results for the 

German civilian population. 

346 
THE LUF~VAFFE DFEATED 

Upon receiving the plan on the evening of March 5, Spaatz and his staff, as 

usual, began their discussion before dinner and continued it into the wee hours. 

Walt W. Rostow, then a first lieutenant in the Enemy Objectives Unit (EOU) of 

the Office of Strategic Services, which served as USSTAF’s unofficial target 

intelligence section, recorded in 198 1, “Despite the effort to emphasize, within 

the plan, the will to complete the attacks on the POINTBLANK systems, General 

Spaatz quickly appreciated that it was to all intents and purposes an Oil Plan.” 

Spaatz then “explored at length the issues at stake, especially the capabilities of 

the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces with respect to the number of targets 

involved. He then ordered the plan completed for prompt presentation to Portal 

and Eisenhower.”ls 

In sending the plan to Eisenhower, Spaatz stated his own views: “I consider 

that the plan provides for the optimum use of Strategic Air Forces between now 

and the time for close support in the immediate tactical area. Our calculations of 

the possible results are considered to be conservative.” He added that the plan’s 

results were “pitched in terms of so lowering the German fighting efficiency on 

existing fronts that the German ability safely to move strategic reserves will be 

impaired; and in the months following D-Day, the capacity of the German ground 

armies effectively to continue resistance must inevitably be exhausted.”16 

The oil plan offered a strategically based rebuttal of the transportation plan. 

Another plan, drawn up by the EOU, challenged the transportation plan on tactical grounds. EOU’s plan called for the bombing of french supply dumps and 

bridges rather than rail marshaling yards. Both plans provided rallying points for 

the critics of Zuckerman’s plan. The counterattack mounted by these critics 

brought Tedder fully into the field in support of the transportation plan because 

he might lose face if the Allies rejected it. He believed that the plan offered a 

partial solution to the air command difficulties by providing a set of targets 

requiring the coordination and cooperation of the strategic and tactical air forces. 

Tedder wrote Portal that in order to derive full use of Allied air power, he 

needed a target system based “on one common object toward which all available 

air forces can be directed. . . . Concentration against one common system, by 

both day and night, is essential.”l7 Tedder’s reasoning was, of course, apparent 

to the adherents of both plans. The oil plan allowed a non-centralized air command system under which the strategic air forces would operate without close 

cooperation with the tactical air forces. The transportation plan required a unified air command in order to yoke both the strategic and tactical air forces into a 

coordinated attack on a complex, wide-spread, resilient target system. 

The dispute between the adherents of the transportation plan and its opponents, who criticized it on strategic and tactical grounds, continued until midMay 1944. During a series of meetings held throughout March the transportation 

plan’s detractors mobilized increasing opposition. Field Marshal Alan Brooke, 

Chief of the Imperial General Staff, the equivalent of the American Chairman of 

347 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and others questioned the plan’s effectiveness,lg as did 

segments of the British Air Staff and Ministry of Economic Warfare. Spaatz, on 

the day of the AAF’s first major raid over Berlin, wrote Arnold enthusiastically: 

We do, however, feel sure that a new range of tactical possibilities in operation 

are open to us, and that it would be a misuse of our force and of the opportunities we have created not to push strategic bombing to its ultimate conclusion, in 

that period available to us. A concentrated effort against oil, which would represent the most far-reaching use of strategic air-power that has been attempted 

in this war, promises more than any other system, a fighting chance of ending 

German resistance in a shorter period than we have hitherto thought po~sible.’~ 

Arnold began cudgelling his own superior, Marshall, to support the oil plan. 

In a memo dated March 13, he explained, “In view of the recent progress made 

against the GAF, the ball-bearing industry and Berlin, and the imminence of 

OVERLORD, it is evident such a plan is required.” After denigrating plans based 

“upon only cold, mathematical-like tables of performance data [the transportation plan],” Arnold concluded, “The tremendous force available to us must not 

be permitted to waste its substance on any but potentially decisive operations.”20 

These pleas did not change Marshall’s determination or that of the War 

Department to leave the major decisions concerning the military policy of the 

invasion to the invasion commander, Eisenhower. On March 16, the AAF Chief 

of Staff, Maj. Gen. Barney Giles, told Spaatz that because Portal, Harris, and, 

above all, Eisenhower had not committed themselves to the oil plan, the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff were unlikely to take action on it. He pointed out that the most 

recent CCS directive on strategic bombing already gave Spaatz the authority to 

start attacks against the systems he had selected. Then Giles asked for new initiatives from Spaatz: 

What concerns us most here is whether or not you are going to be able to sell 

Eisenhower on the necessity for letting you go ahead with your Plan without 

insistence that you be diverted prematurely. I feel that if Eisenhower makes an 

issue of a system or of a date he will be backed up by the U.S. Joint Chiefs of 

Staff-so that places it right in your lap?’ 

In order to “sell” Eisenhower, Spaatz would have to “sell” Tedder, who had 

already told Portal, “I am frankly skeptical of the Oil Plan, partly because we 

have been led up the garden path before, partly because the targets are in difficult areas . . . and partly because I am not sure of the real vulnerability of the 

new synthetic oil plants.”22 On March 16 the Joint Bombing Committee met 

again. Tedder began the meeting completely in favor of the transportation plan, 

but the united opposition of the RAF Assistant Chiefs of Staff for Plans, Bomber 

Operations, and Intelligence caused him to waver and he, with Portal and 

Eisenhower, referred the transportation plan to the British Joint Intelligence 

Committee for review. Spaatz noted optimistically, “Hoped by all concerned 

348 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

here that Tedder will repudiate AEAF Plan of his own accord,” an action that 

would avoid hard feelings all around.23 Tedder, however, did not abandon the 

transportation plan, even in the face of the Joint Intelligence Committee Report, 

which supported the oil plan. The latter report, according to Tedder, was based 

on unsubstantiated and invalid assumptions.24 

Meanwhile, Eisenhower had reached the end of his tether. If a meeting 

scheduled for March 25 did not decide between the competing plans, he stated, 

“I am going to take drastic action and inform the Combined Chiefs of Staff that 

unless the matter is settled at once I will request relief from this command.”25 

At the March 25 bombing policy conference which would decide between 

the competing plans, Spaatz, Tedder, and Eisenhower were joined by Portal, 

Harris, Leigh-Mallory, and various intelligence officers and experts on Axis oil. 

During the preceding week Spaatz and Tedder had prepared and circulated briefs 

detailing their positions and had marshaled last-minute agreements to attract further support for their proposals. Apparently, Tedder persuaded Portal to back the 

transportation plan. Harris, too, gave the plan lukewarm support. He opposed the 

oil plan because he disagreed with the concept of designing a strategic bombing 

strategy around a single-target system. Choosing such a “panacea” diverted his 

forces from area bombing, which he thought was the most effective method of 

conducting the bomber offensive. In addition, British bomber operations in 

March demonstrated the night bomber’s surprisingly high capability for the precision bombing of marshaling yards while simultaneously revealing an alarming 

rise in the effectiveness of the German night-fighter force, which reached its 

apogee in the winter of 1943-1944 and inflicted “prohibitive” casualties.26 

These two factors undercut Harris’s original objections that he could not bomb 

precision targets and that city-busting raids offered a more decisive alternative. 

Spaatz, not to be outdone, took advantage of Eaker’s visit to London-they 

visited each other’s headquarters monthly and coordinated bombing operations 

and policy-to use his friend’s close ties with the British and his expertise to try 

to win converts to the oil plan. On the morning of March 25, Spaatz and Eaker, 

who had just stepped off his plane, went to lobby both Eisenhower and Tedder. 

After discussing air command arrangements in Britain and the proposed directive for air support of OVERLORD, Eisenhower asked for Eaker’s views on the oil 

versus transportation debate. Although he declined to comment on the oil plan 

because he had not studied it, Eaker told Eisenhower that the Luftwaffe must 

receive top priority and recommended that no attacks on communications lines 

south of the Rhine should occur before D-day. His experience in Italy, said 

Eaker, had shown him that communication attacks, unsupported by sustained 

friendly ground action to pressure the enemy and force him to consume supplies, 

had little effect. The two AAF generals then spent an hour with Tedder going 

over the same subJects,27 but they did not change his mind. 

That afternoon Portal, chair of the bombing policy conference called on 

Tedder to present the transportation plan. During the presentation and the ensu349 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ing discussion three salient points emerged. First, all present agreed that the 

bombing of Luftwaffe targets, including ball bearings producers, had top priority, and, therefore, the meeting would consider the allocation to a specific target 

system of only the effort remaining after bombing the highest priority system. 

Second, Tedder believed that only an all-out attack on the transport-action system would sufficiently disrupt enemy movement before and after D-day to give 

the invasion the greatest chance of success. Third, Eisenhower asserted that “the 

greatest contribution that he could imagine the air forces making” was the hindering of enemy movement and “that everything he had read had convinced him 

that, apart from the attack on the G.A.F., the Transportation Plan was the only 

one which offered a reasonable chance of the air forces making an important 

contribution to the land battle during the first vital weeks of OVERLORD.” In fact 

he did not believe that there was any other “real alternative.”28 

Then the group examined the oil plan. Spaatz and F. L. Anderson, the only 

Americans present besides Eisenhower, presented their case. Several factors 

affected the manner of their exposition. Spaatz, congenial, even convivial, in his 

mess or at ease, usually performed woodenly at set-piece conferences,29 as he 

did at this one. He had already circulated his views in his brief and so he confined himself to reiterating three of its conclusions: (1) strategic attacks on the 

railways would not affect the course of initial battle or prevent movement of 

German reserves from other fronts, whereas the oil plan might do both; (2) 

attacks on the rail system would not, in an acceptable length of time, weaken 

enemy resistance on all fronts simultaneously, which the oil plan would do 

while it also hastened the postinvasion success of OVERLORD; and, most important, (3) attacks on rail targets would not provoke a strong reaction from the 

Luftwaffe, whereas attacks on oil targets would.30 This spare, straightforward 

presentation aided the advocates of the transportation plan. A presentation of 

EOU’s tactical plan would have strengthened his case. 

As Rostow has pointed out, other organizational, bureaucratic, and personal 

factors also affected the presentation. Spaatz, because he commanded a strategic 

force, chose not to present the tactical plan, which would require the participation of forces not under his control. Although he harbored genuine, continuing 

doubts as to the invasion’s chances of success in achieving a foothold on the 

Continent, he would accept almost any plan Eisenhower backed because he did 

not want it said that he had not done his utmost to support the attack. A member 

of his staff, Carl Kaysen, recalled that a week or so before the meeting Spaatz 

told his staff, ‘‘I won’t take the responsibility. This ~ [expletive deleted in 

original] invasion can’t succeed, and I don’t want any part of the blame. After it 

fails, we can show them how we can win by bombing.”sl 

Anderson followed Spaatz’s short discourse with the observation that 

although the oil plan could not guarantee a .decisive influence on the initial 

stages of OVERLORD, it could, within six months, have a devastating effect on the 

enemy. Conversely, USSTAF doubted that the transportation plan would ever 

350 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

have a decisive effect on the enemy. A British oil expert from the Ministry of 

Economic Warfare, Oliver Lawrence, commented that if USSTAF attacked its 

twenty-seven targeted oil installations within a three-month period, the Germans 

would have to cut their current military consumption by 25 percent. Lawrence 

added that the Germans had large reserve stocks in the west, so they might not 

immediately cut back operations in France, but they would certainly feel the 

pinch in the west four or five months after the plan’s start. 

Portal immediately seized on Lawrence’s comments to administer the coup 

de grilce to the immediate adoption of the oil plan stating that they “showed conclusively that the oil plan would not help OVERLORD in the first few critical 

weeks.” He softened the blow by strongly suggesting that, once the initial invasion crisis had passed, the oil plan had “great attractions.” Eisenhower agreed. 

This ended the meeting’s consideration of Spaatz’s alternative to the transportation plan.32 

Talk then turned to the use of strategic bombers. Harris doubted that he 

could carry out precision attacks against all twenty-six targets allotted to him in 

the time period before D-day. Despite a rising rate of casualties, he wanted to 

continue his attacks over eastern Germany for as long as he had enough hours of 

darkness. Eisenhower, conceding that the transportation plan would cause 

Bomber Command very little change in its programs, said, “The more important 

question was whether the 8th and 15th Air Forces could achieve their part in [the 

transportation plan].” Spaatz replied that one-half of his visual bombing attacks 

would have to strike Luftwaffe targets and the other half would have to hit a target system capable of producing “at least some enemy fighter reaction, and so 

attrition.” He had chosen the oil plan over the transportation plan precisely 

because the former would guarantee constant air battles and consistent attrition 

of the Luftwaffe’s fighter force. 

Portal disagreed. He believed that the Luftwaffe would defend the railways 

once it realized the Allies had begun an all-out campaign against them. Spaatz 

emphasized the importance of the location of the targets chosen; his forces must 

fly well into Germany in order to generate the maximum amount of air fighting, 

and for tactical reasons some of the transportation targets ought to be in the 

same area as Luftwaffe targets. Tedder agreed, anticipating that he would have 

no problem coming up with targets to fit Spaatz’s requirements. Portal then 

raised another problem-the large numbers of civilian casualties almost certain 

to result from bombing the marshaling yards in or adjacent to French towns. He 

reserved to the British government the opportunity to consider the possible consequences.33 This caveat, which few at the time remarked on, would eventually 

delay complete execution of the transportation plan for several weeks until 

Churchill could satisfy himself that the bombing would not redound to Britain’s 

discredit. 

The bombing policy conference ended with Portal and Eisenhower giving 

Tedder, not Leigh-Mallory, instructions on coordinating the execution of the 

35 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

plan with the air commanders involved.34 At this time Portal and Eisenhower 

also stated their intention to put in place the air command arrangements on 

which they had previously agreed, subject to final approval by the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff.35 From that point on, Eisenhower, using Tedder as his executive 

for air, began to exercise de facto control of the strategic bomber forces.36 The 

decision that Tedder coordinate the execution of the transportation plan had the 

character of a compromise. Eisenhower accepted Leigh-Mallory ’s preinvasion 

plan but did not require that Spaatz, who questioned Leigh-Mallory ’s capabilities, place himself under the man. 

Thus concluded what a British official history termed “the historic occasion.”37 Eisenhower chose the transportation plan over the oil plan, and the air 

command arrangements agreed on between Eisenhower and the British went 

into effect. Critics have disputed the wisdom of the Supreme Commander’s 

choice ever since. Much ink and emotion have flowed over the benefits derived 

from the transportation plan. On tactical grounds its critics maintain that a campaign of bridge busting and bombing of supply dumps would have consumed 

less force with equal results.38 On strategic grounds critics bemoan the “national 

disaster”39 of the delay in the oil campaign, which, when executed, severely 

restricted Germany’s ability to wage war. 

How did Spaatz react to this conference-an event Eisenhower biographer 

Stephen E. Ambrose described as “a crucial moment in his [Spaatz’s] life”?40 

Did he complain bitterly to everyone of the obtuseness of his plan’s opponents? 

No, neither his character nor his thirty years’ service as a Regular Army officer 

fitted him for the role of chronic malcontent. As in the Mitchell court-martial 

nineteen years earlier, he presented and defended a position in which he believed passionately. Once Eisenhower had reached a decision, however, Spaatz 

supported it with grace and, in fact, left the meeting not displeased, but cheered 

that the command arrangements acceptable to him had prevailed. In a letter to 

Arnold, Eaker, who had dinner with Spaatz that evening, said of Spaatz’s reaction: 

I have never seen him quite so jubilant and overjoyed. He had won out completely on the command set up. The strategic British and American Air Forces 

were not to be put under Leigh-Mallory. The communication plan had won 

out over the oil plan, but Tooey was not too displeased about this, since all 

had firmly agreed that the German Air Force was to be an all-consuming first 

priority.41 

The day after the meeting, in his weekly “Eyes Only” summary for Arnold, 

Spaatz commented: 

I believe decision reached was justified based on all factors involved, which are 

predominantly the absolute necessity to insure the initial success of OVERLORD. 

I feel satisfied with the command set-up as now being established. . . . I feel the 

352 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

time has arrived now when the most essential thing is the full out coordination 

of the air effort in support of OVERLORD.42 

Spaatz’s actions and words after the meeting betray little sense of defeat or 

angst at the thought of forfeiting what he considered an excellent chance to hit 

Germany in its most vital organs. Postwar information gathered by the Allies 

reveals that the anti-oil campaign was decisive once it began in earnest in the 

summer of 1944. Spaatz, in March 1944, might have had a hunch that the oil 

campaign would yield immediate crucial results, but he had no proof. He 

accepted the transportation plan because he would only have to divert, at most, 

half of his effort, much of it on days the Eighth could not bomb Germany using 

visual means in any case. He could employ the remainder of his force with a free 

hand to continue increasing the Luftwaffe’s already ruinous attrition rate. The 

latest version of the transportation plan also assigned RAF Bomber Command 

twenty-six rail targets in France, thus ensuring Harris’s participation and removing a specter that had troubled Spaatz since the plan’s inception. In early 

February he had remarked to Zuckerman, “What worries me is that Harris is 

being allowed to get off scot-free. He’ll go on bombing Germany and will be 

given a chance of defeating her before the invasion while I am put under LeighMallory’s command.”Q It is also possible that Spaatz had not given up on the 

oil plan. If he could demonstrate that bombing oil targets could produce a violent air reaction by the Germans, then selecting oil targets would clearly fall into 

the purview of his directive to destroy the Luftwaffe. 

Spaatz may have lost a round on points but he had not lost the fight. On 

March 31 he stepped back into the ring with memos to Portal and Eisenhower 

titled “The Use of Strategic Bombers in Support of OVERLORD,” inwhich he 

accepted the proposition that French railways required heavy attacks. But, after 

noting that neither the oil plan nor the transportation plan had, as yet, a qualitative measure of effectiveness, he rejected an attack on German railways and suggested that oil targets would be just as easy to bomb and more effective in the 

long run: 

I 

The effect from the Oil attack, while offering a less definite input in time, is 

certain to be more far-reaching. It will lead directly to sure disaster for 

Germany. The Rail attack can lead to harassment only. In weighing these two, 

it appears that too great a price may be paid merely for a certainty of very 

little.44 

Spaatz then offered the possibility of simultaneously executing both the oil 

and transportation plans. Eighth Air Force fighter-bombers could bomb both 

French railway targets and synthetic fuel plants in the Ruhr. RAF Bomber 

Command could also make daylight attacks against French rail targets or 

bomb synthetic fuel plants in Stettin or, if they wished, the Ruhr at night. In 

Romania, the Fifteenth Air Force might bomb transportation targets, and the 

353 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Russians might advance far enough to send their limited-range planes against 

Ploesti. To Spaatz, bombing the transport lines around Ploesti was the key to 

hampering German military operations in the Balkans and the southern USSR, 

restricting the flow of refined and crude petroleum from Ploesti, and contributing to the general dislocation of the German rail system. If the Soviets could 

take or neutralize Ploesti, the Germans would be extremely vulnerable to air 

attacks on the synthetic fuel plants, Hitler’s only remaining significant source of 

oil. “These possibilities,” in Spaatz’s opinion, “therefore, lend weight to the 

advantage of early attack upon the synthetics in order to obtain the earliest possible threat. That impact might well be far earlier than currently estimated.”45 

Finally, Spaatz recommended the following target priorities in order of 

importance for his two air forces: 

For the Eighth: 

1. The Luftwaffe and ball bearings, 

2. The nineteen rail targets already selected in occupied countries, and 

3. The thirteen major synthetic oil plants. 

1. The Luftwaffe and ball bearings, 

2. Rail transport in Romania and selected targets in southern France, 

3. Synthetic oil plants in southern Germany, and 

4. Political targets in the Balkans.& 

For the Fifteenth: 

At the end of March, the transportation plan was in; Spaatz was persevering in 

his push for oil; and Leigh-Mallory was out, reduced to the same status as 

Spaatz and Harris, with Eisenhower, acting through Tedder, in command. Spaatz 

had achieved a position satisfactory to himself on several issues. The strategic 

bombers would remain under strategic commanders. He also expected U.S. representation within the AEAF to become more vigorous with the replacement of 

the lackluster Butler by the ambitious Brig. Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg, Spaatz’s 

personal friend. Vandenberg, a former member of the prewar Air Corps Plans 

Division and former Chief of Staff of the Twelfth Air Force and of the 

Northwest African Strategic Air Forces, received his second star in order to have 

the requisite rank for the new assignment. 

Spaatz and Eisenhower had earlier agreed on Butler’s transfer. On March 1, 

Eisenhower cabled Marshall that he found Butler “not [emphasis in original] 

suitable for his present assignment.”47 On March 6, Eisenhower, presumably in 

response to Marshall’s and Arnold’s request for further information, added, 

“The difficulty with General Butler is that he is completely negative,”48 with 

nothing constructive to offer either ally. The Supreme Commander then suggested Vandenberg. “The importance of the American contingent of this staff is 

obvious, and it must be headed by a strong, able type whose word and opinions 

will carry some weight.”49 Marshall, who rubber-stamped almost all of 

Eisenhower’s personnel requests, promptly complied. Vandenberg, leaving his 

354 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

post as AAF Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, arrived in London on March 24, 

where he immediately saw Spaatz. With him came another AAF general, Brig. 

Gen. Frederic H. Smith, Jr., the son-in-law of Admiral Ernest J. King, Chief of 

Naval Operations. Smith’s marital connections gave him greater influence and 

importance than his rank might suggest. He would serve as Vandenberg’s 

deputy and Chief of AEAF Operations. 

At their initial meeting and at another three days later concerning the role 

and responsibilities of the Deputy Commander, Allied Expeditionary Air Force, 

Spaatz clarified his reasons for asking Eisenhower to appoint Vandenberg. 

Vandenberg pointed to the dual nature of his roles: (1) serving as a loyal subordinate to his commander, Leigh-Mallory, and (2) “guarding the operational use 

and fulfilling the administrative requirement of the American component.” 

Spaatz responded that Vandenberg’s top priority ought to be “safeguarding the 

interests of the American component” and gaining Eisenhower’s concurrence in 

this matter. Spaatz added that with Eisenhower’s agreement, he meant to route 

all matters of major policy concerning the Ninth Air Force through Vandenberg. 

Vandenberg would ‘‘inform” General Brereton to direct through him all matters 

requiring decisions by higher authority. The two generals then consulted with 

Eisenhower, who concurred in their decision, and with Tedder concerning the 

position of AEAF and the other air commands in England. Vandenberg finished 

his rounds by going off alone for dinner with Leigh-Mallory at AEAF Headquarters.50 

By placing his own man in the deputy commander slot and making him the 

de facto commander of the entire U.S. contingent in the AEAF, Spaatz tightened 

his control over the nonstrategic AAF elements in Britain. He eliminated Butler, 

who, in addition to his other failings, had supported the transportation plan.51 

He also subordinated Brereton, a congenital maverick who had visions of 

playing an independent role in the tactical sphere of operations, to a member 

of the Arnold-Spaatz AAF ruling faction. Brereton, too, had committed the sin 

of supporting the transportation plan.52 Vandenberg’s selection had the further 

advantage of making available to Leigh-Mallory an efficient, energetic officer 

familiar with strategic operations. In the long run, Vandenberg’s appointment 

would improve the effectiveness of the AEAF as an Allied and a combat headquarters. 

A week before the new man’s arrival, Spaatz and Leigh-Mallory had clashed 

again over the role of the Ninth Air Force’s fighters. On March 10, LeighMallory, eager to implement the transportation plan and to initiate greater training in ground-air tactics and cooperation for his forces, had ordered that, except 

for two groups of P-5 1 aircraft, the Ninth Air Force would “operate exclusively 

under the Allied Expeditionary Air Force . . . released from its commitment to 

assist U.S. VIIIth Air Force POINTBLANK operations under arrangements made 

by that Force.”53 Leigh-Mallory added that the Ninth’s medium-bomber attacks 

would be planned to coincide with the Eighth’s deep-penetration flights. Spaatz 

355 
Maj. Gen. Hoyt S. 

Vandenberg, Deputy 

Commanding General, 

Allied Expeditionary Air 

Force, spring 1944. 

Brig. Gen. Frederic H. 

Smith, Jr., Chief of 

Operations, Allied 

Expeditionary Air Force, 

spring 1944. 
THE LUFTWAWE DEFEATED 

strenuously objected that the loss of the fighters would deprive him of the muchneeded services of five recently activated P-47 groups, some 300 to 375 aircraft 

which, thanks to a newly developed 150-gallon drop tank, had achieved an 

escort range of 475 miles in February. They were able for the first time to escort 

to objectives just beyond an arc drawn from Hamburg to Frankfurt. The relative 

shortage of P-51s plus new drop tanks made the P-47s the backbone of the 

Eighth’s escort fighters for the winter of 1943-1944. 

In his reply to Leigh-Mallory, Spaatz pointed out that the former’s instructions violated previous agreements: 

It is my understanding that all three types of U.S. fighters are at the disposal of 

the Eighth Air Force to assist . . . in POINTBLANK operations. Further, inasmuch 

as I have been made responsible for the training of the Ninth Air Force, it will 

be my responsibility to determine how much diversion from POINTBLANK will 

be allowed for training. 

Spaatz did reaffirm, however, his commitment to release Ninth Air Force 

fighters to the AEAF “whenever possible.”54 

Three days later, Spaatz protested again to Leigh-Mallory and appealed to 

Eisenhower. Spaatz agreed that the Ninth’s medium bombers could fulfill their 

POINTBLANK obligation by timing their tactical strikes in conjunction with the 

Eighth’s strategic missions. He then drew Leigh-Mallory ’s attention to the current operations directive of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, which unequivocally 

gave support of the strategic air forces as the present primary mission of the 

Ninth Air Force. To Eisenhower, Spaatz wrote one blunt paragraph: 

I think this is a matter of utmost importance in our operations. Unless the 

Eighth Air Force operating out of U.K. can be assured of the availability of all 

long-range fighters, including P-47’s, their deep penetrations will result in 

greatly increased heavy bomber losses, and we will be losing many opportunities to deal punishing blows to the German Air F0rce.5~ 

The matter obviously required a decision from higher authority. On March 

20, after a regular commanders’ conference, Spaatz insisted to Eisenhower56 that 

they meet with Tedder and Leigh-Mallory to resolve the issue. Eisenhower ruled 

in favor of Spaatz;57 the Ninth Air Force remained undivided. The incident, like 

earlier ones, did little to help the relationship between the two men and their 

organizations. The AAF official history, not known for criticism of its own, noted 

of the situation: 

The failure to achieve cooperation between USSTAF and AEAF, coupled with 

other differences over the training of Ninth Air Force units and over the control 

of the strategic air forces themselves, created an atmosphere of distrust and suspicion between the two headquarters, which was an exception rather than the 

rule in Anglo-American relations in the European theater.s8 

357 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Operations 

This bureaucratic and policy trench-fighting in March 1944 had no effect on 

operations. Both Allied air forces and the Luftwaffe suffered brutal and unprecedentedly high losses as the skies of occupied Europe served as a battlefield by 

day and by night in the continued struggle for mastery of the air. As mentioned, 

the German night-fighter forces during March reached such a level of effectiveness that RAF heavy-bomber losses became prohibitive. As a result, RAF 

Bomber Command temporarily discontinued night attacks over Germany. The 

month culminated in the disastrous Nuremberg raid on the night of March 

30-31, in which it lost 96 out of 795 bombers-the greatest number of Allied 

heavy bombers ever lost on a single mission.59 The mission went so awry that 

the citizens of Nuremberg never even knew that an RAF force had been directed 

toward their city. The Eighth Air Force also suffered its worst single day’s loss 

on March 6, when the Reich’s air defenses downed 69 out of 730 bombers during 

the Eighth’s first major attack on Berlin.60 For the month, Bomber Command 

lost 278 heavy bombers, while the Eighth lost 232 fighters and 299 heavy 

bombers (plus 41 heavy bombers written off as not repairable). In addition, the 

Eighth had 3,111 bombers with repairable damage.61 The Fifteenth Air Force 

reported 99 bomber losses, most incurred on non-POINTBLANK missions.62 The 

German fighter force, too, suffered astronomical casualties, losing 51 1 pilots 

(21.7 percent of its force) and writing off 56.4 percent of its aircraft, its worst 

percentage loss of the war.63 Aircraft the Luftwaffe could replace, but experienced pilots it could not. Luftwaffe fighter casualties, the vast majority incurred 

in daytime combat, reflected not only the intensity of the fighting but changes in 

American tactics and a surge in the number of American long-range escort fighters. By the end of March, USSTAF had taken a large step toward its goal of daylight air supremacy over Germany and Europe. 

The operational confidence gained during Big Week, fueled by over-optimistic intelligence reports of damage inflicted, led Spaatz and his subordinates 

to change both bomber and fighter tactics. Between March 3 and March 9, the 

Eighth launched five major attacks, none with fewer than 500 heavy bombers, 

on Berlin. Spaatz reported to Arnold, “The operations during the past week had 

the major purpose of forcing the German fighter force into battle. Three attacks 

were made without any attempt at deception, the route followed on each attack 

being exactly the same.”64 More important than the direct routing of heavy 

bombers was the more aggressive employment of U.S. fighter forces. 

Four developments contributed to this change: 

1. The freeing of the U.S. fighters from the restrictions of close escort, 

2. The arrival of large numbers of U.S. long-range fighter aircraft, 

3. The development of the relay fighter escort system, and 

4. The increased strafing of German ground targets by US. fighter aircraft. 

358 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

Upon their arrival and throughout the first three months of 1944, Spaatz and 

Doolittle had insisted that the Eighth go after the Luftwaffe at every opportunity. 

Maj. Gen. William Kepner, head of VIII Fighter Command, said in July 1944, 

“The minute Spaatz and Doolittle came here they directed that I take such steps 

as I felt necessary to lick this German Air Force. If it meant getting out and 

scouring the skies, even . . . thinning down the escort, that would be okay with 

them.”65 

On January 21, in one of his first meetings with the Eighth’s subordinate 

leaders, Doolittle announced the new theme,66 which he based on his experience 

in the Mediterranean.67 He emphasized that although “the role of protecting the 

bombardment formation should not be minimized,” fighters “should be encouraged to meet the enemy and destroy him rather than be content to keep him 

away.”68 Spaatz agreed with this view. A year earlier in North Africa, when he 

had also confronted a situation of air parity or slight inferiority, Spaatz had highlighted certain principles on air employment. His third principle addressed close 

escort of bombers: “Do not give close support to Heavy Bombers [emphasis 

added]. This was not followed in early operations, causing heavy losses in 

fighter units, particularly of P-38’~.”69 Upon his return to Washington, in 

February 1944, AAF Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Barney Giles reported the tactical 

changes to the Air Staff, noting that Doolittle had instructed his fighters “to 

attack enemy fighter formations even though such formations are not pressing * 

attacks on bomber formations.”70 Doolittle’s order freed the long-range escort 

fighters from the restrictions of close escort heretofore applied. Before that time, 

standard procedure had tied U.S. fighters to bomber formations, which they 

were forbidden to desert to pursue German fighters.71 

Prewar and early wartime field manuals had reinforced the use of close 

escort. FM 1-5, “Employment of Aviation of the Army,” in both its April 1940 

and January 1943 incarnations, stated, 

A pursuit force may be employed to furnish close or immediate protection for a 

particular formation engaged in an important air operation. The only method by 

which pursuit forces are able to provide close protection for aircraft in flight is 

by accompanying those aircraft and by engaging any and all enemy aircraft 

which threaten the security of the formati~n.’~ 

Here the use of the word “engaging” rather than “attacking” seems to imply surrender of the initiative to the enemy’s fighters. The manuals went on to state that 

the need for close support depended on the effectiveness of the enemy fighter 

forces and was required when the defensive fire power of the escorted aircraft 

was inadequate. Somewhat ambiguously the manuals noted, “All aircraft in 

flight possess a measure of inherent security, and most aircraft possess considerable defensive power.”73 That clause limited provision of close escort to essential missions against developed air defenses. Even so, if a plane had sufficient 

defensive firepower, as the B-17 and B-24 in theory did, it might not ever need 

359 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

escort (which, until January 1944, it could not get on deep-penetration raids in 

any case). 

AAF Field Manual 1-15, “Tactics and Technique of Air Fighting,” April 10, 

1942, made the task of close escorts clear: “Their mission precludes their seeking to impose combat on other forces except as necessary to carry out their 

defensive role.”74 When it addressed recommended tactics for escorts, the manual stressed their defensive nature: “Forces in special support counterattack 

immediately when hostile fighters make direct attacks on the defended formation. When possible, withdrawal from combat will be made when a threat against 

the defended formation has been removed.”75 At no time did either FM 1-5 or 

FM 1- 15 refer to any type of escort other than close escort. Medium and loose 

escort, both employed by the Twelfth Air Force in the Mediterranean, apparently became useful to the AAF through combat experience. It would seem that 

Eaker and his fighter commander, Maj. Gen. Frank O’D. Hunter, hampered by 

insufficient numbers of escorts, poorly trained groups, and inadequate range for 

the fighters they did possess, had erred chiefly in following “the book” too 

closely. As FM 1-15 acknowledged, “Distance from the supported force will be 

influenced by relative speeds, escort strength, and visibility conditions.”76 

Spaatz, Doolittle, and Kepner had the “escort strength” their predecessors 

lacked, and could thus place their fighters in loose escort. The doctrine of ultimate pursuit introduced by Spaatz and Doolittle, however, stood official doctrine on its head. It turned the escorts into aggressors, which attacked rather than 

counterattacked and did not withdraw from combat but pursued from the tops of 

the clouds to the tops of the trees. 

By the end of January, the Eighth abandoned pure close escort, substituting 

a system based on the doctrine of “ultimate pursuit,” which allowed U.S. fighters to follow the enemy, wherever he might be, until they destroyed him in the 

air or on the ground.77 By the end of February, the escorting fighter groups 

spread out in formations twenty-five to thirty miles wide and frequently sent a 

squadron or more directly ahead to sweep the routes in front of bomber formations.78 If no enemy aircraft attacked the bombers or hovered nearby, two-thirds 

of the fighters were permitted to search both flanks and above and below the 

bombers for enemy fighters. As a result, combat took place at all altitudes, and 

small formations of U.S. fighters returned from Germany at a low level, which 

encouraged them to shoot up targets of opportunity en route.79 Luftwaffe Maj. 

Gen. Adolph Galland, commander of the German day-fighter force, recorded the 

effect of the new U.S. tactics in his postwar memoirs: American fighters 

were no longer glued to the slow-moving bomber formation, but took action 

into their own hands. Wherever our fighters appeared, the Americans hurled 

themselves at them. They went over to low-level attacks on our airfields. 

Nowhere were we safe from them, and we had to skulk on our own bases. 

During take-off, assembling, climb and approach to the bombers, when we 

were in contact with them, on our way back, during landing, and even after that 

the American fighters attacked with overwhelming superiority.80 

360 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

Coincident with the arrival of Spaatz and Doolittle, large numbers of longrange P-38 and P-51 fighter aircraft appeared in the theater, while the P-47, 

already present in large numbers, increased its escort range by one hundred 

miles. (See Maps 9 and 10 and Table 4, which illustrate increases in range and 

number of escort fighters.) 

These increases in numbers and range helped the Americans refine their 

escort technique. The escort ranges represented only a fraction of the fighters’ 

rated capabilities. But several factors-the necessity to provide for an emergency combat reserve for each plane; the fuel consumed by delays in takeoffs, 

landings, and forming up; and less than optimum weather conditions-combined 

to limit their range to, at best, three-eighths of their rated maximum. Escort 

imposed further range restrictions because of the speed difference between the 

bombers and their “little friends.” 

On penetration, the bombers, usually carrying their full wartime emergency 

weight overload, averaged 1.50 mph (indicated air speed). The fighters, throttled 

back for optimum gas consumption, averaged at least 100 mph (indicated air 

speed) faster. For example, P-47s that were not flying escort duty conducted 

sweeps well beyond Berlin-far beyond their escort range. To maintain stations 

with the bombers, the fighters had to weave back and forth, so that side-to-side 

mileage had to be subtracted from their straight-line range. 

To maximize the amount of escort available to medium- and long-range missions, the Eighth Air Force developed a relay escort system. In this system, a 

single fighter group, instead of providing escort to a single bomber formation all 

the way to and from a target-an impossibility given its range-would fly 

straight to a prearranged rendezvous point, meet the formation, escort it 150 to 

200 miles to another rendezvous point, hand it over to a second fighter group, 

and then fly home.81 

This system minimized the fuel consumed in weaving back and forth, 

extended the fighters’ range, and provided escort all the way to and from the target. As the deep-penetration raids flown in 1943 had shown, if bombers did not 

have escort all the way, the Luftwaffe would simply wait until they had flown 

beyond their escort and then attack. At first glance, this system had the apparent 

disadvantage of using several times more fighters than necessary for a given 

mission, but this was not the case. The relay system maximized escort throughout the entire mission. During the first half of 1944, before it had converted all 

but one (the 56th Fighter Group) of its fighter groups to P-51s, the Eighth 

employed three types of fighter aircraft, each with a different range. The relay 

system allowed the P-47s to escort the shallow-penetration leg of the mission, 

the P-38s to escort the medium-penetration section of the mission, and the P-51s 

to provide deep-penetration and target support.82 This system proved of special 

value in February and March when the shorter range P-47s formed the bulk of 

available escort aircraft. Overlapping the P-47, P-38, and P-51 relays allowed 

the long-range fighter groups to double the bombers’ protection for a few min361 


SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Utes or enabled one group to leave the bombers five minutes early, drop down to 

low altitude, and sweep all parts of western, central, and southern Germany.83 

Until the end of March 1944, the RAF Spitfire squadrons of LeighMallory’s AEAF supplemented the fighters of the U.S. Eighth and Ninth Air 

Forces by providing the escort for initial penetration and final withdrawal legs of 

the heavy-bomber missions. The RAF’s contribution allowed the Americans to 

extend the range of their own escort fighters during the early months of 1944 

and to provide fighter cover all the way to the target. By the end of March, however, the increase in the number of available American long-range escorts, the 

decline in the efficiency of the Luftwaffe fighter force, and the Germans’ tactic 

of concentrating their fighter defenses over Germany itself permitted the 

Americans to dispense with the RAF’s assistance.84 Leigh-Mallory, who had 

had to delay his ground support training programs for both his U.S. Ninth Air 

Force and British 2d Tactical Air Force while their fighters supported the 

Eighth’s deep-penetration missions, was probably overjoyed to regain full use of 

some of his force. 

In any case, German ground controllers almost never managed to get all of 

the fighters available to them massed for a single blow, thus the escort seldom 

had to deal with overwhelming numbers of attackers. The Germans depended on 

carefully timed assaults by intact formations to knock down the heavy bombers. 

Table 4 

January-April 1944 

Eighth and Ninth Air Force Fighter Escort Missions 

- 

Month P-38 P-47 P-51 

January 

February 

March 

April” 

597 

1,038 

1,468 

1,962 

4,011 295 

7,032 1,030 

8,717 2,397 

6,483 3,281 

*April’s figures, unlike those for January, February, and March, do not include 

hundreds of missions flown by Ninth Air Force P-47 fighter groups. 

Compiled from Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary. 

364 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

Commanding General, 

Luftwaffe Day Fighter 

Forces. 

Fighters attacking in formation could mass their firepower, downing several aircraft on each pass. A relatively few escorts, even if they shot down no enemy 

fighters, could disrupt German formations and timing, causing them to lose 

much of their effectiveness. Even in the worst case, the Germans would have 

time for only one or two passes against the B-17s and B-24s before some of the 

escorts arrived to disrupt them. It took a brave, determined, and skilled pilot to 

make a successful attack on a heavy-bomber formation alone. 

The relay system led directly to the increased strafing of German ground targets by U.S. fighters. Sometime in February, individual fighter pilots on their 

own began to fly close to the ground on return relay flights and to strafe German 

aircraft, facilities, and other targets of opportunity.85 To encourage this practice 

and to invite the pilots to focus on Luftwaffe fields and facilities, the Eighth 

began to record official “kills” for planes destroyed on the ground. Finally, by 

March all fighters were routinely ordered to descend to low altitude and conduct 

fighter sweeps on their return trips.86 

Although given a unique twist by its application to the relay system, the 

practice of pursuit aircraft strafing ground targets while returning from other 

missions had a certain measure of doctrinal approval. In April 1940, FM 1-5 had 

ruled: 

The attack of surface objectives by pursuit may be combined with the performance of other missions of a higher priority. Opportunities may be presented 

365 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

for the attack of appropriate targets by pursuit forces returning from missions 

without having expended all their ammunition. In such cases the attack of 

appropriate surface objectives as a part of a specific mission or as a general 

procedure is 

This clause in the FM 1-5 of April 1940 probably reflected U.S. analysis of the 

aggressive and freewheeling tactics employed by the German Condor Legion 

in Spain and by the Luftwaffe in the Polish campaign of 1939, when aircraft 

apparently used every opportunity to strafe columns of retreating, disorganized 

enemy military personnel and civilian refugees, neither of whom presented a 

significant antiaircraft threat. FM 1-5 of January 1943 rescinded the entire 

clause following U.S. experience in Tunisia and British experience in the 

Western Desert. Unlike the Poles and the French, Germans both at and behind 

the front in North Africa had the ability to put up deadly amounts of light antiaircraft fire. Such volumes of fire made it extremely costly for fighters to 

attack appropriate ground targets, such as personnel and light vehicles. The 

manual forbade the use of fighter aircraft for ground attack missions unless (1) 

no other aircraft were available, (2) fighters were not needed to gain or maintain air superiority, and (3) fighter aviation did not need to be conserved for 

future employment in its normal role.88 The writers of the January 1943 FM 1- 

5 apparently envisaged fighter ground attack as a tactic of attrition used only 

in extraordinary circumstances. 

Reich Marshal Hermann Goering, Luftwaffe Commander in Chief, with German 

pilots. 

366 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

In effect, Doolittle, Spaatz, and Kepner created a system that simultaneously 

employed fighters primarily as escorts and secondarily as attackers of counterair 

targets on the ground. Because the Germans soon supplied their airfields with 

liberal amounts of light flak, ground strafing became a battle of attrition on both 

sides. By then, however, the Eighth Air Force had established air superiority 

over Germany and could afford some losses. Given Spaatz’s and Doolittle’s 

counterair experiences in North Africa, Sicily, and Italy, the doctrinal underpinnings of their tactics, although interesting, appear to have had no discernible 

effect on the development of their relay/ground attack system. 

In the relay system, as elsewhere, ULTRA and other signal intelligence 

greatly aided the U.S. fighters’ efforts. In March ULTRA intercepts revealed the 

damage done by the low-level fighter attacks. On March 8, a Luftwaffe intercept 

stated, “The enemy has recognized our own tactics of taking off and getting 

away from the airfield with all serviceable aircraft before attacks on our ground 

organization. In the event he has recently put aside a part of the escorting force 

to attack these aircraft and has achieved successes in this connection.”*9 Sixteen 

days later, as Allied fighter pressure increased, the command organization of the 

Luftwaffe’s home fighter forces reported repeated attacks on aircraft landing at 

bases in the home war zone. The report further noted American tactics: “They 

imitate the landing procedures of German fighters or effect surprise by approaching the airfield in fast and level flight. The difficulty of distinguishing 

friend from foe often makes it impossible for flak artillery to fire on them.”90 

With such direct encouragement, the Eighth had decided by April to launch pure 

fighter sweeps in weather unsuitable for bombers to keep up the pressure over 

western and central Germany. In addition to ground attack sweeps, the 

Americans began to launch “free sweeps” toward German fighters in suspected 

concentration areas in order to disperse them before they could mount attacks on 

the U.S. bombers.91 

Tactical signal intercepts gave further impetus to the new sweep tactics. 

RAF “Y” Service, a tactical intercept organization, cooperated fully with the 

Eighth. Upon detecting through in-the-clear transmissions of German ground 

controllers large concentrations of German fighters assembling to attack the 

bombers, “Y” Service vectored groups out on sweeps into the German formations.92 By the end of March, although the Germans had ceased to use radio telephones, British intelligence had worked out new methods of timing P-51 

sweeps. The British intelligence official history claims that these new methods 

“contributed a good deal to the Eighth Air Force’s success in its policy of deliberately seeking out German fighters and forcing them to accept combat.”93 

Attacking German ground targets took a heavy toll of American fighter 

pilots, who suffered five times more casualties in strafing than in air-to-air combat.94 By the end of March, Spaatz reported that USSTAF was 500 fighter pilots 

short of its goal of 2 pilots per plane95 to prevent individual pilots from being 

pushed to the breaking point. 

367 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The increasing intensity of the U.S. daylight heavy-bomber offensive and 

the new tactics of the fighter escorts posed an insoluble problem to the 

Luftwaffe’s day-fighter forces. These forces already labored under the selfimposed handicaps of faulty organization and incompetent higher leadership. 

From October 1943 through March 1944, Goering, Commander in Chief of the 

Luftwaffe, attempted to cope with the deteriorating air situation by strictly 

enforcing a policy of ignoring the fighter escort and attacking the heavy 

bombers.96 Maj. Gen. Adolph Galland, who commanded the Luftwaffe dayfighter force, protested vociferously against this directive, claiming that it 

unnecessarily handcuffed his pilots. German pilots under orders to avoid 

American fighters were put on the defensive and robbed of the aggressiveness 

needed for successful fighter-to-fighter combat.97 

Other German wartime critics advocated attacking the escorts at the earliest 

possible point to force them to jettison their drop tanks and reduce their range.98 

This apparently simple stratagem demonstrated the depth of the German defensive problem. The Luftwaffe did not base substantial numbers of fighters in 

France for three reasons: they would be vulnerable to harassing raids from 

medium bombers and fighter-bombers, their bases would require additional 

manpower for heavy antiaircraft defenses and for ground defense against partisans, and their supply dumps would stretch logistical links as well as offer targets to air raids. To catch incoming U.S. fighters, German fighters would have 

to scramble from western Germany or eastern France. Provided enough of them 

avoided and survived the RAF fighter sweeps vectored precisely by radar and 

“Y” Service, and provided they distinguished American from hunting British 

groups, the German fighters would then have to compel all the Americans to 

strip (jettison) their tanks. Otherwise an American group would leave behind 

one squadron to deal with the few penetrating Germans and continue onward. 

Of course, all Luftwaffe fighter aircraft committed to this operation would be 

unavailable to attack the heavy bombers over Germany. 

If the Luftwaffe had waited until the RAF was out of range to begin its attack 

on the U.S. fighters, much of the advantage of forcing the stripping of tanks would 

have evaporated. In any case, the Eighth’s fighter groups actively sought combat 

with the Luftwaffe, whether flying to or departing escort duty. It is difficult to see 

what the tactic of forcing the Eighth’s fighters to jettison early would have accomplished other than to play directly into Spaatz’s and Doolittle’s hands by provoking air battles not only within range of all AAF fighters but within the reach of 

short-range RAF fighters as well. If the Luftwaffe wished to begin the battle over 

France instead of deep over the Reich, all the better. Given the growing technical 

inferiority of German aircraft, the relative lack of training and experience of 

German fighter pilots, and the superior numbers of Allied fighter aircraft, such a 

policy could have only one result: even greater disaster for the Luftwaffe. 

To some extent the charges against Goering were typical of the postwar 

scapegoating indulged in by German generals. Goering and Hitler presented 

368 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

obvious, large, and defenseless targets. After March 1944, when the Luftwaffe’s 

situation had worsened, Goering authorized one fighter group from each fighter 

division to attack and divert American escorts.99 Granting permission for diversionary operations instead of all-out attacks on American fighters did not, of 

course, return the initiative to the German fighter pilots, but it showed more 

flexibility on Goering’s part than his subordinates tended to attribute to him. 

Also at the end of March, Goering responded to the pleas of his subordinates by 

consolidating the three defensive air commands facing the American bombers. 

He gave operational control of three of the most important of the Reich’s western air defenses to the Luftwaffe’s I Fighter Corps.100 Before then the I Fighter 

Corps, (responsible for northern air defense sectors, coastal areas devoted to 

naval operations, the Berlin area, and industrial districts of the Rhineland, 

Westphalia, and central Germany), the 7th Fighter Division (responsible for the 

defense of southern Germany, especially the industrial areas of Frankfurt-amMain, Mannheim, Stuttgart, Nuremberg, Munich, and Augsburg), and Fighter 

Command Ostmark, (charged with defending vital Austrian targets such as 

Vienna, Wiener-Neustadt, Steyr, and Linz) had operated semiautonomously. 

Each had forces inadequate to defend its sector, but there was no central operational control mechanism capable of forcing the commands to cooperate with 

each other. This was an important factor in the Luftwaffe’s inability to concentrate all of its defensive strength on the attacking U.S. forces. The shortage of 

fighters to apply against its opponent was as much a function of the Luftwaffe’s 

own inefficiency as it was of the heavy losses inflicted by the Americans. 

Ever larger numbers of American long-range escorts succeeded in wrecking 

the combined interceptor tactics the Germans had developed to combat deepbomber penetrations. Before February 1944, the Germans almost always waited 

to attack until the escort had left the bombers to return home, which happened 

on any deep-penetration raid in 1943. Waiting to attack until the escort left 

allowed for basing deep within Germany, and for defensive aircraft to be concentrated after the bombers had committed to a specific route and probable destination. Fighters could concentrate without being attacked. During the 

Schweinfurt missions and later, German twin-engine fighters had stayed beyond 

range of the bombers’ defensive armament and shelled them with 210mm rockets, adapted from the German rocket mortar and known by the ground troops as 

the “screaming meemie.” When the bombers loosened their positions to avoid 

rocket explosions, the single-engine fighters would attack the attenuated formation. In the face of vigorous escorts this tactic did not work. Not only were concentration areas liable to attack, so were home airfields. The performance of the 

American single-engine fighter escorts so outclassed that of the twin-engine 

German heavy fighters as to make the latter virtually helpless. If the Germans 

wished to employ their heavy fighters at all, their light fighters had to escort the 

twin-engine fighters, much to the detriment of German morale and firepower 

369 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Men of the 91st Bomb Group being briefed prior to a raid. 

directed against the bombers. By the end of March, the twin-engine fighters seldom arose to defend against American daylight raids.101 

The increasing numbers of American escorts forced the Luftwaffe to modify 

its single-engine fighter tactics. As early as mid-December 1943, map exercises 

at I Fighter Corps Headquarters had demonstrated that commitment of individual single-engine fighter groups alone had little chance of success. A single 

group would become too involved in fighter-to-fighter combat with the escorts. 

On December 29, 1943, I Fighter Corps ordered future attacks on Allied heavybomber formations to employ a wing formation of at least three closely aligned 

groups to ensure that at least one group of fighters penetrated to the bomber 

stream.102 These larger formations required longer time to marshal, offered targets that were easier for Allied air controllers to identify, and proved difficult for 

increasingly inexperienced German fighter pilots. 

Throughout March and far the rest of the air war against Germany, U.S. 

fighter escorts so efficiently accompanied their bombers that large U.S. losses 

resulted only when navigational or timing errors by either bombers or fighters 

caused them to miss their rendezvous, or when a small contingent of the escorts 

was overwhelmed by large numbers of enemy fighters, which then broke 

through to attack the bombers.103 The March 6, 1944, Eighth Air Force mission 

to Berlin, which will be discussed in detail below, illustrates many of the tactical 

and operational changes involved in the increased use of escort fighters. 

The harsh weather of the winter of 1943-1944 continued unabated in March. 

370 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

It allowed only two days of visual bombing over Germany-on March 8, when 

the Eighth lost 37 of 623 bombers dispatched against the Erkner Ball Bearing 

Works in Berlin and on March 18, when it lost 43 of 738 bombers that attacked 

airfields and aircraft assembly plants in central and southern Germany. The 80 

bombers lost in those two days made them, aside from the 69 of 730 lost in the 

March 6 mission on Berlin, the worst two days of the month. A lack of visual 

bombing opportunities did not prevent the Eighth from launching full-scale 

efforts of 400 or more heavy bombers on fifteen of the month’s days. 

The Eighth had attempted to launch two large missions against Berlin on 

March 3 and 4. Bad weather had stopped both in their tracks, but not before 

fighters, which missed the recall, appeared over Berlin on March 3 and a lone 

wing of B-17s (the 13th Combat Wing from Curtis LeMay’s 3d Bombardment 

Division), became the first of the Eighth’s bombers to hit the German capital by 

pushing through heavy clouds on March 4. These efforts alerted the Germans to 

the Eighth’s intentions. 

On March 6, a total of 730 American bombers, taking three hours to assemble and climb to bombing altitude (24,000 to 27,000 feet), formed up over 

England and headed due east to Berlin. German radar spotted them and their 

RAF Spitfire escort as soon as they left their bases and tracked them for the 

entire mission. American escort consisted of 801 fighters (thirteen Eighth Air 

Force and four Ninth Air Force groups). Eleven groups of P-47s (615 aircraft) 

provided the second leg of the penetration escort. Three groups of P-38s (86 aircraft), one of which turned back because of an excessive number of engine failures, supplied medium-range escort, and four groups of P-51s (100 aircraft) flew 

deep escort. Three groups of the P-47s flew two missions, providing return 

escort on their second flight.104 For the far reaches of the trip the bombers had 

none too many escorts. 

Seventy miles east of the Dutch-German border, at the practical P-47 range 

limit, the B-17s of the 3d Bombardment Division grouped in a sixty-mile-long 

column of combat wing pairs and ran smack into the middle of a concentration 

of perhaps 150 German single-engine fighters. The small number of P-38s operationally available for that leg of the relay left the bombers underescorted. 

German ground controllers, having detected an escort gap in the center of the 

column, sent small forces to the head and tail of the U.S. force to distract and 

pin the escort, and then threw the remaining 100 fighters at the momentarily 

unprotected center. In less than thirty minutes the aggressive German attack 

downed perhaps twenty bombers of the 3d Bombardment Division. 

The attack singled out the 100th Bombardment Group. In fierce air combat 

at 24,000 feet and at 43 degrees below zero the group took a fearful beating. As 

it had so often before and would again, the sky over Germany filled with the carnage of air battle. Bf 109s and FW19Os dived and twisted through the bombers’ 

formation, whose gunners tried futilely to keep them at bay. At one point an 

attacking Bf 109 dived through the formation, apparently enveloped in flames. 

37 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Three gunners on three different bombers claimed and were awarded a sure 

kill.* After diving below the clouds, the German pilot landed his slightly injured 

aircraft at his home field. 

As the fight continued, the American pilots, sweating profusely despite the 

cold, in leather clothes and restrictive oxygen masks, dared not try any but the 

slightest wobble of evasive action for fear of crashing into each other in formation. Once a bomber spouted smoke or flames and, laboring, fell back from the 

safety of the formation, the fighters finished it off like predators stalking a herd. 

The crew of a fatally injured bomber had little time to escape before hundreds of gallons of fuel or six thousand pounds of bombs exploded. If the 

bomber began to spin, the centrifugal force it generated trapped the crew within 

it. Many airmen were crushed and broken by the tail surfaces of their own 

bombers when the slipstream grabbed them as they exited and brutally pushed 

them to the rear. Anyone who bailed out started a five-mile descent to ground by 

falling through other bomber formations, perhaps meeting grisly death on props 

and leading wing edges. Soon the sky filled with falling men, loose hatch covers, ejected shell casings, and spinning pieces of debris. Parachutes-white U.S. 

and brown German, either of which could be collapsed by the close passage of 

aircraft--dotted the sky. 

The Germans did not have things all their own way. When the slow twinengine Bf 110s and Me 210s, made even clumsier by the large racks and rockets 

carried under their wings, attempted to close within rocket range of U.S. 

bombers, American escorts sliced through their formations killing or scattering the Zerstorers (destroyers), leaving the survivors shaken. On March 6, Zerstorergeschwader Horst Wessel scrambled nine aircraft: two aborted because of 

mechanical problems, one was damaged, five were lost in air-to-air conlbat 

(with one pilot killed and four wounded), and the unit’s commander landed his 

damaged plane at a different airfield.105 When the single-engine FW 190s and 

Bf 109s formed up to assault the bombardment divisions, squadrons of P-51s 

* The matter of actual kills versus claims by Eighth Air Force bomber gunners was a matter of 

controversy. The number claimed always exceeded the number actually lost by the Germans by a 

factor of at least eight or nine to one. In part, these inflated claims resulted from the inability of any 

one gunner to be sure that his bullets and not someone else’s accounted for a particular plane. The 

natural confusion of the battle compounded the inability of the participants to assess enemy casualties correctly and accurately. Nor did the Eighth have a remotely foolproof method of debriefing the 

returning crews to eliminate multiple counting. For morale and propaganda purposes the AAF could 

not admit that men pointing sticks would have been hardly less effective than .50 caliber machine 

guns in killing German fighters. However, the heavily armed bombers certainly had enough deterrent firepower to force the Luftwaffe pilots to launch disciplined, coordinated attacks from a respectful distance, which cut down by an unknown, but large, factor the total number of attacks delivered 

and losses inflicted during any one raid. In this book, the author used as a rule-of-thumb U.S. fighter 

claims, not bomber claims, to approximate actual enemy losses. Any overcount in fighter claims, 

possibly one or two in ten, would be cancelled out by the actual losses inflicted by the bomber gunners. For an official discussion of this problem, see Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, pp. 

22 1-224. 

372 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

struck them first, disrupting their attack formations and pursuing them as they 

sought, as ordered, to avoid the escort and close with the bombers. 

As the fighters dueled, a P-51 stuck on the tail of an FW 190, shredding it 

with bullets from its six .50-caliber machine guns. The German pilot huddled 

behind the armor in his cockpit, finally abandoning his ruined aircraft. Back in 

England, review of P-51 gun cameras clearly showed the German leaving his 

plane, which blew up a few moments later. The American pilot gained a kill and 

another small brightly painted swastika on the side of his plane. Eighth Air 

Force public relations officers passed the film to the press, which recorded for the 

American home front the death of another of the Nazi’s vaunted fighter planes. 

The 2d Bombardment Division, just behind the 3d, saw only two German 

fighters in the same defensive area. Over Berlin the Germans concentrated seventy-five twin-engine day and night fighters, escorted by about twenty-five single-engine fighters. They attacked the leading elements of the 1st Bombardment 

Division, the first division over the city, and attempted to saturate the defending 

escort. They were the only heavy opposition and they ceased as the 1st left the 

target area. 

One of the bombers lost over Berlin that day carried to earth with it the 

Commander of the 4th Combat Wing, Brig. Gen. Russ Wilson. In all, enemy 

fighters accounted for 41 bombers, 4 more landed in Sweden, and the remaining 

24 fell victim to antiaircraft fire or accidents. Six more heavy bombers had sustained enough damage to be not repairable. The totals amounted to 75 heavy 

bombers lost or not repairable, 347 heavy bombers damaged, and 11 escort 

fighters lost. Nor had the bombing been accurate; most of the 1,648 tons of 

bombs and 2,448,000 propaganda leaflets fell on areas other than their primary 

targets, the industrial suburbs. USSTAF admitted, “Generally poor results were 

obtained in Berlin area.”l06 Spaatz reported to Arnold that the Eighth had hit 

none of its primary targets.107 Perhaps its crews were tired or rattled by their 

losses. An Allied intelligence report aptly summed up the day: “Thus, on this 

occasion, due no doubt to skillful handling, a good appreciation of our intentions, and good flying weather, the Luftwaffe gave few of the expected indications of rigor mortis.”l08 On the return trip American fighters claimed 1 German 

aircraft destroyed and 12 damaged on the ground.109 Ten hours after takeoff the 

bombers landed back in England. 

A comparison of this raid with the Schweinfurt raids of August 17, 1943, 

and October 14, 1943, reveals how the air war had changed. One indication of 

the intensity of bomber versus fighter combat is the number of fighters claimed 

by bomber gunners. The numbers claimed had no relation whatever to actual 

German losses, but they did indicate the frequency of attack, the activity of the 

gunners, and the ferocity and duration of the attack perceived by the bomber 

crews. During the August 17, 1943, Regensburg-Schweinfurt mission (Eighth 

Air Force Mission no. 84) 346 bombers lost 60 of their own and claimed 288 

German fighters destroyed, 37 probably destroyed, and 99 damaged.110 In fact, 

373 

TThe Eighth Air Force Unleashed. American daylight strikes on Hitler’s Europe were 

unrelenting in the months before the Normandy invasion. Clockwisefrom above: B-17s of the 

381st Bomb Group run up for a mission. Top to bottom, the P-38 Lightning, the P-51 Mustang, 

and the P-47 Thunderbolt were the three principal escort types on which U.S. bombers 

depended. German flak (below) acquires the altitude of a bomber formation over Kassel, 

Germany. Each burst scattered some 1,400 metal fragments, any of which could cripple a 

bomber. A pair of B-17s (opposite, below) maneuver with H2X radar domes fully deployed. 

The H2X radar dome replaced the standard B-17 belly turret and was used to identify and 

bomb objectives through cloud cover. A gun camera registers the beating given a German 

flak tower (opposite, left, above) by an Eighth Air Force fighter in the low-level sweeps that 

ceaselessly harassed German defenders. Spotters (opposite, right, above) man the plotting 

table at the control center of the 65th Fighter Wing at Saffron-Walden, Essex, in England. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The Germans lost 34 fighters shot down, 12 damaged beyond repair, and 25 

damaged.111 On October 14, 1943 (Eighth Air Force Mission no. 115), the 291 

attacking American bombers again lost 60 of their own number and claimed 186 

German fighters shot down, 27 probably destroyed, and 89 damaged.112 The 

Luftwaffe actually lost 31 destroyed, 12 written off, and 34 damaged.113 On 

March 6, the 730 American bombers lost 69 but claimed only half of the number 

of Germans as in the earlier two contests: 97 German fighters destroyed, 28 

probably destroyed, and 60 damaged. A far larger force had suffered a 9.5 percent loss rate (half of that of the two earlier missions) and suffered far less contact 

with enemy fighters. Antiaircraft fire accounted for one-third of the bombers lost 

in the Rerlin raid, a much higher percentage than in the Schweinfurt raids, that 

reveals the decline in German fighter effectiveness. 

As to escort statistics for the three raids, in August 1943, VIII Fighter 

Command dispatched 240 short-range P-47s; they claimed nineteen kills, three 

probables, and four damaged. In October, 196 P-47s newly outfitted with small 

drop tanks, escorting their bombers as far as Aachen, claimed thirteen kills, one 

probable, and four damaged. In the Berlin raid, however, the P-47s, whose range 

had just reached its maximum in February 1944 with the employment of new, 

larger tanks, claimed thirty-six kills, seven probables, and twelve damaged. The 

P-38s, which had an ineffective day, claimed three kills and one damaged. The 

P-51s, which defended the bombers over the target and during deep stretches 

when desperate Luftwaffe pilots could no longer wait for them to depart and had 

to attack before they themselves ran out of fuel, claimed fourty-three destroyed, 

one probable, and twenty damaged. One hundred P-51s bore the brunt of the 

battle and, in losing only five of their number, achieved an 8-to-1 kill ratio.114 

The claims of the American fighters were many times more accurate than those 

of the bombers. Each American fighter came equipped with gun cameras, which 

verified their scores by actually picturing bullet strikes on German aircraft. 

The war diary of the Luftwaffe I Fighter Corps, however, only acknowledged that eighteen of its fighters had been destroyed and thirty-nine had been 

more than 60 percent damaged. The I Fighter Corps claimed that ninety-five 

bombers and fifteen American fighters had been definitely destroyed and ten 

bombers probably destroyed.115 Obviously, aircraft combat claims were subjective. The Germans had lost heavily enough that they offered no concentrated 

opposition over the return route, even though they had sufficient time to land, 

refuel, and rearm. Some of them managed to pick off several stragglers.116 

Two subsequent raids on March 8 and 9 met less opposition, even though 

the weather on March 8 allowed visual bombing and, therefore, excellent conditions for Luftwaffe takeoffs, landings, and air-to-air interceptions. The Americans 

lost 37 bombers and 18 fighters, while their fighters claimed 79 destroyed, 8 probables, and 25 damaged, plus 8 destroyed, 4 probably destroyed, and 7 damaged 

on the ground.] 17 In this attack, few twin-engine fighters presented themselves, 

presumably because they had suffered severely two days earlier. The March 9 

376 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

I 

I 

Eighth Air Force heavy bombers hitting the outlying factory area of Berlin. 

mission, conducted in complete cloud cover all the way to, over, and from 

Berlin, encountered only 15 interceptors. The Germans did not wish to expend 

their force in questionable takeoff and landing conditions. For the week, the 

Eighth wrote off 153 heavy bombers lost attacking Berlin, only 25 fewer than 

during Big Week.118 

By the end of March 1944, the Eighth had written off 349 heavy bombers23.3 percent of its force.119 Ominously for the Germans, so heavily had the 

Eighth been reinforced that this figure represented a sortie loss rate of only 

3.3 percent-a drop from both January and February.120 The AAF official history claimed that “by April 1, 1944 the GAF was a defeated force.”121 

The events of April 1944, a black month for the Eighth, tend to refute that 

claim. The weather in April, as in March, proved poor. Nevertheless, the Eighth 

launched strikes of more than 400 heavy bombers on fifteen of the month’s 

days, thirteen of the attacks on targets inside Germany;lf2 nine of those strikes 

employed, for at least some of the groups involved, visual methods of sighting. 

The first raid of the month, on April 1, set the tone for the entire month-it was 

a fiasco. Of 440 heavy bombers dispatched, only 165 bombed targets, and some 

of those bombed the town of Schaffhausen in neutral Switzerland, angering the 

Swiss and causing both the AAF and the U.S. government a great deal of 

expense and embarrassment. Half of the force ran into heavy weather and turned 

back. The remainder scattered widely throughout southwestern Germany and 

bombed targets of opportunity; some bombed 120 miles south of their assigned 

377 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

objectives. Luckily, the weather played no favorites and prevented the Germans 

from taking full advantage of the Eighth’s scattered formations-only 12 

bombers failed to return. The Germans may also have chosen to conserve their 

fighter forces depleted in March’s air battles. 

On April 22, the Germans initiated a new tactic by infiltrating the bomber 

stream as it approached its bases to land and shooting down fourteen latereturnees as they tried to touch down in the dark. This tactic, fortunately not 

repeated, sent a chill throughout the Eighth, which feared that the Germans had 

finally begun to take advantage of the heavy bombers at their weakest moments 

-when they milled about, out of formation, in the air over their congested airfields waiting to land in the evening or to form up in the morning. These periods, sometimes hours long, were clearly visible to the Germans on their radar 

equipment. 

On April 29, the Eighth lost sixty-three heavy bombers over one of the 

Reich’s most heavily defended targets, Berlin. In this raid, as in others, the heaviest losses were taken by groups that failed to meet their escorts.123 Brig. Gen. 

Orvil A. Anderson, the Eighth’s operations officer, had an immediate first 

impression that the April 29 mission was “the poorest operation . . . I’ve seen 

during the year . . . I’ve been here.” Calling the mission “poorly executed all the 

way through,” Anderson said, “It can go down on the records as one of the 

dumbest ones we’ve done. From the point of execution it just didn’t clicknothing clicked.”l24 The last major raid of the month had proved more costly 

and just as poorly managed as the first. 

The Eighth embarked on a more successful tack when it initiated the practice of flying fighter sweeps in weather unsuitable for bombers. On April 5 and 

16, hundreds of fighters attacked airfields in western and central Germany. 

Spaatz, reporting to Arnold on previous sweeps, said, “Eighth Air Force fighters 

inaugurated a series of sweeps against airdromes, transportation, and Flak towers, which will be increased in scope and should prove very demoralizing to the 

Hun.”125 A week later, Spaatz instructed the AAF Public Relations Office in 

Washington: 

In order to destroy the Luftwaffe it is essential that emphasis be given to the 

destruction of planes on the ground as well as in the air and that our pilots be 

encouraged in strafing operations by official and public credit for their accomplishments. . . . Recommend that Public Relations policy in US be adjusted to 

support present need for emphasis on strafing.’26 

In an account of April 5, Spaatz emphasized to General Giles that properly conducted fighter sweeps inflicted real attrition on the Luftwaffe by destroying its 

aircraft on the ground and demoralizing personnel. Spaatz added, 

Inasmuch as the pilots are briefed to shoot up any moving target within 

Germany, [emphasis added] 750 or 1000 fighter aircraft roaming deep into 

378 
THE LUF~VAFFE DFEATED 

Germany is evidence to the German people of the GAF’s weakness and no 

amount of Goebbels’ propaganda can counteract this impression. It is my plan 

to keep this type of attack going.lZ7 

The rise in the number of claims of enemy aircraft damaged or destroyed on 

the ground by Eighth Air Force fighters amply illustrates the increasing use of 

the counterair sweep; from 1 plane in the last two weeks of January to 40 in 

February, to 113 in March and 712 in the first twelve days of Apri1.128 This tactic was not employed without cost. Combined with fighter attacks in support of 

preinvasion operations, it sent fighter losses up from 232 in March to 338 in 

April to 475 in May.129 Many of the best of the Eighth’s fighter pilots lost their 

lives or spent the rest of the war in prisoner-of-war (POW) camps because of the 

intense light antiaircraft fire they encountered. Although they were hated by 

their pilots, these missions increased Luftwaffe attrition. 130 

In April 1944, the Eighth Air Force wrote off as lost or not repairable 422 

heavy bombers,l31 more than in any other month of the air war over Europe. 

This represented a loss of about 25 percent of the heavy bombers on hand in tactical units, an increase of 1.3 percent over March’s figures.132 Despite the addition of 6 new heavy bombardment groups,l33 which raised the Eighth to a total 

of 39 heavy bombardment groups and 1,872 heavy bombers, the sortie loss rate 

climbed to 3.6 percent from March’s 3.3 percent.134 The heavy-bomber losses 

of the Fifteenth Air Force jumped from 99 to 214,135 many of those the result of 

POINTBLANK missions. German losses remained high, too. Some 447 Luftwaffe 

fighter pilots, 20 percent of the total force, would never fly combat again, nor 

would 43 percent of their fighter aircraft.136 The Luftwaffe’s home fighter command lost 38 percent of its pilots.137 These figures had declined from the previous month, but the loss of trained pilots could never be made good. 

Morale Problems 

All the work of the fighters flying escort and conducting ground attacks did 

not prevent the loss of hundreds of U.S. heavy bombers to enemy fighters. In 

March, the morale among American heavy-bomber crews began to buckle, as 

thirty-seven crews chose internship on the Continent. In April, fifty-two crews, 

or one of every eight planes lost, chose to land and present themselves for intemment in either Sweden (twenty planes) or Switzerland (thirty-two planes).138 In 

contrast, from December 30, 1943, to February 29, 1944, only five crews had 

landed in neutral countries.139 Most of the crews interned during April in 

Sweden had participated in exceptionally deep missions into Poland. They might 

have despaired of achieving a safe landing in far-away England and selected the 

easier course. That excuse seems questionable, however, in light of the fact that 

the Eighth’s crews had bombed some of the same targets before, yet had chosen 

379 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

to return to their bases. Of course, some planes, many heavily damaged, may 

have survived to land on neutral territory because the Luftwaffe fighter force 

had lost its ability to pick off those that had fallen out of formation on their 

return flight. Despite these extenuating factors, too many crews voluntarily, for 

whatever reason, did not return to their bases. 

Another symptom of poor morale was displayed by Eighth Air Force crews 

sent back to the United States on thirty days’ leave at the end of their combat 

tours. In early April Arnold wrote to Spaatz: “Reports reaching me from trustworthy sources, as well as my own personal observations, lead to the conclusion 

that the behavior of returned combat personnel does not always reflect credit 

upon the AAF.” Arnold concluded with the admonition, “Whatever the method, 

however, it is imperative that immediate and adequate measures be taken to 

improve the attitude, conduct, and military bearing of AAF personnel being 

returned to this country.”140 

The air crews were sunk in pessimism; they had worked and fought to 

exhaustion to send out a full effort almost every other day for weeks. Their 

reward, given the high loss rates, was apparently a far better than even chance of 

ending up killed in action or being taken prisoners of war in Germany rather 

than returning to the States. As overwork, exhaustion, and high losses bred 

depression, so did changes in the crew rotation policy initiated by Arnold and 

introduced by Spaatz and Doolittle. The heightened pace of bomber operations 

meant that a bomber crew, after three and one-half to four months of training, 

could complete a tour in as little as two months. The AAF could not afford such 

waste. 

On January 30, Doolittle introduced a policy of retaining selected crew 

members after they had completed their twenty-five-mission tour, anticipating 

by almost two weeks a similar change in rotation policy throughout the AAF.141 

In mid-February, Doolittle explained to his commanders his reasons for doing 

so: (I) the AAF had completed its expansion program, it no longer needed experienced crews to be returned to the United States to form new units; (2) the coming cross-channel invasion meant as many as two missions a day, making a tour 

of twenty-five missions impractical; (3) greatly increased fighter support had 

lowered the loss rate, making it possible for more crews to complete their tour; 

and (4) increased experience raised the effectiveness of the force. Doolittle 

added a final exhortation: 

This Air Force is now approaching the most critical phase of the war with 

Germany. During the next few months it is mandatory that we secure complete 

air superiority over the German Air Force in this Theater. In order to accomplish this end in the time allotted, we must adopt every expedient to improve 

the effectiveness of the Air Force and to keep it at a high level of operational 

efficiency. 14* 

380 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

In March, Doolittle sought to convince his combat crews that when they finished a tour they were not “through with the war.”143 He notified them that 

“hereafter relief of combat crew personnel from regular participation in operations will not take place upon completion of any specified number of sorties.” 

He added, “Combat crews have also been informed that they are relieved from 

duty only to provide time for suitable rest and recuperation. At the end of this 

period, they are considered to be again available for combat assignment.” To 

give the crews a goal to strive toward, Doolittle further ruled that combat crews 

would be eligible for relief after thirty sorties.144 In practice, unit commanders 

routinely relieved crews after thirty missions, but the threat of indefinite assignment lingered to the detriment of morale. 

On March 13, Spaatz and Doolittle saw for themselves how brittle morale 

had become when they visited the 100th Heavy Bombardment Group at Thorpe 

Abbotts. The 100th had lost fifteen bombers on the March 6 Berlin raid. During 

dinner in the officers’ mess a drunken young second lieutenant swayed up to 

Doolittle, poked him in the chest, and announced, “You think we don’t know 

what you’re here for? Well, let me tell you we do. You’re here to improve our 

morale and if there’s anythin’ goin’ to ruin our morale it’s havin’ a bunch of 

generals around here tryin’ to fix it.” Spaatz was not amused.145 The Air 

Surgeon, Maj. Gen. David N. W. Grant, visited England at the end of March and 

found Spaatz “disturbed over the effect on morale of the discontinuance of 

returning air crew members to the U.S. upon the completion of 25 missions.”l46 

A British announcement at a regular RAF press conference on April 12, 

1944, threatened to snap the Eighth’s already taut mood. RAF spokesman Air 

Vice-Marshal Richard Peck, Portal’s principal public information deputy, stated 

that Luftwaffe fighter strength had increased by 200 to 300 machines since 

November 1943, with the whole of the increase directed to the western air 

defenses of the Reich. This, he added, brought Germany’s fighter defenses to 

their numerically strongest state of the war; only the weather had been responsible for the light opposition that U.S.-British bombers had met on some occasions. “The onslaught against the German Air Force on the ground and in the air 

has certainly succeeded in reducing the reinforcement of the enemy’s air 

defenses to a point far below what we had planned,” said Peck, but “it has not 

prevented some continued strengthening.”147 Naturally, the British papers headlined the news, which may have confirmed suspicions harbored by top AAF 

officers, such as Doolittle and Fred Anderson, that members of the British press 

had embarked on “an anti-American bombing effort.”l48 Both had complained 

earlier that the British press seemed out to “belittle” the American effort, and 

they suspected a “sinister movement” to discredit the AAF.149 

Spaatz, whose own intelligence estimates showed a 300-fighter decrease in 

the Luftwaffe since January, objected mightily to Peck’s statements and insensitive timing. On the previous day, April 11, the Eighth had suffered its second 

worst casualty total of the war, losing sixty-four planes, including nine interned 

38 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

in Sweden. The 3d Bombardment Division sustained particularly high casualties 

because it had conducted an unescorted raid aimed at Poznan, well inside 

Poland. The Germans, free to employ their twin-engine fighters, handled it 

roughly. This, or the worsening weather over the primary target, had led the 3d 

to bomb Stettin and Rostock, targets far short of Poznan, and to return early.150 

The bombers may have unloaded on German targets because Eighth Air Force 

policy forbade the use of H2X bombing methods over occupied countriesreflecting the attitude that any collateral civilian casualties inflicted by relatively 

inaccurate bombing-through-clouds techniques ought at least to be German and 

that any bomb dropped on Germany would do some harm, no matter how 

infinitesimal, to the enemy war effort. 

Spaatz conducted both a front-door and a back-door campaign to ameliorate 

the effects of the RAF statement. He and his staff at Park House that evening 

decided not to try to conduct a countercampaign in the British press.151 They 

probably recognized that any such effort might backfiie. Instead, Spaatz wrote a 

stinging letter to Portal but did not sign it or send it through official channels, 

which, of course, kept it out of official records. Spaatz gave a copy of the letter 

to U.S. Ambassador John G. Winant, a trusted friend. He informed Winant of 

the possible consequences of Peck’s statement.152 Winant, whose son, a heavybomber pilot, had been shot down over Germany in October 1943 (this event 

had been reported in the British press only two hours after it occurred),l53 lost 

no time in taking the letter to Churchill, who, with equal celerity, sent it unoffiAir Vice-Marshal Richard 

Peck, Air Chief Marshal 

Portal’s principal RAF 

public information deputy, 

1944. 

382 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

cially to Portal.154 The method of transmission through the American ambassador and the Prime Minister underlined the seriousness of Spaatz’s protest: 

The effects of statements of the kind made by the RAF spokesman on our 

bomber crews and fighter pilots could reach the point of being very serious 

morale problem. Such ill advised statements, not substantiated by facts, discrediting American effort, certainly are disastrous to British-American relationship~.~~~ 

The next day, April 14, Portal, without disavowing Peck’s statement, apologized: 

I am extremely sorry that any statement should have been made which could 

result in discouraging the crews engaged in the combined bomber offensive 

against Germany. I am still more sorry that anything should be said which 

could be interpreted as discrediting the efforts of the Allied Air forces, and particularly of the American 8th and 15th Air Forces, to destroy the German 

fighter force.156 

A few days later Archibald Sinclair, the British Secretary of State for Air, 

replied abjectly to Winant: 

The Prime Minister has drawn my attention to a statement made by an officer 

of the Royal Air Force. . . . I was very distressed to hear from [Churchill] and 

from Portal [who had heard it from Spaatz] that this statement had made a most 

unfavorable impression on officers of the USAAF and that you were much concerned about the effect which it 

These expressions of concern, however, could not wipe out the doubts created in the minds of the Eighth’s flyers. Portal and Spaatz agreed to put their 

staffs to work on a statement documenting the reduction in German aircraft 

manufacturing capacity since November. Portal proposed to follow up that document with a press handout on the same subject and suggested that in the future 

the two headquarters should coordinate their statements.158 

Spaatz agreed to these palliatives while attempting to reinforce them on his 

own. On April 17, he invited three high-powered American correspondents, Ed 

Beattie, Wes Gallagher, and Helen Kirkpatrick to lunch. He asked them to help 

counteract Peck’s statement, telling them that he had no desire to “sell” anything 

to the people back home or to “boast” of USSTAF’s accomplishments. Instead, 

he desired “that all crews be made aware of the overall effect of the work they 

are doing. The crews must be made to know and believe that these losses have 

been worthwhile.” Later that evening he had dinner with Robert Sherwood, head 

of the London Office of the American Office of War Information, the U.S. government’s official public relations and propaganda agency. The two agreed to 

ensure the accuracy of any information on bomb destruction released to the 

crews.159 

383 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

A week after Peck issued his statement, Spaatz inspected the 355th Fighter 

Group at Duxford. He talked to the group commander, who had lost five planes 

that day, and learned, not surprisingly, that the group was “most skeptical as to 

the truth of information we have been giving them that Germany’s fighter force is 

being knocked down.” Next, Spaatz discussed the problem with the Commander 

of the 1st Bombardment Division, Brig. Gen. Robert B. Williams, “who said 

other group commanders have expressed their doubts . . . that the true story is 

being given to them.”’60 Spaatz concluded that “our most important job just 

now is keeping up the morale of these boys who are doing the fighting, and only 

by convincing them with facts can we prove to them that the results obtained are 

worth the effort they are putting into the job.”161 

The next day, April 20, Spaatz showed Doolittle and a group commander 

from the 1 st Bombardment Division advance copies of the joint AAF-RAF press 

release. They approved, but the group commander said that “it will be hard to 

make the crews believe anything just now-they’re dubious of anything they 

read.”162 On April 22, USSTAF handed out a combined RAF-USSTAF press 

release, with no quantifiable effect. Two days later, the Eighth lost forty 

bombers in raids over central Germany, fourteen of which landed in 

Switzerland. Spaatz continued his inspections and other gestures, such as sending autographed bottles of scotch to new fighter aces. One can only speculate if 

these or any of his actions helped. No substantive evidence has yet turned up to 

prove that they did. At least Spaatz recognized the problem and did what he 

could to solve it. In the end, the noticeable drop in casualties in May did as 

much as anything to keep morale from breaking. 

The Oil Plan Is Salvaged 

At the end of March, Spaatz had informed both Portal and Eisenhower of his 

continued support for the oil plan, and during April, he managed to gain the partial acceptance of oil as a high-priority target. He had recognized as early as 

May 1942163 that the bombing of the Romanian oil fields and refinery complex 

at Ploesti was the logical first step in his campaign and a prerequisite for the 

bombing of the synthetic oil plants.164 The elimination of the 25 percent of 

German petroleum production derived from the Romanian fields would wipe out 

all reserves in the Axis oil network and make oil hydrogenation plants even 

more valuable targets. Spaatz, however, had difficulties with the British when it 

came to freeing the Fifteenth Air Force from its other responsibilities to neutralize Ploesti. The latest Combined Bomber Offensive directive pertaining to the 

Fifteenth, issued by Portal on February 17, limited its targets to “cities, transportation targets and other suitable objectives in the Balkans and in the Satellite 

countries of southeastern Europe whenever weather or tactical conditions prevent operations against ‘POINTBLANK’ objectives or in support of land operations 

in Italy.”165 

384 
THE LUFIWAFFE DEFEATED 

Morale visit: Maj. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, Lt. Col. Sherman R. Beaty, General 

Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Col. Herbert B. Tatcher inspecting a Ninth Air Force 

medium bomber group, April 22,1944. 

As early as March 5, USSTAF had requested clearance from the Air 

Ministry for the Fifteenth Air Force to hit Ploesti,l66 which apparently was not 

forthcoming. On March 17, after the Fifteenth had informed Spaatz that the 

weather for the next few days would be favorable, he twice asked for permission 

to proceed with the bombing. In both instances Portal replied that such an attack 

did not fall within current directives; he stated that the Fifteenth should direct its 

activities toward Sofia, Bucharest, and Budapest. Spaatz then appealed to 

Eisenhower, who agreed with him, whereupon Spaatz met Portal once more and 

explained that he intended to appeal to Arnold as well. At this point Portal 

agreed not to object if the Combined Chiefs of Staff approved. The Air Staff in 

Washington told Spaatz that Arnold would raise the subject of Ploesti at the next 

CCS meeting in two hours’ time.167 Apparently this dkmarche to the CCS produced no results. Portal, after consulting with Churchill, ruled Ploesti off-limits 

on March 18. In any case, the weather closed in, ending the opportunity. In the 

meantime, ground operations in Italy consumed the energies of the Mediterranean Allied Air Force and the Fifteenth. The third Battle of Cassino, which 

began on March 15 and produced many casualties but little change in the front 

lines, ground to a halt by March 23. By then the MAAF had commenced 

Operation STRANGLE, anair campaign directed against Axis rail transportation in 

Italy. Unlike Zuckerman’s transportation plan for OVERLORD, STRANGLE concentrated on all aspects of the transportation, system, not just marshaling yards and 

385 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Morale visit: Lt. Gens. James H. Doolittle and Carl A. Spaatz autographing dollar 

bills at a dinner held to mark the completion of a bomber group’s 100th mission, 

April 21,1944. 

repair facilities. It proved relatively successful but drew the Fifteenth away from 

Balkan and PONIBLANK targets.168 

This diversion and a new bombing directive issued on March 22 by General 

Wilson, the Allied theater commander in the Mediterranean, provoked another 

outburst from Spaatz in London. Wilson, seeking to weaken Balkan support for 

the Nazis, whose south Russian front seemed hard hit by the Soviets’ winter 

offensive, ordered the Fifteenth “to act immediately and in the fullest possible 

strength” against the marshaling yards in Bucharest, Ploesti, other suitable 

Romanian targets, and Sofia or other Bulgarian targets. Budapest, conversely, 

should not be bombed under any circumstances.~69 The Fifteenth replied that it 

would put a maximum effort over Bucharest as soon as conditions permitted, but 

Ploesti, as far as they knew, remained on the restricted list and would have to be 

cleared with USSTAF in London. Before Spaatz could send an answer, Portal 

instructed Wilson, “ . . . have recently considered whether to add oil installations 

at Ploesti to list of bombing targets in Southeast Europe, but after discussing 

matters with Chiefs of Staff and His Majesty’s Government, . . . have reached 

conclusion that this would not be advantageous at present time.”l70 

After reading Wilson’s orders to the Fifteenth and Portal’s decision on targets, Spaatz wondered just who actually commanded the other half of his organization. To Arnold, Spaatz complained: 

386 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

Too many agencies are giving orders to the 15th Air Force. . . . It has been my 

understanding that the 15th Air Force operates under my instructions, except 

when the tactical situation of the ground forces in Italy demands otherwise. I 

cannot accept responsibility for the direction of the 15th Air Force unless this 

situation is ~larified.’~’ 

Spaatz objected to the bypassing of his authority by Wilson and Portal and to the 

bombing of political rather than economic targets in the Balkans. This stand 

placed Spaatz squarely in the U.S. military tradition, with its emphasis on the 

destruction of the enemy, as opposed to the British-European military tradition, 

which tended not to divorce war from politics and diplomacy. 

Arnold assured Spaatz that he would take action with the CCS to unsnarl 

command arrangements.172 He also reviewed his conception of USSTAF’s 

place in the European war in a message to Portal and complained that the 

Fifteenth Air Force appeared to have been directed to help the battle in Italy 

rather than to support USSTAF’s priorities. Arnold added, 

Over and above clarifying operational channels we are concerned that undue 

diversion from the primary mission of the Fifteenth US Strategic Air Force may 

result. Although we recognize that there are many attractive targets in the 

Balkans we desire that the higher priority of POINTBLANK targets in possible 

weather conditions be 0bse~ed.l~~ 

Arnold followed up that message with a protest to Field Marshal John Dill, 

head of the British Military Delegation in Washington. Arnold expressed his, 

Marshall’s, and King’s concern about the bypassing of Spaatz.174 Portal replied 

on March 25, before he attended the transportation versus oil plan conference 

that day. He stated that he regretted any difficulties regarding command channels, citing his objections at the Cairo Conference to the formation of USSTAF. 

At no time had he meant to give strategic direction to the Fifteenth through 

Wilson rather than Spaatz. He would correct the circumstances that led Spaatz to 

think otherwise. As for using the Fifteenth in the Balkans, Portal responded, “In 

my opinion and in that of the other British Chiefs of Staff, the situation in 

Rumania and Bulgaria now ranks as a strategic emergency though it is the 

Germans and not we who are threatened.”l75 He therefore asked Arnold to agree 

to authorize “a few heavy attacks on Balkan targets.” Bucharest, according to 

Portal, could be attacked a few times without loss to OVERLORD. 

Through a more confidential channel, Portal gave further reasons for his 

decisions. The ban on bombing Hungary was a political decision imposed by the 

British government, which was in communication with anti-German elements in 

the Hungarian government. The British did not want to compromise a possible 

anti-German uprising. The Germans, however, forestalled any further Hungarian 

wavering by deposing the government of Admiral Miklos Horthy and installing 

their own puppet regime; following this development, Portal hoped to have the 

387 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

bombing ban on Hungary removed. However, he still objected to bombing 

Ploesti on military grounds-it would require more visual bombing days than 

would likely be available, and it would detract from the Fifteenth’s responsibilities to POINTBLANK and Italy. Portal believed that greater damage could be done 

to Romanian oil exports by bombing not the oil refineries in Ploesti but the marshaling yards in Bucharest.176 

For his part, Spaatz continued on the warpath. He had just learned of a 

British proposal to the CCS that would allow theater commanders to direct 

strategic air force attacks against political-strategic objectives “when they considered such action desirable.” Spaatz viewed this proposal as threatening to the 

entire POINTBLANK offensive because it gave the theater commanders power to 

replace his attacks on German “industrial and military systems,” the effects of 

which were measurable, with area bombing, the effects of which were not, in 

order to break down German morale. Not only would such a proposal increase 

the theater commanders’ power at Spaatz’s expense, “it will probably nullify my 

control of Combined POINTBLANK operations at critical times with no balanced 

judgments [with] regard to issues involved.” Spaatz urged Arnold to advocate 

that the CCS “adopt a policy of resisting all but genuinely necessary demands 

for diversion of effort.” Spaatz added that he did not regard OVERLORD asa 

diversion and that he was of course prepared to come under Eisenhower’s control to support it.177 

On the other side of the Atlantic, Arnold sought to achieve a solution to the 

Fifteeth’s command problems. The CCS, with Arnold’s agreement, approved a 

cable to Portal authorizing him “to capitalize on favorable opportunities for 

Morale visit: Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz and Brig. Gen. Robert B. Williams (far right) 

chatting with a member of the 381st Bomb Group, April 19,1944. 

1 

I 

388 
THE LUFTWAFFE DEFEATED 

heavy attacks on important political and military targets in Southeast Europe.”l7* 

This wording allowed the British to pursue political targets and the Fifteenth to 

go after military targets, specifically oil. Arnold cabled to Portal his agreement 

that the bombing of certain Balkan targets would not only aid OVERLORD but 

would do more damage to the German cause than other targets already on the 

priority lists. However, Arnold saw that the priority of Balkan targets might vary 

with the course of the war, and he maintained that any such bombing had to be 

tied to POINTBLANK. Fortunately, the weather would hardly ever be favorable 

over both Balkan and POINTBLANK targets at the same time. Balkan targets 

could, therefore, be bombed, provided careful supervision limited the diversions 

from OVERLORD and coordinated the bombing effort. Arnold concluded with a 

remonstrance: 

In order to get full effectiveness from the United States units and equipment 

Spaatz must be informed at all times of what is expected of his units. The 

USSTAF is building up an extremely powerful force of bombers and it must be 

used efficiently. I appreciate your assurances of maintaining the channel of 

command.179 

Portal agreed with Arnold on all points. He promised to work closely with 

Spaatz and not to authorize diversions “unless really important results can be 

expected.”l80 

Thereupon, Portal added Balkan and Hungarian political targets to the Fifteenth’s strike list. His refusal to target Ploesti stemmed from the confrontation 

over the oil versus transportation plans going on in London at the same time the 

dispute over command channels erupted. Because Ploesti represented 25 percent 

of total Axis production, it was the single most lucrative target in any oil campaign. It made little sense for the Allies to damage Ploesti, forcing the Germans 

back on their synthetic production, and then ignore the remaining highly vulnerable plants in Germany proper. A successful raid on Ploesti would put a high 

trump in Spaatz’s hand and might well allow him to gather enough support to 

carry the day for oil. Thus Spaatz adamantly pressed for a strike on Ploesti, and 

Portal just as adamantly resisted it. 

On April 2, the Fifteenth struck ball-bearing targets in Steyr, Austria. For 

the next two days it hit marshaling yards in Budapest and elsewhere in the 

Balkans. On April 5, it went after Ploesti’s marshaling yards, but actually hit 

oil targets-each refinery complex had its own commercial railway yard, and 

“sloppy” bombing of the yards inflicted damage on the oil centers. As the AAF 

official history states, “It was thought wise to begin the undertaking surreptitiously under the general directive which called for bombing transportation targets supporting German forces who were facing the Russians.” With some 

satisfaction the history notes, “Most of the 588 tons of bombs, with more than 

coincidental inaccuracy, struck and badly damaged the Astra group of refineries near by.”181 

389 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Twice more, on April 15 and 26, hundreds of U.S. heavy bombers returned 

to Ploesti, where they inflicted “incidental” damage to oil refineries. These raids 

alerted the Germans. By the time the Fifteenth obtained Portal’s official permission to blast Ploesti, in May 1944, they had greatly intensified their artificial 

smoke screen, antiaircraft artillery, and fighter defenses. As a result, H2X bombing and a much greater expenditure of effort were required to achieve the accurate delivery of the required amount of high explosives on target.182 But German 

imports of finished oil products, mostly from Romania, fell from 186,000 tons in 

March to 104,000 tons in April to 40,000 tons in June.183 The April raids obviously had inflicted great damage. 

Even as the Fifteenth Air Force began its clandestine oil offensive, setting 

the stage for attacks on synthetic plants, Spaatz continued to seek a way for the 

Eighth to begin one as well. Although approved by Eisenhower, the transportation plan had at least temporarily failed to gain Churchill’s endorsement. When 

Churchill and the British War Cabinet reviewed it on April 3, they blanched at 

an attached Bomber Command estimate predicting 80,000 to 160,000 French 

civilian casualties from the bombing of marshaling yards.184 Churchill, who 

well remembered the disastrous effect of the decision to bombard the French 

fleet in July 1940, regarded these figures with apprehension.185 He wrote to 

Eisenhower, 

The Cabinet today took rather a grave and on the whole an adverse view of the 

proposal to bomb so many French railway centres, in view of the fact that 

scores of thousands of French civilians, men, women, and children, would lose 

their lives or be injured. Considering that they are all our friends, this might be 

held to be an act of very great severity, bringing much hatred on the Allied Air 

Forces.’86 

After consulting with Tedder, Eisenhower replied on April 5 that the loss 

projection of civilians was “grossly exaggerated”; that senior airmen agreed that 

the only viable air target, other than the Luftwaffe, was transport; and that the 

French people were “slaves” with the biggest stake of all in the success of the 

invasion. 187 

Churchill did not agree. That evening the Prime Minister began a monthlong series of Defence Committee meetings during which he questioned the 

necessity for the transportation plan. In the meantime he wished to limit transport attacks to those with estimated civilian casualties of no more than 100 to 

150 per raid.188 With the full execution of the transportation plan on hold, 

Spaatz and USSTAF perceived an opening for the implementation of the oil 

plan. 

Even as Spaatz prepared to reopen the oil plan with Eisenhower, another 

diversion threatened to occupy his force’s efforts. In mid-April, British concern 

over V-1 launch sites intensified. On April 15, the day after Bomber Command 

and the Eighth Air Force came under Eisenhower’s direction, the air leaders met 

390 
THE LUFIWAFFE DEFEATED 

to decide which transport targets to attack in relation to the Luftwaffe and 

CROSSBOW. Tedder opened with a statement that a directive for the use of the 

strategic effort had been agreed upon. Air Vice-Marshal Norman H. Bottomley, 

Deputy Chief of the RAF Air Staff, immediately disputed him, pointing out that 

Portal had not approved any such directive because the Prime Minister had not 

cleared the plan for political reasons. In his response, Tedder noted that all but 

two of USSTAF’s targets had been cleared. 

Discussion turned to CROSSBOW. Tedder suggested four priorities for 

USSTAF (1) the Luftwaffe, (2) CROSSBOW, (3) transport targets in France, and 

(4) transport targets in Germany. Spaatz noted that such a ranking “greatly prejudiced” USSTAF’s chances of destroying the nineteen transport targets assigned 

to it in France. Tedder said he would accept that price if it meant neutralizing 

CROSSBOW targets.189 

On the afternoon of April 19, Tedder phoned Spaatz’s Deputy for Operations, Fred Anderson, to give him a new bombing directive. CROSSBOW had priority even over the destruction of the Luftwaffe. The British War Cabinet and 

the British Chiefs of Staff, alarmed by recent intelligence showing a dramatic 

increase in V-1 launch sites, declared the security of the British Isles at risk and 

invoked the escape clause in the air agreement.190 This may have been the final 

straw for Spaatz, whose forces Tedder proposed to divert from POINTBLANK for a 

target system chosen solely for British domestic political considerations. 

That evening, Spaatz took his dissatisfaction to Eisenhower, who had retired 

to his house and the two had a stormy meeting. The Supreme Commander’s 

“obvious agitation” before Spaatz’s visit was described in a diary belonging to 

his naval aide who was on the scene. Eisenhower had just received word of a 

breach of security by one of Spaatz’s general officers, Maj. Gen. Henry J. F. 

Miller, West Point 1915, and Commanding General of the Ninth Air Force’s Air 

Service Command. On the night of April 18, Miller became drunk at a large 

London hotel and proceeded loudly to take bets that the invasion would come 

before June 15.191 Eisenhower brought the incident up as soon as Spaatz 

entered. Spaatz showed his displeasure by walking to the phone and calling the 

Ninth’s chief of staff, Brig. Gen. Victor H. Strahm. He ordered Strahm to arrest 

Miller and confine him to quarters.192 Eisenhower subsequently removed Miller 

from his post, reduced him to the permanent rank of colonel, and returned him to 

the United States, where he soon retired.193 

Spaatz, too, had emotional issues to discuss. He strongly protested Tedder’s 

decision to give CROSSBOW overall priority. As he told Tedder later that evening, 

if the rocket sites so upset the British, they should send the RAF to get them.194 

Eisenhower supported Spaatz’s basic position: POINTBLANK had priority over 

CROSSBOW. 195Spaatz also reopened the oil plan debate. 

Earlier that day Spaatz had decided to ask Eisenhower for permission to 

bomb oil targets during the next two days with suitable visual weather conditions.196 Spaatz based the decision on several factors. Discussions that morning 

391 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

with his staff had developed a consensus that German fighter opposition had 

appreciably lessened.197 On April 18 and 19, two strikes of more than 775 heavy 

bombers each, directed against Berlin and Kassel respectively, had lost a combined total of only 15 bombers.198 Spaatz and USSTAF wanted to experiment 

with the oil targets to see whether striking them could continue to force attrition 

on the Luftwaffe. 199 Spaatz personally still believed that oil should have priority 

second only to the destruction of the Luftwaffe.200 Finally, the morale of his 

command needed boosting.201 If oil bombing proved as successful as he suspected it would be, his men would see that their efforts were effective. If Spaatz 

could not gain Eisenhower’s approval, he feared that the entire AAF strategic 

effort in Europe might fail, or at least fail to keep the Luftwaffe out of the air 

over the invasion beaches. 

Apparently, Eisenhower was hard to convince. At one point in the meeting 

Spaatz may have threatened to resign if he could not have a greater voice in the 

employment of his force.202 Such an act would probably have completely 

soured Allied air relationships at a critical stage prior to OVERLORD. Spaatz had 

done his best to keep his disputes with the RAF out of the public eye. A more 

flamboyant airman would have had less respect from the British and might have 

been harder to deal with than Spaatz, who, in every case except this, had proved 

himself a loyal and self-effacing subordinate. Spaatz’s departure and his reasons 

for it could not have been concealed any better than Patton’s notorious slapping 

incident. The press would undoubtedly have given the story top piay, bringing 

air strategy arguments out into the open and exposing them to public criticism. 

In any case, convinced either by the logic and vehemence of Spaatz’s arguments 

or by his promise to give up his command, Eisenhower gave him verbal permission to take the two days he needed.203 It must have seemed a small price to pay 

given the possibly disruptive consequences of strictly adhering to the transportation plan. During the meeting Eisenhower may also have taken Spaatz to task for 

his laggardly performance on behalf of the transportation plan. As of April 19 the 

Eighth had not bombed a single one of its assigned rail targets. 

Furthermore, Eisenhower and Spaatz both knew that the weather seldom 

granted the bomber force visual access to targets deep in Germany and on the 

French coast during the same day. Eisenhower kept no record of the meeting, 

and Spaatz’s diary merely lists the points under discussion, giving little hint of 

any conversation or emotions. He laconically noted, 

Received permission from Eisenhower to use two days of visual target weather 

to attack oil targets for purpose of determining German’s willingness to send up 

defensive fighters against our bombers-must find some way to force them into 

the Air so that the strength of the German Air Force can continue to be 

decreased. . . . *04 

As the official AAF history states, “Somehow it seemed important to the two 

U.S. leaders not to go on record as taking the initiative in opening this new 

offensive.”205 

392 
THE LUFIWAFFE DEFEATED 

General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary 

Force, in the cockpit of a B-26, April 11,1944. 

On the morning of the next day, April 20, Spaatz went to Tedder’s office 

where the two reached a decision on CROSSBOW’S priority. At first Tedder 

insisted that the bomber force make the V- 1 launch sites their primary objective. 

At Spaatz’s urgings he agreed to a compromise. On the first suitable day the 

Eighth would bomb CROSSBOW, and on the next two suitable days it would attack 

oil targets.206 That very day Spaatz and Doolittle sent 892 B-17s and B-24s 

against CROSSBOW targets in France. The Luftwaffe offered no opposition, and 

the Eighth lost 9 bombers to antiaircraft fire.207 On April 21, Spaatz and 

Doolittle, on board their own B-17, watched their bombers form up for the first 

oil attack. The weather turned foul; strong winds and clouds extended to 30,000 

feet, causing the entire mission to abort. Even Spaatz, despite high hopes, admitted that he was glad the Eighth had canceled the mission rather than attempt it in 

impossible circumstances.208 Not until May 12 would the right combination of 

weather over bases and targets allow the first blow against oil. Meanwhile, the 

Eighth conducted nine CROSSBOW missions, sending out 2,941 sorties and losing 

33 bombers to flak or the junk heap of non-repairable aircraft.209 Two days after 

his meeting with Eisenhower, Spaatz sent the Eighth over its first transportation 

target-Hamm, Germany, the largest rail marshaling yard in Europe. This action 

may have fulfilled his bargain with the Supreme Commander. 

In March and April 1944, the battle of air attrition between USSTAF and the 

Luftwaffe fighter force continued over German-occupied Europe. In the first 

week of March a single raid on Berlin lost 69 heavy bombers; in the last week of 

April a mission to the same target lost 63. The number of the Eighth’s bombers 

attributed lost to enemy fighters climbed from 178 in March to 314 in April.210 

The fierceness of these battles reflected the AAF’s and Spaatz’s policy of forc393 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ing combat at every opportunity. New techniques-employing long-range 

escorts on deep-penetration sweeps and encouraging aggressive tactics and attitudes against the enemy in the air and on the ground-paid dividends in March 

and April 1944, as the Luftwaffe fighter force had an almost 100 percent 

turnover of aircraft and a 40 percent turnover of pilots.211 By the end of April, 

despite its own losses, USSTAF had defeated the Luftwaffe fighter force. In 

May, the Eighth lost 100 fewer bombers to enemy fighters than in April; in June 

it lost 200 fewer than in April. By the beginning of May Luftwaffe fighter forces 

could no longer mount continuous heavy opposition to the Allied strategic 

bombing campaign, nor did they retain the strength to interfere with the impending cross-channel invasion. 

Spaatz contributed greatly to the defeat of the Luftwaffe. He put his whole 

authority behind the decision to employ aggressive, loose-escort tactics, which 

freed the fighters to seek out the enemy but left the bombers more vulnerable. 

The heavy losses his forces suffered did not cause him to flinch from his objectives. Years later, he recalled that after a mission with heavy losses Eisenhower 

asked him whether the air forces could continue to take such losses: 

I said, “What’s that got to do with it?” [Eisenhower asked] “Are we getting 

control of the German Air Force?” I said, “If we have to take these losses to 

control them, then we have to. . . . You can’t have a war and worry about that. 

What you have to worry about is whether you’re winning or not.”212 

In addition, Spaatz drove his senior commanders to use their forces to the 

fullest. On March 2, Spaatz informed Doolittle and Twining: 

Our effort requiring the enemy to oppose us on our terms must be pushed 

relentlessly every day it is humanly possible to operate over Germany. Standard 

operational limitations which have been wisely used in the past will not be 

applicable to the present emergency situation. Greater risks are justified, and 

infinitely greater demands on personnel are mandatory. Further, for the immediate future it is even desirable to invite an opposition when we have fighter 

escort, rather than . . . to evade it.213 

Doolittle later recalled that, once, after he had canceled a mission, Spaatz told 

him “If you haven’t got the guts to run a big Air Force, we’ll get someone 

else.”214 

Spaatz never doubted that he could overcome the Luftwaffe, undermine the 

German economy, and guarantee air supremacy over Europe and the invasion 

beaches provided he had suitable weather, replacement of his losses, and freedom to use his force. Meteorological conditions provided just enough usable 

weather. Arnold not only made good the losses but increased the force. And 

Spaatz, steering carefully through the labyrinthine disputes over command, control, and policy, maintained his close working relationships with Tedder and 

Eisenhower, pursued his chief objectives: the Luftwaffe and oil targets. 

394 
Chapter 11 

Final Preparations 

for the Invasion 

(May-June 1944) 

Your concern over the reaction of the G[erman] A[ir] 

F[orce] when OVERLORD is launched is shared by me. He 

[the enemy] is undoubtedly attempting to ration his forces 

to the greatest extent possible at this time in order to maintain an adequate force against a threat of invasion from the 

West. I have stressed in all my conferences with Eisenhower, 

Tedder, and others that a continuation of POINTBLANK operations is vital in order to maintain wastage of the GAF. The 

primary purpose of these POINTBLANK operations to date 

has been the depletion of the GAF. At this time it is the sole 

purpose. Targets selected are those which we anticipate 

will force the GAF into the air against us.' 

4paatz to Arnold, May 10, I944 

The Oil Plan Is Implemented 

In the five weeks before the Allied landings at Normandy, the AAF continued to execute its main tasks: the elimination of the Luftwaffe, the neutralization 

of V-1 launch sites, and the interdiction of the German transportation system in 

France. In the days just preceding and during the assault phase of OVERLORD, 

USSTAF put aside these tasks to provide maximum direct support of the invasion. Spaatz contributed substantially to the attainment of the Allies' and the 

AAF's goals. 

The Eighth Air Force entered May with 39 operational heavy-bombardment 

groups, to which the Fifteenth added another 20, for an authorized front-line 

strength of 2,832 B-17s and B-24s. Spaatz used this force in a manner calculated 

395 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

to provoke combat with the Luftwaffe so as to inflict fatal attrition upon it. 

Despite the fact that German day fighters shot down 100 more American heavy 

bombers in April 1944 than in any other month of the war,2 USSTAF Headquarters had perceived a weakening in the enemy’s fighter reaction. The nonexistent Luftwaffe reaction to missions flown against CROSSBOW and transportation 

targets in late April and the first week of May confirmed speculation. 

This decline produced not cheer but apprehension within USSTAF and suspicion that the Luftwaffe meant to conserve its forces for action against the 

expected invasion. On May 6, at an Allied air conference held at AEAF Headquarters, Stanmore, Spaatz admitted his fear that the Germans “were conserving 

their effort against the threat of invasion” and that they might leave the homeland undefended in order to bring all their fighters to bear on the beachheads.3 

Spaatz probably based his assessment on reports received from the RAF’s Air 

Intelligence Branch (AI). On April 30, A1 noted that the Luftwaffe had maintained its strength and predicted a German air strength of 1,950 aircraft spread 

from Norway and northern Germany to southern France, with 750 immediately 

available to oppose the invasion. Estimated strength increased throughout the 

month. On May 25, A1 placed total German strength in the west at 2,350 planes; 

the 900 immediately available included 500 bombers and 220 single-engine 

fighters.4 But AI, in information gleaned from ULTRA, attributed this situation to 

a conservation policy stemming from a shortage of pilots. In February, for 

example, decrypts indicated Luftwaffe intentions to use aircraft from flying 

schools and training units in case of emergency.5 

Spaatz believed that attacking oil targets would nullify the Germans’ intention to conserve their aircraft and pilots and force the Luftwaffe up to protect its 

sources of fuel. On May 12, weather conditions finally permitted a full-scale 

visual attack on several crucial synthetic oil-producing plants. Aside from two 

costly strikes on April 29 and May 8 over Berlin, which usually produced heavy 

German reaction, this attack attracted the heaviest opposition in three weeks. 

Fifteen combat wings-886 heavy bombers plus 735 escorting fighters left 

Britain to bomb their targets. The leading division, the 3d, which was underescorted because one of its assigned fighter groups had mistakenly rendezvoused 

with a trailing division, saw its remaining escort swamped by a large force of 

German fighters, which, in forty minutes, downed 32 bombers before they could 

reach their targets. This single massed blow accounted for most of the 46 bombers 

lost. The other two bombardment divisions lost only 2 bombers to enemy fighters 

and 12 to antiaircraft fire.6 The Eighth wrote off an additional 9 bombers as unrepairable7 (See Map 11, Greater German Synthetic Oil Plants.) The American 

escort lost 4 P-47s and 3 P-51s, claiming in return 61 German aircraft destroyed 

and 11 damaged in the air as well as 5 destroyed and 2 damaged on the ground. 

German records confirmed the accuracy of those claims, counting 28 pilots dead, 

26 injured,g and 65 aircraft lost.9 Surviving bombers dropped 1,718 tons of 

bombs, through ground haze and low clouds, on synthetic oil plants at Zwickau, 

396 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Merseburg-Leuna, Brux, Lutzkendorf, Bohlen, and Zeitz, while, coincidentally 

and unknown to the Allies until after the war, destroying at Merseburg-Leuna, a 

building engaged in heavy-water experiments for Germany’s atom bomb program.10 Albert Speer, Nazi Minister of Armaments and War Production, spoke 

of USSTAF’s work that day in his postwar memoirs: 

I shall never forget the day the technological war was decided. Until then we 

had managed to produce approximately as many weapons as the armed forces 

needed, in spite of their considerable losses. But, with the attack of nine hundred and thirty-five daylight bombers of the American Eighth Air Force upon 

several fuel plants in central and eastern Germany, a new era in the air war 

began. It meant the end of German armaments production.l’ 

A week later Speer reported to Hitler, “The enemy has struck us at one of our 

weakest points. If [he] persist[s] at it this time, we will soon no longer have any 

fuel production worth mentioning. Our one hope is that the other side has an air 

force General Staff as scatterbrained as ours!”l2 

Commitments to CROSSBOW and OVERLORD and the weather delayed the 

next oil mission until May 28, when 400 heavy bombers attacked plants at 

Ruhland and Magdeburg and restruck Merseburg-Leuna, Zeitz, and Lutzkendorf. The next day the Eighth sent 224 B-24s to bomb the synthetic plant at 

Politz, while the rest of the force bombed aircraft industry targets deep in eastern 

Germany and Poland. A combined total of 66 bombers and 19 fighters were lost 

in the two raids. American escorts claimed 100 destroyed, 2 probably destroyed, 

and 11 damaged in the air and 21 destroyed and 22 damaged on the ground.13 

Only the month’s three raids on Berlin and the previous oil raid met opposition of 

similar intensity. 

These oil strikes proved two of Spaatz’s contentions: First, the enemy would 

come up to resist them, but would not defend V-1 launch sites or marshaling yards. 

Second, the bombing of the German synthetic oil plants would have immediate 

and serious consequences for the German war economy. ULTRA intercepted an 

order, dated May 13, showing that the previous day’s mission had greatly alarmed 

the Germans. This order, from the Luftwaffe Operations Staff in Berlin, stripped 

heavy and light antiaircraft guns from the Eastern Front and from the fightermanufacturing plants of Oschersleben, Leipzig-Erla, and Wiener Neustadt for the 

protection of hydrogenation plants at Zeitz and Politz.14 A history of USSTAF 

and ULTRA called this intercept “one of the most decisive and timely pieces of 

intelligence received in this war.”l5 It gave proof that the Germans regarded oil 

as the target system of paramount importance-even above the production of 

fighter aircraft. A week later the Allies intercepted an order directing the German 

armed forces to convert an even higher percentage of their motor transport to 

power supplied by highly inefficient wood fuel generators.16 When he learned of 

these messages, Tedder dropped his opposition to the oil plan and is reported to 

have remarked, “I guess we’ll have to give the customer what he wants.”l7 

398 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

The first oil raid: Bomb damage to a synthetic oil plant in Bohlen, Germany, May 

12,1944. 

After the war, captured documents from Speer to Hitler revealed the dramatic and almost instantaneous effect of May’s bombings. On June 30, Speer 

reported the state of production of aviation fuel to Hitler. In April, the Luftwaffe 

consumed 156,000 tons of the 175,000 tons of aviation gasoline manufactured 

by the synthetic plants; the average daily production in April was 5,850 tons. 

The attack of May 12 reduced that average to 4,821, but production had recovered to 5,526 tons per day by May 28, when the Allies completely knocked out 

the plant at Leuna. The May 29 attack stopped all production at Politz, and the’ 

two strikes combined dropped daily production to 2,775 tons. The total output 

for May of 156,000 tons fell 14,000 tons short of essential planned consumption. 

In June, thanks to more attacks, production rose above 3,000 tons on only two 

days.18 On June 7, ULTRA deciphered the following message, dated June 5, from 

the Luftwaffe Operations staff, 

As a result of renewed encroachment into the production of a/c [aircraft] fuel 

by enemy action, the most essential requirements for training and carrying out 

production plans can scarcely be covered with the quantities of a/c fuel available. In order to assure the defense of the Reich and to prevent the readiness for 

defense of the G.A.F. in the east from gradually collapsing, it has been necessary to break into the strategical reserve.19 

Portal sent a copy of this decryption to the Prime Minister, saying, “I regard 

this as one ohe most important pieces of information we have yet received.” 

399 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Portal also recommended a concentrated bombing attack on synthetic oil targets 

by all Allied strategic bombers as soon as they could be spared by the invasion. 

Piecemeal attacks spread over a long period by small forces, warned Portal, 

would only allow the enemy time to increase his flak and smoke defenses. 

Churchill replied, “Good.”20 

Even as the Eighth Air Force staggered the Germans under punishing roundhouse blows, the Fifteenth Air Force continued pounding Ploesti. As a result of 

Spaatz’s visit to the MAAF and the Fifteenth at the end of April, USSTAF 

finally obtained Portal’s approval of oil as a legitimate target.21 Spaatz persuaded Portal that the Fifteenth had grown so large that for tactical reasons it 

should hit other important targets, such as refineries, near the Ploesti marshaling 

yards.22 No longer obliged to conduct on the sly its missions against oil, the 

Fifteenth sent almost 500 heavy bombers to Ploesti on May 5 and followed with 

700 on May 18,460 on May 31, and 300 on June 6. Results were, for the most 

part, excellent. It also bombed small crude oil targets in the Balkans while the 

RAF kept up a heavy mining campaign in the Danube River.23 A postwar examination of captured German records reveals that, at the time of the Fifteenth’s 

bombing of Ploesti and other Balkan petroleum targets, German imports of finished oil products had fallen from 186,000 tons in March 1944 to 104,000 in 

April and 81,000 in May. By August, when the Russians occupied the gutted 

ruins of Ploesti, German oil imports had dropped to a mere 11,000 tons.24 On 

June 4, Eisenhower’s headquarters publicly proclaimed the existence of the oil 

offensive.25 

Churchill Delays the Transportation Plan 

By May 1, five weeks after the transportation plan had been endorsed by 

Eisenhower, it had not been endorsed by Churchill, who remained worried about 

the potential political side effects of killing and maiming French civilians. 

Spaatz, too, worried. He believed that, although actual casualties might vary 

widely, the Germans would greatly exaggerate their number for propaganda purposes.26 On April 22, after discussion with his personal staff and Bedell Smith, 

Spaatz met with Eisenhower on the subject,27 bringing the draft of a letter with 

him in which he spelled out his objections and proposed an alternative: 

I would feel seriously remiss in my duty if I did not bring to your attention the 

serious implications involved with these attacks. Many thousands of French 

people will be killed and many towns will be laid waste in these operations. I 

feel a joint responsibility with you and I view with alarm a military operation 

which involves such widespread destruction and death in countries not our enemies, particularly since the results to be achieved from these bombing operations have not been conclusively shown to be . . . decisive. . . . 2x 

400 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

Spaatz then pointed out the necessity for all air forces to give direct support 

to OVERLORD, but he observed: 

The use of these forces in a manner which involves so much destruction to our 

Allies on the continent may far outweigh the advantages gained by the attacks 

as planned. We must evolve a scheme of employment of our Air Forces which 

better achieves the basic aim of maximum direct assistance to OVERLORD. 

He suggested considering the possibilities of cutting rail and road lines at 

points outside town centers and of attacking concentrations of German troops, 

their supply and ammunition depots, and their tank parks.29 

Eisenhower replied that he had examined the problem and understood the 

political repercussions in a postwar Europe, but he argued that the primary consideration was the absolute necessity of winning the war quickly.30 Although 

not completely convinced by Eisenhower’s rejoinder, Spaatz acquiesced to 

Eisenhower’s wishes.31 

The next day Ambassador Winant lunched with Spaatz at Park House. The 

two discussed their concern over the bombing of populated areas in occupied 

territory but agreed that they had faith in Eisenhower and would abide by whatever he decided.32 Spaatz accepted the continuation of the transportation plan 

but did what he could to mitigate its consequences for French civilians living in 

harm’s way. He emphasized to his subordinates the importance of being careful 

in all operations against French targets: only the best lead bombardiers would be 

used, no indiscriminant bombing and no H2X bombing would be permitted. 

“The crews must be impressed with the need for air discipline in order to avoid 

needless killing. . . . ”33 

The Prime Minister, whose political senses were perhaps more acute than 

those of the U.S. generals, delayed his final decision. On the night of April 19, 

Churchill still doubted that any suffering caused by the transportation plan justified its results. He raised the possibility of attacking synthetic oil targets,34 but 

Portal and Tedder repeated their opinion that such a tactic could not succeed by 

D-day. Even after the British Chiefs of Staff asked for a speedy decision, Churchill 

demurred, although he admitted that the longer the decision remained in question, the stronger the case for the transportation plan became.35 

On April 26, the Prime Minister agreed to put the matter before the War 

Cabinet. Portal drew up a list of targets, the bombing of which would cause no 

more than 100 civilian casualties each. At a meeting the next day, the Cabinet 

agreed to revise the transportation plan to include only attacks that would inflict 

no more than 150 civilian casualties each. Churchill was to visit Eisenhower and 

then send a message to Roosevelt for a definitive American opinion.36 

On April 29, Churchill suggested to Eisenhower that USSTAF, perhaps in 

conjunction with the Air Ministry, produce a plan for employing heavy bombers 

which would sacrifice no more than 100 French lives per attack. If it failed to 

inflict sufficient damage to the key portions of the French rail system, the full 

40 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

transportation plan, whatever its cost to civilians, would be strengthened.37 

Slowing or delaying the movement of German ground units toward the beachhead had to have priority over other considerations. 

Eisenhower remained adamant. To abandon the transportation plan at this 

juncture was unthinkable. He wrote to Marshall, “There is no other way in 

which this tremendous air force can help us during the preparatory period, to 

get ashore and stay there. The Prime Minister talked to me about bombing 

‘bases, troop concentrations and dumps.’ ”38 Churchill’s reference to dumps and 

troop concentrations echoed Spaatz’s letter on civilian casualties to Eisenhower; 

such similarity of phrasing points to close collaboration between Spaatz’s headquarters and Churchill’s staff. On April 22, Doolittle, for instance, attended a 

dinner at 10 Downing Street where he was prepared to discuss and support 

USSTAF’s views on the oil plan.39 In the space of a week, both Churchill and 

Spaatz, using virtually the same language, proposed to Eisenhower that the use 

of American heavy bombers in the transportation plan be restricted. 

On May 2, Eisenhower sent Churchill a more detailed reply, written for the 

most part by Tedder,40 which patiently reviewed the rationale behind the transportation plan-it was intended to weaken and confuse the rail network at a critical time, rather than to choke it off entirely. Next, Tedder and Eisenhower took 

note of the March 25 meeting and of USSTAF’s alternative suggestions, which 

they had “fully and sympathetically considered” but rejected because “they do 

not, themselves, in any way constitute a plan by which our air power can, in the 

final stages, effectively delay and disrupt enemy concentrations.” After noting 

that a limitation to 100 to 150 casualties per mission would “emasculate” the 

transportation plan, the reply concluded with Eisenhower’s typical reaction 

against any challenge to his wishes: “The ‘OVERLORD’ concept was based on the 

assumption that our overwhelming Air Power would be able to prepare the way 

for the assault. If its hands are to be tied, the perils of an already hazardous 

undertaking will be greatly enhanced.”41 

That night the War Cabinet considered the reply. Churchill spoke of the hazards of interfering with Eisenhower’s plans for political reasons, yet said he had 

not realized “that our use of air power before ‘OVERLORD’ would assume so 

cruel and remorseless a form.”42 Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden feared the 

adverse reaction of the western Europeans. Support for the transportation plan 

came from the British Chiefs of Staff. Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial 

General Staff, supported the plan more vigorously than he had before because of 

the effort already expended on it. Finally, the Cabinet agreed that the Prime 

Minister “should consider further the air plan for support of 

On May 3, the British Defence Committee met for the last time on the subject. Before the meeting Tedder had convinced the Prime Minister of South 

Africa, Field Marshal Jan Smuts, who happened to be in London for a meeting 

of the British Commonwealth, of the necessity of the transportation plan. Smuts, 

who had been instrumental in establishing the RAF as an independent service in 

402 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

1917, held great influence over Churchill and pressed him on the plan before the 

meeting,44 but any waivering he might have induced in Churchill did not start at 

the subsequent Defence Committee meeting. The transportation plan, said 

Churchill, “will smear the good name of the Royal Air Force across the world.” 

Churchill asked whether the plan could be implemented at a cost of less than 

10,000 dead. Tedder expressed his hopes of keeping the number of French dead 

below that number, although he could make no guarantees. The committee then 

considered a suggestion from Lord Cherwell, Churchill’s chief scientific 

adviser, that bridges might be better alternative targets than rail centers. Tedder 

rejected the suggestion out of hand. In the end, the committee instructed Tedder 

to report its discussion and conclusion to Eisenhower, after reviewing the transportation plan to ensure no more than 10,000 French casualties.45 

On May 7, Churchill informed Roosevelt of the British government’s concern over the “slaughter” of French civilians, which might “leave a legacy of 

hate.” He noted “the great differences of opinion in the two air forces-not 

between them but crisscross about the efficacy of the ‘railway plan’ as a shortterm project.” Then he asked for Roosevelt’s opinion: 

It must be remembered, on the one hand, that this slaughter is among a friendly 

people who have committed no crimes against us, and not among the German 

foe, with all their record of cruelty and ruthlessness. On the other hand, we naturally feel the hazardous nature of ‘OVERLORD’ and are in deadly earnest about 

making it a success. Whatever is settled between us, we are quite willing to 

share responsibilities with y0u.4~ 

Roosevelt replied on May 1 1, 

However regrettable the attendant loss of civilian lives is, I am not prepared to 

impose from this distance any restriction on military action by the responsible 

commanders that in their opinion might militate against the success of 

‘OVERLORD’ or cause additional loss of life to our Allied forces of inva~ion.4~ 

This ended the matter. Having received no support from the Combined Chiefs of 

Staff or the President and having been opposed by Eisenhower, Churchill 

allowed the transportation plan to proceed without interference. Happily, civilian casualties from rail center attacks before D-day proved to be less than half of 

those predicted; approximately 4,750 were killed.48 

Whereas Churchill had opposed the transportation plan on political grounds, 

Spaatz attempted to overturn it on practical grounds. He had already gained 

Eisenhower’s permission for two days’ visual bombing of oil targets; these missions demonstrated the effectiveness of the oil plan as a strategic alternative. In 

addition, by late April and early May, he began to offer a tactical alternative to 

the transportation plan. He pushed for an interdiction campaign directed first 

against the Seine and Loire River bridges, important rail junctions, and open 

stretches of track, and then against ammunition and fuel dumps, ordnance 

403 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

depots, and other military establishments large enough to offer a suitable target.49 He chose not to present those plans on March 25 because he did not want 

to appear to overstep his authority. Churchill’s opposition to the transportation 

plan, however, kept alive the possibility of a replacement. Thus Spaatz sought to 

substitute his oil and interdiction campaign. 

The details of USSTAF’s interdiction campaign, which the Enemy Objectives 

Unit had prepared in mid- and late February20 circulated throughout the Allied 

air establishment and beyond. This was apparently done sub rosa or by word of 

mouth, perhaps with Spaatz’s approval. Churchill, at one point, advocated the 

adoption of portions of the plan to Eisenhower. Lord Cherwell kept suggesting 

bridge attacks. By May, additional information supporting the interdiction advocates’ position had become available with the completion of Operation STRANGLE, 

a campaign conducted by Allied air over a period of almost two months in Italy 

against all types of targets along whole sections of track rather than one type of 

target. By the end of the operation, May 12, it had switched primarily to attacks on 

bridges, because they had proved to be better targets.51 

On trips to Italy at the end of April, Spaatz and Anderson had the chance to 

review STRANGLE’S results first hand and brought back enthusiastic reports of its 

success in bridge breaking. Experts had predicted that the tactic would require 

the expending of huge numbers of bombs and had thus deemed it unrewarding. 

STRANGLE had demonstrated that it was entirely feasible with modest numbers of 

bombs and that it was, moreover, a highly effective block to enemy movement.52 RAF Air Intelligence joined USSTAF in backing bridge attacks. A1 

reports of bridge attacks in Italy during February and March, based on photographic reconnaissance and high-grade signal intelligence, testified to the tactic’s “not unimpressive” effect.53 

Given this evidence and Churchill’s ongoing political concern, a concern that 

certainly percolated to Spaatz’s headquarters, the experimental bombing of the 

Vernon rail bridge over the Seine on May 7 assumed special significance. It 

occurred when Churchill, who had run out of time in fighting the transportation 

plan, needed some hard evidence to quiet its advocates. Spaatz also had to provide 

a demonstration of the effectiveness of his alternative tactical proposal. Their 

chance came when Montgomery’s 21 Army Group Headquarters requested the 

destruction of several bridges by the air force to interfere with the enemy’s ability 

to ship reinforcements to the Normandy area. This request dovetailed neatly with 

Spaatz’s effort to introduce bridge-bombing operations. By mid-April, his chief of 

intelligence had already passed along to Brig. Gen. Frederic Smith, Vandenberg’s 

deputy at AJZAF, a “suggestion” to bomb bridges. Smith and four other brigadier 

generals prepared a plan to bomb those spanning the Seine River between Paris 

and Rouen.54 

On May 3, at a target meeting, Leigh-Mallory rejected Smith’s bridge plan, 

but suggested that, if it were technically possible, the Eighth’s heavy bombers 

destroy several bridges and other likely communications sites.55 This suggestion 

404 
Anthony Eden, British 

Foreign Secretary, 

1941-1945. 

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and his War Cabinet. Standing from left to 

right: Archibald Sinclair, Albert Alexander, Lord Cranborne, Herbert Morrison, 

Lord Moyne, David Mergesson, and Brendan Bracken; seated from left to right: 

Ernest Bevin, Lord Beaverbrook, Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee, Churchill, John 

Anderson, Arthur Greenwood, and Kingsley Wood. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

merely confirmed Spaatz’s low opinion of Leigh-Mallory. Spaatz wired Arnold, 

“Extremely heavy program of attack against communications and other precision targets submitted by AEAF for OVERLORD. Preparations may compromise 

POINTBLANK if approved and weaken OVERLORD if not completed.”56 Spaatz did 

not object to targeting the bridges; he objected to doing so with the least-efficient aircraft available for the job-heavy bombers. Their use not only would 

divert them from POINTBLANK and CROSSBOW but also would produce high figures of bomb tonnage versus bridge destruction, confirming Zuckerman’s, 

Leigh-Mallory ’s, and Tedder’s opinion that bridge breaking did not offer an 

effective alternative to transportation targets. Operations in Italy had shown the 

superior effectiveness of the fighter-bomber for the task. 

After the meeting of May 3, USSTAF attempted to reverse Leigh-Mallory’s 

decision to allocate the bridges to heavy bombers. Thirty-five years later, Smith 

recalled that on May 4 he received a call from Fred Anderson requesting that he 

stay late in his office where a captain of the Horse Guards, the unit that guarded 

the Prime Minister, would pick up a copy of the bridge-bombing plan Smith had 

proposed at the May 3 meeting. The Guards officer duly arrived and, Smith 

believed, whisked the plan off to Churchill, who pressed Leigh-Mallory to 

reverse his stand.57 If Smith’s memory and surmises were accurate, they give 

ample evidence that Spaatz’s and Churchill’s people, at least on this occasion, 

cooperated closely in trying to determine the details of preinvasion bombing 

operations. (See Map 12, Normandy Transport Network.) 

On May 6, at another target conference, Spaatz, Leigh-Mallory, Tedder, and 

many of their deputies once more reviewed the target priorities of their respective organizations. After committing the Eighth Air Force to a limited program 

of airfield bombing, termed “preinvasion post-holing’’ because of the cratering 

of the runways caused by high-explosive bombs, Spaatz brought up the subject 

of bridges. He quoted a report from Italy on fighter-bomber effectiveness. 

Leigh-Mallory attempted to cut off discussion by announcing that “bridges were 

a difficult target and he did not want to see a waste of effort at this time.” Then 

the 21 Army Group Planning Officer, Brig. Gen. Charles Richardson, spoke up, 

stating that the ground forces wanted the destruction of eight bridges. “This,” he 

said, “would be of more decisive value than pin-pricking on rail communications.” Coningham lent support to bridge bombing, which he wanted done on an 

experimental basis first, because it would hamper road movement as well as rail 

movement and, in the invasion area itself, would compel the enemy to rely more 

heavily on motor transport than rail. Leigh-Mallory, perhaps bowing to Spaatz’s 

and Coningham’s arguments or perhaps feeling the pressure from 10 Downing 

Street, agreed to experimental attacks on bridges over both the Seine and the 

Meuse. He added diversionary attacks on the Meuse to deceive the Germans. He 

also excused the Eighth from participating.58 

Little did Leigh-Mallory realize the alacrity with which the AAF would pursue this initiative. General Smith immediately selected the Seine bridge at 

406 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Vernon, called his roommate Brig. Gen. David Schlatter of the Ninth Air Force, 

and told him to go ahead.59 Just before noon the next day, a flight of fighterbombers from the 365th Fighter Group, specially trained in low-level bombing, left 

England for France. Twelve planes and escorts attacked the bridge at Vernon, and 

another twelve with escorts attacked additional bridges. Within a few minutes and 

under the gaze of German Field Marshal Irwin Rommel, who happened to be 

there?() the P-47s, with only six tons of bombs, destroyed the bridge and a nearby 

ammunition factory, at the cost of two planes lost and five damaged. The flight 

leader reported “the most intensive light flak they had yet encountered.”61 Another 

flight damaged three more bridges at Oissel, Orival, and Mantes-Gassicourt the 

same day.62 This brilliant piece of beginner’s luck was the most accurate bridge 

raid of the campaign in northwestern Europe; the typical bridge cut took 173 tons.63 

The next morning, May 8, every major figure in the bombing plan controversy 

found a set of post-attack aerial photographs on his desk showing the bridge lying 

at the bottom of the Seine. Like the ULTRA intercept on German oil, they removed 

all doubt about the cost-effectiveness of attacking bridges with fighter-bombers 

rather than heavy bombers.64 On May 10, Leigh-Mallory, after assessing the raid’s 

effectiveness, ordered his tactical forces to begin cutting the bridges over the 

Albert Canal in Belgium and along the Meuse. Because of security considerations, 

the AEAF did not bomb the Loire bridges until D-day.65 Tedder ceased his opposition.66 As its advocates had claimed, pre-D-day bridge-breaking also proved easier on the French civilian population than bombing marshaling yards. Less than 

1,000 French civilians died as a result of it.67 

Almost as an afterthought the British and the Americans finally asked an official 

representative of General Charles de Gaulle’s Free French government-in-exile its 

opinions on the matter of killing French civilians. Churchill, who had little love for 

the stubborn French general or his government, opposed the consultation, saying: 

It is therefore in my opinion not necessary that a psychological effect should be 

obtained by a French transport expert being consulted by the Target Committee. 

His presence would only constitute a complication, and a suggestion to de Gaulle 

of this kind would only give another opportunity of obtruding himself.68 

Nonetheless, on May 16, Eisenhower sent his chief of staff, Bedell Smith, to call 

on the Commander of the French Forces in Britain, Maj. General Pierre Joseph 

Koenig. After Smith explained the situation, Koenig grimly replied, “C’est la 

guerre [This is war].” He added, “It must be expected that people will be killed. 

We would take twice the anticipated loss to be rid of the Germans.”@ 

Preinvasion Operations 

The King of England, his Prime Minister, the Supreme Allied Commander, 

and most of the senior officers responsible for the planning and execution of 

OVERLORD met for a formal presentation of the invasion plan on May 15 at the 

408 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

Headquarters of 21 Army Group, at St. Paul’s School in London. After Eisenhower spoke, each of the major commanders delineated the tasks assigned to his 

troops. Spaatz, as usual, performed woodenly in public, reading from a prepared 

text. It bored Alan Brooke and Leigh-Mallory, but Patton commented that, 

“Bradley and Spaatz made short and good speeches.”70 Spaatz left the description of the Combined Bomber Offensive and the invasion air plans to Harris and 

Leigh-Mallory respectively, instead concentrating on the battle against the 

Luftwaffe. He claimed that German fighter and bomber production had declined 

by about 50 percent since January 1. He also touched on the transportation plan, 

informing his listeners that the Eighth Air Force had struck eighteen of its 

twenty-two assigned targets. In concluding, he repeated his favorite theme-the 

attrition of the Luftwaffe: “In addition to the destruction of the transportation 

and airdrome targets assigned the 8th Air Force prior to D-day, the 8th will continue its operations into Germany with the primary objective of further depletion 

of the German Air Force in being.”71 

General Montgomery probably made the day’s most impressive presentation. Always the master of the set piece, be it a battle or a briefing, Montgomery 

strutted through the ground invasion plan. In the course of his talk he produced 

maps showing phase-lines of the anticipated advance, which indicated the capture of Caen by D-day plus three or four days. Those present were all professional military men who understood that Montgomery’s maps represented only 

planning estimates. Nonetheless, the phase-lines and the tenor of his presentation left the clear impression that he would obtain a large beachhead fairly 

rapidly.72 

The size of the beachhead was a matter of particular concern to the British 

airmen of the 2d Tactical Air Force. Their short-range fighters and fighterbombers would be launched from airfields in Britain averaging 130 miles from 

the Normandy beachhead. Thus their time directly over the beachhead itself 

would be severly restricted. Consequently, they deemed the establishment of 

landing strips and airfields in Normandy a matter of the first importance. The 

airfields had to be able to accommodate the storage and management of necessarily huge quantities of ordnance and fuel. A large initial beachhead would 

allow a greater proportion of the British tactical air force to move to advanced 

stations on the Continent. The 130-mile gap was much less important to the 

American airmen, all of whose fighter aircraft had drop tanks that extended their 

range. 

On May 20, the intelligence staff of Eisenhower’s headquarters (SHAEF, G2) reported that the bombing of the railway marshaling yards had yet to produce 

as intended. Rail traffic in France had dropped by only one-third-or to the 

point where the more enthusiastic transportation plan proponents had predicted 

that German military transport would begin to suffer.73 Leigh-Mallory, however, 

was able to supplement the plan because Tedder had just lifted the ban on strafing trains-a ban the Allies had heretofore observed because they had difficulty 

409 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

distinguishing civilian from military traffic.74 He therefore ordered a series of 

fighter sweeps against moving trains. These so-called “Chattanooga Choo-Choo” 

missions on May 21,25, and 29 and June 2,3, and 4 damaged hundreds of locomotives, cut the rails in numerous places, and forced the Germans to bring in 

train crews of their own nationals to man the trains along dangerous lines after 

the French crews deserted in large numbers. Daylight traffic almost completely 

halted. 

The bridge campaign also continued. From May 11 through May 26, Allied 

aircraft attacked bridges in Belgium and northern France. On May 24, the ban 

on the Seine bridges, imposed because of security considerations, was removed, 

and by D-day, June 6, all Seine River rail and road bridges below Paris were at 

the bottom of the river or otherwise unusable, all at the cost of about 220 tons of 

bombs per bridge.75 

While the medium bombers and fighter-bombers of the AEAF downed 

bridges and shot up trains, the Eighth Air Force lent its efforts to pre-D-day 

preparations. On April 22, it’s bombers inaugurated their part in the transportation plan by striking the largest railroad marshaling yard in Europe, at Hamm, 

Germany. Hamm was the rail gateway to the Ruhr, Germany’s largest industrial 

area, and the Eighth’s bombs left it crippled for the rest of the war.76 On May 1 

and 11, its fighters participated in the “Chattanoogas” while its heavy bombers 

conducted large-scale raids on French rail center targets. In the two weeks 

before the invasion, USSTAF delivered the bulk of its tonnage on transportation 

targets. In missions on May 23, 25, 27, and 30 and June 4, it delivered more than 

13,000 tons of bombs. Of the twenty-three rail centers assigned to it, the Eighth 

damaged fifteen so severely that they needed no additional bombing. It also 

inflicted great damage on the remaining eight.77 

RAF Bomber Command participated more heavily against rail centers than 

USSTAF, dropping 46,000 of 71,000 tons expended. Spaatz’s initial fear that 

Bomber Command would get off scot-free while he had to tie himself to the 

transportation plan never materialized. German rail transport was reduced by 

another one-third from the beginning of January 1944.78 

The authorities and participants, both Allied and German, have continued to 

dispute the relative effectiveness of the various methods employed against rail 

traffic. Tedder and Zuckerman naturally claimed that the transportation plan was 

the most important contributor to its decline.79 The official AAF history, in contrast, quoted just as many sources with the opposite opinion and concluded with 

a statement by the AAF Evaluation Board: “The pre-D-day attacks against 

French rail centers were not necessary and the 70,000 tons involved could have 

been devoted to alternative targets.”80 The fact remains that the pre-D-day air 

campaign imposed severe and damaging injuries to the German military’s mobility and logistics, which undoubtedly hurt the German effort on D-day and after. 

In conjunction with its interdiction campaign, Allied air power also sought 

to neutralize all 100 usable enemy airfields within a 350-mile arc from the 

410 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

planned invasion beaches. The British wanted the airfields within 130 miles of 

the invasion area singled out in order to put the Luftwaffe at the same operational disadvantage as their own aircraft operating from British bases. The 

Eighth, which flew its first antiairfield mission of the campaign on May 9, executed the lion’s share of this phase of pre-D-day preparations. Of the airfields 

within 130 miles of Caen, the left flank of the invasion, Bomber Command had 

responsibility for 8, AEAF for 12, and USSTAF for 20. The Eighth and the 

Fifteenth also had responsibility for neutralizing the 59 fields more than 130 

miles but less than 350 miles from Caen. Large missions by the Eighth on May 

23,24, and 25 and missions by the Fifteenth damaged many but when it became 

evident, probably from ULTRA sources, that the Luftwaffe had not begun to 

occupy its advanced bases in France, the Allies discontinued their attacks.81 

As air preliminaries for the invasion proceeded, Leigh-Mallory laid the 

groundwork for the final phase of preinvasion activities. In the week before the 

invasion he would have control of all assisting air forces. On May 23, less than 

two weeks before D-day, scheduled for June 5, he inaugurated a series of daily 

morning Allied Air Commanders’ Conferences on projected operations and the 

allotment of tasks between the various forces involved.82 Tedder, Spaatz, 

Doolittle, Harris, and senior AEAF officers attended this initial session in the 

Battle Room of Advanced AEAF Headquarters in Uxbridge. 

Afterwards, in a gesture typical of his obtuseness, Leigh-Mallory complained that the American officers assigned to the Battle Room, from which he 

planned to conduct and monitor the daily combat activities of the Allied air 

forces over the beachhead, were not carrying out procedures “according to his 

ideas,” and he asked Vandenberg that they be transferred elsewhere and replaced 

by British officers. Vandenberg acquiesced, but later called Spaatz and, characterizing Leigh-Mallory ’s actions as “outrageous,” offered to “bring a very fine 

fight out in the open.” After thinking it over, Spaatz instructed Vandenberg “to 

carry on at present, say nothing to upset relations.” Once they got the troops 

ashore, said Spaatz, the whole question of command and use of the American air 

forces would have to be reexamined.83 Not surprisingly, sour relations between 

Leigh-Mallory and senior American air officers continued until the invasion and 

beyond. 

By the end of May, USSTAF had still not completed the details of its participation in the first day of the invasion. All agreed that its first bomber mission 

should drench the invasion beaches just before the assault forces landed. 

USSTAF and AEAF parted company, however, on the objectives for the second 

mission of the day. On June 1, Leigh-Mallory, Vandenberg, and his deputy, 

Brig. Gen. Frederic Smith, all rejected as operationally unsound USSTAF’s proposal to strike enemy troop and road movement behind the front 1ines.from an 

altitude of 15,000 feet. The bombers would be unable to locate German troops in 

the thickly wooded country of Normandy, and they would further congest the 

already crowded airspace. AEAF wanted USSTAF to stick to bombing desig41 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

U.S. Army Air Forces fighters bringing an engine to its last stop on a "Chattanooga 

Choo-Choo" strafing sortie, May 1944. 

nated villages and towns in order to block the roads with rubble and impede 

German movement.84 

That evening during dinner, Vandenberg with Spaatz and Maj. Gen. 

Laurence S. Kuter, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff for Plans, who had just 

arrived from Washington, agreed that USSTAF's plans for bombing troop 

movements could not work. Spaatz, who feared that the Luftwaffe's capabilities 

for D-day might have been greatly underestimated, instead, wanted to post-hole 

one more time all airfields within fighter range of the beachhead. Vandenberg 

demurred on the ground that the bombers would be spread too thin. He advocated bombing only key airfields, Spaatz agreed, Vandenberg would present the 

new plan to Leigh-Mallory the next day.85 

This proposal fit in well with instructions Spaatz had received earlier in the 

day from Tedder. Tedder, still bound by Churchill's desire to minimize French 

civilian casualties, required that Spaatz obtain clearance for any targets in 

France near a town or city center.86 This dinner session was typical of Spaatz's 

modus operundi. He purposely used the relaxing atmosphere of his comfortable 

house and table to facilitate compromise and discussion in a convivial setting far 

removed from an office or conference room where everyone would be on guard. 

The next day, Leigh-Mallory disapproved the key airfields plan, whereupon 

412 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

Vandenberg suggested that he consult Tedder. This Leigh-Mallory did and 

reported back to Vandenberg that not only Tedder but Eisenhower had approved 

his own plan to bomb the road choke points between German reinforcements 

and the beachheads. Reluctantly, Vandenberg then signed the order for an attack 

on eleven French cities.87 

On June 3, Tedder, Spaatz, and others trekked to Stanmore for the daily Air 

Commanders’ meeting. Spaatz suggested changes in the employment of the strategic forces. In his view, the plan for strategic air support after the initial D-day 

strike was too rigid and it lacked provisions for any counterair effort. He probably 

based his appraisal on the need for a counterair effort on the reports emanating 

from RAF Air Intelligence. On May 25, A1 predicted that approximately 1,600 

German aircraft would be engaged against the beachhead by D-day plus four days 

and that there would be 1,100 to 1,250 German sorties on the day of the invasion. 

On May 30, ULTRA identified only ten groups (280 planes) of single-engine 

fighters in Germany, because of the transfer of other groups to the west.88 

Spaatz proposed withholding a reserve for airfield bombing and the flexible 

employment of his force according to the flow of the ground assault, rather than 

the execution of a set scheme of attacks on targets fixed before the battle. LeighMallory ridiculed the suggestion, maintaining that fighters and fighter-bombers 

could provide the necessary counterair effort. But Spaatz persisted, believing 

that Leigh-Mallory had committed the Eighth Air Force to “using a doubtful 

means of delaying enemy ground movements and neglecting a punitive means 

of reducing his air efforts.”89 Leigh-Mallory would not reconsider his position, 

and, as Vandenberg noted in his diary, “a slightly acrimonious air prevailed as 

the meeting was adjourned.”90 

Later, Spaatz met separately with both Eisenhower and Tedder at WIDEWINGS, 

where he continued to press his views on the employment of heavy bombers. 

Spaatz complained to Eisenhower that the more bombers he had, the more missions the ground commanders planned to send them on.91 Eisenhower sympathized but apparently would sanction no changes in the AEAF’s plan. 

Early Monday morning, June 5, Eisenhower, despite marginal weather conditions, made his fateful decision to commit his forces to the assault the following day, June 6. That evening Spaatz and Vandenberg had dinner at Eisenhower’s 

house and spent the evening at Vandenberg’s quarters. There they kept track of 

the Ninth Air Force’s Troop Carrier Command, which had just left its bases to 

drop two American airborne divisions behind the invasion beaches. For the rest 

of the night the two continued to receive reports on airborne operations and the 

lack of German air opposition. They had both worried that the airborne troops, 

whose route took them directly over portions of the invasion fleet, might 

encounter the same murderous antiaircraft fire from their own forces as they had 

during the Sicilian invasion. Around 4:OO A.M., June 6, when the last of the main 

drops had ended, Spaatz left Vandenberg’s residence and returned to his own 

headquarters to follow the invasion from there.92 

413 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Each segment of the AAF played its own distinctive part in the operations 

on D-day. The IX Troop Carrier Command began the American assault on 

Normandy with its airborne drop during the night of June 5-6. The VIII Fighter 

Command began patrolling the outer perimeter of the invasion area as the troop 

carriers and night bombers withdrew. The Eighth’s fighters kept up their patrols 

until the troops landed, whereupon they moved to an area just outside the beachhead to patrol and to attack any legitimate targets. The IX Fighter Command and 

the RAF (with their shorter-endurance fighters) covered the beaches and provided fighter-bomber support. Five groups of P-38s, one from the Ninth Air 

Force and four from the Eighth, maintained an all-day umbrella over the invasion convoys delivering the ground assault troops to the beaches. Just before Hhour* the bombers of the Eighth and Ninth attacked the beach defenses. Low 

clouds forced the heavy bombers to employ H2X. The medium bombers of the 

Ninth had to come in under the clouds to drop their payloads, exposing themselves to heavy coastal antiaircraft fire. Weather interfered with the Eighth’s 

second mission of the day, and only three groups, approximately 90 aircraft out 

of 528 bombers dispatched, released their bombs on road choke points outside 

the beachhead. Other Eighth Air Force missions bombed Caen and transportation targets in a wide arc from Coutances in the west to Lisieux in the east. For 

the day, the Eighth and Ninth launched 8,722 sorties and lost 71 aircraft, mostly 

fighters, to flak.93 

As for the Luftwaffe it could mount barely 100 sorties (70 by fighters) on 

the first day of the invasion, and only 175 more completely ineffectual sorties on 

the night of June 6-7. In all of France it possessed 815 aircraft, including 325 

bombers, 170 single-engine fighters, 45 twin-engine fighters, and only 75 

ground attack aircraft.94 As Spaatz stated in late June 1944, “The concentrated 

attacks on the Luftwaffe, production, and product, paid the dividends that we 

always envisioned, the dividend being beyond expectation. During the entire 

first day of the invasion enemy opposition in the air, either fighter or bomber, 

was next to ni1.”95 

The battle for air supremacy over the beachhead never occurred, because the 

AAF had already defeated the Luftwaffe over Germany. D-day and the Luftwaffe’s 

feeble reaction in the following weeks amply proved Spaatz’s oft-repeated contention that the greatest contribution the strategic air forces could make to 

OVERLORD was the smashing of the German fighter force. This offensive achievement ranked with the defensive victory of the RAF in the Battle of Britain. The 

demise of the German fighter force was a turning point in the air war. 

* H-hour, the time when the first assault craft would land and release its troops onto the beach, 

was 6:30 A.M. for the American invasion beaches (Omaha and Utah) and 7:OO A.M. and 7:30 A.M. for 

the British landings. Among the factors dictating selection of H-hour were at least an hour of daylight before it (for preliminary bombardment) and tide at half-flood (to expose German obstacles) 

and rising (to ensure two high tides in daylight for maximum unloading of supplies). 

414 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

When Spaatz returned to London from the Mediterranean in late December 

1943 to form the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, he had two primary tasks: 

to justify and execute the AAF’s portion of the Combined Bomber Offensive 

against Germany and to ensure the success of the U.S.-British cross-channel 

invasion to the best of his ability. These tasks required him to serve two masters, 

Arnold and Eisenhower, both of whom had, at times, very different conceptions 

of the part they wished him to play. 

Arnold had fought for the creation of USSTAF because he believed that the 

American strategic air forces in Italy and England should have a single, able airman to coordinate, control, and command them. Arnold had another objective as 

well. As he told Spaatz in late February 1944: 

The other, and perhaps equally important, motive behind the formation of the 

United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe was my desire to build an 

American Air Commander to a high position prior to the defeat of Germany. It 

is that aspect particularly which had impelled me in my so far successful fight 

to keep your command parallel in stature to Harris’ command and, therefore, 

parallel to Ike’s. 

Arnold further felt the need to ensure the AAF a proper share of the victory. He 

told Spaatz: 

If you do not remain in a position parallel with Harris the air war will certainly 

be won by the RAP, if anybody. Already the spectacular effectiveness of their 

devastation of cities has placed their contribution in the popular mind at so high 

a plane that I am having the greatest difficulty in keeping your achievement (far 

less spectacular to the public) in its proper role not only in publications, but 

unfortunately in military and naval circles, and in fact, with the President himself. Therefore, considering only the aspect of a proper American share in 

credit for success in the air war, I feel we must have a high air commander 

some place in Europe. Today you can be that commander [emphasis added].96 

Eisenhower, in contrast, wanted control of the strategic forces in order to 

guarantee the success of OVERLORD. Herequired that control as early as possible--far longer than desired by Arnold, who initially conceded only that the 

heavy bombers would come under the Supreme Commander during the assault 

phase of the invasion. In addition, Eisenhower intended to use his control of the 

strategic air forces to implement a plan whose aims, requirements, and methods 

of execution raised profound doubts in the minds of many senior airmen, including Spaatz. 

Spaatz, of course, had his own ideas; he did not meekly follow the dictates of 

his powerful superiors. Against Arnold’s hopes, he did not do his utmost to maintain a position independent from Eisenhower’s. He did not object to coming 

under Eisenhower’s control, provided he was not subordinated to the AEAF and 

provided Bomber Command came under equal and parallel control. Spaatz’s 

415 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

willingness to come under Eisenhower, however, did not mean that he abdicated 

his responsibility as a professional airman to employ his units to inflict maximum damage on the enemy. An examination of Spaatz’s actions from New 

Year’s Day 1944 to D-day, June 6, 1944, shows that he not only served his masters well but did so while remaining his own man. 

From the beginning of his tenure, Spaatz clearly saw that the attainment of 

the goals of both POINTBLANK and OVERLORD depended on a single factor-the 

destruction of the Luftwaffe. Once he had severed Hitler’s air arm, he could 

pulverize Germany’s war economy and ensure air supremacy for the land campaign. Spaatz remorselessly pursued that goal, pushing the men under his command almost to the breaking point. Doolittle, under the watchful eyes of 

Anderson and Spaatz, sent his men and machines into the air day after day. By 

March, the Eighth Air Force often abandoned deception tactics and flew straight 

to their targets in order to provoke attrition. The primary reason the Eighth made 

the long, hard, costly trip to Berlin was not just to bomb Hitler’s capital but to 

force the Luftwaffe into the air. At last, when their losses in machines and pilots 

forced the Germans to adopt a policy of conservation, Spaatz insisted, over the 

objections of Tedder and Portal and the resistance of Eisenhower, on launching 

the strategic attack on the German oil industry. The absolutely necessary defense 

of that target system exposed the Luftwaffe to further punishing attrition. 

Spaatz’s championship of the oil plan exemplified his ability to fight for and 

gain his own goals while not irreparably damaging the teamwork and unity 

demanded by successful coalition warfare and interservice cooperation. Spaatz 

believed that if he could smash the oil industry, he could quickly and fatally 

weaken Germany. He would not allow anyone or anything to permanently divert 

him from that goal. First, he presented an alternative to the transportation plan. 

When that failed, he sought an opportunity to demonstrate the effectiveness of 

his policy. When the Germans showed signs of conserving their fighter force, 

Spaatz had the leverage he needed to obtain Eisenhower’s approval of a limited 

trial of oil bombing. As Spaatz had opined, the actual bombing revealed the 

acute sensitivity of the Germans to threats to their oil. 

Spaatz did not simply advocate the oil plan. He took risks with his career by 

authorizing the clandestine bombing of the Ploesti refineries. Such a move, if 

unsuccessful, might have been difficult to explain and could have earned him a 

reprimand or worse. But again, by keeping that bombing sub rosa, he allowed 

the British to ignore it when they heard of it, which presumably they did soon 

after the raids. 

Spaatz used variations of this same subterfuge in his unsigned letters to 

Portal on morale and to Eisenhower on civilian casualties, and in obtaining permission to interdict bridges. In these instances, the results justified Spaatz’s 

actions and judgments. That he did not show similar restraint in his dealings 

with Leigh-Mallory is understandable. He did not believe that Leigh-Mallory 

was competent to perform his duties or, because of his high-handedness and 

416 
FINAL PREPARATIONS 

insensitivity, deal with Americans. Because Leigh-Mallory insisted on having a 

headquarters top-heavy with British personnel and tried to interfere with his 

relationship with the Ninth Air Force, Spaatz apparently decided that, in this 

instance, the rules of Allied unity need not apply. Spaatz continued to question 

Leigh-Mallory’s plans until the eve of the invasion. 

The efforts of the AAF in this period cost dearly in blood and matiriel. From 

January 1 through May 3 1, the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces lost 2,35 1 heavy 

bombers on combat missions. They wrote off another 254 from accidents and 

unrepairable battle damage. The Eighth and Ninth Air Forces lost 983 fighters 

and suffered 18,403 casualties (5,427 killed in action, 11,033 missing in action or 

interned, and 1,943 wounded). Ninety percent of those men, most of whom were 

missing in action or prisoners of war, would not fight against Germany again. 

The Fifteenth and Twelfth Air Forces lost 595 fighters and sustained 7,285 casualties (2,780 killed in action, 3,452 missing in action, and 1,053 wounded). The 

Fifteenth probably suffered 80 percent of the AAF’s personnel losses in the 

Mediterranean. This expenditure of resources gained the Allies air supremacy 

over Europe. With air supremacy came the freedom to bomb at will any target in 

Germany and the freedom invade France without Luftwaffe interference. 

The achievement of air supremacy over France and the invasion area and of 

air superiority over Germany before D-day was the decisive contribution 

of Spaatz and USSTAF to OVERLORD. Battling for control of the skies on the day 

of the invasion might have ruined Allied objectives. By forcing the Luftwaffe to 

concentrate its chief defensive effort over Germany, USSTAF left the Luftwaffe 

unable or unwilling to oppose the Allied interdiction air campaign in northern 

France. The Eighth’s contribution to the transportation plan, although not niggardly, amounted to less than one-third of Bomber Command’s-13,000 tons to 

46,000 tons.97 For the first three months of 1944, 70 percent of the Eighth’s 

bombs hit German soil.98 In April, the Eighth Air Force dropped 62.5 percent of 

its bombs on Germany; in May, 57 percent of its bombs fell on Germany.99 

Given the increase in bombers available to Doolittle in April and May, actual 

tonnage on the Reich went up in both months. Thus, preinvasion bombing, 

although a diversion, did not greatly damage the Combined Bomber Offensive. 

For the first five months of 1944, CROSSBOW targets received more tonnage16,082 tons-than transportation targets.100 This represented a dead loss to the 

Eighth’s war effort, because CROSSBOW neither involved Luftwaffe fighter opposition nor substantially delayed German deployment of V-1 pilotless jet propelled bombers. Transportation bombing at least aided the invasion. 

Spaatz’s bridge campaign may have been at least as important as the transportation plan. The bridge campaign consumed only 4,400 tons of bombs and 

for the first phase of the invasion greatly reduced the Germans’ ability to shift 

heavy units rapidly to the invasion beachhead. The units eventually arrived but 

battered, piecemeal, and late, which gave the Allied ground forces the time they 

needed to consolidate their positions. 

417 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

In the first six days of June, the Eighth bombed only tactical targets in 

France in support of the OVERLORD assault. Out of 14,230 tons dropped, the 

Eighth dropped 7,018 on the Pas-de-Calais coastal defenses as part of Allied 

preinvasion deception efforts, and 4,852 on D-day.101 Aside from in some measure keeping Hitler’s attention fixed on Pas-de-Calais as the most probable invasion site, this effort probably contributed little to the success of the invasion. 

There was no testimony among the German defenders at the Normandy beaches 

of any discomfiture attributable to Allied heavy bombers. 

USSTAF’s preinvasion bombing certainly damaged the Germans, but those 

efforts seem small compared with the efforts of Bomber Command and the 

AEAF, which by themselves would have sufficed to fulfill the Allies’ goals for 

preinvasion air operations. If USSTAF had spent that same effort demolishing 

the German oil industry, the Allies might have won the war earlier. Spaatz did 

everything in his power to keep his bombers over Germany where they could 

bomb oil targets and maintain air supremacy. 

418 
Part Five 

The Mortal Blow 

From Normandy to Berlin, 

June 6,1944-May 9,1945 

Part Five 

The Mortal Blow 

During the last eleven months of the war in Europe the Anglo-American 

Allies successfully established themselves on the Continent, broke out of their 

beachhead to drive across France to the German border, fought an arduous campaign to penetrate the German border defenses, repelled Hitler’s last-gamble 

counteroffensive, crossed the Rhine River to meet the westward advancing 

forces of the Soviet Union, and finally forced the unconditional surrender of the 

German state. The Army Air Forces and its senior officer in Europe, Carl 

Spaatz, played a large role in achieving Allied victory. Operating under Dwight 

Eisenhower’s direct control from June to September 1944 and thereafter independently, the United States Strategic Air Forces in Europe crushed the already 

defeated Luftwaffe while seeking a balance between its strategic mission of 

destroying the German war economy and its tactical responsibilities to aid the 

advance of the Allied ground armies by all means possible. 

Because his dual positions as the commander of both USSTAF and the AAF 

in the European Theater of Operations gave Spaatz administrative control of all 

AAF units in the theater, he became the de facto leader of almost all U.S. Army 

Air Forces fighting the Nazis. Even Ira Eaker, AAF commander of the Mediterranean Allied Air Forces, often consulted with Spaatz and tended to defer to 

his judgment. The head of the AAF, Arnold, certainly viewed Spaatz as the principal U.S. airman in Europe. Arnold did his utmost to support Spaatz with men 

and materiel while charging him with the task of enhancing the image and status 

of the AAF at every opportunity. 

Thanks in part to his close and easy relationships with the Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force, Eisenhower, and the Deputy Supreme Commander, 

Tedder, Spaatz balanced the competing and sometimes contradictory demands on 

his command’s capabilities with an kclut that brought promotion for himself and, 

more important, prestige and credit to the AAF. 

42 1 

Chapter 12 

Summer 1944: 

CROSSBOW, THUNDERCLAP, 

and Strategic Bombing 

(June-September 1944) 

My own opinion of the present situation is that so far the 

Germans have been very successful in that all the power of 

the Americans and the British is being contained in a narrow beachhead by fourteen half-baked . . . divisions, 

thereby relieving Germany of the pressure of the bombardment to which they have been subjected during the past six 

months.' 

4paatz's Command Diary, June 17, I944 

From June to mid-September 1944, the fighting on the ground between the 

Western Allies and the Germans divided into two distinct phases: (1) the landing 

and expansion of the beachhead (June 6 to July 24) and (2) the breakout from 

the beachhead and pursuit of the defeated Germans to the French-German border 

(July 25 to September 10). Whereas the operations of the Allied tactical air 

forces had to adapt to the exigencies of the ground situation, the operations of 

the strategic air forces developed differently. Spaatz, although subordinate to 

Eisenhower until the middle of September, had his eyes on a perspective beyond 

that of some ground and tactical air leaders who wished to put themselves into a 

position from which they could attack and destroy Germany. Spaatz already had 

the means available to attack deep within Germany. He fought to retain his 

forces for the Combined Bomber Offensive, while the ground soldiers continually pressed him to divert his planes to tasks on the front line or relatively close 

behind it. They believed that a well-timed, heavy air strike might provide the 

final element needed to achieve the decisive breakthrough. 

423 
\ 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

This argument could never convince a strategically minded airman like 

Spaatz. He pleaded that large formations of heavy bombers did not easily lend 

themselves to concentration on a single decisive point necessary for the support 

of a land attack. The Eighth often launched missions consisting of several hundred heavy bombers, but when they reached their target area, they separated into 

component bomb wings (100 to 150 bombers) or bomb groups (40 to 50 planes) 

to deliver their ordnance on individual targets. This practice increased bombing 

accuracy and avoided possible problems when too many bombers hit the same 

target at too close intervals. These problems included dust and smoke clouds 

obscuring the target, antiaircraft artillery, and air congestion disrupting formations and causing highly spread bomb patterns. In any case, the Army did not 

need, except in cases of emergency, the constant support of heavy bombers and 

their escorts when the tactical air forces had ample numbers of fighter-bombers 

and medium bombers at the beck and call of the ground forces. Spaatz’s efforts to 

maintain the strategic bomber offensive in the face of diversions to retard the 

German V-1 attacks on England, to support the ground forces, and to engage in 

morale bombing as opposed to precision bombing over Germany constitute the 

theme of this chapter. 

Initial Operations 

Before the invasion Spaatz had agreed to aid the assault phase of the operation. For that critical phase the Eighth Air Force ceased its attacks directed 

against German industry and devoted its efforts to the bombing program called 

for in preinvasion and invasion deception plans. From May 30, when the Eighth 

struck aircraft production targets in Germany and then temporarily halted strategic attacks, until June 18, when it resumed missions against industrial targets in 

Germany, the Eighth flew exclusively in support of the invasion. In June the 

Eighth dropped 44,209 tons of bombs on France, almost 76 percent of its effort 

for the month.2 

The Germans, too, meant to put their maximum air power into the skies over 

the beachhead. To that end, in the four days following D-day they sent more 

than 300 single-engine fighter aircraft in addition to the 170 already in France to 

fly ground support for the troops battling the Allies.3 This action, however, 

proved disastrous. The Luftwaffe drew its planes from the fighter force defending the homeland against attacks by Allied heavy-bomber forces and assigned 

them to fledgling pilots, who had just replaced the veteran pilots killed or disabled in the spring, were minimally trained for antibomber operations, and had 

no ground support training. In their flights to the forward airfields they suffered 

an accumulation of losses not only from Allied aircraft, who knew their flight 

plans from signal intelligence decryptions,4 but also from their own faulty navigation and from landings on unfamiliar fields.5 

The Luftwaffe literally telegraphed its punches to the Allies. Throughout 

424 
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

I 

I 

I 

7 Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz and 

General Henry H. Arnold 

visiting the first Ninth Air 

Force air strip constructed 

in the Normandy beachhead, June 1944. 

this phase of the campaign in the west, the Allied ULTRA signal intercept organization read and distributed the Luftwaffe’s messages at least as quickly as the 

intended recipients.6 The Luftwaffe Enigma machine was simpler than its army 

and navy equivalents in that it possessed one less code-setting wheel or rotor. 

Consequently, the ULTRA organization had fewer difficulties deciphering the 

Luftwaffe’s messages than those of the other German armed forces. As early as 

2:30 P.M. on June 6, ULTRA learned that eighteen fighter groups had left 

Germany for France.7 By June 8, it learned that seven more groups had arrived, 

and it passed their exact locations on to Allied operational units. Within six days 

of the invasion, June 12, ULTRA knew that because of the fierce pressure exerted 

by the Allies, the Luftwaffe had given up on fighter-bombing, ordering the 

removal of bomb racks and the reconversion of their aircraft to their pure fighter 

configuration.8 This action, which eliminated the fighters’ capacity to deliver 

bombs, proved that the Luftwaffe had abandoned its ground support role and had 

been forced entirely into defense against Allied air attacks. By the end of the first 

week, the Luftwaffe’s strength stood at 1,100 machines, its highest of the campaign. 

The British Air Ministry greatly overestimated this force at 1,615 aircraft, but 

noted a very low serviceability rate, 33 percent for fighters and 16 percent for 

fighter-bombers. The average daily fighter effort ranged from 250 to 300 sorties. 

RAF Air Intelligence noted that bomber groups operated at only 65 percent of 

425 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

establishment.9 Heavy attacks by the Eighth over airfields on June 14 and 15- 

based on information from ULTRA intercepts-applied the coup de grace. On 

June 16, the Luftwaffe withdrew five shattered groups for refitting in Germany. 

Their replacements at the front, also drawn from domestic air defense duties, 

fared little better. During the month of June 1944, the total fighter force available for German home defense fell from 700 to 370.10 

The diversion of the Eighth Air Force from the strategic bombing campaign 

to the immediate support of the invasion could not have been avoided. It was 

unlikely that Eisenhower, who had ultimate control of the heavy bombers and 

most of the other high-level Allied commanders, would ever have allowed the 

Combined Bomber Offensive to continue unabated while the Luftwaffe and the 

German Army rushed units toward the beachhead. Spaatz had accepted this fact 

from the day he learned of his appointment to USSTAF. In any case, the 

Luftwaffe was unable to use the temporary halt in POINTBLANK to any advantage. 

Instead, Hitler and Goering stripped the homeland of half of its defending aircraft to send them into the maelstrom over Normandy, where overwhelming 

Allied air power quickly dashed them to bits. When the Combined Bomber 

Offensive resumed, it found much less opposition. 

Operation CROSSBOW 

The first major diversion of the strategic bombing forces, after operations 

flown in direct support of OVERLORD, began within a few days of the invasion. 

On the night of June 12-13, the first V-1 robot bomb, designated by the 

Germans as Vergeltungswuffe eins (Reprisal Weapon No. 1) and called, among 

other names, “flying bomb,” “buzz-bomb,” or “doodlebug” by the Allies, struck 

England. In the next few days, the rate of the attack, directed mainly toward 

London, increased. In retrospect, this weapon caused much more alarm among 

the English people and their political leaders than was warranted. Nonetheless, 

at the time, the V-1, with its near-total unpredictability and unnerving buzzing 

sound that shut off just before impact, provoked extraordinary anxiety and led to 

extreme pressure on the Allies to reduce the threat. 

In all, between June 13 and September 1, 1944, 5,890 flying bombs landed 

in England. They killed 5,835 persons and seriously injured an additional 

16,762. London suffered 90 percent of all casualties.11 Each weapon killed, on 

the average, one person and seriously injured almost three more. In contrast, 

during the ten-day Battle of Hamburg in July 1943, the RAF and the AAF killed 

almost 50,000 German civilians, most as the result of a single fire storm on the 

night of July 27-28.12 (See Map 13, Operation CROSSBOW Network.) 

Because the Allied armies had bogged down in Normandy and could not 

break out to occupy any launch sites farther up the French coast and because 

they needed most of the tactical air forces’ efforts for their own support, the burden of countering the V-l fell to the strategic air forces. The British wanted the 

426 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

launch sites bombed into inoperability, and they wanted counterterror raids conducted on the German people. Spaatz objected to both solutions; previous bombings of launch sites had proved ineffective and terror bombing could produce no 

predictable result to justify the abandonment of precision bombing. 

At first the Allies failed to react, but the firing of 300 buzz bombs on the 

night of June 15-16 necessitated some countermeasure. On June 18, Churchill 

visited Tedder and Eisenhower at the latter’s headquarters at WIDEWINGS in the 

London suburb of Teddington. Churchill persuaded them to designate V-1 sites 

as the chief targets of the strategic air forces.13 Eisenhower passed the decision 

along to the airmen at the Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting and emphasized to 

all present the seriousness with which he viewed the situation. He approved the 

use of USSTAF and Bomber Command and every other “means practicable for 

stopping the pilotless aircraft.”l4 At the end of the meeting, Eisenhower told 

Maj. Gen. Fred Anderson to carry the word to Spaatz that CROSSBOW would 

“receive first priority over all other targets, either in France or Germany.”ls 

Eisenhower followed up his message with a call to Spaatz that afternoon, and 

Spaatz promised to set aside a small force for exclusive use against V-1 sites.16 

Spaatz and Doolittle responded promptly. They had already resumed 

CROSSBOW strikes on June 16 and 18, and on June 19 they stepped up their effort 

by sending 703 heavy bombers out to hit V-1 launch sites. During six of the 

remaining eleven days of the month, the Eighth sent out CROSSBOW missions of 

at least 125 planes each. In addition to hitting the launch sites, the Eighth broadened its attack to include electrical switching and power stations that supplied 

the weapons as well as storage areas. Bomber Command took even stronger 

measures, and the Ninth also contributed 1,500 medium-bomber sorties starting 

on June 23. For the latter half of June, Allied air power dispatched 8,310 bomber 

sorties and dropped 23,431 tons of bombs.17 As AAF official historians acknowledged, “CROSSBOW Operations during the second half of June indicated that the 

Germans had again created for the Allies a diversionary problem of the first 

magnitude.”] 8 

From the beginning of this new phase of CROSSBOW, Spaatz voiced his 

objections to the amount of force he had to devote to it and to the targets 

selected for it. Like most of the AAF’s commanders in Europe, Spaatz believed 

that mass bombing of the launch sites accomplished little. The Germans had 

hardened the large sites with vast amounts of concrete, making them impervious 

to the most powerful bombs. They had, for the most part, abandoned the large 

sites to concentrate on small, well-camouflaged positions almost impossible to 

spot from the air. Spaatz wished to bomb the electrical system in Pas-de-Calais, 

which would stymie the functioning of the large sites and supply areas. The 

British, who controlled the V-1 targeting selection from the Air Ministry, incorporated these proposals into their plans but did not emphasize them.19 They continued to expend most of the heavy-bomber effort on large launch sites, with 

negligible results. Spaatz asked Arnold to direct the air proving grounds in 

428 
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

B 

J 

L 

Winston Churchill wearing the uniform of a Marshal of the RAF at an antiaircraft 

gun line in Britain. 

Florida to begin experiments using war-weary planes loaded with explosives. 

Spaatz hoped to fly the planes by remote control to crash into otherwise impregnable targets. At the same time he initiated within the theater a similar program 

variously called APHRODITE or WEARY-WILLIE.~~ 

Finally, he offered two suggestions closer to his true purpose-that of maintaining the Combined Bomber Offensive. He offered to bomb the German factories making the V- 1 ’s gyroscopes and the large, recently discovered V- 1 storage 

depots in France.21 The bombing of factories in Germany would serve Spaatz’s 

twofold purpose of halting the V-1 attacks and of luring the Luftwaffe into the 

sky. 

On June 29, he hand-carried a letter to Eisenhower expressing his views on 

the main tasks facing USSTAF. In it he pointed out that the defeat of the 

Luftwaffe had taken place over Germany and not the occupied countries: “I consider the primary tasks of the Strategic Air Forces now to be the denial to the 

German ground. . . of the means with which to effectively continue resistance 

and the continuation of the neutralization of the German Air Force.” To accomplish these tasks Spaatz asked Eisenhower to make the following policy decision: “On those days when weather conditions over Germany are favorable for 

visual bombing, such operations should have overriding priority over all others.” 

Spaatz allowed for two exceptions-a major emergency involving the ground 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

forces and operations against the large installations being prepared to launch the 

German rocket-propelled V-2. The V-2 was a supersonic rocket whose advent 

the Allies feared perhaps even more than that of the V-1. No defense, save the 

destruction of its takeoff platform, could work against the swift, powerful V-2. 

Spaatz did not believe that operations against V-1 firing sites could be sufficiently decisive on any one day to justify diverting the strategic air forces from 

their primary tasks on the few days of favorable weather over Germany. As for 

the use of heavy bombers in support of the ground forces, Spaatz noted, “In the 

absence of a major ground force emergency, I do not believe that the results from 

the tactical use of heavy bombers will constitute as much support to OVERLORD as 

the use of the same force against critical German targets.” Spaatz explained that 

the “normal weather cycle” ensured enough unsuitable weather over Germany to 

provide a large proportion of the available heavy-bomber effort for employment 

against tactical objectives in Normandy.22 

Although Eisenhower privately regarded the V-1 as “very much of a nuisance,”23 his ranking of air priorities naturally differed from Spaatz’s. In a memo 

to his chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith, he observed that by September 20 good flying weather over Europe would cease. Therefore, for the next sixty 

to ninety days he ranked “direct attacks against Germany” sixth in priority below 

normal close support of the ground army, disruption of communication lines, 

neutralization of CROSSBOW, airborne operations, and supply of troops by air. 

However, he allowed an escape clause: “In any event there will unquestionably 

be sufficient days, when other types of operations are impracticable, to continue 

the striking [air] assault upon Germany, and there will be days during the winter 

when this can likewise be carried out.”24 

When he received Spaatz’s letter, June 29, Eisenhower appended it to a 

memo for Deputy Supreme Commander Tedder in which he issued a new bombing directive giving CROSSBOW top priority with the proviso, ‘‘ . . . when we have 

favorable conditions over Germany and when the entire Strategic Air Force cannot be used against CROSSBOW, we should attack-a. Aircraft industry; b. Oil; c. 

Ball bearings; d. Vehicular production.”25 

Spaatz’s resentment of and resistance to the CROSSBOW diversion continued 

into July. When he received an allocation of targets giving the Eighth Air Force 

sixty-eight CROSSBOW targets as compared to thirty for Bomber Command and 

only six for the AEAF, he strongly protested to Eisenhower, “If we are to consider all these targets as a high priority obligation, the implementation of our 

strategic bombing plans will be seriously hindered.”26 At the forefront of Spaatz’s 

objections lay the realization that long summer days provided unparalleled opportunities for his own forces but denied opportunities to Bomber Command, which 

could not penetrate deeply into Germany during the short summer nights in northem Europe. A short winter’s day later could not replace a long sunlit summer’s 

day, which gave the U.S. bomber formations license to penetrate as deeply as possible into German-occupied Europe. Spaatz pointed out to Eisenhower: 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

Germans preparing to launch a V-1 flying bomb across the English Channel. 

It must be borne in mind that the U.S. Strategic Air Force is the only force 

presently in a position to make deep penetrations in strength beyond the Ruhr 

and therefore must be responsible for the largest share of the strategic task of 

denying to the enemy the means with which to effectively continue resistance.*’ 

Spaatz also noted that CROSSBOW would interfere with USSTAF’s tactical 

target assignments (bridges, POL [petroleum, oil, and lubricants] dumps, and 

airfields). Because of the “present restricted operational capabilities” of Bomber 

Command and the limited range of the tactical air force, he recommended that 

they be directed to maintain a fixed percentage of their force for CROSSBOW. For 

his part, he promised to put in a strong effort against the V-2 launch sites when 

he could not fly over Germany. “Such an arrangement,” he stated, “should 

insure adequate effort against the CROSSBOW installations and. . . will not force 

one command to carry a greater burden than another to the detriment of the other 

priority tasks and the war effort as a whole.”28 

On the same day Spaatz discussed the CROSSBOW situation with Tedder. 

They agreed that current crazy-quilt air command arrangements interfered with 

the coordination of the CROSSBOW campaign. Spaatz used this chance to emphasize the need to continue operations over Germany in order to shorten the war 

and to continue the destruction of the German fighter force. He hoped to strain 

the Luftwaffe’s depleted daylight fighter force to such an extent that its crack 

night fighter force would have to join daylight battles. “If this is not done now,” 

Spaatz told Tedder, “the British night bomber force will not be able to operate 

43 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

without excessive losses when the nights get longer.”29 Tedder, despite the pressure on him from the British government to bomb CROSSBOW sites, agreed to 

work with Spaatz in persuading Eisenhower to free USSTAF from excessive 

commitment to CROSSBOW.30 Finally, Tedder, Portal, and Eisenhower, at Spaatz’s 

urging,31 set up a Joint CROSSBOW Committee to coordinate among the relevant 

air agencies but it proved ineffectual, in the opinion of USSTAF.32 In any case, 

there was no need for it after the V-1 launch sites were eliminated by ground 

forces in late August. 

From July and August until Allied ground troops overran the sites around 

September 1, Bomber Command, USSTAF, and the AEAF rained bombs on the 

entire identified V-weapon target system-from the German experimental 

rocket research station at Peenemunde on the Baltic, through the manufacturing 

plants at Russelshiem and Ober Raderach, through the power stations and electrical switching sites in France, to the storage areas and launch sites in Pas-deCalais. The campaign lasted seventy-seven days. In just two months-July and 

August-the Allied air forces expended 16,566 sorties and one-fourth of their 

total tonnage on CROSSBOW targets,33 all, however, to little avail. The AAF official history admits that the rate of V-1 firings continued “essentially unhindered,”34 and concludes, “The CROSSBOW campaign of the summer of 1944 must 

be regarded generally as having failed to achieve its objectives. Indeed it seems 

to have been the least successful part of the over-all effort.”35 

Reprisal Bombing and THUNDERCLAP 

The ineffectiveness of CROSSBOW raised the specter of another diversion of 

the strategic bombing effort. The failure of the rate of V-1 firings to drop by 

early July 1944, which was apparent to residents of London, led to demands for 

the diversion of the strategic air forces to retaliation or counterterror raids over 

Germany. These demands were behind Air Chief Marshal Harris’s request to 

schedule Bomber Command with the Eighth on a daylight mission over Berlin 

on June 21, 1944. Portal informed Churchill that he, Spaatz, Tedder, and 

Eisenhower favored the operation. More than 2,000 bombers, including 700 

from Bomber Command, would drop 6,500 tons of bombs. “At the lowest,” said 

Portal, “it will be a pretty good answer to the results achieved in the last few 

days by the ‘flying bomb’.”36 Operational considerations, such as the effectiveness of the German night fighter force and the lack of night-time flying hours (at 

the time of the summer solstice in European latitudes), also influenced Harris’s 

decision to participate in a daylight raid. 

However, at 1:OO A.M. on June 21, Harris, with Tedder’s concurrence,37 

scrubbed the mission. Base weather did not look favorable. Harris did not 

approve of Doolittle’s decision to send only half of his bomber force over the 

main target area, which increased the risk of flak to the low-flying RAF. He also 

had misgivings because mission plans revealed that the number of escorts sup432 
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

plied the British might drop from 300 to 150 or less.38 This decision was greeted 

with relief by Spaatz and Doolittle, who no longer had to stretch their escort 

fighters to cover the bomber formations of both air forces.39 The Eighth sent 

1,000 bombers to the Berlin area: 368 B-24s bombed targets in the vicinity of 

the city, and 560 B-l7s, using visual bombing techniques, released 1,371 tons of 

bombs, 20 percent of them incendiaries, on the military and civilian government 

area in the center of the city. This was the ninth release since March 6 by the 

Eighth of 750 or more tons on the heart of the city.40 

The idea of reprisal raids for the V-1, once started, gained a life of its own. 

By June 27, USSTAF developed Operation SHATTER, which proposed to bomb 

100 or more German cities in a single day in order to demonstrate to the German 

people (1) their vulnerability, (2) their defenselessness, (3) the full scope of 

Allied air power, (4) the fact that no city in Germany was too insignificant a target, and (5) the decline of the Luftwaffe. The authors of this plan, however, did 

not wish the attack to be tarred with the brush of terror bombing. They suggested striking utilities, transportation networks, government buildings, or minor 

industries.41 

Churchill raised the subject of reprisal raids at his Chiefs of Staff meeting on 

July 1, suggesting that the British announce their intention to flatten lesser 

German cities in turn if V-1 attacks continued. The British Chiefs agreed to 

postpone action to allow for a thorough study. In the meantime, Churchill took 

up the policy with Bedell Smith, who approved it, and Tedder, who considered it 

ineffective and “wickedly uneconomical.”42 At the British Chiefs of Staff meeting on July 3, Portal spoke against retaliatory bombing, warning that it gave 

“invaluable proof’ to the Germans that their V-1 policy had succeeded and 

amounted to entering into negotiations with the enemy. The Germans would not 

alter their plans for the sake of unimportant towns, and such bombing would 

divert resources from more important communications and oil targets. The other 

Chiefs agreed to further study.43 

At his War Cabinet meeting that evening Churchill ordered his Chiefs to 

take up the matter the next day. Portal presented further arguments against the 

idea. Fearing that the Germans might resort to counter measures, such as murdering downed air crews from British reprisal raids, he recommended adding V-1 

attacks to the list of war crimes for which the Nazis would be held accountable 

after the war. “We could not hope to keep pace with the Germans in a campaign 

of reprisals,” he concluded. The British Chiefs agreed to prepare a report on all 

aspects of retaliatory bombing, including the use of poison gas.4 The report, 

prepared by the Air Staff and the Ministry of Economic Warfare, took twentyfour hours and reflected Portal’s views. “No threat,” he reasoned, “is likely to 

deter Hitler in his present fix. Indeed it may well encourage him to order more 

F.B.’s [flying bombs] and make still further efforts to increase the scale of 

attack.” A threat to bomb the towns (1) implied a guarantee not to bomb them if 

Hitler stopped his V-1 campaign and (2) opened the door to the Germans on 

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negotiations over other aspects of bombing. Portal acknowledged, “Actually, 

London with its vast production, its communications centres, and the seat of 

Government is (under the conditions prevailing in the present war) a perfectly 

legitimate target for the sort of ‘browning’ [night nuisance] attacks which we are 

making by instruments on Berlin.”45 The final report repeated Portal’s arguments recommending rejection of the policy.46 This rejection did not end the 

matter. On July 5, the British Chiefs of Staff agreed “that the time might well 

come in the not too distant future when an all-out attack by every means at our 

disposal on German civilian morale might be decisive.” The British Chiefs recommended to Churchill “that the method by which such an attack would be carried out should be examined and all possible preparations made.”47 

For the next month a working committee with Air Staff, Foreign Office, 

Ministry of Economic Warfare, and USSTAF representatives met to determine 

the ideal approach to conducting a morale attack. On July 22, the committee 

issued a preliminary report and concluded that the object of any morale attack 

was “to influence the minds of the German authorities in such a way that they 

prefer organized surrender to continued resistance.” Until final military defeat 

was imminent, the Allies should continue the bomber offensive against economic and military targets. Any assault should be coordinated with Allied propaganda policy and directed against the High Command, the army, and the civilian 

population. Because of its importance as a center of population, industry, communications, and administration, Berlin was selected as the target of the committee’s campaign. The results of such bombing-the disruption of governmental 

services and communications at a critical juncture, as well as the demoralization 

of minor civil servants-would lead to an overall breakdown of public morale. 

Berlin had the operational advantage of being free of weather restrictions (its 

size made it easy to locate on radar scopes), and it could be attacked on short 

notice because both air forces knew the route to and the defenses of the city. The 

committee proposed to deliver 20,000 tons of bombs in a four-day and threenight round-the-clock blitz of the administrative center of Berlin.‘@ According to 

the British, Spaatz was in “general agreement” with the recommendations, but 

preferred “that no reference should be made in it to the concurrence of his unofficial representative at the meeting which discussed it.”49 

Spaatz’s reasons for withholding “official” concurrence were not clear. 

Apparently, the plan’s focus on population bombing troubled him. On July 21, 

after receiving advance notice of the morale committee’s report, he discussed the 

issue with Eisenhower, who stated, “We will continue precision bombing and 

not be deflected to morale bornbing.”so Yet on the same day, Spaatz’s Deputy 

for Operations, Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, issued a USSTAF policy directive to both the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces. Noting Spaatz’s oft reiterated 

and continuing intention to bomb precision targets, Anderson categorically 

denied any intention to area-bomb. But having denied the intention, Anderson 

proceeded to authorize the practice: “We will conduct bombing attacks through 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

the overcast where it is impossible to get precision targets. Such attacks will 

include German marshalling yards whether or not they are located in German 

cities.”5* As Anderson and Spaatz well knew, bombs dropped on targets in cities 

using overcast bombing techniques would cause great collateral damage. 

Apparently, it was acceptable to attack German civilians if they lived in cities 

with military targets, but not acceptable to make German civilians targets in and 

of themselves. 

In fact, thanks to four missions against Munich, which bombed through 

overcast and carried large percentages of incendiaries, Eighth Air Force records 

showed a wartime high for tonnage dropped on “towns & cities” of 9,886 tons 

in July 1944.52 Anderson and others in USSTAF did not regard this policy as 

hypocritical. They knew they had not aimed these raids at civilians, but rather at 

military targets. They judged themselves by their motives rather than their results. 

The committee’s final draft, submitted to the British Chiefs of Staff on 

August 3, placed even greater emphasis on population bombing and gave the 

plan of attack on German civilian morale a code name-THUNDERCLAP.53 The 

operational details called for 2,000 Eighth Air Force bombers to drop 5,000 

tons, under visual conditions, on a 2% square-mile area of central Berlin, estimated to contain a daytime population of 375,000. A bomb density of 2,000 tons 

per square mile would produce approximately 137,500 dead and 137,500 seriously injured. If necessary, the Fifteenth Air Force could participate, and 

Bomber Command could follow up with a night incendiary raid.54 

The plan continued to percolate through the AAF and RAF staffs. Kuter questioned it, writing to Anderson, “Since any such attack will feature U.S.A.A.F. 

units in the limelight, we should consider whether the recent buzz bomb attacks 

have not instilled in the British Government a desire for retaliation in which 

American air units will be called upon to share with the R.A.F. Bomber Command 

the onus for the more critical features of night area bombing.” Kuter reaffirmed 

the AAF’s policy of attacking military targets. “Our entire target policy has been 

founded on the fact that it was uneconomical to bomb any except military objectives and the German productive capacity. The bombing of civilian targets in 

Germany cannot be expected to have similar effects to those which might be 

expected in a democratic country where the people are still able to influence 

national will.” Kuter concluded: “It is contrary to our national ideals to wage war 

against civilians.” 

Ironically, a war plan Kuter had helped to author three years earlier called for 

the very action he now questioned. AWPD/l had provided for a massive strategic 

bombing campaign against Germany and contained specific suggestions on possible target systems. It listed four lines of action whose accomplishment would 

fulfill the air mission in Europe, including “undermining of German morale by 

air attack of civil concentrations.” In discussing that action AWPD/l stated: 

Timeliness of attack is most important in the conduct of air operations directly 

against civil morale. If the morale of the people is already low because of sus435 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

tained suffering and deprivation and because the people are losing faith in the 

ability of the armed forces to win a favorable decision, then heavy and sustained bombing of cities may crash that morale entirely. However, if these conditions do not exist, then area bombing of cities may actually stiffen the 

resistance of the population, especially if the attacks are weak and sporadic. . . . 

It is believed that the entire bombing effort might be applied to this purpose 

when it becomes apparent that the proper psychological conditions exist. 

In one of its annexes AWPD/l spoke of Berlin’s role in the anticipated air 

war. Immediately after strategic bombing had heavily and visibly damaged its 

economic targets, “or immediately after some major set-back of the German 

ground forces, it may become highly profitable to deliver a large scale all-out 

attack on the civil population of Berlin. In this event any or all of the bombardment forces may be diverted for this mission.”55 

Spaatz, as Chief of the AAF Staff, Arnold, as Commanding General of the 

AAF, Army Chief of Staff Marshall, Secretary of War Stimson, and President 

Roosevelt had all endorsed AWPD/l before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. 

Kuter and Spaatz may have objected less to the concept of a campaign or mission against morale then to the timing of THUNDERCLAP. 

In any case, like any good staff officer, Kuter began to prepare a contingency 

plan for the remote possibility that the AAF, “even though we are strongly 

opposed at this time to such methods,” might participate in such an operation. 

Kuter selected a dozen smaller cities, “ancient, compact, historic, wide-spread 

and of as much industrial importance as possible.” The AAF would warn the 

cities that one of them would be destroyed (to cause panic in all twelve) and 

finally all forces would deliver a concentrated attack on the selected city.56 

Arnold may never have seen this plan, but he objected strongly when the British 

proposal to attack civilian morale reached his desk. He preferred not to direct the 

attack solely at Berlin or the German people. He suggested a six-day-long series 

of sweeps by all available fighters and heavy bombers over all of Germany.57 

On August 3, the Air Staff presented THUNDERCLAP to the British Chiefs, 

who suggested that the War Cabinet’s Joint Planning Staff prepare an additional 

study regarding a possible assault on the Nazi machinery of repression, particularly the S.S. and the Gestapo. This attack would occur in coordination with, but 

not at the same time as, THUNDERCLAP in order to weaken Nazi control of the 

people.58 An Air Staff review of a draft of this plan rejected the bombing of 

security forces, reiterated the virtues of bombing Berlin, and produced a bloodcurdling analysis of the advantages of THUNDERCLAP, noting: “A spectacular and 

final object lesson to the German people on the consequences of universal 

aggression would be of continuing value in the post-war period. Again, the total 

devastation of the centre of a vast city such as Berlin would offer incontrovertible proof to all peoples of the power of a modem air force.” The Air Staff suggested “that such a proof would appreciably ease the task of policing the 

occupied areas largely by means of Air Forces. Moreover, it would convince our 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

Russian allies and the Neutrals of the effectiveness of Anglo-American air 

power.” The analysis concluded, “When allied forces had occasion to occupy, 

or neutral representatives to visit Berlin, they would be presented with a long 

continuing memorial to the effects which strategical bombing had produced in 

this war and could produce at any time again.”59 

The final plan of attack on the German government went forward on 

August 17. The Joint Planning Staff, because of the wide dispersion of targets 

and doubts as to their exact location, did not predict that the scheme was 

“likely to achieve any worthwhile degree of success.”60 The RAF Air Staff 

had additional concerns: The German government was not vulnerable; the 

selected small targets required visual bombing; and the RAF had insufficient 

intelligence. In addition, raids on complexes with concentration camps would 

produce casualties among the “internees.”61 Churchill agreed that the plan 

was impractical. He suggested instead drawing up a short list of war criminals, 50 to 100 high ranking Nazis, who would be executed if they fell into 

Allied hands. Publishing such a list, he speculated, would open a gap between 

those named and the people. He observed, “At the present moment, none of 

the German leaders has any interest but fighting to the last man, hoping he 

will be that last man. It is very important to show the German people that they 

are not on the same footing as Hitler, Goering, Himmler and other monsters 

who will infallibly be destroyed.”6* 

Later in August, SHAEF Headquarters began to discuss THUNDERCLAP.63 

On August 24, at the Allied Air Commanders’ meeting, Harris suggested that 

the Allies threaten in an ultimatum to the Germans to destroy certain towns if 

any V-2 rockets were fired into London.64 The suggestion was referred to the 

RAF Air Staff which quietly buried it. Spaatz gave Eisenhower his opinion of 

THUNDERCLAP, “I am opposed to this operation as now planned. We are prepared to participate in an operation against Berlin, but in doing so will select 

targets for attack of military importance.” Spaatz added, “U.S. Bombing 

Policy, as you know, has been directed against precision military objectives, 

and not morale.”65 Eisenhower, in his endorsement of Spaatz’s letter, noted 

that the operation would occur only under a limited set of conditions. He noted 

that although he had always insisted that USSTAF bomb precision targets he 

was “always prepared to take part in anything that gives real promise to ending 

the war quickly.” Eisenhower promised Spaatz, “The policies under which you 

are now operating will be unchanged unless in my opinion an opportunity 

arises where a sudden and devastating blow may have an incalculable result.”66 

Spaatz expressed stronger views to Arnold, who, unlike Eisenhower, did 

not require his subordinates to eschew inter-Allied bickering: 

I have been subjected to some pressure on the part of the Air Ministry to join 

hands with them in morale bombing. I discussed this matter previously with 

[Robert] Lovett when he was here and have maintained a firm position that 

our bombing will continue to be precision bombing against military objective [sic]. 

437 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

While admitting that a case could be made for bombing Berlin, Spaatz stated 

flatly, “I personally believe that any deviation from our present policy, even for 

an exceptional case, will be unfortunate. There is no doubt in my mind that the 

RAF want very much to have the U.S. Air Forces tarred with the morale bombing aftermath, which we feel will be terrific.”67 THUNDERCLAP’S prediction of 

137,500 dead and an equal number seriously wounded as a result of American 

bombing was apparently too much for him. 

Eisenhower had the last word. On September 9, he asked Spaatz to make 

sure Doolittle would be ready to bomb Berlin at a moment’s notice. Spaatz complied, instructing the Eighth to drop plans to hit military objectives and to be 

ready to drop bombs “indiscriminately” on the city when Eisenhower gave the 

order.68 Eisenhower may have been holding THUNDERCLAP as alast card to play 

in the faltering drive across France. Only the last-gasp Operation MARKETGARDEN paratroop drop in Holland, scheduled for mid-September, seemed to 

offer hope of a quick breakthrough. Had the paratroopers succeeded in establishing a bridgehead over the Rhine, the moment for launching THUNDERCLAP might 

have arrived. Instead, MARKET-GARDEN proved a costly failure. 

Ironically, the British and the Americans may have missed their opportunity. 

One can only speculate on the results of an antimorale raid coming on the heels 

of the July 20 assassination attempt on Hitler. For a brief instant before Hitler 

savagely and sadistically retaliated against the plotters, confusion reigned. If 

nothing else, a raid at that time would have further roiled an already boiling pot. 

The Allied breakout from the Normandy beachhead, which would have occurred 

at approximately the same time, might have added the final push. Talk of 

THUNDERCLAP subsided with the establishment of a stalemate on the Western 

Front in September 1944 but would be resurrected under a different set of circumstances four months later. 

THUNDERCLAP andits planning illustrated how confident air power leaders 

still were in the bomber fleet as an effective striking force. In the period between 

the two world wars, Western air power experts and general public alike subscribed to the view that a massive strategic bombing attack, delivered in a sudden stroke at the beginning of hostilities, might quickly end a war between major 

powers. This so-called bolt from the blue was intended to totally disrupt daily life 

and inflict such horrific casualties on civilians as to compel the recipient power to 

capitulate. Yet, long after Chinese, British, and, especially, German civilians had 

demonstrated a capacity to withstand the heaviest of aerial bombardments, Allied 

air planners still seriously proposed a back-breaking, seventy-two-hour operation 

of THUNDERCLAP’S magnitude. The estimated casualty figures were more akin to 

those predicted in 1935 by the RAF Air Staff-150,000 casualties in the first week 

of the bombing of London69-than those to be expected in 1944. Even the operation’s code name evoked the image of the prewar bolt-from-the-blue mentality. 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

Strategic Bombing in the Summer of 1944 

Following the successful breakthrough at St. L8, described later in Chapter 

13, the Allies advanced spectacularly through France. They pushed a defeated, 

disorganized foe before them, recapturing Paris on August 25 and taking most of 

the great port of Antwerp on September 4. A week later an armored reconnaissance squadron crossed the 1939 German border. By that time, however, the 

Allied armies had literally run out of gas as they forged ahead of their supply 

lines. This enforced halt at the German border, combined with the frantic but 

successful effort of the Wehrmacht to cobble together a solid defensive line, 

turned a war of movement back into a war of position. 

Once the ground forces established themselves on the Continent, Spaatz 

hoped to return his command to what he considered its primary task-the strategic bombardment of Germany. In June 1944, the Eighth Air Force conducted 

only four missions over German industrial targets. On June 18 and 20, it attacked oil targets, losing 50 heavy bombers and writing off 4 more. On June 21, 

the Eighth lost an additional 45 heavy bombers in a raid on the center of Berlin. 

On June 29, Doolittle’s bombers again attacked oil targets. Nevertheless, of the 

320 heavy bombers lost by the Eighth in combat in June, at least 55 percent fell 

in action against CROSSBOW sites or in missions against airfields, bridges, and 

other tactical targets in France.70 For the first time, losses of heavy bombers to 

antiaircraft artillery exceeded those lost to Luftwaffe fighters.” That fact indicated three features of June operations: the German transfer of hundreds of 

fighters to ground-support roles; the preponderant number of missions flown by 

the Eighth against tactical targets defended, if at all, solely by flak; and the 

increasing efficiency and number of expanded radar-directed German antiaircraft artillery batteries. In January 1944, flak had accounted for only 27 bomber 

losses;72 in June, the Eighth lost 2% bombers (201) to flak for each one lost to 

enemy fighters (80). 

Each month from June 1944, in the case of the Eighth Air Force, and July, in 

the case of the Fifteenth, until the end of the war in May 1945, USSTAF lost 

more bombers to flak than to enemy fighters. From September 1944 to May 

1945, the Eighth lost 511 bombers to fighters and 1,263 to flak.73 During the 

same period the Fifteenth lost 33 B-17s and B-24s to fighters and 681 to flak.74 

The effectiveness of German antiaircraft stemmed, in part, from a reorganization and vast expansion of the Reich’s flak defenses ordered by Hitler in 

response to RAF raids in 1943.75 From August 1943 to June 1944, personnel 

devoted to the antiaircraft reorganization doubled, to 300,000, including 75,000 

secondary school students, 45,000 Soviet POW volunteers, and 15,000 

women.76 This increase in personnel enabled the Germans to field larger numbers of heavier antiaircraft guns. These heavier 135mm weapons could place 

their shells far higher than 88mm antiaircraft guns. Large-caliber weapons eliminated much of the relative immunity to flak that the higher flying B-17 had 

439 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

enjoyed over the B-24, whose optimal performance altitude was 3,000 to 5,000 

feet lower. 

German countermeasures consumed vast quantities of manpower and 

matCriel sorely needed elsewhere. The thousands of high-velocity artillery 

pieces and the thousands of tons of ammunition they either consumed or kept 

idle in reserve would have greatly aided hard-pressed German defenders on the 

Eastern Front in their efforts to halt the Soviet advance. Because strategic bombing raids were restricted by weather conditions and shifting priorities, German 

flak forces were spread thin to defend many areas. Yet, most defensive flak 

forces fought only a few days a month, further accentuating the drain they 

imposed on the Reich’s economy with long periods of enforced idleness that tied 

up needed resources. 

Moreover, by October 1944 the Germans, unknown to the AAF, had developed the ability to track the bombers carrying H2X radar. This ability greatly 

aided their range computations.77 Even such missions as the November 25, 

1944, attack by the Eighth Air Force on the heavily defended Leuna oil plant, in 

which 766 bombers dropped their explosive cargoes through thick clouds and 

suffered 209 (27 percent) aircraft damaged by flak,78 did not alert the AAF to its 

new vulnerability. A visual attack on October 7 by 142 B-17s of the 1st Bombardment Division on another oil target, Politz, near Stettin, left only 19 

unscathed and lost 17, with 30 heavily damaged and 76 slightly damaged. The 

lead ships, equipped with H2X, suffered particularly heavy damage.79 All this, 

however, lay in the future. At the end of June 1944, Spaatz still pressed to have 

his planes released for missions over Germany. 

In July, after Spaatz gained Eisenhower’s agreement that the days offering 

visual conditions over Germany ought to be used for bombing,80 the Eighth sent 

missions into Germany twelve times. So quickly did the weather change over 

central Europe that one-half of those missions employed H2X radar bombing 

over the target. Four of the missions struck oil targets, while the others attacked 

aircraft production, ball-bearing plants, and the experimental rocket station at 

Peenemunde.81 Of the 352 bombers lost by the Eighth in July, strategic missions 

accounted for at least 212 lost and 35 written off,82 70 percent of the month’s 

losses. The Fifteenth sent out fifteen strategic missions, thirteen of them directed 

all or in part against Axis oil targets. It lost 196 heavy bombers in June and 317 

more in July, the costliest month in its history. The Fifteenth’s losses reflected 

how effectively antiaircraft artillery defenses were being employed by the 

Germans at Ploesti and other oil targets. Given the difference in aircraft on hand 

between the Fifteenth (1,407 heavy bombers) and the Eighth (3,492 heavy 

bombers) in July 1944,83 Twining’s forces suffered casualties at more than twice 

the rate of Doolittle’s. The figures demonstrate the return of both air forces to the 

Combined Bomber Offensive. 

Despite such heavy casualties during their raids of June and July, efforts of 

the Eighth and Fifteenth further aggravated Germany’s critically low oil supply. 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ULTRA tracked Allied progress against Germany, particularly this most vulnerable sector of its war economy. On July 9, ULTRA deciphered a circular from 

Goering to his field commanders, which read in part, “The deep inroads made 

into the supply of aircraft fuel demand the most stringent reduction in flying. 

Drastic economy is absolutely essential.84 Another intercept of July 29 gave the 

results of attacks on Merseburg, the single largest synthetic oil plant: “Heaviest 

attacks so far; heavy damage-works provisionally 100 percent out of action.”85 

The American breaking of Japanese ciphers supplied more information. In 

August, three confidential telegrams from the Japanese ambassador in Berlin to 

Tokyo gave new information on the effect of Allied bombing. The ambassador 

reported confidential statements made by Speer that presented as rosy a picture 

as possible but could not conceal the damage done by the strategic bombing 

offensive. Speer stated that, overall, the bombing had checked the rise of the production curve. It had not to caused production in the aggregate to fall. The 

attacks on oil installations were, however, another matter. “For the first time,” 

Speer continued, “wehrwirtshaftkh [war economy] raids, which might deal a 

really fatal blow to Germany, had begun.” The oil offensive “was the problem to 

which they attached the greatest importance at the moment,” and the Germans 

intended to strain every nerve to restore the situation. Speer then lied to the 

Japanese ambassador, telling him that Allied claims of 50 percent destruction of 

German oil supplies overstated the case. After observing that only the regaining 

of air superiority could combat Allied heavy bombers, he offered wildly inflated 

production figures for single- and twin-engine fighters, claiming production of 

Germans preparing to fire 88mm antiaircraft artillery. 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

genation synthetic fuel plants, which produced high-octane distillates, delivered 

47,000 tons of aviation fuel, 13.5 percent of April’s production. Imported oil had 

fallen to 11,000 tons, a mere 10.6 percent of April’s figures. ULTRA described 

fuel shortages cutting into the Luftwaffe’s operations on the Eastern Front. On 

August 10, air units withdrawing from France were ordered to evacuate fuel 

stocks down to the “last drop.” Five days later, the Luftwaffe’s high command 

ordered LuftjZotte 3 (or the 3d air fleet) in France to curtail operations in order to 

release fuel for training 120 crews per month for the west or to accept a lower 

training fuel allocation sufficient for 40 crews per month.94 From all sources the 

Germans garnered 345,000 tons of finished oil products, 42.6 percent of April’s 

tota1.95 This decline was attributable solely to USSTAF’s oil bombing campaign. Attacks on the hydrogenation plants disrupted other parts of the German 

chemical industry. These plants produced methanol and nitrogen, key components in synthetic rubber and explosives. The Germans had no natural source for 

either substance and could not easily substitute for them. Speer morosely 

recorded, “From October 1944 on, our explosives consisted of 20 percent rock 

salt, which reduced their effectiveness correspondingly.”96 

Problems of the American Strategic Air Forces 

During the summer of 1944, Spaatz did not spend all of his time attending 

Air Commanders’ Meetings or justifying the need for strategic bombing of 

Germany. He spent much of his time and effort in somewhat more mundane 

administrative concerns. Personnel considerations topped the list. Although a 

complete study of the Eighth Air Force’s personnel difficulties would fill a large 

volume, Spaatz expended considerable energy on three interrelated problems: 

crew morale, crew replacements, and internment of crews in foreign countries. 

As the AAF official history admits, “Low morale among air crews, particularly in the Eighth Air Force, was a nagging problem during the middle of 

1944.97 The ground crews, who maintained, serviced, and repaired aircraft, also 

suffered from poor morale brought about by an entirely different set of circumstances. Aside from matters that soldiers have grumbled about since the profession of arms began, such as food, boredom, and the general incomprehensibility 

of most actions or decisions by the powers that be, AAF ground and air crews in 

Europe fought two different types of wars. The ground crews did not rotate back 

to the United States after a set period; they stayed with their units throughout the 

war. Added to the certainty of no home leave-although leave spent in England 

was not unpleasant-were primitive working conditions and long hours. 

Britain was as civilized and developed a country as any in which the AAF 

worked in 1944. Even so, the Eighth’s bomber and fighter fields, for the most 

part, offered few hangars and covered working spaces. In periods of heavy operations in wintertime, the ground crews, who worked during the night and in the 

early morning, suffered greatly from the cold and damp. Italy offered even fewer 

445 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

amenities or diversions; its weather was certainly harsher than that of England. 

During the summer, the ground crews had to work harder and harder in response 

to dramatically increasing numbers of missions. Of course, they did not risk their 

lives or suffer to the same extent as those in the infantry or on the front lines. 

However, they were exposed to the rigors of the flight line, where boring and 

dangerous conditions steadily took their toll. As Eaker noted to Arnold in a summary of operations, dated June 1, “Those [ground crews] who have been in the 

theater approaching two years are definitely weary and not as keen as they were 

and their work falls off.’’98 

The air crews fought a private war, the horizons of which extended little 

beyond themselves or their planes. Throughout the summer the Eighth Air 

Force’s percentage of aircraft lost per sortie rate declined. The rate dropped from 

3.6 percent in April to 2.2 percent in May, 1.1 in June, when the Eighth flew 

only four strategic missions, and 1.5 percent in both July and August. The lower 

loss rates greatly increased an air crew’s chances of completing its tour of duty. 

Unfortunately, the apprehension level of the crews did not decline. Many still 

seemed to react as they had when loss rates were higher. The lengthening of the 

combat tour in February 1944 from twenty-five to thirty missions dealt a blow to 

everyone’s morale. Even at 1.5 percent loss per sortie for thirty missions, a crew 

member stood a 36 percent chance of not surviving. With the summer came 

increased numbers of missions and the opportunity for some crews to finish their 

required tour of thirty missions in as little as sixty-two days.99 The Eighth 

retained some crews for more than thirty missions. On July 1, for example, 117 

crews, almost 4 percent of the crews on hand, had thirty missions.100 Eighth Air 

Force reports identified the causes of poor morale as the lack of understanding 

of the difficulties of combat crews by their superior officers, inadequate fighter 

escort on some missions, the seemingly elastic limit on combat tours, and too 

frequent missions. 101 

The air crew rotation policy instituted by Spaatz and Doolittle in the spring 

of 1944 dampened spirits further. Before its imposition, air crews completing 

their combat tours returned to the United States. and, in practice, flew no more 

combat missions. However, heavy losses compelled Spaatz and Doolittle to discontinue the permanent release of at least some trained crews that had finished 

their initial tours. They were obliged to return to Europe for another tour of duty 

after a month’s furlough of rest and recreation in the United States. They as well 

as crews already into their first tour who could easily picture themselves in the 

same situation naturally felt aggrieved. Arnold, apparently, wished to halt any 

furloughs. The low morale of the crews returning to the United States was obvious and did nothing for the AAF’s public image. The ideal solution to the problem-lack of trained manpower-would have been a replacement pipeline full 

of crews-a goal the AAF never managed to achieve. 

In fact, at least as seen from AAF Headquarters in Washington, USSTAF’s 

furlough scheme threatened to upset the carefully crafted training program for 

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STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

Eighth Air Force ground crews servicing a P-38. They worked unprotected from 

the elements, often at night. 

air crew replacements. In a letter dated June 21, Lt. Gen. Barney M. Giles, 

Deputy Commanding General, AAF, and Chief of the AAF Staff, informed 

Spaatz that “General Arnold had contended successfully that every crew going 

to the wars is entitled to an even chance at surviving its tour. . . it has . . . been 

necessary that we train two crews for every one you lose.”l02 Once Spaatz’s 

forces achieved their goal of two crews per heavy bomber, the replacement and 

force build-up flow would of necessity slow. 

The two-crew-per-bomber policy had become the foundation of AAF crew 

training. From his office in the Pentagon, where he poured over the figures 

detailing the ebb and flow of personnel through training, Giles attempted to convey to Spaatz the importance that AAF Headquarters had attached to continuing 

a proven system. He noted that Spaatz’s retention of crews in Europe threatened 

to cause backlogs and delays throughout the replacement pipeline and that 

Any change in what is now a smooth machine would not be good. As you can 

see, a major leave and furlough policy in our four largest air forces would force 

a considerable change and a downward revision in our crew training which 

might not be smart until we see the final victory more immediately ahead than 

we now see it. 

Giles added the hope “that having built the track we can keep the program 

441 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

running on it without any further hitches until we get you up to strength when, I 

am convinced, we should return to the old rotation system.103 

A month later Spaatz replied that he, too, wished to return to a straight rotation policy, which he estimated would occur on August 1, the date the Eighth 

would reach its authorized strength of two crews per aircraft. But he also wished 

to retain the right to return, temporarily, for rest and recuperation certain key 

personnel such as group and squadron commanders, lead pilots, bombardiers, and 

navigators.104 The Eighth reached its goal of double crews in July. The Fifteenth, 

which had a higher casualty rate, had only one and one-half crews per plane on 

July 3 1 .lo5 

The number of Eighth Air Force crews interned as a result of crashing or 

landing in neutral countries jumped from eighteen in May to thirty-eight in June 

and forty-one in July.106 Although these crews and planes amounted to only a 

tiny fraction of the totals sent out, Arnold received the statistics with alarm, 

especially after he read reports of interviews with interned crews conducted by 

U.S. diplomatic personnel. 

The 2d Bombardment Division seemed particularly prone to this problem, in 

part because the B-24’s longer range, as compared with the B-17’s, allowed it to 

fly deeper penetration missions. On deep missions a crew in a damaged plane 

might be more likely to land in neutral territory than to chance a long, dangerous 

return trip to Britain. In June, three-quarters of the crews interned belonged to 

the 2d Bombardment Division (28 of 38); in July about 40 percent of interned 

crews belonged to the 2d Division (15 of 41). During the June 20 raid on Politz, 

an oil target in Poland, conducted by 358 2d Division B-24s, an eye-popping 20 

bombers landed in Sweden. The next day, the fourth in a row in which the 

Eighth launched more than 1,100 bombers, 14 more bombers (7 from the 2d 

Division) on missions to the Berlin area landed in Sweden. 107 

In midJuly, Spaatz suggested to Arnold that battle-experienced, intelligent, 

senior USSTAF air officers join the diplomatic representatives in Sweden and 

Switzerland to interview the crews and to evaluate and investigate the reasons 

for their landings from a more professional perspective.108 On July 27, Arnold 

sent a message to Spaatz in which he noted the increasing number of aircraft 

making landings in neutral countries “without indication of serious battle damage or mechanical failure, or shortage of fuel.” Then he noted diplomatic reports 

confirming “the fact that the landings were intentional evasions of further combat service.” Finally, Arnold insisted, “It is plainly evident that measures must 

be taken immediately against the development of such a state of mind among 

[other] flyers and crews now engaged in extremely active operations.”lo9 Arnold 

emphasized “that great care be taken not to hold combat crews in the theater 

until war weariness provokes an uncontrollable urge to grasp release by the 

action indicated.” He further required Spaatz to return all crews over USSTAF’s 

authorized strength and to use green crews to the maximum extent. Arnold cau448 
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

tioned that “individuals or crews who appear near the breaking point should also 

be returned for reconditioning.”llo 

On July 29, Spaatz strongly defended his crews to Arnold. Speaking for 

himself and Eaker, he noted, “We resent the implication that these crews are 

cowards, are low in morale or lack the will to fight. Such is a base slander 

against the most courageous group of fighting men in this war.”l*l He pointed out 

that the internees amounted to only a tiny fraction among crews dispatched and 

that some groups had persevered despite 60 percent casualties. He observed that 

the morale of the crews depended to some extent on the morale of their commanding officers, many of whom held ranks inferior to their responsibilities. He 

suggested that several of his wing commanders be promoted to brigadier general, 

and he repeated his desire to have USSTAF officers assigned to diplomatic staffs. 

He stressed that “the most recent program for sending war weary crews back to 

the US should meet the combat fatigue situation, and you can rest assured that we 

will not maintain combat crews in operations when they approach the breaking 

point, provided you continue to send replacement crews. . . .”I12 Spaatz did 

acknowledge, however, that “in the past some crews have undoubtedly been 

employed who were very tired, overstrained and near the breaking point. This has 

been done because of crew shortages, the importance of the battle and in a desire 

to put forth maximum effort in destroying the German Air Force before launching OVERLORD.” Spaatz argued that the employment of overtired crews “was 

inevitable in the initial application of our vastly expanding air forces. It was by 

these means that the necessary air supremacy has been established which has 

enabled the American Air Forces to get the situation in hand in the European 

Theater.”* 13 

This response did not placate Arnold, who sent Lt. Col. James W. Wilson 

from Headquarters, AAF, to the European Theater of Operations to investigate 

and to report back to him. Wilson arrived in London on August 26, carrying a 

set of confidential personnel instructions and an equally confidential letter from 

Arnold to Spaatz. In it Arnold wrote that he did not blame Spaatz for resenting 

the implied slander or for defending his troops. “Nevertheless,” he continued, 

I am concerned lest we fail to note any incipient weaknesses that may not be 

apparent, but whose existence may be indicated by reports even by unskilled 

observers or constitutional faultfinders. For your information, these unfortunate 

attitudes are reputed to include, beyond the normal griping, lack of respect 

(amounting to near hatred) for certain very senior leaders; disgust with the 

influence of political expedients on tactical and strategical employment; lack of 

desire to kill Germans; lack of understanding as to the political necessity for 

fighting the war; general personal lassitude with consequent lack of patriotic 

enthusiasm for their jobs. We must not let our aversion to believing them influence our thinking or our determination to ferret out facts if early knowledge of 

even the faintest taint would enable us to take efficacious preventative measure~.’’~ 

449 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Arnold assured Spaatz that Wilson came neither as an “inspector” nor as a “spy” 

but merely to “clarify a situation that I fear has become clouded due to many 

rumors and reports.”ll5 

In his instructions to Wilson, which Wilson handed over to Spaatz, Arnold 

revealed that, in addition to diplomatic reports, reports from a flight surgeon 

recently on duty with the Eighth indicated “a possible deterioration of combat 

crew morale.” Arnold said, “If these reports are essentially correct, immediate 

action must be taken to prevent serious reductions in the fighting efficiency of 

air crews in the European Theater of Operations.” Arnold instructed Wilson to 

“mingle with combat crewmen of all grades in tactical units” to determine for 

himself their attitudes and then to submit to him and Spaatz a report with recommendations.116 

In mid-September, Wilson, who claimed to have talked to more than a thousand crew members, reported to Arnold that morale, after a drop-off in July,ll7 

had recently improved considerably. “Not only were the airmen confident of 

their airplanes, their methods, and themselves, but they felt sure they were doing 

more to win the war than either the ground forces or the RAF.” Wilson’s informal investigation, plus other investigations conducted on Arnold’s behalf, and 

the findings of specially detailed USSTAF officers who interviewed the interned 

crews convinced Arnold and Spaatz that the morale problem had been greatly 

exaggerated. 1 18 

The advance of the ground forces to the western borders of Germany virtually ended the internment controversy. Once crews could land safely in France, 

instead of farther away in England, the attractiveness of Sweden and Switzerland 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz 

visiting a crew replacement center, England, 

June 12,1944. 

450 
STRATEGIC OPERATIONS 

diminished. Later, in the winter of 1944-1945, the Soviet advance to the eastern 

borders of Germany allowed crews whose planes were damaged in deep missions to Berlin and beyond to land in Soviet-occupied territory instead of 

Sweden. 

Of all the bombing by USSTAF during the summer of 1944, only the strategic bombing of oil, with its side effects on the German chemical industry, hastened eventual Allied victory. CROSSBOW bombing did little more than crater the 

Pas-de-Calais district. Nor would morale bombing, given the blows subsequently withstood by the German populace, have furthered the Allied cause 

effectively. 

For Spaatz and the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, the summer of 1944 

represented a season-long fight to prevent the weakening of the strategic bomber 

offensive with the diversion of the heavy-bomber effort to other important, but 

less crucial, tasks. Spaatz succeeded, by and large, in fending off all but the most 

necessary distractions from the main strategic effort. After establishing the dramatic potential of the oil plan in the May 1944 raids, he managed to pry out of 

Eisenhower enough freedom of action to continue and steadily increase in scale 

the assault on the life’s blood of the German military machine. Finally, Spaatz 

showed once again his flexibility and common sense by, on the one hand, rejecting such extreme air power proposals as terror-bombing and, on the other, sending his heavy bombers into direct support of ground troops (discussed in the 

next chapter), an action not contemplated by prewar bombing enthusiasts. 

45 1 

Chapter 13 

Summer 1944: 

Heavy Bombers in 

Close Air Support 

(July-August 1944) 

Technically viewed, the bombing was good.' 

-AAF official history on COBRA, 1951 

Though the results were not what we expected, it never 

occurred to us that we could fail after the use of such mass 

aircraft.2 

After-action questionnaire of US. 9th 

Infantry Division on results of COBRA, 1944 

In July and August 1944, the Allied strategic bombers departed from their 

customary tasks of attacking vital military or political targets and engaging in 

counterair and interdiction campaigns to directly assist the Allied ground forces 

on the battlefield. The Allied ground forces, bogged down in the excellent 

defensive terrain of Normandy, required heavy-bomber assaults in addition to 

those planned for D-day. This foray into large-scale close air support presented 

unique and unanticipated command, control, and technical problems to the 

Eighth Air Force and Bomber Command as they sought to fulfill obligations for 

which they lacked methods and training. These close air support missions were, 

of course, diversions from the strategic effort. Not all Allied airmen agreed with 

the necessity of heavy bombers in close air support. Tedder, for instance, 

believed that Leigh-Mallory had oversold the army on the need for air support. 

But Spaatz, although he might have preferred to attack targets in Germany, 

45 3 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

assented, without coercion by Eisenhower or Tedder, to all requests to aid the 

ground forces. The complex interplay between the command and control of the 

bombers, the technical difficulties associated with heavy-bomber strikes close to 

friendly troops, and the effects of conflicts among air leaders on the entire equation are the themes of this chapter. 

Initial Attempts at Ground Support 

Although the Allied air forces had cut the Luftwaffe at the front to bits, the 

Allied ground forces, under the overall command of Gen. Montgomery’s 21 

Army Group, encountered stiff resistance. The Germans kept the Allies on their 

relatively cramped beachhead. On the Allied left flank, the British 2d Army 

could not take the city of Caen or break into the clear area beyond the River 

Orne. On the Allied right the U.S. First Army, under Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, 

found itself enmeshed in the bocage, or hedgerow country. Hedgerows, earthen 

dikes four feet high covered with tangled vegetation, provided perfect static 

defensive positions that slowed the American advance to a crawl.3 From the air, 

however, the bocage appeared insignificant. 

Allied airmen found the failure of the ground forces to expand the beachhead 

rapidly in the face of determined enemy resistance frustrating. On June 14, at the 

Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting at Stanmore, Air Marshal ‘‘Mary’’ Coningham 

announced that his own information on the situation at the front did not jibe with 

that supplied by the army. He described the situation as “near crisis.”4 To bolster morale, the airmen decided to put in an especially heavy mission near the 

front line, and Air Chief Marshal Tedder, Deputy Supreme Commander of the 

Allied Expeditionary Force, canceled an Eighth Air Force mission over Berlin 

scheduled for the next day.5 Later on June 14, Tedder, who had attended the air 

meeting, persuaded Eisenhower to fly to the front with him to get a firsthand 

opinion of affairs there. 

At this point the confused Allied air command situation once again became 

a problem. Leigh-Mallory, Commander in Chief of the Allied Expeditionary Air 

Force, commanded all air directly assigned to Eisenhower: the British 2d 

Tactical Air Force and the American Ninth (Tactical) Air Force. Spaatz and 

Harris, although controlled by Eisenhower, through Tedder, had the task, independent of Eisenhower, of conducting the Combined Bomber Offensive against 

Germany. Furthermore, Harris and Spaatz not only questioned Leigh-Mallory ’s 

competence to conduct heavy-bomber operations but denied his claims that his 

position gave him operational command of all air power working with 

Eisenhower. As a result, the two heavy-bomber commanders had refused to 

allow their organizations to come under Leigh-Mallory ’s hand. This led 

Eisenhower to appoint Tedder, his preferred choice for overall air commander, 

as overall coordinator between the tactical and strategic air forces. To further 

confuse the situation, Leigh-Mallory, in the few days immediately before and 

454 
HEAVY BOMBERS INSUPPORT 

after the assault phase of the invasion, had actually been given operational control of the heavy bombers by Eisenhower in order to ensure their full integration 

into the vital air operations of that phase of the invasion. As a result, he may have 

assumed he would again receive such control in other times of crisis. 

The next link down the chain of command had more problems. LeighMallory’s AEAF Headquarters, supposedly a combined U.S.-British headquarters, was really a house divided between its British and American components. 

The AAF official history succinctly stated the American view of the AEAF by 

calling it “possibly the least successful venture of the entire war with a combined 

Anglo-American command.”6 The British component in AEAF Headquarters 

outnumbered the American component two to one at the general officer’s rank. 

Leigh-Mallory had annoyed the Americans by taking care that for each combined 

section of the headquarters the senior British officer outranked his American 

counterpart. 

On several occasions Spaatz had to restrain the strong-willed Deputy Commander of the AEAF, Maj. Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg, whom he had brought in to 

replace an ineffectual predecessor, from complaining too bitterly and vociferously about Leigh-Mallory and his actions, one of which involved procedures in 

AEAF War/Operations Room actions.7 Leigh-Mallory disliked the combined 

operation of the AEAF War/Operations Room and ruled that it be run entirely by 

British personnel using British methods. On June 6, the AEAF War/Operations 

Room posted no information on the progress at the American beaches until long 

after 5:OO P.M. As Vandenberg recorded in his diary, “I asked for an explanation 

and pointed out quite forcibly that, in my opinion, the whole proceeding from an 

informational point of view was entirely inexcusable.” Vandenberg pointed out 

that “all three British beaches had clearly defined information as to the approximate position of the front lines, but . . . there was not a single mark on either of 

the American beaches.”g Vandenberg “stormed” from the War/Operations 

Room and drove to Leigh-Mallory ’s headquarfers to demand remedial action. 

The next day Vandenberg asked Spaatz whether he “should open up the 

fight.” Spaatz replied that “the time was not ripe.” But Spaatz and Doolittle, 

Commander of the Eighth Air Force, suggested that Vandenberg inform LeighMallory that the Eighth “was very displeased with the manner in which their 

operations were being presented and that, as far as General Spaatz was concerned, he felt strongly that the whole picture was so confused by the various 

presentations that an accurate analysis and the proper action to take was, as a 

result, impossible.”9 Spaatz particularly objected to Leigh-Mallory’s Daily Air 

Commanders’ Meetings, not only because they confused many issues but 

because they dragged on interminably and produced, in his opinion, little of 

import.10 

Nor did Leigh-Mallory and his chief Commonwealth subordinate, Coningham, work together well. Coningham, although less aloof and stiff than LeighMallory, had no greater knack than his superior for getting along with his fellow 

455 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

I- " - 

RAF Operations Room. Deep underground, its walls were lined with huge maps, 

charts, and blackboards. 

officers. Coningham seldom took the time to conceal his contempt for anyone 

who failed to appreciate his brilliance and his ideas concerning air-ground cooperation.11 Coningham may have been the prime advocate of improved air-ground 

cooperation, but his venomous view of Montgomery led him to violate a prime 

tenet of his own creed-the ground commander and the air commander should 

site their headquarters at the same place in order to provide the swiftest communications and maximum cooperation between the two combat forces. Claiming 

that the beachhead could not yet provide the sophisticated communications network he needed to control his forces, Coningham stayed at his own headquarters, 

designated AEAF, HQ (Advanced), at Uxbridge in England, while Montgomery 

set up headquarters on the beachhead.12 

As Commander, AEAF, HQ (Advanced), Coningham had day-to-day control 

of the tactical air forces, both the British 2d Tactical Air Force and the U.S. Ninth 

Air Force, and directed their efforts to assist the ground troops. Plans called for 

the dissolution of AEAF, HQ (Advanced), when the beachhead expanded enough 

to allow the separation of the British and American forces into different army 

groups, whereupon each air force would cooperate with the army group composed of its nation's ground forces. This arrangement never functioned smoothly 

because Leigh-Mallory refused to accept it, because Montgomery did his best to 

ignore Coningham,l3 and because the Commander of the Ninth Air Force, Lt. 

Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, asserted his independence whenever possible. 

456 
HEAVY BOMBERS INSUPPORT 

After the meeting on June 14, Leigh-Mallory, who still had nominal control 

of targeting for the heavy bombers, on his own initiative flew to Normandy to 

consult with Montgomery. Montgomery, a less than enthusiastic host, still 

resented Leigh-Mallory for refusing five days earlier to allow the 1st British 

Airborne Division to conduct a drop just beyond Caen in order to surround the 

city and hasten its fall. In fact, Montgomery had just denounced Leigh-Mallory 

in a scathing letter to his own Chief of Staff, Maj. Gen. Francis (Freddie) de 

Guingand: 

The real point is that LM [Leigh-Mallory] sitting in his office cannot possibly 

know the local battle form over here; and therefore he must not refuse my 

demands unless he first comes over to see me; he could fly here in a Mosquito 

in ’/* hour, talk for an hour, and be back in England in ‘/2 hour. Obviously he is a 

gutless bugger, who refuses to take a chance and plays for safety on all occasions. I have no use for him.I4 

When Leigh-Mallory offered to employ the whole of Bomber Command, 

USSTAF, and the AEAF “to blast out the Eighth [2d] Army from in front of 

Caen,” however, Montgomery readily agreed with his suggestion.15 LeighMallory returned to England, promising to send part of his staff to the beachhead 

the next day to firm up a plan with officers of the British 2d Army.16 

Leigh-Mallory ’s blithe offer of the entire strength of Allied air power brought 

the frustration of Coningham and Spaatz to the fore. Early in the morning both 

men had heard of the proposal. Spaatz undoubtedly heard from Vandenberg, 

whose American second-in-command, Brig. Gen. Frederic H. Smith, Jr., had 

more or less forced his presence into Leigh-Mallory’s conference with 

Montgomery. At 2:OO A.M. on June 15, Smith had roused Vandenberg to tell him 

of matters afoot. They agreed that such a “use contemplated was not proper.”l7 

Vandenberg directed Smith to keep the number of planes involved to a minimum. 

Coningham, who had left his headquarters for dinner on June 14, claimed 

that he had never been informed, but Leigh-Mallory indicated in his diary that 

he spoke to Coningham’s deputy, Air Vice-Marshal Stephen Strafford and 

explained the plan to him in detail.18 It seems unlikely that Coningham’s deputy 

would have neglected to inform his chief of such an important impending operation at the first opportunity. Leigh-Mallory’s plan incensed Coningham because 

it had cut him out of the decision-making process. As Commander of AEAF 

(Advanced), the major tactical air operational headquarters, Coningham insisted 

that he, not Leigh-Mallory, should negotiate with Montgomery. Spaatz, too, 

objected to what he considered Leigh-Mallory’s usurpation of his prerogative 

concerning command of the heavy bombers. 

Early on June 15 at the Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting, Leigh-Mallory 

discussed the possibility of air assistance to the army to break up the “stalemate” 

in front of Caen. Opposition was immediate. A guest at the meeting, General 

457 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Henry H. Arnold, Commanding General, AAF, had come to London to attend 

meetings of the Combined Chiefs of Staff and to inspect the beachhead; he spoke 

up and “expressed the hope that” this was not going to be “another Cassino,”l9 

where a heavy-bomber attack had reduced its target to rubble, and ironically provided the enemey a far better defensive position. 

Even as Leigh-Mallory addressed the Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting, 

Tedder and Eisenhower flew to the beachhead to check on the extent of the “crisis” for themselves. They met Coningham, who, in Tedder’s words, “happened 

to be in Normandy,”20 and drove to Montgomery’s headquarters. Montgomery, 

however, was not there, and rather than cool their heels until he returned, they 

continued on to Lt. Gen. Miles Dempsey’s British 2d Army Headquarters. There 

they found a joint air force-army planning session, consisting of part of LeighMallory’s AEAF staff and some of the 2d Army staff, in progress. LeighMallory had sent his ubiquitous civilian scientific adviser, Professor Solly 

Zuckerman, who had concocted another of his mathematically based bombing 

schemes, this time involving close support of front-line troops by heavy bombers, 

and some of the AEAF military staff to draw up a bomb line with Dempsey and 

the 2d Army staff. 

Tedder, flanked by Coningham and Air Vice-Marshal Harry Broadhurst, 

marched into this cabal and broke it up. Tedder claimed in his memoirs that he 

did so because neither Spaatz nor Coningham was represented at the meeting.21 

This disingenuous explanation does not accord with the facts. Coningham was 

aware of the meeting, having informed Tedder of it the night before,22 and could 

have sent representatives had he wished. Nor was Coningham’s presence in 

Normandy a coincidence. Similarly Spaatz, although not formally represented, 

not only knew of the meeting from Vandenberg, but could count on accurate 

reports from the two American general officers present at the session, Brig. 

Gens. Frederic H. Smith and David M. Schlatter, Ninth Air Force Deputy Chief 

of Staff, Operations, who would, he knew, voice their opposition to the “misuse” 

of American heavy bombers.23 

Tedder stopped the meeting because Leigh-Mallory had violated military 

protocol in bypassing Coningham.24 When Tedder and Eisenhower caught up 

with Montgomery later in the day, they made clear to him that his counterpart in 

the air chain of command was Coningham, not Leigh-Mallory. Tedder also 

made it clear to Dempsey that Air Vice-Marshal Broadhurst was his opposite 

number.25 “Montgomery,” stated Tedder, “seemed relieved to have this confirmation.”26 Given Montgomery’s attitude toward Coningham, the extent of his 

“relief’ is questionable. Tedder’s efforts, however, did end this first attempt to 

divert the heavy bombers. Leigh-Mallory, for his part, took Tedder’s actions as a 

personal rebuff and had to be dissuaded from resigning27 

On the evening of June 15, after his return from Normandy, Eisenhower met 

with Spaatz. Apparently, to ease by the logjam on the ground and perhaps to 

458 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

Britkh 26 Army 

Commander Lt. Gen. Miles 

Dempsey and Air Commodore Archibald Boyle. 

chide Spaatz gently for his adamant opposition to the use of heavy bombers in 

direct close support of the ground forces, Eisenhower brought up the subject of 

“the necessity for exercising full imagination in the employment of forces.”28 

Spaatz did not apply this gentle hint to himself. In his diary he recorded after the 

meeting: 

Later developments indicate that complete lack of imagination exists in the 

minds of Army command, particularly Leigh-Mallory and Montgomery, who 

visualize best use of tremendous air potential lies in plowing up several square 

miles of terrain in front of the ground forces to obtain a few miles of advance. 

Our forces now are far superior to [the] Germans opposing us, both in men and 

material. The only thing necessary to move forward is sufficient guts on the 

part of the ground comrnander~.~~ 

Two days afterwards, Spaatz suggested to Tedder that the strategic bombers 

be allowed to resume a full-scale campaign against Germany, save for a force 

held back to act as a “fire brigade” for the ground forces.30 For his part, LeighMallory simply could not understand Spaatz’s continuing insistence on strategic 

bombing. Near the end of June he noted in his campaign diary, “The Americans 

are a strange lot. They are still obsessed with the notion that to bomb Germany 

in daylight is the proper course.”31 

459 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Although Spaatz managed to avoid a diversion to morale bombing, he could 

not ignore the demands of the ground forces for any tactical bombing that might 

help them break out of the beachhead. During July and August he committed the 

Eighth’s heavy bombers four times in close support of ground attacks-three 

times for Montgomery and one time for Bradley. 

By the end of June, Allied air leaders had begun to question the progress of 

the ground forces in Normandy. Montgomery’s seemed particularly slow paced. 

“I am feeling,” Leigh-Mallory remarked, “slightly frustrated and have the distinct feeling that the Army is becoming more and more sealed in.”32 On July 1, 

he noted, “The Army I can only describe as stagnant.”33 Coningham also criticized the army’s slow progress. Portal and Tedder agreed that the problem was 

Montgomery, who could neither be removed nor moved to action.34 Eisenhower’s 

complaints about him to Churchill resulted in a four-hour argument between the 

Prime Minister, who was no fan of Montgomery, and the Chief of the Imperial 

General Staff, General Alan Brooke, a staunch supporter.35 For his part, 

Montgomery maintained that he had not received vigorous enough air support.36 

To Leigh-Mallory the best way to break the army free was to give it as much 

air support as possible. “I have always taken the view,” he stated in his usual 

assertive way, “that the Army must be given all the air support it desires.” Then 

he described his frustrations: 

What I have been up against more or less since D-Day is the school of thought 

which takes the view that air support given to the Army should be the minimum 

rather than the maximum, on the principle that if you give the Army an inch it 

will take a mile. This school of thought urges as a principle that really heavy 

Air Forces should not be employed on the battlefront, but elsewhere beyond 

and outside it. I maintain, and have always, that heavy bombers can produce a 

concentration of high explosive infinitely greater than any which can be produced by any other means.37 

To prove his point, Leigh-Mallory arranged for Bomber Command and the 

Eighth to aid Montgomery’s lunge forward on July 8. Tedder warned LeighMallory “that he was in danger of leading the Army up the garden path by his 

sweeping assurances of help.” Tedder was convinced that neither the army nor 

Leigh-Mallory fully understood the limitations of air support on the battlefield 

or the role of air power outside the battle area.38 

During the night of July 7-8, Bomber Command dropped 6,000 half-ton 

bombs directly on northern Caen39 and on targets 6,000 yards beyond the British 

front lines, with negligible damage to the Germans. The raid devastated about 2’/2 

square miles, leaving practically contiguous craters, none of which measured 

less than 20 feet across, that blocked all the roads to Caen save one.40 The 

Eighth bombed bridges and tunnels beyond the German lines. The bombing, 

according to Zuckerman, who observed and prepared a detailed report on it soon 

460 
HEAVY BOMBERS INSUPPORT 

after it occurred, did not result in any Allied casualties but neither did it demoralize or materially affect the Germans.41 

Zuckerman concluded that a great deal of French property was unnecessarily 

destroyed, and he expressed some doubt as to whether the batteries and other 

strong points listed by the British 2d Army were even in the target area. He suggested, in future, bombing closer to the troops or on the flanks of an attack and 

more careful planning.42 Tedder, examining Zuckerman’s report a few days 

later, said he had “never read a more demoralizing document” and refused to circulate it.43 He probably feared that it might damage air-ground relations. 

Montgomery’s next attack, Operation GOODWOOD, seemed to offer more 

toward a breaking through. Although cautious with subordinates, to whom he 

spoke merely of killing Germans and improving positions, Montgomery told 

Eisenhower that the operation might have “far reaching results.” On July 14, he 

informed Tedder that the plan “promises to be decisive.”44 This prospect 

delighted the airmen. Tedder, noting the agreement of the senior airmen, proclaimed the operation “a brilliant stroke which will knock loose our present 

shackles. Every plane available will be ready for such a purpose.”45 LeighMallory hoped that at long last his moment had come. After the affair of midJune he had 

decided to sit tight for I felt quite sure that the plum would fall ripely into my 

hand. Now, as the result of my talks in France yesterday and the day before, I 

feel sure that it has. The policy of double-dealing, the effect of which has been 

to deny the Army what it wanted in the field, has 

Leigh-Mallory and Montgomery agreed to cut out Coningham and to deal 

directly with each other. Leigh-Mallory intended to move his mobile headquarters caravan into Montgomery’s 21 Army Group Headquarters and take charge 

of the tactical air battle. He gleefully recorded, “This means I am going to put 

Air Marshal Coningham where he ought to be, in charge of one branch of the 

General Air Forces, and I am going to take command of their dispositions 

myself. If he does not like the situation, he will have to clear out.” As for 

Tedder, if he objected, “then he or I will go. My mind is now fully made up. 

Either I am to be allowed to direct, if necessary, the whole air forces available to 

the full and immediate support of the Army or I shall resign on that issue.”47 

On July 11, Leigh-Mallory blithely went to see Portal and informed him of 

his intentions to restructure the air command in Normandy. Portal appeared 

“somewhat startled.” He appeared “still more startled when I said that I did not 

intend to inform Tedder that I was going to see the Supreme Commander-inChief, but would tell him after I had done so.” Leigh-Mallory explained that, in 

his view, “Tedder had not been open with me over the role which Coningham 

should play in his estimation, and that, in any case, I was perfectly entitled to go 

direct to Ike.” 

46 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Leigh-Mallory did go to see Eisenhower and outlined his ideas on taking a 

larger share in directing the battle and putting Coningham in his place. The 

Supreme Commander seemed agreeable but apparently did not commit himself. 

Then Leigh-Mallory bearded the lion in his den-he saw Tedder. They engaged 

in “some very plain speaking.” Leigh-Mallory complained that Tedder did 

everything through Coningham. Tedder replied that Eisenhower had delegated 

the authority to control air to him.48 If Leigh-Mallory insisted on taking control of 

the tactical battle and interfering with Coningham and Brereton, Tedder threatened to take away from him all voice in the employment of heavy bombers. Portal 

sided with Tedder.49 The situation remained unresolved until after Operation 

GOODWOOD. 

On July 18, Bomber Command and the Eighth Air Force provided direct 

support for the next British assault. At dawn Bomber Command dropped 6,000 

half-ton bombs and 9,600 500-pound bombs on three target areas. At 7:OO A.M. 

medium bombers of the Ninth Air Force swept over the field, but many could 

not drop their bombs through the clouds of smoke and dirt left behind by 

Bomber Command. Then, at 8:30 A.M., the B-24s of the Eighth’s 2d Bombardment Division, 570 strong, dropped almost 13,000 100-pound and 76,000 20- 

pound fragmentation bombs (1,410 tons in all) on a key tactical feature, 

Bourguebus Ridge. In all, 4,500 Allied aircraft beset the Germans. Once again, 

bombing did not completely clear the way for the ground forces. 

Bomber Command struck first in the remarkably clear morning, hitting most 

of its targets squarely. Even four months later a British Bombing Analysis Unit 

reported that one area “resembled the surface of the moon.” It found the rusting 

remains of an entire Panzer company-fifteen tanks and twelve half-tracks-none 

of which had been hit with shells or mortars. Only a few of the B-24s’ fragmentation weapons fell on their targets; most scattered over the countryside. In the 

ensuing ground assault, Allied troops encountered particularly stiff resistance in 

the American target areas.50 Bomb bursts had cratered the terrain, hindering the 

advance of some units, and had failed to knock out all of the entrenched German 

tanks and antitank guns. Furthermore, the Germans, anticipating the attack, had 

prepared deep defenses, many of which had not come under fire. Operation 

GOODWOOD, like its predecessors, soon ground to a bloody halt.51 

It was no fluke that the British heavy bombers were more accurate than the 

American heavy bombers. As illogical as it seemed, British night tactics produced more precise bombing than American daylight tactics. The Americans 

flew compact formations in which only the lead bombardier made full use of his 

accurate Norden Visual Bombsight (M-9). This practice produced closely 

grouped bomb patterns and many missed targets. When several groups bombed 

a target, as they usually did, however, some of the bomb patterns landed directly 

where they should have. Because Bomber Command could not fly formations at 

night, each bombardier made all bombsight corrections. 

462 
HEAVY BOMBERS INSUPPORT 

Moreover, whereas the Eighth used radar only in its lead planes, almost all 

British bombers carried radar and crews trained in more accurate radar bombing. 

In addition, by the summer of 1944, Bomber Command was employing a “master bomber” or airborne air controller who stayed over the target for an entire 

mission and adjusted the bombing as it occurred. For the last year of the war, 

Bomber Command, plane for plane, not only delivered more tonnage but delivered it more effectively.52 Of course, if the British had had to fly their lightly 

armed bombers in formation, in daylight, without escort from their short-ranged 

Spitfires, the analysis of bomb plots might well have tilted toward the Americans. 

The failure of Montgomery’s much ballyhooed attack led to a round of 

recriminations among top Allied leaders. The airmen, in particular, expressed 

keen disappointment. The normally unflappable Tedder began to agitate for 

Montgomery’s dismissal and wrote to his old friend, Lord Trenchard, the 

founder of the RAF, that he and Eisenhower had been “had for suckers” by 

Montgomery.53 At a high-level SHAEF staff meeting on July 21, Tedder asked 

Bedell Smith when the army would get to the V-1 launch sites in the Pas-deCalais region of France. When Bedell Smith replied it would not be soon, 

Tedder sarcastically remarked, “Then we must change our leaders for men who 

will get us there.”54 Leigh-Mallory felt “bitterly disappointed, for it does not 

seem to me that the breakthrough which we produced has been exploited and 

pressed to a conclusion.”55 Eisenhower fumed as well. He acidly noted that the 

air forces had dropped a thousand tons of bombs for each mile of Montgomery’s 

advance and wondered whether the Allies could afford to move through all of 

France at such a cost.56 

Operation COBRA 

The Eighth’s next and last ground support mission in July proved to be both 

its most effective and its most controversial, because some of its bombs dropped 

short of the intended target area, landed among American troops, killed over one 

hundred of them and wounded hundreds more. This mission, flown in support of 

Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley’s Operation COBRA, greatly assisted the ground forces 

in their attack, which eventually penetrated the German main line of resistance 

and produced the opportunity for the long-awaited Allied breakout from the 

Normandy beachhead. 

The plan for COBRA came almost solely from Bradley, who first expounded 

it, and his chief subordinate, who would execute it, Maj. Gen. J. Lawton 

“Lightning Joe” Collins, at that time Commander of the U.S. VII Army Corps. 

Bradley had decided on the plan’s outline by July 10,57 and he presented it to his 

staff and to his corps commanders on July 12. COBRA differed from the usual 

pattern of American offensives. First, once the U.S. First Army reached the part 

of the road between St. La and PCriers, where the offensive was to start, Collins 

463 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

would use his combat-experienced reserve of two U.S. armored divisions, the 2d 

and 3d-both organized according to an early wartime table of organization and 

equipment which gave them greater numbers of tanks than the typical US. 

armored division-and the fully motorized 1st Infantry Division to launch a narrow and concentrated attack on the German front line. As Russell F. Weigley, in 

his study of the campaign in France and Germany, has made clear, their concentration on a narrow front departed from the wide-front operations usually conducted by U.S. ground forces.58 Bradley meant to conduct a battle to pierce 

enemy lines rather than to continue the attritional struggles of the earlier phases 

of the campaign. ULTRA intercepts helped to fuel Bradley’s determination. The 

two enemy units opposite him, II Parachute Corps and LXXXIV Corps, reported 

heavy losses before July 10 and continuing heavy losses during the next two 

weeks. The senior German officers on the scene expected a breakthrough at any 

moment 39 

Second, Bradley insisted that a heavy aerial bombardment immediately precede the beginning of COBRA. From its inception, Bradley intended that the air 

bombardment include the use of heavy bombers. As Bradley described it, 

“Realizing the great power we had in our Air Force, I wanted to secure someplace where we could use a great mass of power to virtually wipe out some 

German division opposing part of our line and then punch a hole through.” 

Bradley chose the straight stretch of road running from St. LB through 

Pkriers to Lossay, having determined60 that it could support the large force he 

intended to deploy. The air bombardment, in Bradley’s mind, offset the lack of 

artillery firepower available. He told his chief of artillery, Brig. Gen. Charles E. 

Hart, that if he had had ten times the number of guns, he might have dispensed 

with air support.61 Lack of artillery ammunition, at least as much as lack of 

artillery pieces, prevented an extensive gunfire bombardment. The Allied supply 

situation, restricted to what could come in over the original landing beaches, did 

not allow for a surfeit of shells. Bradley also wanted the “blast effect” of the 

bombs, which, with their thin metal casings, greatly exceeded the blast effect of 

artillery shells of similar weight.62 

Because Bradley himself had originated the idea of employing heavy 

bombers, he had several preconceived notions about how they should be used. He 

required that the air bombardment fall into a rectangular area approximately 4 

miles long and 1% miles deep, 7,000 yards by 2,500 yards.63 The area covered 

the entire front of his initial attack. He also required that only 100-pound fragmentation bombs be dropped64 to prevent excessive cratering that would hamper 

the advance of the infantry and, more important, the mechanized forces. He 

planned to withdraw his troops 800 yards from the front line.65 A withdrawal of 

only 800 yards cut the safety margin exceedingly fine, but Bradley wished to 

avoid placing his troops too far away to follow up the attack without delay and 

letting the Germans reoccupy the conceded space, which would, in turn, force 

his men to fight through an enlarged defensive position. Bradley also wanted the 

464 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

air bombardment conducted rapidly; if it stretched out over several hours, it 

would lose its shock effect. 

Bradley recognized that the airmen would prefer to approach the target box 

at a right angle to the front, flying from north to south, first crossing over the 

American lines and then dropping their bombs on the Germans to minimize 

exposure to antiaircraft fire. Bradley, however, wished the bombers to fly parallel to the front (along German lines) rather than perpendicular to it, in order to 

provide a greater security margin for his troops. The bombers could attack from 

east to west, during the morning, putting the sun in the eyes of the antiaircraft 

gunners, or reverse the course of attack in the aftemoon.66 

Bradley had picked the St. LB-PCriers road as the battle’s start line because 

it was straight, paralleled the front immediately behind or on the German front 

line, and would serve as a clear and unmistakable aiming point for the air forces. 

The entire target box fell just to the south of the road.67 As Bradley stated in his 

1951 memoirs, “Indeed it was the thought of saturation bombing that attracted 

me to the PCriers road. Easily recognizable from the air, the road described a 

long straight line that would separate our position from that of the Germans. The 

bombers, I reasoned, could fly parallel to it without danger of mistaking our 

front” [emphasis added] .68 

Given the key role allotted to air power in the attack, it is puzzling why 

Bradley waited until July 19 to fully inform the Allied air commanders of his 

scheme and their place in it. He merely said that he did not approach them until 

he had finished his plans and obtained Montgomery’s approval on July 18.69 On 

July 19, Bradley, flew from his headquarters in Normandy with his tactical air 

commander, Maj. Gen. Elwood R. (Pete) Quesada, Commander of the IX 

Tactical Air Command, to Leigh-Mallory’s headquarters at Stanmore. There 

they found arrayed the full panoply of Allied air leadership-Tedder, LeighMallory, and Spaatz-accompanied by Vandenberg, Brereton, Doolittle, 

Coningham, and lesser lights.70 In his memoirs Bradley glossed over the differences between himself and the air chiefs. He baldly stated: 

Air’s enthusiasm for COBRA almost exceeded that of our troops on the ground, 

for air welcomed the St. LB carpet attack as an unrivaled opportunity to test the 

feasibility of saturation bombing. Leigh-Mallory proposed a heavier concentration of bombers than the Allies had ever before put into the air?’ 

Bradley left the meeting with a commitment for 1,500 heavy bombers, almost 

900 medium bombers, and 350 fighter bombers.72 

Bradley’s description masked the serious differences he had had with the 

other airmen in attendance, who had initially insisted on a safety zone of 3,000 

yards to separate his troops from the bombing. They agreed to reduce the safety 

zone to 1,500 yards, which still did not satisfy him. In the end he agreed to withdraw the troops only 1,200 yards. The heavy bombers, however, would not 

strike the front edge of the target box and would thereby add 250 yards to their 

465 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Maj. Gen. Elwood R. 

“Pete” Quesada, Commanding General, IX 

Tactical Air Command. 

safety zone. Fighter-bombers would cover those 250 yards with their own more 

accurate and easily deliverable ordnance.73 Leigh-Mallory even attempted to 

gain the participation of Bomber Command, but Bradley and Vandenberg both 

vetoed his idea. Bomber Command was equipped to drop only large bombs whose 

craters might retard the advance.74 

At the meeting, Quesada and Bradley insisted that the bombers fly parallel 

to the front,75 When some of the airmen present agreed with them, they apparently assumed that all of the airmen present agreed with them. In this they were 

mistaken. They had unknowingly run afoul of the air command system, which at 

that moment was suffering from tangled lines of authority and was riven with 

even greater personal animosity than usual. 

On the American side of the house several principals were involved in a 

game of musical chairs. Two days before the July 19 meeting Eisenhower and 

Spaatz had accepted Marshall’s recommendation that Brereton vacate his post as 

Commander of the Ninth Air Force to assume command of Combined Airborne 

Headquarters, which consisted of all British and American airborne divisions in 

the theater (a force of three divisions), plus separate troops, the IX Troop Carrier 

Command, and RAF transport and troop carrier formations. This conglomeration became the First Allied Airborne Army in August 1944.76 

Meanwhile, Vandenberg, whom Spaatz and Eisenhower had originally 

wanted for the airborne command but whom Marshall refused to promote,77 

466 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

would move over to command the Ninth. The Ninth’s Deputy Commander, Maj. 

Gen. Ralph Royce (another member of Spaatz’s West Point Class of 1914), 

would take over Vandenberg’s old post as Deputy Commander in Chief, AEAF. 

Although the principals had learned of these moves, the War Department and 

Marshall had not yet approved them. This left most of the American tactical air 

high command in a state of flux. If his diary is a reliable guide, Vandenberg 

spent a considerable amount of time during this period stewing over the “RoyceBrereton-Vandenberg triangle.”78 Quesada apparently continued, blissfully 

unaware of his superior’s command changes until later. 

Brereton may well have been “kicked upstairs”-at least, Bradley thought 

~0.79 He said of Brereton, “Ike knew Brereton was not pulling his weight. I had 

told Ike he was hard to do business with. Brereton never seemed interested in 

the job, would never throw himself into it.”go Brereton had committed two of 

the worst sins possible for an air commander with a ground support mission. He 

had not established a good working relationship with nor set up his headquarters 

directly alongside his counterpart in the ground forces. Apparently, after he set 

up his own plush headquarters in Normandy, he hardly ever went to see Bradley 

in the field, only a mile away.81 Unlike Coningham, who also had a less-thanexemplary relationship with his counterpart in the ground forces, Brereton had 

neither the patina of past success nor the support of his superiors in the air chain 

of command. His aspirations for independence and his support of the transportation plan had probably irritated Spaatz. In the somewhat feudal and definitely 

hierarchical nature of the military establishment there was no indication that 

Brereton was a “Spaatz man.” Conversely, Vandenberg had formed strong ties 

to the Arnold-Spaatz section of the Army Air Forces. 

As the American generals sorted out their new positions, the British air marshals engaged in a brouhaha of their own, revolving around their respective views 

of Montgomery. Coningham was still hostile toward him, Tedder, as discussed 

earlier, had taken up the warpath against him for his supposed lack of vigor and 

success and had continued the campaign for his relief. Leigh-Mallory, marching 

to his own drum, had alienated Portal, Tedder, and SHAEF Headquarters staff by 

literally moving in with Montgomery. In his Command Diary, on July 19, 

Tedder noted: 

Montgomery will not deal with Coningham, but only with L-M [LeighMallory]. This entails Broadhurst, Coningham’s subordinate, dealing direct 

with L-M. . . . L-M has even moved his own personal caravan. . . with Monty. 

L-M seems to be cashing in on the discomfiture of his own subordinate.82 

This finished Leigh-Mallory as far as Tedder was concerned. 

In his postwar memoirs Tedder proceeded directly from the end of GOODWOOD to the air command situation. GOODWOOD’S failure allowed him to squelch 

Leigh-Mallory’s ambition to take a more active role. 

467 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Field Marshal Bernard 

L. Montgomery, General 

Officer Commanding, 21 

Army Group, Northwest 

Europe, 1944-1945. 

My immediate problem was to place on a more solid footing the arrangements 

for control of our Air Forces. Leigh-Mallory, though earnest, zealous, and brave, 

did not inspire confidence as Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Air 

Forces. It seemed to me that he was insufficiently fm in explaining to the Army 

authorities the limitations of air-power in direct support of the ground 

Montgomery meanwhile had developed a greater appreciation for LeighMallory’s qualities. He wrote to a friend at the War Office in London, “We must 

definitely keep Leigh-Mallory as Air Commander-in-Chief. He is the only airman who is out to help us with the land battle and has no jealous reactions.”84In 

the eyes of most of the top Allied airmen, Montgomery’s support could only 

have been the kiss of death. 

At this point Tedder decided to eliminate or greatly reduce Headquarters, 

AEAF. He had already removed CROSSBOW from AEAF’s purview and had 

informed Leigh-Mallory that if he, Leigh-Mallory, wished to move forward to 

direct the tactical battle at the expense of Coningham, then he, Tedder, would 

resume total direction of the strategic air forces. ‘‘I could not help feeling,” 

wrote Tedder in 1966, “that Leigh-Mallory’s large assurances to Montgomery 

encouraged the unhealthy tendency of the Army to rely on air-power for support 

of a kind which it could not confer.”85 

Bradley, and probably Quesada, could have had little idea of the quagmire 

into which they had stepped. Leigh-Mallory ’s enthusiastic support for COBRA at 

468 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

the meeting of July 19 must have left the impression that he would ensure the 

adherence of the other airmen. After all, when Bradley gave an order to his subordinates or agreed to an operation on their behalf, he very naturally assumed 

that they would follow his lead once a decision was made, even if they had previously expressed disagreement. Bradley had, of course, heard the protests of 

Vandenberg and Brig. Gen. Orvil A. Anderson, Doolittle’s operations officer, 

that the big bombers could not fly parallel to the front, but he had also heard 

Leigh-Mallory dismiss these objections.86 With good reason, then, Bradley 

assumed that the airmen had accepted his strictures and he returned to the 

Continent jubilant at the extent of the air commitment. He and the Air Chiefs had 

set the date for COBRA for the morning of July 21, less than thirty-six hours 

away.87 

The Air Chiefs had also completed the air command arrangements for 

COBRA, abizarre mishmash that excluded USSTAF and the Eighth Air Force 

from most command decisions and left the heavy bombers subject to the orders 

of men who understood little of the technical difficulties involved in their operation. Tedder, who had approved the mission in the first place, would provide 

top-level supervision; Leigh-Mallory would set the time and date of the operation; Brereton would plan the bomber attack; and Quesada would coordinate the 

air attack with the ground forces.88 

Inclement weather forced the postponement of COBRA from July 21 to July 

24. This postponement gave the Eighth the chance to send a 1,100-bomber raid 

against German aircraft production plants on July 21 and a 280-bomber attack 

on French airfields on July 23. On the evening of July 23, AEAF’s meteorologists predicted that the weather on the next day would be suitable for COBRA. 

USSTAF’s weathermen had a different forecast. They predicted heavy to moderate clouds for July 24 and better conditions for July 25 in the St. LB area. They 

foresaw good bombing weather over Berlin and central Germany on July 24. 

At 9:30 P.M. on July 23, Spaatz’s Deputy for Operations, Maj. Gen. Frederick 

L. Anderson, called Leigh-Mallory for an immediate decision as to the target 

because the Eighth needed to know which bombs to load, 500-pound generalpurpose bombs and incendiaries for Berlin or fragmentation bombs for St. LB. 

Leigh-Mallory, relying on his own forecasts, set the starting time for COBRA’S 

air bombardment at 1O:OO A.M. On the morning of July 24, AEAF’s meteorologists revised their estimates and called for slowly breaking clouds from 11:OO 

A.M. to 1:00 P.M. Therefore, at 6:30 A.M. Leigh-Mallory delayed the attack for 

two hours, rescheduling it for 12 110011.89 Despite the unease of their own Eighth 

Air Force weathermen, 1,586 B-17s and B-24s left their bases to participate in 

COBRA. Leigh-Mallory flew to Bradley’s headquarters. Vandenberg and Smith 

flew forward as well. They saw little; except for a brief period when the clouds 

thinned somewhat, the skies stayed heavily overcast with a ceiling of only 5,000 

feet. Leigh-Mallory had no choice but to call off the mission and reschedule it 

for the next day. 

469 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Unfortunately, the timing of this decision-he waited until the last moment 

to cancel-revealed Leigh-Mallory ’s unfamiliarity with the handling of heavy 

bombers and reflected unfavorably on his ability to command such formations. 

The cancellation caused tragedy and confusion. Incredibly, the ground forces had 

no direct communications link to the bombers in the air. Quesada passed LeighMallory’s halt order back to Stanmore by radio-telephone, where its receipt produced immediate consternation in the Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting, which 

had convened, as usual, at 11 :00 A.M. Tedder, Spaatz, Harris, Doolittle, and 

Eaker (who had come up from the Mediterranean for his and Spaatz’s end-ofthe-month meeting) were nonplussed. Doolittle said that the bombers were only 

seven minutes from their targets and could not be recalled now. He assumed that 

the planes would return fully loaded if they could not bomb visually. Spaatz 

wanted to know who had set the attack for noon, when the Eighth’s weathermen 

had predicted solid overcast at that time, with a chance of some clearing only at 

2:OO P.M. Bradley, he said, had indicated that he could wait until 3:OO P.M. for the 

bombing to start. “Why,” asked Spaatz, “had the earlier time been selected?”90 

No one present could answer him. 

Over St. L6 the first of the Eighth’s three bombardment divisions made no 

attack because of poor visibility. In the second bombardment division to pass, 

one group (35 bombers), after making three runs to identify its target, released 

its bombs. The third bombardment division to arrive over the target box found 

weather conditions slightly improved, and 3 17 bombers loosed their loads, 550 

tons of high explosives and 135 tons of fragmentation bombs, before finally 

receiving the recall order.91 All the heavy bombers had approached and bombed 

at a right angle, or perpendicular, to the front line. Some had dropped short, 

directly onto their own troops. They killed 25 men and wounded 131 more of 

the 30th Division. 

The performance enraged Bradley. Thanks to the confusion caused by 

bombing after the cancellation of the air phase of COBRA and some indecision as 

to whether the ground phase was also postponed, his troops had to fight hand-tohand to regain the start line.92 The German LXXXZV Corps defending St. L6 

optimistically (and prematurely) reported that it had shot the American offensive 

into the ground with a great expenditure of artillery ammunition.93 

Bradley could scarcely believe that the bombers had not struck parallel to 

the front. At his command post he found Leigh-Mallory equally upset. “But 

what worries me more than anything else,” Bradley told Leigh-Mallory, “is the 

fact that those heavies came in over our heads instead of parallel to the Pkriers 

road. I left Stanmore with a clear understanding that they would fly parallel to 

the road.”94 Vandenberg and Brig. Gen. Frederic H. Smith, his deputy, attempted 

to explain to Bradley, Leigh-Mallory, and Quesada why the mission could not 

be carried out as planned-to little effect. Bradley did not even mention them in 

his memoirs, but Vandenberg noted sourly in his diary, “General Bradley gave 

the appearance of having very little idea as to the cloud conditions required for 

470 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

heavy bombardment, a situation we attempted to remedy.”95 Before leaving 

Bradley’s headquarters, Leigh-Mallory promised to check on the bombers’ 

direction of attack. 

Leaving an incensed Bradley behind, Vandenberg flew back to England 

where he found a message to call an irate Spaatz. Spaatz demanded to know 

why the mission had not been set up for Tuesday, July 25, “when his weather 

people had given a much brighter forecast for that day than they had for Monday.”96 Vandenberg replied that his forecasters had predicted no better weather 

for Tuesday than for Monday, and besides, he himself had observed that, as the 

Eighth’s meteorologists had predicted, the weather had not broken that afternoon. Spaatz responded that if the COBRA mission was on for Tuesday and if 

there was any difference of opinion between the two groups of meteorologists, 

he should be informed at once. By 9:OO P.M. that evening Vandenberg informed 

Spaatz that all of the meteorologists had agreed on 1O:OO A.M. for the next day’s 

mission over St. L6.97 What irked Spaatz was not the bombing short, but the 

waste of effort for 1,600 of his bombers. The late decision to cancel had cost 

him a day of visual bombing conditions over Berlin and central Germany.98 

Vandenberg’s busy evening continued. He talked to Eighth Air Force 

Headquarters and, after some argument, informed it of Leigh-Mallory ’s desire 

for bombing parallel to the road. Eighth Air Force Headquarters replied that as 

long as Bradley required that the bombers attack in as little time as possible, 

they could not fly parallel. Funneling more than 1,500 bombers through the 

short side of the target box would take 2% hours, if it could be done at all. Soon 

afterward, Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson of USSTAF called Vandenberg. 

He, too, emphasized that “the time factor” controlled their direction of attack. 

He suggested that Bradley might want to extend the time allowed. Before 

Vandenberg could pass this message on to Leigh-Mallory, Leigh-Mallory 

informed him that he had just spoken to Bradley and that Bradley could not 

accept a lengthier attack and, therefore, “had decided to accept the additional 

risk of perpendicular to the road bombing.”99 

Bradley had accepted the alternative with extreme reluctance. Later he 

expressed his feelings about having been coerced: 

I was shocked and angered by air’s reply, for to me it represented a serious 

breach of good faith planning. . . . Had I known of air’s intent to chance the 

perpendicular approach, I would never have consented to its plan. 

What clinched the decision for Bradley was Leigh-Mallory ’s latest weather forecast, which noted that a low-pressure area would move into the St. L6 area in the 

afternoon of July 25, carrying with it several days of bad weather. In addition, at 

an earlier command conference he and his subordinates had decided to wait only 

one or two more days for air support. Bradley would have pulled his troops farther back had he known in advance of the bombers’ approach route.100 

47 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The status of the enemy troops facing his attack added to Bradley’s anxiety. 

Signal intelligence decrypts from July 14 and 21 revealed that the German 

LXXXIV Corps and I1 Parachute Corps had reported serious disorganization as a 

result of earlier American attacks and were unsure that they could continue a 

successful defense. Further messages on July 22,24, and 25 detailed the steadily 

depreciating combat value of II Parachute Corps.101 An extraordinary opportunity beckoned if only Bradley’s forces could go forward, and the blow could not 

be long delayed. A more ominous signal, which indicated that the Germans 

might have begun to realize their vulnerability to Bradley’s forces in this section 

of the beachhead, dated late July 22, decrypted 8:18 A.M. July 23, from the 

German Seventh Army Luftwaffe liaison, urgently requested reconnaissance of 

powerful new U.S. forces with tanks (Patton’s Third Army) opposite the 17th SS 

Panzer Grenadier Division.102 (See Map 14, Operation COBRA Area, Night of 

On the morning of July 25, at about 1O:OO A.M., Eighth Air Force mission 

no. 494 began its bomb drop. In an effort equaling the previous day’s, the Eighth 

dispatched 1,581 B-17s and B-24s. Unlike the day before, 1,503 of the heavies 

released their high-explosive cargo and sent it hurtling toward the front line. 

Over 3,300 tons of explosives plus 870 tons dropped by the medium bombers 

and fighter-bombers crashed into the greatly understrength German Panzer Lehr 

Division, killing 1,000 of its men, destroying three of its battalion command 

posts, knocking out all but a dozen of its armored fighting vehicles, and wiping 

out an attached parachute regiment.103 Lt. Gen. Fritz Bayerlein, the division’s 

commander, described the Normandy scene in a postwar interrogation. “It was 

hell. . . . The planes kept coming overhead like a conveyor belt, and the bomb 

carpets came down. . . . My front lines looked like a landscape on the moon, and 

at least seventy percent of my personnel were out of action-dead, wounded, 

crazed or numb.”l04 At 1O:OO A.M. Bayerlein reported to his superiors that the 

air bombardment heralded an American breakthrough attempt. He urgently 

requested the Luftwaffe’s assistance.105 

Despite this punishing blow and the artillery barrage that followed it, the 

well-disciplined and -trained German survivors, in a last-gasp effort, managed to 

prevent the American breakthrough for one more day. By the night of July 25, 

the American assault had advanced only a mile south of the Ptriers road, still 

within the target box. The general gloom and disappointment that surrounded 

the first day’s action did not affect General Collins. He sensed that the attack 

had broken through the German lines. Signal intelligence on the Germans’ 

weakened state even before the offensive, which Bradley undoubtedly shared 

with Collins, and the early morning decryption of Bayerlein’s plea for help must 

have confirmed his feelings. ULTRA also intercepted a message dated before 

dawn on July 26 in which LXXXIV Corps reported a shortage of 88mm antitank 

ammunition, heavy casualties, and a deteriorating situation.106 On the evening 

of July 25, Collins summoned his armor to the front with orders to push through 

July 24-25, 1944.) 

472 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the last German defenders and exploit the breakthrough. 107 The German forces 

in Normandy, bled white by seven weeks of attrition, their attention focused on 

the Caen sector by Montgomery’s repeated attacks, and their mobility curtailed 

by Allied control of the air, did not react quickly or forcefully enough to 

Bradley’s offensive. On July 26, Collins’s troops burst through the thin screen of 

Germans opposing them, and, thanks to the ingeniously simple idea of welding 

iron shears to the front of each tank, which gave them a tactical advantage over 

the road-bound Germans, the Americans plowed through the hedgerows into the 

clear terrain beyond. The race through France to the German border had begun. 

On the afternoon of July 25, however, the long-awaited breakthrough seemed 

as far away as ever. In addition to the surprisingly stout German defense, more 

short bombings had shaken the advancing troops. Although in retrospect it was 

evident that the air bombardment had accomplished its goal of wrecking the 

German defenses, Americans on the spot were naturally more inclined to dwell 

on their own losses. Once again, the 30th Infantry Division bore the brunt of 

friendly fire. A unit of the 9th Infantry Division also suffered heavily. Short 

bombs killed 11 1 Americans, including Lt. Gen. Leslie J. McNair, the highestranking Allied officer to die in the campaign, and wounded 490 more.108 

Ironically, McNair, in his previous assignment as head of the Army Ground 

Forces, had been one of the harshest critics of the AAF’s lack of training in 

close air support. Other GIs suffered from combat fatigue or, to use the more 

vivid World War I term, shell shock. As a direct result of the July 25 bombings, 

the 30th Infantry Division reported 164 cases of combat exhaustion.109 

Eisenhower, who had come to Bradley’s headquarters to observe the first day of 

the offensive, was more dismayed by the short bombing than Bradley and said 

of the heavy bombers’ performance, “I don’t believe they can be used in support 

of ground forces. That’s a job for artillery. I gave them a green light this time. 

But I promise you it’s the last.”l10 

Bombs from between thirty-five and sixty heavy bombers and forty-two 

medium bombers fell within American lines,ll* all as a result of human error.112 

The bombers were working under what were for them unusual conditions. They 

had planned to bomb at 15,000 to 16,000 feet, but cloud cover over St. L6 

forced them to recompute their sights while airborne and to bomb at 12,000 feet. 

In descending to the lower altitude, formations loosened up, as nervous pilots 

sought air space in congested areas over the target. Elongated bomb patterns 

resulted as the groups followed standard procedure and released their bombs 

when the lead plane dropped its bombs. On the ground, a prevailing wind from 

the south quickly dissipated the smoke from the marking shells fired by 

American artillery. This smoke soon mixed with the clouds from the attack and 

drifted back toward the American lines, masking any aiming points.113 The allimportant St. LbPCriers road, visible on the map, like much else in Normandy, 

proved less prominent from the air. Years later Quesada berated himself 

474 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

The shattered aftermath of Operation COBRA near St. L8, France, July 26,1944. 

Now, everybody made a mistake, including Pete Quesada, in thinking that the 

St. L8 road was a good and visible demarcation point that anybody could see, 

and it turned out not to be so. The St. L8 road was . . . rather obscure . . . and I 

have always condemned myself. . . [for] not having flown over this road 

myself and looked at 

In fact, many bombardiers, well aware of the first day’s tragedy, took great 

pains not to bomb short on the second day. One-half of the 1st Bombardment 

Division, approximately 150 to 200 bombers, delivered their loads beyond the 

target. Unfortunately, 2 to 4 percent of the bombers dropped short. One bombardier had trouble with his bombsight and recomputed visually, with poor 

results; another failed- identify vital landmarks properly; and a command pilot 

failed to observe the order to drop by bomb group, ordering “bombs away” 

when his wing leader, several hundred yards ahead of the pilot’s formation, 

dropped his bombs.115 

The next day Spaatz talked to Doolittle, Eisenhower, and Bradley. In summarizing the operation, Spaatz made four main points: 

1. Short bombing, like short rounds from supporting artillery fire, was an 

unavoidable fact of life. 

2. The mass of bombs dropped on St. L8 had so demoralized the enemy 

that the demoralized U.S. troops had still succeeded in achieving a breakthrough. 

475 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

3. Because of their striking power and potential for tremendous damage, 

masses of heavy bombers should not be routed over friendly troops. 

4. All our bombing experience shows that lateral error is greater than range 

error. To achieve the foregoing, the Air Commander himself must determine 

what weight of effort can be placed in any area selected by the Army Commander and must have the power to decide whether or not an area can be 

attacked at a11.116 

Spaatz’s problem with lateral dispersion, also known as drift, raised an issue 

seldom discussed in other analyses of COBRA. That was perhaps for two reasons: 

(1) either the strategic airmen had become so accustomed to analyzing bomb 

plots that they regarded it as a given and subconsciously assumed that everyone 

understood, or (2) the airmen believed it to be so technical that they could not 

possibly explain it to an outsider. In a perpendicular approach, if a plane 

released bombs at the proper time, its forward momentum would be imparted to 

its bombs and would carry them beyond friendly lines, even if they veered off a 

straight course. A parallel approach did not have that advantage. Even if a heavy 

bomber released its bombs at the correct time, side-to-side error, which was 

much harder to calculate and compensate for than forward momentum, would 

almost certainly carry bombs into friendly forces. 

Furthermore, if bombers on a parallel approach entered the target zone at an 

angle different from the briefed approach, any under- or over-shooting of the target could again put strings of bombs into friendly troops. In any attempt to send 

1,500 bombers through a two-and-one-half-mile-wide parallel approach, congestion would invariably put many groups on the wrong approach angle. A parallel 

approach for COBRA would force the bombers to form a column two groups 

wide, extending all the way back to Holland, and take several hours to funnel 

over the target. Although lateral dispersion caused no attributable casualties, the 

AAF official history does note that for COBRA “spillage to the east and west of 

their targets” occurred for several of the formations, all of which flew from 

north to south.117 

The Eighth’s standard operating procedure added to the possibility of lateral 

dispersion. Although, by this stage in the war, most heavy bombers carried the 

improved Norden bombsight (M-9), capable of very high accuracy in welltrained hands, only the lead bombardier in each formation, usually the group or 

wing in 1944, used his bombsight to correct both for drift (side-to-side accuracy) 

and for range or rate (front-to-back accuracy). The remaining bombardiers in the 

formation corrected for range only and released their bombs when they saw the 

lead plane release its bombs. Most of the bombardiers in a formation did not correct for drift. 

This procedure was obviously not ideal for maximum bombing efficiency 

but had been adopted for safety’s sake. By 1944 the bombardier was actually 

able to take over control of his aircraft from the pilot when he adjusted his sight 

476 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

and allowed the bombsight, through its electrical connection with the automatic 

pilot, to adjust course. In a formation, kept tight to maximize each aircraft's 

defensive power and the compactness of its bomb patterns, the danger of midair 

collision would have greatly increased had each bombadier maneuvered independently to correct his aim. Hence, only the formation's lead bombardier made 

the necessary corrections; the others conformed to his movements.118 It was 

hardly likely that the Eighth could or would change this practice for a single 

mission with only a few days' notice. 

If timing and lateral dispersion problems necessitated a perpendicular 

approach, why, then, did Spaatz recommend parallel bombing for future support 

missions requiring heavy-bomber participation? He did so to avoid psychological damage to the assault troops. The day after the COBRA bombardment, Spaatz 

recorded in his Command Diary, 

If by any chance a gross error in the leading formations causes bombs to fall 

among our troops, the psychological effect of succeeding waves of bombing 

becomes temfic since, if one of our formations errs, in the minds of the soldiers 

on the ground the same error may be made by others, and their worry and anxiety builds up to tremendous prop~rtion."~ 

Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz alighting from his B-17 at an Eighth Air Force B-24 base to 

confer with his air crews. He visited immediately before and after combat operations whenever possible. 

477 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Parallel bombing would reduce the number of planes passing over the troops. 

Spaatz also recommended selecting more aiming points to reduce the concentration of planes and potential errors at a single point-a 1,500-yard safety 

margin simply did not suffice. Finally, Spaatz conceded to the ground commander, Bradley, the right to suggest the target area, but he reserved to the air commander the right to determine the weight of effort placed on any specific point 

and “the power to decide whether or not an area can be attacked at a11.”120As 

Spaatz well knew, he and Doolittle had had too little voice in determining either 

the time of the attack or its feasibility under prevailing weather conditions. 

Although Spaatz had defended the work of the Eighth to Eisenhower and 

Bradley, the performance of the 2d Bombardment Division, made up entirely of 

B-24s, apparently had not pleased him. In contrast to American ground force 

leaders like Bradley, Patton, and even Eisenhower, who openly relieved several 

division commanders and lesser officers promptly, if not too promptly, for inadequate performance, Spaatz did not deal harshly with his subordinate commanders. If they failed the test of combat, he quietly sent them to other posts. This 

seems to have been the fate of the commanding general of the 2d Bombardment 

Division, Maj. Gen. James P. Hodges. 

In mid-August the Eighth reorganized. It reduced VIII Fighter Command to 

a paper organization and assigned its fighter groups directly to the three bombardment divisions, which became air divisions. This reorganization enabled the 

same bomber and fighter formations to operate together for extended periods 

and thus ensured close cooperation between them, with the goal of reducing the 

number of occasions on which either type of aircraft would miss an all-important air rendezvous. Bombers without constant escort still proved easy marks for 

the Luftwaffe. 

As part of the reorganization, Maj. Gen. William E. Kepner, who had a reputation as a troubleshooter, took over Hodges’s bombardment division. Within 

twenty days of COBRA, Hodges found himself in Washington as Assistant Chief 

of the Air Staff, Intelligence, Headquarters, AAF. He never held another combat 

command and retired in 1951 still a major general. This reassignment had been 

in the works before COBRA. On the day of the bombing, Hodges attended a luncheon given by Spaatz’s Chief of Intelligence, Brig. Gen. George C. McDonald, 

where he met the top British intelligence officers and was processed into the 

“real Blackmarket Intelligence business.”l21 Hodges’s new post was, apparently, not highly regarded. His predecessor as Assistant Chief of the Air Staff, 

Intelligence, Brig. Gen. Thomas D. White, upon leaving the assignment, pungently commented to McDonald, “I never have had an unhappier job tho’ few 

people know it; A-2 will forever suck the hind tit [sic] in the AAF.”122 

From January 1944 through July 1944, the 2d Bombardment Division’s 

bombing accuracy had fallen far behind that of the 1st Division’s and, for five of 

those seven months, behind the 3d Division’s as well.123 In the Eighth, the B-24 

was considered inferior to the B-17, mostly because of its lower effective com478 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

bat air ceiling and poor center of gravity, caused by many modifications, which 

made it more prone to flak losses and more difficult for pilots to operate. 

However, it had performed well for the Fifteenth Air Force.124 The aircraft’s 

capabilities did not account for the poor achievements of Hodges’s units. 

The 2d Division did badly during COBRA, leading the mission on both July 

24 and 25. Its lead bombers had the easiest time because the smoke of previous 

groups did not obscure their aiming points and targets and because enemy flak 

had not had time to find its range and adjust for atmospheric conditions. On July 

25, thirteen of the 2d’s forty-five squadrons bombing dropped short of the target 

area; two of those dropped 2,800 to 3,000 yards short, among the American 

troops. In the 3d Division, which followed, six out of thirty-six squadrons 

bombed short, with one of those-the 100th Bomb Group-dropping bombs 

into the American lines. 

In the 1st Division, only one squadron bombed short of the target area, by a 

mere 100 yards, and five groups withheld their cargoes and hit alternate targets 

because they could not identify their aiming points. One-half of the 1st Division 

bombed beyond the target area; obviously, its bombardiers had taken to heart the 

briefings concerning the proximity of U.S. troops to the target box.125 

After Hodges left the 2d Division, its bombing accuracy improved to equal 

or surpass that of the other divisions. In January, February, and March 1945, it 

significantly outdistanced them.126 

As the breakthrough progressed and the troops and commanders had a 

chance to assess the damage inflicted on the Germans, emotions cooled. By July 

28, Bradley wrote to Eisenhower: “This operation could not have been the success it has been without such close cooperation of the Air. In the first place the 

bombardment we gave them last Tuesday was apparently highly successful, 

even though we did suffer many casualties ourselves.”l27 

Later Missions in Support of Ground Operations 

Montgomery requested another heavy-bomber mission for early August to 

assist an offensive by his newly established 1st Canadian Army. On August 5, 

Spaatz and Vandenberg128 met with other air leaders, including Tedder and 

Leigh-Mallory and,129 after a five-hour session, they agreed to supply the 

American and British heavy bombers. 

At 1O:OO P.M. on August 7, Leigh-Mallory once again tried to make lastminute changes in operational plans. He called Spaatz and informed him that the 

AAF’s bombing effort over two of the aiming points needed augmentation 

because he had already requested Harris and Bomber Command to give additional support for those two areas. Spaatz, apparently incensed at another example of Leigh-Mallory’s penchant for interference and inability to let well enough 

alone, immediately called Tedder and gained his agreement that if the attack 

479 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

needed more weight, the Americans themselves would supply it. Spaatz was 

seeking to avoid the confusion that was very likely to result if the two Allied 

bomber forces attacked the same pinpoint targets. Then Spaatz called LeighMallory back and obtained his agreement to place more American bombers over 

the aiming points in question.130 The next day the Eighth dispatched 678 

bombers to follow up the initial bombardment of 637 RAF aircraft.131 The 2d 

Bombardment Division did not participate in this attack. 

This combined attack incorporated several lessons learned from the St. LB 

and earlier air bombardments. Bomber Command did not bomb directly ahead 

of the troops. Instead, it delivered large bombs, with their accompanying cratering effect, on both flanks of the assaulting Canadians in order to seal off lateral 

movement by German reinforcements. Also, the RAF, departing from its practice in earlier close support missions, attacked at night, when the Canadians 

began their own assault, penetrating the first two German lines and gaining five 

kilometers. Ground mist in the morning delayed further attacks, which allowed 

the Germans to counterattack. Nevertheless, Lt. Gen. G. C. Simonds, Commander of the 2d Canadian Corps, committed two inexperienced armored divisions, 

the 4th Canadian and the 1st Polish, to exploit the attack.132 

At 1:00 P.M. on August 8, the Eighth Air Force arrived to bomb its targets. 

Scouting planes had preceded it to check weather conditions and the state of the 

target areas, which were marked by smoke shells and flares. As planned, the 

bombers flew parallel to the lines of the attacking troops, a tactic forcing a long 

flight over enemy territory and, of course, magnifying the usual problems of 

operating in congested air space. After the troops had withdrawn only 1,500 

yards-the Canadians, like Bradley, apparently were willing to chance casualties rather than give up too much ground and momentum-the American heavy 

bombers delivered their attacks flying north to south. 

The bombardment struck its targets in turn, in the manner of a creeping 

barrage. The bombers flew straight and level down forty miles of the German 

lines and received intense heavy flak for the entire distance. The 681 attackers 

lost 7 bombers, wrote off 4 more as not repairable, and had 107 with major 

damage and 187 with minor damage. They dropped 1,275 tons of bombs. Two 

of their four aiming points were well covered. Clouds of dust prevented the 

bombing of one point and allowed only 30 percent of the bombers to drop on 

the other.133 

Two 12-plane formations, unfortunately, bombed short, killing 65 and 

wounding 265 Canadians and Poles in areas packed with unsuspecting members 

of the 1st Polish Armored Division and the 3d Canadian Infantry Division, many 

of them sitting in their vehicles moving or waiting to move up to the front. Some 

of the bombs fell on the tactical headquarters of the Canadian division, wounding its commander, Maj. Gen. R.F.L. Kellor, and forcing his evacuation.134 The 

discomfiture caused by the shorts, the 5-minute safety delay between the bombardment and the renewal of the ground assault, the 1,500-yard safety margin, 

480 
HEAVY BOMBERS IN SUPPORT 

and the two divisions’ inexperience caused the attack to bog down. It halted on 

August 9 after gaining 13 kilometers.135 

AAF after-action reports revealed the near impossibility of preventing such 

short bombing. In one bomb group an antiaircraft round hit the lead plane just 

after it had decided to bypass the primary target, which was obscured by smoke. 

The round caused a fire in the bomb bay. The pilot, fearing for the lives of himself and his crew, salvoed his bomb load. The rest of the formation followed his 

lead. Their bombs landed in the friendly city of Caen. 

In a second instance, the lead bombardier and pilot, confused by a course 

change to avoid intense flak, performed “exceedingly poorly,” misidentifying 

their targets and dropping the formation’s bombs just to the south of Caen.136 

Such errors were inevitable on any large mission. The only way to keep them 

from adversely affecting the friendly assault troops was to bomb so far behind 

the enemy front line that any direct advantage the troops might gain was eliminated. 

The next day Spaatz flew to the Continent. At Heston Airfield, just before 

taking off, he encountered Eisenhower, who had just come from Normandy to 

review the paratroops of the 82d and lOlst Divisions. They discussed the use of 

heavy bombers in close support. After describing what he had learned so far, 

much of it based on an extensive report from Doolittle on operations of July 24 

and 25, Spaatz incorrectly noted that most of the gross bombing errors were the 

result of enemy antiaircraft fire or the actions of enemy aircraft. Eisenhower 

suggested that Spaatz visit Montgomery, who, after the previous day’s short 

bombing, had apparently developed misgivings about the employment of heavy 

bombers in close support. Before they parted Spaatz told Eisenhower that, in his 

opinion, “the only significant breakthrough obtained had been through the use of 

heavy bombardment [aircraft].”l37 

Once on the Continent, Spaatz visited, in order, Bradley, Patton, and 

Montgomery. The first two praised the cooperation of the tactical air forces, 

which had helped the speed and success of their advances. Spaatz found 

Montgomery singing a tune slightly different from the one Eisenhower had 

heard. Montgomery apparently told Spaatz that “the breakthrough of the Army 

was made possible by heavy bombardment,” and that “to have attempted such a 

breakthrough without such preparation would have cost him 10,000 men.”138 

Montgomery had certainly not sworn off using heavy bombers. 

Five days later, on August 14, a daylight Bomber Command bombardment 

preceded another 1st Canadian Army lunge toward Falaise. This time the RAF 

dropped short, causing 400 Commonwealth casualties, including 65 killed and 

91 missing, many blown to bits. A recent history of the RAF explained why: 

It appeared that someone had omitted to inform Bomber Command that the 

Army’s standard color for marking its positions was yellow; this was Bomber 

Command’s target-indicating colour, and 77 aircraft which had gone astray 

48 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

proceeded to bomb on yellow marks-(the more the troops burnt yellow flares 

to show their position the more the errant aircraft bombed them).m 

Once again the Poles suffered along with the Canadians. Ironically forty-four of 

the bomber crews dropping short were Canadian. The RAF, adding insult to 

injury, almost killed one of its own in a concentration of short bombs-Air 

Marshal Coningham-and a Canadian corps commander. 140 

Allied heavy bombers did not fly another close support mission until 

November 16, 1944, when they participated in the preliminary bombardment of 

Operation QUEEN, a U.S. First Army offensive in the Huertgen Forest region near 

Aachen. Their overall performance in close support during the campaign in 

northwestern Europe indicates that heavy bombers were not entirely suitable 

weapons. They did not belong on the tactical battlefield unless all other ground 

or tactical air firepower available was insufficient. A flyswatter and a sledgehammer can both kill flies, but the ease of use of the former made it far easier to 

control and more effective than the sound and force of the latter. In three out of 

four cases, close support of the ground troops, although spectacular, achieved 

little for effort involved. The ground troops did not achieve a breakthrough. In 

the fourth case, at St. L6, the heavy bombers expedited the success of a massive 

ground offensive by undercutting German resistance and probably saved American lives. 

The attacks in support of Montgomery, who faced the bulk of the Germans’ 

high-quality armored formations, could do little because he did not have the preponderance of strength necessary to overwhelm the troops facing him. Sheer 

weight of fire cannot make up for lack of manpower against a first-class opponent. The Panzer Lehr Division held on for one more day despite its drenching 

from the air. If the Germans had had reserves available, they might well have 

delayed the breakthrough for days. The decisive factors in the St. L6 breakthrough were Bradley’s massing of four divisions on a single division front and 

the Germans’ total lack of reserves to respond. This blow would have succeeded 

in any case, but the heavy-bomber attack helped the assault to penetrate the 

German lines more quickly and with fewer American casualties. 

482 
Chapter 14 

Stalemate on the 

German Frontier 

(September 11-December 15,1944) 

There is no conclusive evidence of any intention of the 

Germans to quit.‘ 

Spaatz to Arnold, September 24,1944 

To what extent the ground forces can advance during the 

ensuing late fall and winter months is anyone’s guess. 

However, it is my prediction that unless the weather is 

extremely unusual, the ground advances will be very limited until the good weather of spring again permits the 

overwhelming air cover to which they have become accustomed. Barring a disintegration within Germany itself or 

the benefit of a spell of good weather in October or 

November, I foresee a repetition of the winter in Africa and 

last winter in Italy.2 

4paatz to Lovett, October I, 1944. 

From the middle of September through the middle of December 1944, the 

U.S.-British ground forces engaged in a series of sanguinary battles from the 

Swiss border to the North Sea. As the Allied armies inched forward against the 

stout resistance of hastily created or largely reconstituted German divisions, 

Allied air power continued to dominate the skies over the battle lines and above 

Hitler’s truncated empire. 

In September, at a high-level Anglo-American conference in Quebec, codenamed OCTAGON, Roosevelt, Churchill, and the Combined Chiefs of Staff, in the 

483 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

midst of discussion concerning strategy and coming operations in the Pacific and 

Europe, resolved the air command tangle in the European Theater of Operations 

by abolishing the AEAF and removing, over Spaatz’s and Eisenhower’s objections, Bomber Command and USSTAF from Eisenhower’s direct control. Within 

the European Theater, Spaatz and his fellow Allied airmen faced, as usual, the 

task of setting strategic bombing priorities in the light of changing perceptions 

of remaining German military and economic strength. In addition, Spaatz had to 

balance the requirements of the strategic bombing campaign with the needs and 

exigencies of the ground situation. Finally, just as the Allied armies confronted 

recovered and effective opponents, Spaatz feared a revival of the Luftwaffe, 

which had begun to deploy the deadly new jet, the Me 262. 

A controversial phase of the AAF’s strategic bombing effort in Europe 

began in the autumn of 1944. Strong advocates of U.S. strategic bombing, such 

as former strategic bomber commander Maj. Gen. Haywood S. Hansell, have 

pointed to the four months from mid-September to mid-January as the time 

when the bombing offensive fatally weakened Germany “before a single Allied 

soldier set foot on German soil,” catastrophically injured selected German economic and industrial systems, and completed the remaining original strategic 

objectives of AWPDD.3 Academic critics of the bombing offensive have 

detected an effort “adrift among conflicting visions of the road to victory”4 and 

an AAF reversion “from its selective bombing doctrine to the Douhetian principles of mass attack and terror.”5 None of those views completely encompassed 

the reality of the bombing effort, yet all described, with varying degrees of 

objectivity, important aspects of the state of strategic bombing in Europe in the 

last quarter of 1944. 

This chapter and the one that follows show how the bombing of railroad marshaling yards could simultaneously be a euphemism for area bombing and a 

killing blow to the German war economy; how bomber leaders constantly shifted 

bombing priorities, yet continued to strangle both oil production and transportation; and how precision bombing became a jackhammer reducing German cities 

to rubble, instead of a scalpel cutting the heart out of German industry. 

The Removal of the Strategic Air Forces from SHAEF’s Control 

In late August 1944, Spaatz visited Eaker in the Mediterranean primarily to 

discuss the fate of the XI1 Tactical Air Command (XI1 TAC), which had accompanied Lt. Gen. Jacob L. Devers’s 6th Army Group in its invasion of southern 

France (Operation ANVIL/DRAGOON) and in its advance to the north. When 

Devers’s and Eisenhower’s troops made contact with each other, they would all 

come under Eisenhower’s control. Until then, Eaker and Spaatz agreed that 

Vandenberg, Commander of the Ninth Air Force, and Lt. Gen. John K. Cannon, 

Commander of the Twelfth Air Force, would coordinate the activities of XI1 

Tactical Air Command, through a REDLINE cable link already established between 

484 
STALEMATE 

the two headquarters.6 Afterward, XI1 TAC would come under the operational and 

administrative control of the Ninth Air Force.7 

Spaatz and Eaker used the occasion to pass on to Arnold, for his use at the 

coming conference at Quebec, their views of the air command arrangements in 

the European Theater of Operations. After declaring that the current AAF organization was “the most satisfactory” likely to be attained, they went on to condemn the AEAF. Each army group, they added, needed its own air force, and 

those air forces required no more controls between them than did the army 

groups. Just as no intervening headquarters existed between Eisenhower, who 

would formally assume command of all ground forces on September 1, and his 

army group commanders, none should exist between Eisenhower and his air 

forces.8 

On the afternoon of his return from the Mediterranean on August 30, Spaatz 

discussed with Eisenhower the organization of the U.S. Army Air Forces in the 

ETO. The next morning he held further discussions on the subject with Tedder 

and again with Eisenhower. That afternoon he met with Ambassador Winant and 

RAF Chief of Staff Charles Portal. All agreed that the AEAF ought to be disbanded. Spaatz cheerfully informed Robert Lovett, Assistant Secretary of War 

for Air, “In general, it is our desire to eliminate the Allied Expeditionary Air 

Force as soon as possible and I believe this will be accomplished. That headquarters has been a cause for disagreement since its inception.”s 

In his meeting with Spaatz, Portal not only had indicated a willingness to 

dispense with the AEAF but also had raised the issue of the changing command 

arrangements between Eisenhower and the strategic air forces. Because OVERLORD 

had obviously succeeded, Portal wished to invoke the provision, previously agreed 

upon by the CCS, of preinvasion air agreements that called for the independence 

of Bomber Command and USSTAF sometime after the establishment of the 

Western Allies on the Continent.10 Instead of supporting this move, as might 

have been expected, Spaatz opposed it. 

Spaatz assumed that Portal intended “to attempt to obtain a decision for the 

return of the strategic forces to the status existent January 1, 1944,”11 and he had 

no wish that Portal resume his role as chief interlocutor of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive. Before OVERLORD, Spaatz had strenuously objected to several of Portal’s actions, especially his refusal to authorize the bombing of the 

Ploesti oil facilities. In the months since then, Spaatz had become accustomed to 

serving under Eisenhower’s congenial hand and had no wish to exchange an 

American master for a British one. Spaatz wamed Arnold that “under no conditions should RAF Bomber Command be consolidated with the U.S. Strategic Air 

Forces.” He foresaw continued heavy losses for the RAF if it flew at night or, if 

it operated by day, extensive disruption of his own fighters covering it. Spaatz 

realized that Bomber Command would not accept an overall American strategic 

bombing commander; as for USSTAF, he added, “It may not be fully appreciated by you how strongly our American Air Force personnel feel about serving 

485 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

under British Command.”l2 Instead, Spaatz suggested to Portal that Eisenhower 

have both operational control and direct command of the heavy bombers. 13 

Spaatz preferred a slight modification of the current status of command relations. He had completely turned Eisenhower, with whom he worked extremely 

well, against the reversion to Portal’s control of the strategic air forces on September 1.14 Neither saw any need for a change in arrangements. 

At Spaatz’s urging, Eisenhower detailed their objections in messages to both 

Marshall and Arnold. Emphasizing that he “would regard any change as a serious mistake,” Eisenhower told Marshall that he needed to retain control of the 

strategic forces in order to concentrate the greatest possible strength for the 

“penetration” of Germany. So far, there had been no disputes between his headquarters and the British Chiefs of Staff concerning the bombers. Moreover, 

strategic priorities and bombing missions needed to be carefully coordinated 

with the ground battle by planners in his own headquarters. To facilitate such 

coordination, Spaatz, on September 1, had moved his headquarters to the 

Continent, next to Eisenhower’s. Air Chief Marshal Harris, head of Bomber 

Command, had sent his own liaison officers. Thus, Eisenhower urged, USSTAF 

should stay under his control. Reversion of Bomber Command to Portal’s direction would make it difficult to coordinate the two strategic commands-one 

under Portal and one under Spaatz.15 

On September 3, Eisenhower told Arnold, “All of us are striving to keep the 

heavies on normal tasks but emergency use in battle must be assured by continuation of the command system.”l6 Arnold replied, 

With regard to the Strategic Air Force command situation, I agree wholeheartedly [emphasis in original] with the view expressed in your recent cables that 

the control now vested in your headquarters should not be changed to revert to 

Chief of Air Staff but instead that all strategic air forces should be placed under 

your command.I7 

At the Second Quebec Conference, September 12-17, 1944, Arnold, however, “flopped over” on the issue of independence for the heavy bombers.18 

During the conference, which dealt mainly with European occupation policy and 

the war against Japan, Portal gained Arnold’s consent and the approval of the 

CCS to detach the strategic air forces from Eisenhower’s control. This air issue 

had meant more to Portal than to any of the other Chiefs. By bringing Harris, 

who, like Spaatz, had enjoyed comparative freedom under Eisenhower’s lenient 

yoke, back under the control of the Air Ministry, Portal hoped to rein him in.19 

In August, Harris had obtained Tedder’s and Eisenhower’s permission to 

mount twelve area attacks on German cities when his forces were not required 

elsewhere. In a single attack on Konigsberg on the night of August 29-30, for 

example, only 175 Lancaster heavy bombers left 134,000 people homeless.20 

Portal and the Air Staff, however, disapproved of such attacks. They had at last 

seized on the oil plan with the enthusiasm only a convert can generate21 and 

486 
STALEMATE 

hoped to redirect Harris’s efforts toward the synthetic plants and refineries.22 

Ironically, Harris, who for the first time actually subordinated himself to another 

commander, operated with more freedom after the command change from 

Eisenhower to the Air Ministry than before.23 He happily stepped up his program to area bomb German cities.24 At Quebec, Portal apparently wanted so 

badly to control Harris that he was willing to pull Bomber Command out from 

under Eisenhower and leave USSTAF under SHAEF if the Americans refused to 

cooperate.25 

Arnold and Marshall initially resisted Portal’s suggestions, but the next day, 

September 13, the British and American Chiefs agreed to the substance of his 

new command arrangements.26 The CCS directive to Spaatz and Air Marshal 

Norman Bottomley, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, RAF, announced the 

new command structure and specified certain target priorities. The CCS vested 

joint executive responsibility for the control of strategic bomber forces in 

Europe in the Chief of Staff, RAF, and the Commander, AAF, who in turn, designated Bottomley and Spaatz as their representatives for the purpose of providing control and local coordination through consultation. The directive required 

support of the ground and naval forces and charged Spaatz and Bottomley with 

the task of coordinating their actions with the theater tactical air forces. After 

accepting current target priorities, it added six further objectives: 

1. Counter air force action consisting of policing current production facili2. Direct support of land and naval forces whenever the Supreme 

3. The bombing of important industrial areas when weather made other tar4. Attacks in support of the Soviet armies, when authorized by the CCS; 

5. Continued support for British Special Operations Executive/American 

6. Targets of opportunity, such as the German fleet or submarines.27 

ties; 

Commanders called for it; 

gets impractical, and the use of blind bombing techniques if necessary; 

Office of Strategic Services* operations; and 

These objectives reflected particularly the concerns of the Combined Chiefs. 

The first three points were already part of current directives to the bomber 

forces. Before accepting the change, both the American and British Chiefs had 

ensured that the heavy bombers would be available for other purposes if needed. 

Point 3 authorized RAF area bombing, while point 4, inserted at the behest of 

the British,28 introduced an entirely new consideration, of little importance until 

January and February 1945. 

* The British Special Operations Executive (SOE) and the American Office of Strategic 

Services (OSS) were Allied intelligence organizations heavily involved with resistance movements 

in German-occupied Europe. They also engaged in other types of covert intelligence operations 

directed against the Germans. 

487 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Why did Arnold revise his stance on the issue of command change for the 

strategic air forces? In a letter to Spaatz shortly after the directive was issued, 

Arnold wrote that he “found it expedient to agree to having the responsibility for 

the direction of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces vested in me.” The reason, he 

implied, was that Portal had formulated a plan to equalize the RAF and the AAF 

by making them co-directors of the Combined Bomber Offensive.29 A few days 

later, in an “Eyes Only” letter to Spaatz, Amold explained further, 

I went to Quebec with a firm conviction that we should not change the control 

of the Strategic Air Forces RAF and AAF, but after I went into the matter more 

thoroughly and saw that there was no control lost by the United States Higher 

Command and that provisions could be made for General Eisenhower to get 

strategic bombing missions upon request, I flopped over. In my opinion the 

advantages of having you as my representative determine the targets and objectives for the Strategic Air Force on a co-equal status with Portal give us. a position in the scheme of things that we have never had before.30 

When Spaatz and Eisenhower first learned of the CCS’s decision, they were 

not happy.31 Their initial surprise soon passed and, although Eisenhower termed 

the new structure a “poor arrangement,”32 both he and Spaatz had no qualms 

about the decision. Both men admitted that their personal and official relationships were so close that Eisenhower would get “just as much support from the 

Strategic Air Forces under this arrangement as he did before.”33 

The Quebec Conference also approved the demise of the AEAF. On September 14, Eisenhower had agreed with Arnold “that under the present circumstances we can get along without Leigh-Mallory’s headquarters.”34 Within a few 

days, Eisenhower received formal notification of Leigh-Mallory ’s transfer to the 

Allied Air Forces in South East Asia. The idea for this posting had come from 

Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten, the Allied Commander in Chief, South East 

Asia Command (SEAC).35 Mountbatten had worked closely with Leigh-Mallory 

in 1942 on the planning and conduct of the ill-fated Dieppe raid. Portal wholeheartedly embraced the idea (it offered a face-saving method of removing a difficult personality from northwest Europe) and presented it to Arnold. Arnold, 

who felt that the Air Commander’s post in SEAC ought to be awarded to an 

American officer since the AAF supplied the majority of the theater’s aircraft, 

was quite irritated, but nonchalantly suggested that Leigh-Mallory be assigned, 

instead, to one of the British military missions in the United States. It is hard to 

imagine a less congenial placement for the ethnocentric commander of the 

AEAF. With feigned indifference, Arnold protested to Eisenhower that LeighMallory ’s disposition was an internal RAF matter, noting that a suitable assignment for one of over twenty Air Chief Marshals and Marshals of the Royal Air 

Force on the RAF’s active rolls was not an insuperable problem.36 

Since the Second Quebec Conference agreed to intensify operations in 

Burma and since the British supplied most of the naval and ground forces in that 

488 
STALEMATE 

Air Marshal James M. 

Robb, RAF, Chief of Staff 

(Air), SHAEF, 1945. 

E 

P 

5 

P 

theater, Mountbatten’s request for Leigh-Mallory outweighed Arnold’s desire to 

see the post go to an American. Because Leigh-Mallory had become heavily 

involved in air operations surrounding Operation MARKET-GARDEN, the Allied 

paratroop drop designed to seize a series of bridges and break through across the 

Rhine, Eisenhower delayed his release until October 15.37 On that date the 

AEAF ceased to exist.* 

Coningham became responsible for the administration of his 2d Tactical Air 

Force, while administrative control of the Ninth Air Force remained with 

Spaatz. Eisenhower created a new position within his own headquarters, Chief 

of Staff (Air), and designated Air Vice-Marshal James M. Robb, Spaatz’s 

Deputy Commander from the Northwest African Air Forces, to fill it. Robb 

would take over the AEAF’s operational functions. To Tedder fell the tasks of 

coordinating the Allied tactical air forces and presenting Eisenhower’s requirements for strategic bombing to the strategic bomber commanders.38Robb’s large 

and predominately British staff, although less controversial than the AEAF, 

proved no more effective at handling operations or at suppressing national jeal- 

* En route to India, the plane carrying Leigh-Mallory, his wife, and his staff became lost in the 

mountains thirty miles from Grenoble, France, and crashed, killing all aboard. Seven months later, a 

French fanner discovered the wreckage, solving the mystery of the air marshal’s disappearance. Air 

Chief Marshal Keith Park replaced Leigh-Mallory in SEAC. 

489 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ousies.39 Nonetheless, the final form of Allied air command in Europe had been 

established. (See Chart 7, System of Control of Strategic Air Forces.) 

The new format made no difference to the congenial relationship already 

established between Spaatz, Tedder, and Eisenhower. As Eisenhower moved 

SHAEF to Granville, Normandy, thence to Paris, and finally to Reims, Spaatz, 

after momentarily deciding in the first flush of command change that his presence might be more useful in LondonPo marched in lockstep, keeping his personal headquarters next to the Supreme Commander’s. On October 1, Spaatz 

informed Lovett, “We have moved an advance headquarters of USSTAF to the 

vicinity of Paris and very close to Eisenhower’s main headquarters. . . . I expect 

to spend practically all of my time here in order to be close to Eisenhower.”41 

Spaatz left Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson in London to ensure coordination 

of operations. This propinquity facilitated Spaatz’s administrative control of the 

large AAF contingent in France and maintained short and speedy lines of coordination between the strategic air forces and the Supreme Commander. 

Strategic Target Selection in the Autumn of 1944 

One of the chief contributions Spaatz made to the conduct of the war during 

the late summer and autumn of 1944 was the setting of target priorities for the 

U.S. Eighth and Fifteenth Strategic Air Forces. He insisted on the primacy of oil 

targets with the same tenacity that Harris displayed in his embrace of area bombing. 

On September 1, Spaatz issued a new set of target priorities reflecting his 

and USSTAF’s assessment of the German military and economic situation. Four 

factors influenced his judgment: (1) the success of the oil attacks, (2) the dispersal of the German aircraft industry, (3) the acute shortage of trained German 

pilots, and (4) the German losses in men and materiel to the Anglo-American 

forces in France and to the Soviets during its summer offensive, which alone had 

destroyed twenty-five German divisions. 

From these factors, Spaatz drew three conclusions: 

1. The Luftwaffe, the German ground forces, and the German economy all 

2. Pilot and aviation fuel shortages, not lack of aircraft, would severely 

3. The Germans lacked sufficient military equipment to reequip battered 

faced imminent collapse from lack of fuel. 

limit Luftwaffe operations in the future. 

formations and to equip newly raised units. 

Therefore, to take advantage of the few remaining summer days, Spaatz issued 

instructions to Doolittle and Twining to intensify their attacks on oil targets, to 

confine any attacks on the German aircraft production industries to those manufacturing components for rockets and jet fighters, to devote excess effort to the 

490 
Chart 7 

System of Control of Strategic Air Forces and Channels Used in Determining Bombing Policy 

Great Britain September 16,1944 to May 24,1945 USA 

Cabinel and Advisors 

President 

t Cabinet Defense Committee 

Chiefs of Staff 

Committee Joint Chiefs of Staff 

I+ Chief of Air Staff 

Assistant Assistant 

Chief of Air Staff Chief of Air Staff 

(Intelligence) (Operations) Director 

of 

I I 

Combined Strd Targets Committee 

Air Ministry * WarOffice - Admiralty * SHAEF 

I - .. 

I I 

Commanding General 

U.S. Eighth AF 

USSTAF (Europe) * Bomber Command 

US. Eighth Alr Force Economic Adviswy Branch (Foreign Office) and 

A.O.C. in C. 

Bomber Command 

Harris Ministry of Economic Warfare 

L US. Enemy Objectives Unit (Economic Warfare Department) 

- Operational Control . . . . . . . Coordination Targeting Policy 

Dwlittle 

Commanding General 

U.S. Fitteenth AF 

Twining 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

destruction of, in order of priority, ordnance depots, armored fighting vehicle 

production, and motor transport production, and, finally if weather “or other 

considerations” made these targets “impracticable,” to employ bombingthrough-clouds techniques or other methods to strike transportation targets.42 

Aside from its emphasis on oil, to which all of his post-D-day directives 

gave primacy, this memo signaled Spaatz’s diminishing sense of urgency 

regarding the Luftwaffe and increased interest in an antiordnance/military equipment campaign already started on a small scale in August. The memo also indicated his willingness to employ his force during bad weather over Germany, 

even though it was dependent on inaccurate H2X radar. This method, as Spaatz 

well knew, performed best over built-up areas (cities) but had little ability to 

pick out individual targets (marshaling yards, etc).43 H2X accuracy improved 

greatly if any part of a bomb run could be done visually. Moreover, transportation sites offered a good subsidiary system when bomb groups that were unable 

to hit their primary target often found that openings in the clouds presented them 

with targets of opportunity, such as marshaling yards. Nonetheless, Spaatz had 

no qualms about any incidental damage that bombs falling short would cause 

among German civilians. 

Within days of the September 1 directive, Air Marshal Bottomley discussed 

new priorities with Spaatz and Tedder. By that time German defenses had visibly stiffened, taking the edge off some of the optimism in Allied command circles. The day before they received the Quebec directive, September 13, 1944, 

the three agreed to a new scheme for new circumstances. In this scheme, Spaatz 

assented to a rearrangement of his just-issued priorities. Oil retained top priority. 

ULTRA intercepts continued to confirm the injury inflicted by the oil offensive. A 

September 7 decryption revealed an order calling for qualified volunteers from 

other branches of the Luftwaffe to join the fighter arm in order to conserve on 

training fuel. A September 11 decryption uncovered Goering’s order of September 

1 restricting flights to a bare minimum to ensure that every possible drop went to 

operational training.44 

German rail and water transportation systems, particularly those located in 

the Ruhr and Saar and leading from those regions to the front, would be the targets of the strategic air forces, which would carry out attacks progressively 

deeper into Germany. The tactical air forces would deal with transportation targets closest to the battlefront. Motor transport, armored fighting vehicles, and 

ordnance plants and depots would have the same priority as transportation systems. The Luftwaffe would receive any residual effort. This new schedule, 

which served as a basis for a more formal directive issued in accordance with 

the instructions from Quebec, meant that Tedder had succeeded in upgrading to 

second priority his own preferred target system, that of transportation.45 

On September 25, Bottomley issued a “Directive for the Control of Strategic 

Bomber Forces in Europe,” to Arthur Harris.46 Spaatz had agreed to this directive, later designated “Strategic Bombing Directive No. 1 ,” two days earlier.47 

492 
STALEMATE 

Air Marshal Norman 

H. Bottomley, Deputy 

Chief of the Air Staff, 

RAF, 1943. 

Bottomley ’s directive conformed, for the most part, to his previous discussion 

with Tedder and Spaatz, but one item reappeared. Referring to important industrial areas, the document stated, “When weather or tactical conditions are unsuitable for operations against specific primary objectives, attacks should be delivered on important industrial areas, using blind bombing techniques as necessary.” Area bombing simply would not disappear. Given the tenor of the times, 

no one could have justified keeping idle the heavy-bomber fleets, on which so 

much national treasure and energy had been heaped, merely because cloud cover 

or darkness necessitated their use against built-up areas rather than specific targets. 

Bottomley ’s directive also provided for the periodic issuance of a separate 

list of strategic targets. The list would specify the targets best calculated to 

achieve the goals of the bomber offensive and would set relative priorities 

among them. The directive further noted that the priorities within the list would 

“be adjusted in . . . accordance with the situation.” Interestingly enough, the first 

list lumped attacks on the German rail transport system in a secondary category 

with missions against the Luftwaffe. Both types of attack would occur “from 

time to time.” In the meantime, oil targets retained first priority; second priority 

went to ordnance, tanks and motor transport depots, tank assembly plants, and 

motor transport assembly plants, in that order.48 Apparently the Allied air leaders 

felt that the immediate denial of tactical equipment to the German ground forces 

would still pay a greater dividend than a protracted series of strategic attacks on 

493 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

transport. This view, which emphasized short-term results, mirrored the hopes 

still prevalent that the Germans would collapse with one more good push. 

Eisenhower’s headquarters in particular placed the highest priority on the 

Wehrmacht’s major ordnance depots.49 

Within a week this optimism had evaporated. The Allied air leaders began to 

search for new ways to employ their forces. At one of the last of LeighMallory ’s Daily Air Commanders’ Meetings, on September 29, held at Versailles, 

Air Marshal Coningham suggested “that it might be a matter of months before 

the Army would make any considerable move into Germany, and that the only 

hope of a quick finish to the war was from a collapse inside Germany.”sO In 

view of that prospect, which might allow the Germans time to raise a large force 

of jets and to improve their antiaircraft defenses, he pressed for an immediate, 

concentrated attack to cripple either German morale or the jet aircraft industry. 

He was seconding a proposition Spaatz had voiced moments earlier-that, with 

three or four continuous days of good weather predicted for October, an all-out 

effort might prove profitable. Leigh-Mallory agreed, pointing out that the tactical bomb line already in effect provided an ideal basis for a division of labor 

between the tactical and strategic forces. Spaatz then clarified his proposal, indicating that he envisaged an all-out attack by the combined strategic and tactical 

forces outside the tactical area. Such an attack “was bound to have considerable 

effect on morale, especially if kept up for two or three days.”sl 

Bottomley attempted to throw cold water on the whole idea. The inhabitants 

of 100 smaller cities in Germany made up only 10 percent of the populationnot enough, in his opinion, to influence the German High Command. The Chiefs 

of Staff, he continued, had already approved THUNDERCLAP (a maximum-force, 

combined strike by USSTAF and Bomber Command on Berlin) for implementation when German morale showed signs of cracking. Until then, the German war 

effort ought to remain the primary target. Besides, any all-out attack would have 

maximum impact if tightly focused on a single objective, such as transportation 

in a single region. To defuse the effort over a wide area against something as 

amorphous as morale would have little long-term benefit. Bottomley concluded 

by requesting that the air forces place priority on the transportation network of 

the Saar and Ruhr industrial regions in support of the ground effort that 

Eisenhower intended to direct against them.52 The meeting ended with no agreement on any all-out massive attack. Soon afterward, however, both the Air 

Ministry and USSTAF began to formulate plans53 for widespread maximumforce attacks against Germany (code-named HURRICANES I and 11). 

Spaatz strongly supported the HURRICANE plans. On October 1 he wrote to 

Lmett: 

I have urged and started the development of a plan for the full-out beating 

up of Germany with all the Air Forces at our disposal, if and when we have a 

proper weather break. 

494 
STALEMATE 

He did not know whether such an operation could be decisive, but, he wrote, 

“To my mind it represents the only means of terminating the war this year with 

our forces” [emphasis addedl.54 

Spaatz believed that the plans were a necessary gamble. How much to wager 

remained a question. As he explained to Arnold on October 4, oil remained the 

overriding priority, but, he went on, “I must emphasize that the war with 

Germany is not over and with the stagnation of the ground front, it may be up to 

Air to force Germany out of the war.” Spaatz then described the HURRICANE 

plans, both of which had RAF approval. 

HURRICANE I concentrated Bomber Command and the Eighth Air Force, plus 

portions of the theater’s tactical air forces, against targets in western Germany, 

primarily the Ruhr area. This event was to be closely tied with the maneuver of 

the ground forces. The attack was to be all-out, except when weather permitted 

attack on high-priority oil targets throughout Germany. 

HURRICANE I1 required good weather over all of Germany and involved a 

concentration of all U.S. and British air forces from the Mediterranean and 

Britain over Germany. This force was to attack targets in the following priority: 

(1) oil; (2) ordnance depots; (3) motor transport depots and armored force vehicle depots; and (4) transportation. The Allies would be hitting something almost 

everywhere they could reach. Both plans kept oil targets foremost.55 Spaatz 

would not loosen his grip on oil, the life’s blood of the Nazi military machine. 

As he had told Doolittle and Twining the previous day, “Failure to maintain this 

primary aim will result in immediate increase in fighting effectiveness of enemy 

ground forces and offensive operations by the GAF.”56 

After meetings on October 3 between Bottomley for the Air Ministry, 

Tedder and Robb for SHAEF, and Anderson and Spaatz for USSTAF, the airmen set October 7 as the tentative date for HURRICANE 11.57 Given the relative 

quiet in ground operations, the more strategically oriented HURRICANE I1 seemed 

a better choice than HURRICANE I, which limited itself to the Ruhr and was 

meant to assist a ground offensive. Arnold concurred with the HURRICANE I1 

plan to emphasize oil targets, but wanted attacks on “everything of military 

importance,” to impress all sections of Germany with Allied air power’s “overwhelming superiority and destructive power.” Arnold explicitly added, “I will 

not condone attacks on purely civilian objectives.”58 

Neither HURRICANE plan was ever executed. Despite forecasts of a stretch of 

clear days during the first two weeks of October, prolonged good weather never 

materialized. Instead, USSTAF took advantage of the few clear days to strike 

the vital oil plants again. By mid-October the opportunity, improbable and fleeting as it was, had passed. 

Near the end of October the Allies again reviewed their strategic priorities 

for air. This review, caused by the stagnation of the front on one hand and 

Marshall’s hope for a quick end to the war on the other, produced a new directive. Revision in the face of changing circumstances does not seem remarkable; 

495 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

what was remarkable was Marshall’s optimism, which he maintained even after 

an extensive visit to the Western Front in early October. As late as October 20, 

he reported to Eisenhower that the U.S. Chiefs of Staff contemplated issuing “at 

an early date” a directive for a supreme effort to end the war in Europe by 

January 1. Such a decision, said Marshall, would require the employment of the 

strategic air forces in an almost exclusively tactical manner.59 In response to 

Marshall’s request for frank comment, Eisenhower mentioned his logistical difficulties but also volunteered that more infantry and supplies might produce a 

quicker conclusion. 

In the same message Eisenhower supported strategic use of the heavy bombers. 

Poor weather prevented them from flying in direct support of the ground forces. 

Also, noted Eisenhower, “We know in these conditions our best bet has been to 

keep hammering constantly at the enemy’s oi1.”60 The British Chiefs of Staff 

also discounted the chances of ending the war before the start of the year. The 

Air Staff, in particular, objected to diverting the heavy bombers from oil targets, 

which, if freed from attack, would rapidly regain much higher production levels. 

Consequently, the British asked Marshall to shelve the directive, which he did 

on November 1.61 

The bombing results of September and October had shown the inconclusiveness of the campaign against ordnance, tanks, and motor transport. Oil targets 

had absorbed most of the visual bombing days, and USSTAF had employed 

blind bombing techniques for part of most raids against military equipment targets. This produced less accurate bombing. Meanwhile, the German front-line 

troops showed no equipment shortages attributable to the bombing, and postwar 

analysis revealed no major effects. By the end of October, the Allies were ready 

to try different target systems.62 

The British Air Staff, for its part, wanted a new directive that would enable 

it to get better control over Harris. Since the CCS directive of September 14 

placing him again under Portal, Harris had proceeded on his own course as he 

continued to do at least until the beginning of 1945. During the last three months 

of 1944, Bomber Command dropped 53 percent of its bombs on cities, 15 percent on railways and canals, 18 percent on miscellaneous targets, and only 14 

percent on oil targets.63 Harris, who enjoyed personal access to Churchill and 

great prestige from Bomber Command’s status as both the largest component of 

the RAF and the most successful punisher of the Germans, rebuffed Portal’s 

repeated attempts to have him concentrate on oil targets. By late January 1945 

the dispute between Harris and Portal over oil targeting culminated in a threat by 

Harris to resign. Although Portal had the authority to accept Harris’s resignation, he chose not to. Removing him would have been difficult to justify to 

Churchiil and the British populace, who regarded Harris as a war hero. However, 

in declining Harris’s gesture, Portal lost any sanction he might have held. 

Consequently, Harris persisted in flouting Portal’s authority until the end of the 

war. In any case, Bomber Command had delivered only 6 percent of its bombs 

496 
STALEMATE 

against oil targets in OctoberP4 a figure Portal and Bottomley wanted greatly 

increased. 

Portal also solicited Tedder’s views on new instructions for the heavy 

bombers.65 Tedder replied on October 25 with a tightly reasoned brief favoring 

transportation as the primary target system. After referring to the current operations of the strategic and tactical air forces, he continued, “I am not satisfied 

that on these lines, we are using our air power effectively. The various types of 

operations should fit into one comprehensive pattern, whereas I feel that at present they are more like a patchwork quilt.”66 Tedder believed that the one common factor underlying the entire German war effort, from political control to 

troop supply, was communications. He argued, “Our primary air objective 

should be the enemy’s communications. Road, water and rail are interdependent and complementary, and our Air operations should play on that fact. The 

present oil plan is the key to movement by road or air, and, moreover, directly 

affects operations in the battle area.”67 

Tedder had integrated the oil plan into his own, adding two factors that he 

believed would make his antitransportation system effort even more telling than 

the one that had preceded OVERLORD. First, all loss of transport traffic would be 

a dead loss to the German war effort. In France, the Wehrmacht required only 20 

percent of all rail traffic, with much of the remainder going to support the 

French economy. In Germany, any loss of transportation would eventually produce a shortage or delay in the German war effort. In Germany, bombed-out 

transport lines could be replaced only at the cost of other vital programs, 

whereas, in France the Wehrmacht could use a large portion of the 80 percent of 

remaining capacity to replace bombed-out capacity. 

Second, noted Tedder, “In FRANCE and BELGIUM the programme of 

attacks on rail centres was severely limited, both as regards selection of targets 

and as regards weather conditions, by the need to avoid civilian casualties; no 

such limitations affect attacks on German rail centres.”6* Tedder had concluded 

that by concentrating heavy bombers over marshaling yards, oil targets, the 

canal system, and “centres of population” in the Ruhr, and backing up that concentration with the tactical air forces’ operations against trains, rail embankments, and selected bridges, the Allies “would rapidly produce a state of chaos 

which would vitally affect not only the immediate battle on the West Wall, but 

also the whole German war effort.”@ 

British intelligence buttressed Tedder’s arguments. As early as July 1944 the 

British Joint Intelligence Committee detected diversion of essential war freight 

from the overstrained railroads to the inland water transport system. By the end 

of August the Allies perceived an overall weakening of the German transport 

system demonstrated by more diversion to water transport and delay in the 

delivery of war production materials. Intelligence from high-grade intercepts in 

October revealed a worsening situation. An October 10 decryption of an October 

2 message from the Japanese naval attach6 reported gradually increasing havoc 

497 

The Reich Besieged. The cumulative effect of strategic bombing was evident by late 1944. 

Clockwiseffom above: Eighth Air Force bombs struck the Tegel tank works and a nearby gas 

plant (above, left) in Berlin, October 6, 1944. A tangle of wagons, twisted track, and craters 

(above, right) mark the marshaling yard at Limburg after a Ninth Air Force raid. “Wheels 

Must Roll for Victory!” is the exhortation (below) amid the ruin of a rail terminus late in the 

war. River transport suffered the loss of countless barges and tugs (opposite, below), as this 

scene near Mainz attests. The Magdeburg synthetic oil plant (opposite, above) shows the 

effects of repeated American attacks by early 1945. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

on the lines of communications and confusion in the transport of coal and munitions from the Rhineland. A particularly telling decryption on October 24 of a 

four-day-old message from Hitler’s headquarters quoted a Speer report that 

destruction of traffic installations and lack of power had brought from thirty to 

thirty-five percent of all armament factories to a standstill.70 Lack of power 

meant lack of coal to fire generating plants, a sign of serious, if not catastrophic, 

rail disruption. This intercept can only have convinced the Allied air leaders 

both- of the efficacy of transportation bombing and of the diminishing capacity 

of the Germans to absorb more of it. 

After a meeting on October 28 at SHAEF in Paris, at which the possible 

contributions both the strategic and the tactical air forces could make in assisting 

the ground forces were thoroughly analyzed, Spaatz and Bottomley issued a new 

directive, Strategic Directive No. 2. It deleted the military equipment targets not 

specifically requested by the ground forces. This deletion left only two target 

systems: the petroleum industry and lines of communication, the latter with second priority. Spaatz and the British Air Staff had maintained top priority for oil 

targets but had also seen the advantages of Tedder’s campaign against communications.71 

Meanwhile, Harris had an escape clause as wide as an autobahn. Strategic 

Directive No. 2 authorized the bombing of “Important Industrial Areas”-that 

useful euphemism for area bombing-whenever weather or tactical conditions 

were unsuitable for the two main objectives. Bottomley modified the clause 

slightly by adding language requiring these alternative attacks to contribute, as 

far as possible, to the destruction of the oil and transport systems. He also wrote 

a cover letter to Harris emphasizing the importance of oil-to little avail. Harris 

believed in neither oil nor communication targets. He dryly annotated his copy 

of Bottomley’s letter, “Here we go around the Mulberry bush.”72 In November, 

however, Harris did increase petroleum strikes to 24.6 percent of his total effort, 

a figure not far from the Fifteenth’s 28.4 percent. In November the Eighth Air 

Force dropped 39 percent of its bomb tonnage on oil targets.73 This directive 

remained in effect until it was replaced by Strategic Directive No. 3, issued on 

January 12, 1945. 

Operations 

The changes in strategic priorities, none of which displaced the oil campaign 

from its position as the target system of highest priority, had less effect on the 

operations of USSTAF during the autumn of 1944 than the advances of the 

ground forces, the severity of the weather, and the resurgence of the Luftwaffe. 

Constantly increasing numbers of enemy operational jet and conventional 

fighter aircraft available from September onward constituted, in Spaatz’s eyes, 

the greatest potential threat to the success of a continued Allied strategic bomber 

offensive against Germany. 

500 
STALEMATE 

The advance of the Allied ground forces across France in the summer of 

1944 had greatly complicated the Luftwaffe’s defense problems. Whatever 

advantage accrued to Germany’s hard-pressed aerial defenders from the forced 

concentration of almost all of their resources into Germany proper did not offset 

the disadvantages occasioned by the destruction of most of their early warning 

network in the occupied countries or the denial of sufficient territory in which to 

conduct a defense in depth. The heretofore relatively efficient German nightfighter force probably suffered a greater decline in operational ability because of 

these factors than the day force. In May and June, when Bomber Command 

devoted a great part of its strength to 25,000 night sorties over France in support 

of OVERLORD, the night fighters shot down 265 British heavy bombers. In 

September and October, when Bomber Command flew more than 16,000 night 

sorties against targets in Germany, the British credited only 36 losses to enemy 

night fighters.74 

As Allied ground forces advanced they disorganized the Luftwaffe’s fighter 

defenses, but when they were halted at the German border they stretched the 

Allied bomber effort in two ways. (See Map 15, Front Lines, 1944-1945.) The 

inability of the Allied logistics system to keep pace with the rapid advance of its 

armies led to the diversion of an entire B-24 combat wing, composed of four 

combat groups (approximately 200 bombers), to the task of ferrying supplies to 

the forward troops; and the scarity of supplies led Eisenhower to limit the broadbased advance of his forces in favor of a single narrow thrust. After some hesitation between alternatives offered by Montgomery, who championed an airborne 

thrust across Holland to the Rhine, and Bradley, who advocated an attack 

through the Saar to the Rhine, Eisenhower settled on Montgomery’s proposal, 

code-named Operation MARKETGARDEN. In its planning and execution, 

Montgomery’s airborne operation tied up the theater’s air transport craft, making them unavailable to the ground forces throughout the theater, and it diverted 

the Eighth Air Force from strategic targets in Germany.75 

From August 29 to September 30, USSTAF directed the Eighth Air Force to 

conduct cargo trucking operations to assist the Allied armies in France. Starting 

with a small force of fewer than 30 aircraft on August 29, the operation grew to 

200 by September 8. Eventually 225 B-24s made the daily trek from supply 

sources in England to the Continent. In the first ten days the planes carried 1,383 

tons of supplies, mostly medicine and food, to OrleansBriey Airfield, seventy 

miles south of Paris. When loading, unloading, and flying went smoothly, many 

planes made two trips a day.76 

After a three-day pause for reorganization, the second phase of the operation 

began on September 12. This time the bombers carried mostly 80-octane gasoline for the forward armored units. They had a commitment, never attained, to 

deliver 354,000 gallons of gasoline a day. On September 14, the B-24s began to 

land at Chartres, 50 miles to the southwest of Paris. Eight days later, the Eighth 

continued to deliver gasoline to three airfields: Chartres, St. Dizier (120 miles 

501 

STALEMATE 

east of Paris), and Florennes, Belgium (140 miles northeast of Paris). During 

this second phase, despite missing three days because of weather, the ferry service delivered 8,226 tons of gasoline (2,703,255 gallons/169,000 per day) and 

244 tons of other supplies.77 Spaatz considered the diversion sound; he merely 

wished that the army had called on him before it had come to a halt.78 

Operation MARKET-GARDEN, a three-division airborne assault conducted by 

the First Allied Airborne Army operating under the command of Montgomery’s 

21 Army Group, was part of the Allies’ bold attempt to break through the German 

lines in Holland and into Germany itself. At the very least the Allies hoped to 

cut off the German Fifteenth Army in Holland, turn Germany’s border defenses, 

and position 21 Army Group around the north flank of the Ruhr.79 The operation achieved none of these goals. As the official U.S. Army history stated, “By 

the merciless logic of war, MARKET-GARDEN wasa failure.”so 

Two features of the operation impinged on the strategic air forces: the locking up of the theater’s air transport assets and the diversion of the strategic effort 

to the direct support of the ground forces. In the first four days of the operation, 

September 17-20, the Eighth committed both its bombers and its fighters. 

General Doolittle, a few days after the close of the affair, estimated that “MARKET 

cost four (4) major and two (2) minor heavy bomber missions in September.”sl 

On September 17, 875 of the Eighth’s heavy bombers dropped fragmentation 

bombs in support of MARKET-GARDEN, while another 703 of its fighters strafed 

enemy antiaircraft positions, for a loss of 2 bombers and 14 fighters. On 

September 18, 254 B-24s dropped supplies for the paratroops. That mission lost 

8 bombers to flak, and about half of the remainder received battle damage. Its 

575 fighter escorts lost 20 aircraft and wrote off 9 more upon return to base, all 

to flak.82 

At the Daily Air Commanders’ Meeting on September 19, Doolittle complained that because the involvement of all of his fighters in support of the 

troops prevented the use of heavy bombers elsewhere, “he hoped that it [MARKETGARDEN] would not be extended beyond the four days, as in addition to preventing heavy bomber operations, it was proving very expensive in fighters.”83 The 

Eighth continued its commitment to the ground offensive until September 26, 

during which time it limited those bombers not involved in the operation to shallow penetrations into western Germany. It bombed marshaling yards, airfields, 

and military equipment targets but no major oil targets.84 

In addition to the diversions caused by MARKET-GARDEN, weather greatly 

affected the operations of USSTAF in the autumn of 1944. In mid-December, 

Spaatz ruefully commented in a letter to Lovett, “We have been facing unusual 

handicaps from weather in our operations.”85 On the same day, he wrote to 

Arnold, “Weather is, of course, the serious handicap in any operation at this time 

of year. Practically all of our bombing for the last two months has been PFF 

[blind bombing]. The amount of rainfall exceeds, in the opinion of experts to 

whom we have talked, any experienced for the last thirty years.”86 

503 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Spaatz did not exaggerate the problem. The AAF official history noted that 

in the last quarter of 1944, 80 percent of the Eighth’s and 70 percent of the 

Fifteenth’s missions employed, at least in part, blind-bombing devices.87 An 

Eighth Air Force Operational Analysis Section report on the bombing accuracy 

for the period September 1 to December 31, 1944, graphically depicted the 

effects of weather on operational performance. Of the seventy-three days in the 

period in which the Eighth conducted heavy-bomber operations, visual means 

could be used on only twenty-six days. Only 14 percent of the Eighth’s bombing 

was done by visual means under good visibility. Even in good visibility (no 

cloud cover, no German smoke screens, or haze), high altitude and smoke from 

preceding bombing meant that only 30 percent of the bombs landed within 1,000 

feet of their aiming point. Thirty-five percent of the bombing employed H2X 

through complete cloud cover. The possibility that bombs would land within 

1,000 feet of an aiming point was 150 times greater with good visibility than 

with H2X through 100 percent cloud cover.88 

Even for visual targets, bombing accuracy in the fourth quarter of the year 

fell a dramatic 40 percent-a drop that the report attributed to more heavily 

defended targets, longer missions, and poor flying conditions. More flak at the 

target meant increased altitudes and decreased accuracy. Table 5 shows the 

abysmal results obtained for 58 percent of the bombing employing H2X. An 

official postwar survey admitted, “It cannot be said that this equipment [H2X] 

was in any sense a precision bombing instrument.”89 

The German synthetic oil industry, particularly, benefited from cloud cover 

and man-made smoke screens. Large-scale visual attacks on September 11, 12, 

and 13 brought the production of aviation fuel to a virtual halt from September 

11 to 19.90 For the month, the fourteen chief hydrogenation plants produced 

only 5,300 tons, one-thirtieth of their May 1944 production.91 In October, however, the Eighth dropped more tonnage on military equipment targets than on oil 

targets. It also conducted only three oil raids using completely visual means. As 

a result, German aviation gas production tripled to 16,400 tons. In November, 

the Eighth did not have a single completely visual attack on an oil targets. 

Although it devoted 39 percent of its bombing effort (16,147 tons) aided by 32 

percent of the Fifteenth’s efforts (4,837 tons) and 24 percent of Bomber 

Command’s (13,060 tons), German aviation gasoline production doubled again 

to 35,400 tons. 

In December, the Eighth Air Force diverted much of its energy to helping 

the ground forces repel the German Ardennes counteroffensive at the Battle of 

the Bulge. Hitler’s last gamble to win the war on the Western Front, which 

began December 16, was initially successful but within two weeks it had been 

contained by the Allies. Communications bombing and tactical support for the 

Battle of the Bulge lowered the Eighth’s capacity to bomb oil targets. Consequently, the Eighth delivered only 2,940 tons of bombs, only 7.2 percent of its 

504 
STALEMATE 

Table 5 

The Relationship between H2X Bombing Accuracy and Cloud Cover 

September 1-December 31,1944 

Estimated Percentage of Bombs within Standard Distances around Assigned 

Aiming Point 

Reported Percentage 

Cloud 1,000 Feet Mile 1 Mile 3 Miles 5 Miles of Total 

Cover Eighth 

Air Force 

10/10 0.2 1.2 5.6 39.8 58.5 35 

23-9/10 1 .o 7.3 22.5 67.4 82.0 15 

6-7/10 2.0 12.5 36.5 84.0 90.5 5 

4-5/10 4.4 22.8 48.5 89.1 96.0 3 

Based on Eighth Air Force Operations Analysis Section, “Report on Bombing Accuracy, Eighth Air 

Force, 1 September to 31 December 1944,” April 20, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

total monthly tonnage, on oil targets. The Fifteenth, however, picked up the 

slack, employing 43.5 percent of its total effort and dropping 6,939 tons on oil 

targets. Bomber Command, with its ability to drop heavier bombs than the AAF, 

delivered the most punishing single blow in a night attack, December 6-7, on 

Leuna-Merseburg. This attack, combined with two Eighth Air Force raids, 

stopped all production at Leuna for December, the chief reason German aviation 

gasoline production declined to 23,400 tons in that month.92 

Despite diversions and weather, the offensive against oil targets in the fall of 

1944 kept the total of oil production from all sources in Germany to only onethird of production in January 1944.93 (See Chart 8, Total German Synthetic 

Fuel Production, 1940-1945.) 

The oil plants required repeated attacks in part because of the Germans’ 

repair efforts and in part because of the low accuracy of the bombing. Out of 

every 100 bombs dropped on oil plants, 87 missed the target completely, 8 

landed in open spaces inside the plant causing no damage, 2 landed on the plant, 

but failed to explode, 1 hit pipelines or other utilities causing repairable damage, 

and 2 hit buildings and important equipment.94 

505 

STALEMATE 

These figures emphasize the vital importance of visual bombing; postwar 

data indicate that full visual bombing of the oil plants scored five times as many 

hits as full-instrument attacks.95 

In the last third of the year the Eighth devoted increasing attention to rail 

installations, tracks, marshaling yards, and stations-components of the marshaling yard target complex.96 The Eighth delivered the bulk of its bombs nonvisually, which meant that the area around the target, invariably a city, was 

drenched. In September, the Eighth released 13,053 tons of bombs (33 percent 

visual sighting, 32 percent of monthly total) on marshaling yards, exceeding the 

total of the previous three months, in which it had assisted the ground troops and 

bombed CROSSBOW targets. The figure went up in October to 18,844 tons (5 percent visual sighting, 43 percent of monthly total), fell in November to only 

11,829 tons (14 percent visual sighting, 29 percent of monthly total) when the 

Eighth rained bombs on the oil industry, and rose in December to 22,921 tons 

(30 percent visual sighting, 55 percent of monthly total) when the Eighth aided 

the ground forces against the German Ardennes counteroffensive by pummeling 

enemy transport lines feeding the attack.97 

This deluge of bombs played havoc with the German rail system or Reichsbahn. 

The Reichsbahn and, to a lesser extent, the German river and canal transport 

system, like the bloodstream carrying oxygen, carried coal to German industry. 

Without coal, all war production would grind to a halt, as the factories and 

power plants consumed the last of their stockpiles. The Reichsbahn also transported other raw materials and finished and semifinished assemblies from subcontractors to factories, while hauling completed arms and munitions to military 

depots. Troop trains and military supply trains had the highest priority, followed 

by coal trains. All other traffic, including essential war production traffic, would 

be cut back in favor of the highest-priority trains. In striking the marshaling 

yards and canals, the Eighth tightened the same deadly tourniquet around the 

artery supplying coal to the German war economy as it had around the synthetic 

oil plants feeding the German military machine. 

If the oil campaign was Spaatz’s contribution to winning the war, the transportation campaign was Tedder’s. Tedder was fortunate that Spaatz willingly 

aided him because Harris continued his area bombing campaign. Spaatz had 

sound technical reasons for striking marshaling yards. The terrible weather of 

the fall of 1944 compelled his forces to bomb blind, which meant bombing targets that could be picked up on H2X. As mentioned earlier, the Germans had 

located synthetic oil plants away from cities. Although large, these facilities 

were not large enough to give a consistently identifiable return on H2X radar. 

They had to be bombed by visual means in order to achieve a reasonable return 

on the effort invested to get to them. Bombs that missed the synthetic plants 

usually fell in open country where they did little harm. However, H2X had no 

trouble locating cities and the marshaling yards within them and, given any 

507 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

break in the clouds, the yards would be well hit. But therein lay the tragic 

conundrum of the strategic bombing campaign: a well-hit marshaling yard 

meant a well-hit city, with block upon block of residential areas gutted, families 

left homeless, small businesses smashed, and workers and others-including 

women and children-blown to bits or, more likely, burned or crushed by the 

hundreds, if not the thousands.* 

Eighth Air Force policy increased the likelihood of area bombing. On 

October 29, 1944, a memorandum defining standard procedure for operations set 

the policy for attack on secondary and last-resort targets: 

1. No towns or cities in Germany will be attacked as secondary or last 

resort targets, targets of opportunity, or otherwise, unless such towns contain or 

have immediately adjacent to them, one (1) or more military objectives. 

Military objectives include railway lines; junctions; marshalling yards; railway 

or road bridges, or other communications networks; any industrial plant; and 

such obvious military objectives as oil storage tanks, military camps and barracks, troop concentrations, motor transport or AFV parks, ordnance or supply 

depots, ammunition depots; airfields; etc. 

gets other than military objectives in Germany are attacked. 

3. It has been determined that towns and cities large enough to produce an 

identifiable return on the H2X scope generally contain a large proportion of the 

military objectives listed above. These centers, therefore, may be attacked as 

secondary or last resort targets by through-the-overcast bombing technique?* 

Almost every city or town in Germany with a population exceeding 50,000 

met the foregoing criteria. This policy made it open season for bombing 

Germany’s major cities in any weather. Those cities fortunate enough not to 

show up on H2X could still be bombed by visual or visually assisted means. If 

the AAF did not actually abandoned its precision techniques for area and terror 

bombing in this memo, it came perilously close. 

On September 5, the Eighth began to inflict the death-of-a-thousand-cuts on 

the German transportation system (see Map 16, Greater German Transport 

Network) with a raid of 218 B-24s dropping, by visual means, 463 tons on the 

Karlsruhe marshaling yards. Escorting and sweeping fighters strafed transportation targets and claimed 192 aircraft destroyed on the ground.99 In attacks 

mounted on October 14, 15, 17, and 18, the Eighth bombed Cologne, employing 

for the most part H2X radar and in one the far more accurate Gee-H radar/ground 

beacon system. These raids, plus raids on Hamm and RAF raids on Duisburg and 

2. Combat crews will be briefed before each mission to insure that no tar- 

* Everyone in Germany had heard, in one form or another, of the old grandfather who had gone 

into city X with five coffins for his son, daughter-in-law, and their three children, killed in an Allied 

bombing raid, only to return with the remains of all in a single bucket. 

508 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Wedau on October 14, almost shut down the coal railroad gateways leading 

from the Ruhr. They temporarily cut coal traffic by 80 percent. The October 14 

strike by U.S. planes at Cologne not only damaged the yards but by a stroke of 

extraordinary chance set off the demolition charges affixed to the CologneMulheimer Bridge. The 13,000-ton suspension span, roadway intact, collapsed 

into the Rhine River, blocking navigation. Only unusually high water later in the 

winter allowed a few days of traffic to float over the wreckage.100 On October 

29, ULTRA revealed this debacle to the Allies.101 By the end of October, as a 

result of Allied bombing, Germany’s three most important western waterways 

had ceased to function at the time of their highest use before the winter freeze 

drastically lowered their efficiency. 

The Reichsbahn had great reserves: rolling stock and locomotives looted 

from all of Europe; an abundance of trackage for alternate routes; and welltrained, relatively numerous repair crews. All this did not suffice. By the first 

week of November, 50,000 “workers” from Holland reinforced repair crews. By 

mid-November the Germans committed 161,000 workers, 95,000 of them in the 

Ruhr. Marshaling yards had top priority. On November 29, Hitler allowed Speer 

to send 150,000 laborers, taken from all sections of the country, including some 

engaged in fortification work, to the Ruhr. But enormous inputs of unskilled 

labor could not substitute for exhausted trained crews. Repairs to constantly 

bombed yards consumed spare parts, signals, switches, and rails. Bombs 

churned up the earth, making it unable to support the rails and flattened the 

switching humps, dramatically decreasing the yards’ ability to marshal cars into 

proper trains. 102 

Unable to use wrecked or unrepaired telecommunications equipment, 

Reichsbahn and German industrial managers made fatal recourse to their code 

machines. By November 1944 the British Government Code and Cypher Schoolthe ULTRA organization-had broken two Reichsbahn Enigma keys (codenamed BLUNDERBUSS and CULVERIN) for Germany and the west and some armament industry Geheimschreiber settings (FISH).* A November 8 decryption 

called for more use of waterways. Other decryptions spoke of increased antiaircraft defenses for traffic installations, and a January 1 decryption stated that 

fighter-bomber attacks (from the Ninth Air Force) in the area between the Moselle 

and the Saarland had ruined weeks of repair work, eliminated telephone facilities, and made it impossible to reroute trains.103 

This cumulative destruction of the yards took its toll on the economy. Items 

of military necessity, troop and vital supply trains, could get through on a single 

track, which could be opened in a few hours or days. Even so, point-to-point 

travel times in Germany lengthened. But one through line did not a functioning 

* The Geheimschreiber was a more advanced machine than the Enigma and was used for 

Hitler’s and other high-ranking officials’ traffic. 

510 
STALEMATE 

marshaling yard make. Raid after raid, repair after repair, each not quite as good 

as the last, reduced the capacity of the yards in an ever-descending spiral, dooming the German war economy. The thousands of separate items needed for production, not to mention coal, piled up at the factories and shaft heads or lay idle 

in marshaling yards or sidings, as the trains to haul them could no longer be put 

together. By November the Reichsbahn got a chilling glimpse of its future. It 

could not even keep its own fireboxes full. Instead of the normal twenty-day 

supply of hard coal, the system's supply stood at eleven days on November 5, 

ten days on November 11, nine on November 18, eight days on November 20, 

six days on December 1, and five days on December 12. The east suffered as 

badly as the west, and in the south, cut off from the Ruhr by shattered rail lines, 

empty bins testified to a complete coal famine.104 

When the Reichsbahn resorted to brown coal for its fuel, locomotive power 

dropped, repair intervals tripled, and a much larger smoke cloud made the 

engines easier targets for roving Allied fighter-bombers and fighters. Reduced to 

a hand-to-mouth fuel situation in one of the greatest coal producing countries in 

the world, and unable to marshal necessary trains, the Reichsbahn imposed further embargoes on cargo. In the western areas, only coal and Wehrmacht troop 

and supply shipments were allowed; not even food or armament production 

trains could be placed.* The railroads even refused a plea from the Ministry of 

Food and Agriculture for additional car space for the harvest.los Clearly, the 

economic life of Germany was ebbing away. Yet, like the Wehrmacht and the 

Luftwaffe, the Reichsbahn was capable of one last effort, which Hitler demanded 

and squandered in his futile Ardennes counteroffensive. 

The Resurgence of the Luftwaffe 

Spaatz's chief concern during the fall of 1944 was a possible resurgence in 

the effectiveness of the Luftwaffe's fighter force. September 1944, the month in 

which Germany produced its wartime high of 3,375 fighter aircraft (thanks to 

high priorities given fighter production and to a thorough dispersal program for 

the fighter assembly plants), gave indications that such a resurgence could 

occur. On September 11 and 12, large numbers of Luftwaffe fighters opposed 

Eighth Air Force missions directed against important oil hydrogenation plants 

for the first time since the oil strikes in May 1944. The Eighth lost 75 heavy 

bombers on those two missions.106 

On September 27, when the Eighth hit industrial and transportation targets, 

the Luftwaffe demonstrated its still deadly effectiveness against unescorted, 

bomber formations. Using newly developed tactics based on the development of 

* In railroad terminology placing is the assembly and ordering of cars within a train. Normally, 

placing occurs only in a marshaling yard. 

511 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the Sturmgruppe (literally storm group, a special bomber assault unit consisting 

of heavily armored FW 190 fighters equipped with rapid-firing 30mm cannons), 

the Luftwaffe pounced on the 445th Bomb Group, whose 37 B-24s had wandered out from under the protective umbrella of its escort. In the three minutes 

between the bombers’ plea for help and the arrival of the 361st Fighter Group’s 

P-51s, Sturmgruppe IllJG4’s 48 aircraft disrupted the formation and shot down 

26 bombers; 2 more badly damaged bombers crashed in France. This was the 

largest loss by a single group during a mission ever experienced by the Eighth. 

The other 1,155 bombers dispatched lost only 2 bombers to enemy action. 

The Sturmgruppe’s heavily armed and armored planes proved a doubleedged weapon. Additional weight severely hampered their maneuverability. The 

nimble Mustang P-51s of a single squadron of the 361st probably saved the 

remainder of the 445th; they certainly avenged their comrades. They intercepted 

the Sturmgruppe and its escort of Bf 109s, shooting down 18 fighters-the 

Eighth Air Force record for kills by a single squadron in a single day. 107 

This increase in Luftwaffe activity did not go unremarked by Spaatz or 

Arnold. On September 3, Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, with Spaatz’s 

approval, warned Arnold of USSTAF’s concern over the progress of the 

Germans in fielding their new jet fighter, the Me 262. Anderson described the 

attacks the AAF in Europe planned to make on the enemy’s jet airframe, engine, 

and fuel-manufacturing facilities, and on the experimental and training airfields. 

Two of USSTAF’s greatest worries were (1) the Germans’ obvious intention to 

use their jets against Allied photographic reconnaissance aircraft and (2) the 

small, dispersed underground sites where the jets themselves were assembled. 

Anderson requested the earliest possible deployment of the American jet fighter, 

the P-80.108 Arnold replied that the AAF in the United States was working hard 

to meet Spaatz’s requirements. New, more effective P-51s and P-47s had gone 

into production, and so would the P-80 when its development was finished. 

Arnold also promised to send the latest bombing-through-overcast radar devices 

as they became available.109 

The terrible losses absorbed by the 445th had a sobering effect on the heavybomber commanders. Although the Luftwaffe never duplicated the September 

27 feat, the Americans had to assume that it would. On September 28, Doolittle 

wrote to Spaatz. He cited a gradual increase in the strength and aggressiveness 

of the Luftwaffe as a reason periodically to give “first priority to the conduct of 

winter air operations on the German Air Force-in-being to insure that their aircraft productive capacity does not get out of hand.” Doolittle added, “It is inexpedient for us to permit them to build up their force to a point where, even 

though we fly the maximum number of our limited escort fighters on every deep 

penetration bomber mission, they are able, in their periodic attacks, to take a 

serious toll of bombers.”llo 

Three weeks later, a still worried Doolittle described the new Sturmgruppe 

tactics: 

512 
STALEMATE 

The Germans have developed a “line abreast” method of attack and it has 

proved so effective that they are now using it almost to the exclusion of other 

forms of attack. The concentrated fire from “line abreast” attacks has greatly 

reduced the effectiveness of the defensive fire of our bombers. Once a ‘line 

abreast’ attack is launched, it is practically impossible to break up that particular attack unless our fighters are in a position between the bombers and the 

attacking enemy. Split-second timing is necessary and we do not have enough 

fighters to give close cover to all of our bombers.”’ 

Doolittle pleaded for the forward deployment of a new and more effective 

Allied radar. He informed Spaatz that microwave early warning radar (MEW) 

should come forward to Luxembourg where, with its 250-mile range, it could 

observe enemy fighter formations as they formed up, direct and control friendly 

fighters, pinpoint bomber forces and direct them to the vicinity of their targets in 

overcast, and help Allied aircraft locate home or emergency fields in very bad 

weather. “It is my personal opinion,” added Doolittle, “and that of our fighter 

controllers, that with our M.E.W. located on the Continent, operated by the 

Eighth Air Force and tied in with this headquarters by adequate communications, the effectiveness of Eighth Air Force fighters will be increased at least 

50%.”112 

Spaatz shared Doolittle’s feeling of alarm, but he focused on potential and 

actual German technical advances. At the beginning of October he wrote to 

Lovett, “The Luftwaffe has raised its head a bit in the past week or so by means 

of jet propelled or rocket planes that are now able to carry on reconnaissance 

which was denied to them prior to D-Day and up until quite recently.”l13 At 

about the same time he wrote to Arnold expressing a more pessimistic outlook: 

“There is every chance, I think, that the Germans may be using proximity fuzes* 

or an improved type of radar control for their flak. We can’t prove this yet and 

our increased flak losses may be due simply to the fact that they are concentrating all their available flak in a smaller area.” Spaatz also expressed concern 

about German jet aircraft: “The Hun has still got a lot of fight left in him, even 

in the air, and we must concentrate to kill him off if possible before he can 

develop these new threats against us.”114 

* The proximity, or variable time (VT), fuze was an “influence” fuze. The fuze contained a 

miniature wet-cell battery and a five-tube two-way radio activated by the impact of the firing 

artillery piece. It transmitted a 140-foot doughnut-shaped signal, which, in proximity to aircraft or 

the ground, reflected back to the fuze, triggering an electric impulse that detonated the shell. 

Although it was difficult to manufacture, and, as a consequence, had a high dud rate, it was the most 

effective antiaircraft fuze of the war. It eliminated the extremely difficult problem of fuze setting for 

larger antiaircraft artillery guns, increasing the effect of antiaircraft fire by approximately 300 percent. The shell was developed in strict secrecy and first employed by the U.S. Navy in the Pacific. 

The V-1 campaign in the summer of 1944 prompted its use in England. Not until mid-December 

1944 did the Americans employ it on the European continent. See Frank E. Comparato, Age of the 

Great Guns: Cannon Kings and Cannoneers who Forged the Firepower of Artillery (Harrisburg, 

Pa.: Stackpole, 1965), pp. 265-267, for a more detailed description of the fuze and its effectiveness. 

513 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

RAF Air Intelligence added to Spaatz’s unease. On October 1, A1 estimated, 

correctly, that in September the Germans had reached a new monthly high in 

single-engine fighter plane production and predicted, incorrectly, that the 

upward trend would continue. A1 assessed the current Luftwaffe single-engine 

fighter strength at 2,000 and guessed that it could rise to 2,500 in six months. An 

October 3 ULTRA decryption showed a Luftwaffe reorganization shifting fighter 

forces back to the defense of the Reich. Six days later, signal intelligence disclosed Goering’s orders reducing close support fighters in the west by 150 aircraft and adding that number to strategic defense. 1 15 

On October 4, Spaatz, in an “Eyes Only” letter to Arnold, showed that the 

shock of the attack on the 445th Bombardment Group had abated. After noting 

that recent losses were “not unduly high,” he said, “I am reasonably sure that, at 

the present time, the Germans have no new weapons that are causing our losses, 

although I am not overlooking the possibility of proximity fuzes, and better 

ammunition and sights for their fighters.”ll6 Nevertheless, Spaatz retained enough 

concern that he authorized the Fifteenth Air Force to abandon temporarily the oil 

campaign if it felt the need to defend itself by attacking airfields and aircraft 

production. 1 17 

After approving the forward move of the theater’s only microwave early 

warning radar set, Spaatz sought to enhance intelligence operations. On October 

20, he asked Portal to move the RAF “Y” Service tactical radio interception unit 

from England to the Continent, arguing, “In as much as the German defensive 

measures appear to be increasing in capacity and efficiency, it is of vital importance to the successful continuation of our daylight bombing operations that we 

obtain . . . every possible means to improve the efficiency of our fighter coverage.”118 The same day Spaatz wrote to Air Vice-Marshal Robb, head of SHAEF’s 

air section, “The increasing efficiency of German Air Force operations against our 

penetration necessitates that every means be taken to improve the efficiency of 

our own fighter operations in their protection of the bombers.” Thereupon, 

Spaatz requested improved voice and teletype circuits to enable better communications linking Eighth Air Force Headquarters, Ninth Air Force Advanced 

Headquarters, the MEW set in Luxembourg, and the “Y” Service unit moving to 

the Continent.119 

Additional signal intelligence may have heightened Spaatz’s concern. In 

mid-October RAF Air Intelligence informed the British Joint Intelligence 

Committee that the Germans had enough fuel for advanced fighter training and 

maximum deployment for defense of the Reich. A1 added that front-line fighter 

strength had risen 25 percent from August 1 and would continue to increase. 

From this data A1 concluded that the Luftwaffe, in conjunction with its jet and 

rocket aircraft, might secure some degree of air superiority over Germany, 

thereby enabling it to protect vital war industries during the upcoming winter.120 

On October 17, a signal from Lufiotte Reich, decrypted by Bletchley Park the 

514 
STALEMATE 

next day, gave close-support forces the main task of engaging Allied air forces 

in the rear of the operational area and over the population working on the West 

Wall (German border fortifications). They would undertake ground support only 

in critical situations. An October 26 decryption of an October 18 message unambiguously set the Luftwaffe’s main task as the strategic defense of the Fatherland and warned of impending transfers of additional ground support fighters to 

air defense.121 None of this could have added to Spaatz’s peace of mind. 

Spaatz visited Bradley at his headquarters on October 21. After being 

briefed on the 12th Army Group’s plans for an attack on November 10, Spaatz 

told Bradley of his concern about the German air buildup. Spaatz feared that 

daylight bombing into Germany would become very expensive and that the 

strategic air force might have to lose “about 40,000 crew members” in order to 

maintain present air superiority. Spaatz added that it was essential for the army 

to press forward to the Rhine in order to obtain advanced airfields that would 

enable the Ninth to move forward and the Eighth to send its fighters into the 

continental fields vacated by the Ninth. Such a move would almost double the 

effectiveness of his fighters, Spaatz declared. Bradley replied that if good flying 

weather appeared likely, he could advance the date of his attack to November 5. 

Spaatz responded that the strategic air forces were prepared to lay down a barrage wherever Bradley requested it, weather permitting. In any case, Spaatz 

promised to aid Bradley’s attack by operating the Eighth’s fighters just to the 

east of the Rhine to enable the Ninth’s fighters to concentrate on Bradley’s 

immediate front.122If nothing else, this interchange between Bradley and Spaatz 

demonstrated more integration and interdependence between the ground and 

strategic air efforts than is usually conceded by the proponents of either effort. 

This conversation probably had little influence on Bradley’s plans; he made 

no mention of it in his memoirs. The U.S. Army official history does note, however, that one reason Eisenhower and his advisers [Spaatz?] wished to avoid a 

halt in operations in November was that they feared such a pause might give the 

Germans the chance to increase jet fighter production and discover the proximity fuze “which might blast Allied bombers from the skies.”123 

The weather, as Spaatz anticipated, did not cooperate. Patton’s Third Army 

began its attack toward Metz on November 8. Hodges’s First Army, which had 

included a massive air bombardment as a prelude to its attack, postponed action 

from November 10 to November 16 because the heavy bombers could not fly 

until then. This attack, code-named Operation QUEEN, far exceeded the St. 

LVCOBRA attack in technical efficiency. Unfortunately, its ultimate effectiveness came nowhere close to the proficiency of its predecessor in Normandy. In 

its preparations and execution QUEEN showed how far the Eighth Air Force had 

come in its ground support role. Instead of only a few days’ preparation, 

Doolittle rehearsed his forces thoroughly for the assault. On November 7 he 

conducted a full-scale “experimental” practice attack on a target in England to 

515 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

test safety measures. He also insisted that he have more input into advance planning; if he had only short notice, the Army “must expect the hazards incidental 

to support from heavy bombers.”l24 

Unlike earlier bomber-support attacks, QUEEN employed elaborate measures 

to mark the front lines. In addition to sixty-four 90mm antiaircraft artillery 

pieces that fired colored shells, giant ground-marking panels laid out by the 

troops, and a string of barrage balloons, the Eighth set up a series of radio and 

radar beacons close to the line. The planes would bomb no closer than 3,600 

yards from the troops, well over twice the margin used in the St. L8 attack.125 

On the morning of November 16, a total of 1,191 Eighth Air Force heavy 

bombers dropped their fragmentation bombs through overcast, killing only one 

American soldier and wounding only three with short bombs. An additional 

1,188 Bomber Command aircraft bombed and cratered areas flanking the assault 

in the hope of preventing enemy reinforcement. Unfortunately, this attack, 

World War 11’s largest air attack in direct support of ground troops, did not produce results commensurate with efforts. Because of the large safety zone, most 

bombs fell beyond the German main line of resistance, striking artillery positions and fortuitously cutting up a German infantry division caught in the open 

while relieving a front-line unit. After a few hours, enemy resistance stiffened. 

Subsequent fighting produced no spectacular breakthrough, only more dogged 

attritional warfare. The air commanders blamed the large safety zone for poor 

results, because it prevented a rapid follow-up by the ground forces.126 Spaatz 

commented to Arnold: “As a result of these operations, it has very definitely 

been established that unless there is a quick follow up of the bombardment by 

ground troops, the enemy recovers from the shock and the effect of the bombing 

is vitiated.”l27 

Other factors prevented this attack from achieving the tremendous results of 

the St. L8 breakthrough. First, the U.S. ground forces did not launch so highly 

concentrated an attack as in Normandy. Second, the Germans-in contrast to 

their attenuated situation in France-had adequate reserves, which allowed them 

to seal any break in their lines before it became critical. Even if QUEEN had 

severely damaged the front-line troops, it would have made no lasting break. 

At the beginning of December the Allies seriously considered diverting 

more strategic effort to the direct support of their bogged-down ground troops to 

achieve an immediate end to hostilities. Why bomb strategic targets when the 

war might be over in sixty days? On December 5, the air commanders and 

Eisenhower met at Versailles “to devise some means of using the strategic air 

forces in such a way as to bring about an early decision on the Western Front.”128 

After opening the meeting by acknowledging the stalemated position of the 

ground forces and the pressure from the CCS to end the war quickly, Tedder 

suggested possible solutions: (1) conducting another QUEEN-type operation or 

(2) providing continuous close support by heavy bombers over a long period of 

516 
STALEMATE 

time. By limiting the airmen to these two options, Tedder hoped that Eisenhower 

would understand what extended heavy-bomber support would cost him in terms 

of damage not inflicted on the interior of Germany. Spaatz spoke up immediately. He could deliver 40,000 to 50,000 tons of bombs per month. Of that total, 

10,000 tons of bombs were needed to keep German production down at ten oil 

facilities, which, if they could continue operating uninterrupted for a month, 

might bring forth 400,000 tons of all types of fuel. In addition, Spaatz suggested 

that the antitransportation attacks had begun to show results and should continue 

to receive “some effort.” As for the Luftwaffe, it could be limited by air battle 

alone without Allied recourse to bombing. Hence perhaps 30,000 tons of bombs 

were left for tactical support.129 

After Spaatz’s recitation, Tedder skillfully guided the meeting toward the 

conclusion that he and most of the other airmen supported: the strategic air 

forces should mount QUEEN-like operations when required, but should also persevere with the strategic bomber offensive. From Coningham and Quesada 

Tedder extracted agreement that heavy-bomber carpet bombing would not materially assist the tactical air forces at present. Tedder also gained from Doolittle 

and Harris agreement that QUEEN-like operations would be the most effective 

type of ground support operation for the heavy bombers. Doolittle noted that the 

Eighth had begun to train strategic air support parties and planned to have an airborne air controller to assist in future operations. 130 

The airmen emphasized to Eisenhower that they thought QUEEN-like operations would be most effective only if they supported troops actually moving forward. Repeated and continued bombings of targets such as villages and towns 

immediately behind the front lines would accomplish virtually nothing. Eisenhower agreed and closed by paying the air forces a compliment: “It was impossible to convince the Army that the battle of St. L8 had not been won as a result 

of the direct support given by the 8th Air Force.”l31 

The next day, Spaatz flew to Patton’s headquarters and offered him the 

direct support of the heavy bombers during the attack on the Siegfried Line in a 

week or ten days. Because Patton’s attack would occur at the boundary between 

Devers’s 6th Army Group and Bradley’s 12th Army Group, Spaatz also visited 

Devers on December 7 and Bradley on December 8.132 However, the German 

Ardennes counteroffensive caused the hurried shelving of this initiative. 

As the Eighth prepared for QUEEN and possible ground-support missions, 

Spaatz fretted over the Luftwaffe, which now had far more fighter aircraft than 

ever before. From the all-time high of 3,375 fighters in September, production 

fell off only slightly to 2,975 machines in October and to 2,995 and 2,630 in the 

last two months of the year.133 If the Luftwaffe had possessed the fuel necessary 

to train its pilots properly and to oppose all raids in strength, this formidable 

force might have fulfilled the hopes of its masters. Despite their severe losses in 

the quarter ending December 31, 1944, the Germans placed 4,219 more aircraft 

517 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

into service than they lost, 90 percent of them fighters.134 

The Germans were at cross-purposes about how to deploy this force. Maj. 

Gen. Adolph Galland, the Luftwaffe day-fighter commandant, and Speer hoped 

to use it to defend Germany from the Allied heavy bombers. On October 5, 

Speer concluded a report to Hitler on the oil situation with this recommendation: 

“Raise the effective fighting capacity of the German fighter force to such a 

height as is absolutely possible, to add all available machines to its strength, and 

then concentrate this fighter force for the protection of the home armaments and 

war production.”l35 

In the meantime, Galland, according to his postwar interrogations, succeeded in convincing Goering and the Luftwaffe General Staff that the fighter 

forces needed a period of rest and rehabilitation before being returned to combat.136 Alternatively, Hitler may have decided at that point to allow the conservation of fighters in order to save them for his planned counteroffensive. In any 

case, probably unaware of Hitler’s plans, Galland confidently began to implement his own scheme. He stripped Italy and Austria of German fighters, 

increased the number of planes per group to 68, made sure that each group 

received fifteen hours (a pitiful amount) of special training in air defense, and 

reorganized the command structure to reflect the actual basing of his aircraft. 

By early November he claimed a strength of 3,000 aircraft, 2,500 of them operational.137 The Eighth and Ninth Air Forces had a paper strength o€ 4,204 fighters,138 with a high serviceability rate, and the British could add 2,000 more 

fighter aircraft. Galland claimed that he had achieved a satisfactory resolution 

to fighter leadership personnel problems and, although he admitted that fuel 

shortages hampered training, he maintained that all formations had had enough 

time to complete their courses. 

Galland planned to use this rejuvenated force in a series of “Big Blows” 

against the Eighth Air Force. The first interception would consist of 1,000 fighters, 300 to 400 of which would refuel and attack again. A further 80 to 100 night 

fighters would pick off cripples headed for Sweden or Switzerland.139 Under 

Galland’s direction, the fighter force carefully practiced the tactics required for 

such a large-scale operation and awaited the combination of a clear day and a 

deep bomber penetration to put their preparations into practice.140 With all in 

readiness by November 12, Galland hoped to shoot down 500 bombers in a single day. He expected to lose an equal number of fighters and 150 pilots. This 

effort, he thought, would force the Americans to resume bombing the aircraft 

industry (instead of oil targets) and perhaps give the Germans the chance to hold 

the Soviets while making a separate peace with the Anglo-American Allies.141 

The weather in mid-November never provided the clear day both the AAF 

and the Luftwaffe hoped for. In late November Galland received orders to transfer fighters to the Western Front, ostensibly to defend against a coming Allied 

attack, but, as he subsequently realized, in reality to assist the counteroffensive.142 Once engaged in the Battle of the Bulge, the pilots, without even mini518 
STALEMATE 

ma1 training in ground support, and their machines rapidly succumbed to the 

massive air power the Allies applied to halt the attack. One of Germany’s last 

hopes to protect its industry-a slim hope, given the poor performance of its 

pilots-went down in flames as the fighter arm dissipated itself in vain attempts 

to assist the German ground forces. During the Battle of the Bulge the Germans 

lost hundreds of fighters in air-to-air combat and hundreds more in ground 

attacks, including more than 200 on a spectacular but ineffective New Year’s 

Day raid on Allied airfields. 

No full-scale Big Blow was ever launched; but the tactics and control techniques developed in case it was must have aided the Luftwaffe in fielding its 

three largest interceptions of the war. On November 2, 21, and 26 at least 500 

German fighters arose to defend their Fatherland. These interceptions evoked 

both consternation and relief within USSTAF and the Eighth-consternation 

because such large forces could be marshaled and relief because they were ineffective. In the entire month of November the AAF credited German fighters 

with the destruction of only 50 heavy bombers, a far cry from the 314 bombers 

shot down by enemy fighters in Apri1.143 What is more, the Luftwaffe paid a 

heavy price. Even if the claims of the bomber gunners were invariably inflated, 

American fighters, most of whose kills were recorded by gunsight cameras, 

knocked down 102 enemy fighters on November 2, 68 on November 21, and 

114 on November 26.144 

Yet, the large-scale German interception on November 2 sent a shiver 

through USSTAF. Three days later Spaatz wrote a long letter to Arnold explaining his current thinking on the situation. “For some months we have been carefully weighing the build up of the German fighter force,” reported Spaatz. 

Showing that he had grasped at least the outline of Galland’s Big Blow, Spaatz 

continued: 

It has been increasingly evident that the GAF was being processed to become a 

major threat to our deep penetrations, in daylight, into Germany. The operations last Thursday, at which time the GAF hit our penetration with a well laid 

plan, and in strength, resulted in an outstanding aerial victory for our forces. 

However, this victory was attained because of almost perfect fighter cover and 

because of a fortunate chain of circumstances which contributed to the decisive 

outcome.’45 

Spaatz described four factors in the Luftwaffe’s resurgence: conversion of 

its remaining bomber pilots to fighter pilots, all-out expansion of the entire 

fighter force, the highest-priority development and production of jet aircraft, and 

perhaps most important, the continuation of a conservation policy. Spaatz noted 

that the enemy met his critical oil shortage by not operating during the increasing periods of poor weather or against shallow penetrations or well-escorted 

bomber missions. “Thus,” Spaatz informed Arnold, “it is possible that during 

our deep penetrations we can be hit in force now, and this possibility is con519 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EWOPE 

General Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, and his two leading 

ground commanders, Lt. Gen. Jacob L. Devers (left), Commanding General, 6th 

Army Group, and Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley (right), Commanding General, 12th 

Army Group, November 1944. 

stantly increasing with the resurgence of the GAF during the winter. This is a 

point of serious concern and may have a major effect on the war should it last 

throughout the sprhg.’’146 

Spaatz went on to discuss the countermeasures necessary to avert the threat. 

In his opinion the Eighth had too few fighters; with the influx of new bomber 

groups in the spring and summer there was only one fighter to protect every two 

bombers. This shortage posed a serious problem because it offered Spaatz only 

two options: reducing the number of bombers sent on deep missions to a number 

which the fighters could adequately cover, or sending out the maximum number 

of bombers on each mission, knowing full well that a massive German attack 

might overwhelm both a thinly spread escort and its flock. Spaatz regarded the 

fist alternative as unacceptable because winter weather limited the number of 

good bombing days to a handful. With key targets protected by weather, flak, 

and smoke screens, the only way to obtain a reasonable assurance of destruction 

was by concentrating the maximum force on each target. Having decided to risk 

520 
STALEMATE 

Lt. Gens. Carl A. Spaatz, George S. Patton, and James H. Doolittle; Maj. Gen. Hoyt 

S. Vandenberg, Commanding General, Ninth Air Force; and Brig. Gen. 0. P. 

Weyland, Commanding General, XIX Air Support Command, autumn 1944. 

the second alternative, Spaatz strove to limit the Germans’ opportunities for 

attack. Microwave early warning radar and “Y” signal intercepts helped, but, as 

he told Arnold, “a permanent movement of the Eighth Air Force fighters from 

the U.K. to the Belgium-Holland area is the only real answer to increasing our 

escort fighter density.”l47 Such a move could not occur until the British 2d 

Tactical Air Force moved forward and vacated its present fields, more communications equipment arrived to supplement the already overloaded equipment on 

the Continent, and Montgomery succeeded in opening Antwerp.148 

In the meantime, the Americans took countermeasures. On November 27, the 

Eighth sent two forces into Germany. The first, made up of 515 heavy bombers 

escorted by 241 fighters, bombed marshaling yards in southwest Germany. The 

second force, composed of 460 fighter bombers, headed for four oil centers in 

northern and central Germany. Using radio deception methods to trick the 

Germans into mistaking fighter formations for heavy bombers and aided by both 

heavy overcast (which prevented ground observers from identifying the aircraft) 

and newly deployed very high frequency radar jammers (which partially blinded 

the German ground controllers), this force, vectored to the German fighter rendezvous areas by the newly positioned MEW radar, provoked strong German 

reaction. In the ensuing fighter melee the Americans claimed to have downed 98 

enemy fighters, against a loss of 12 of their own.149 As Spaatz observed to 

52 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

General Giles, Chief of the Air Staff, two weeks later, “Our war is becoming a 

radar war. We depend heavily on the operational capabilities of a small number 

of radar sets of extraordinary performance.” As H2X had increased the bombers’ 

effectiveness in the first half of 1944, the three MEW sets in the theater were 

largely responsible, Spaatz said, “for the superiority of our fighters over 

Germany. We are therefore willing to pay the high price of the introduction of 

new and complicated apparatus because the return is proportionately high.”lsO 

Arnold, too, felt the growing threat of the Luftwaffe. In his reply to Spaatz’s 

letter of November 5, he agreed on the urgency of getting the Eighth’s fighters 

to the Continent. He displayed a more open attitude than Spaatz did toward the 

possibility of changing priorities such as increasing night bombing, sacrificing 

heavy bomber effort in favor of more fighter sweeps, or creating a strategic 

fighter force to conduct additional fighter sweeps. Arnold closed on a hopeful 

note: “The staggering losses you have inflicted in the past few days suggest that 

numerical increases in aircraft may not reflect the true position of the GAF.”151 

Another letter from AAF Headquarters in Washington, this time from 

General Giles, further explained the attitude prevalent there. He admitted AAF 

Headquarters’ concern over the growing strength of the Luftwaffe and mentioned alternatives studied and rejected, including a suggestion for 500 additional fighters. “If we are to hit the Germans low with the fighters and high with 

the bombers,” wrote Giles, “it will have to be done with the means we know we 

possess.” Giles also seconded Spaatz’s desire to get the fighters to the Continent 

and supported the maximum use of heavy bombers. Finally, he expressed concern about the accuracy of the Eighth’s blind bombing.152 

At USSTAF, examination of November’s operations restored a certain 

amount of optimism. Spaatz wrote to Washington, “In spite of the buildup of 

strength, his [the enemy’s] overall effectiveness has not increased. In recent 

operations, when he has come up to fight, we have destroyed as much as 25% of 

his forces. . . . ”153 If Spaatz’s airmen could only get a break in the weather, they 

could destroy the German fighter force and free the escorts to return to a purely 

offensive role. “In the meantime,” he assured Lovett, “our motto is-the maximum tonnage of bombs on Germany that the weather will permit.”l54 

Three days after his letter, three German armies plus supporting troops 

stormed through the surprised American defenders in Belgium’s Ardennes 

Forest region and began to drive for the Meuse River and Antwerp. If they succeeded they would split the American and British army groups and possibly 

crush each separately. The Luftwaffe supported this offensive with all its capabilities. Spaatz and the other Allied airmen finally had the chance they had 

sought to destroy the Luftwaffe. 

522 
STALEMATE 

Arnold and the Public Image of the AAF 

The goal of winning the war dominated the thoughts and actions of both 

Arnold and Spaatz. Nonetheless, the two also worked toward the fulfillment of 

another goal, the independence of the Air Force within the U.S. military establishment. Toward this end, USSTAF had to present itself to the public and to its 

elected representatives in the U.S. Congress in the best possible light-hence, 

Arnold’s and Spaatz’s concern with the amount, quality, and type of press coverage for the AAF. 

Naturally, Arnold in Washington felt the need for a good press more acutely 

than Spaatz in Europe. Arnold dealt daily with the heads of the services, congressional committees, the British Chiefs of Staff, the civilian politicians in 

charge of the War Department, and, occasionally, the President-all in a goldfish-bowl atmosphere. As a result, he could assess the position of the AAF in the 

hierarchy and its future prospects with a precision unobtainable elsewhere. The 

AAF’s position depended not only on its actual performance but on its perceived 

performance as well. Arnold, with his hand so close to the nation’s pulse, at least 

with regard to air matters, invariably pressed his air force commanders for favorable news items to convince the public of the AAF’s importance to the war effort. 

Spaatz, concerned as he was with the operation and administration of the AAF’s 

three largest numbered air forces, felt the pressure from Washington on public 

relations and reacted to it. 

The invasion of France caused an abrupt decline in the amount of press coverage devoted to the AAF in Europe. Heretofore, the AAF, as the only allAmerican force in the ETO directly engaged in combat with the Nazis, had 

enjoyed front-page coverage of its operations. Indeed, press attention further 

focused on it because censorship and restrictions concerning the ground forces’ 

state of preinvasion preparations actively diverted attention from other U.S. 

forces. After D-day the situation reversed itself. On June 8, Chief of the Air 

Staff Giles wrote Spaatz, “We all appreciate your innumerable current problems 

and your magnificent participation in the invasion. However, the newspapers 

here are pressing us for some special material which I should like to have you 

get together for us at the earliest practicable moment.” Giles asked for a brief, 

colorful overview of the air forces in action, with special stories on troop-carrier 

and heavy-bomber operations. In a penciled note he requested stories on the 

fighters, too.155 

The breakout from Normandy and the drive to the Siegfried Line kept the 

ground forces on the front pages. In late September, Arnold wrote Spaatz, “I am 

extremely concerned over current press releases stressing remarkable achievements of Ground Force commanders such as Hodges, Patton, and Patch in 

speeding the war to an early and successful end with armor, mobile infantry, and 

artillery occupying the spotlight.” Instead Arnold wanted to see 

523 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

balanced narration of battles and offensives, with the effects of an action upon 

the outcome being described in true relation to the overall success, one would 

imagine that air power played a relatively small part in the liberation of the 

occupied countries and the defeat of the German airmen therein. However, you 

must apply pressure in Europe while I apply it here, to the end that our press 

releases more nearly picture in proper balance the relative contribution of 

ground, sea and air forces in our approach toward a complete victory over our 

enemies. 

Next, Arnold expressed his view on the necessity of a favorable public opinion 

for air power. “I consider the whole subject of realistic reorientation of the public’s concept of the effects of air power upon the outcome of the war so important that I will scour the country to provide you with the men most capable of 

putting into words the achievements of the Army Air Forces.”l56 Finally, 

Arnold wanted Spaatz to emphasize that USSTAF was no longer under Eisenhower’s control so that the public would know that the strategic air offensive 

was playing an independent role in Europe. 

Spaatz, who had appeared on the D-day cover of Time magazine, must at 

first have wondered what more Arnold could want. In his reply, prepared by 

Anderson, Spaatz shared Arnold’s “concern over the inadequate attention given 

to air operations in press and radio accounts of the war in Europe and other theaters.”157 After describing various measures taken to remedy the situation, 

Spaatz noted, “In case of a stalemate on the ground, our operations should 

become top news once more.” He then asked for twelve additional public relations officers for the Ninth Air Force. He also wrote that he had asked Doolittle 

and Vandenberg “to redouble their efforts to help us achieve the results you 

want.” 

In November, Arnold escalated his criticism of Spaatz’s public relations 

effort. Having just gained Marshall’s permission to establish the AAF Office of 

Information Services158 to issue press releases, he groused to Spaatz, “I am 

increasingly concerned about the display given accomplishments of the Air 

Forces in your area by the American newspapers. Since these stories originate in 

the theater, the primary reason for the monotonous presentations must be over 

there.”l59 In typical fashion Arnold informed Spaatz of his intention to send an 

officer, Col. Rex Smith, Chief of the AAF Office of Information Services, out 

“for a complete study of this situation for such remedial recommendations as are 

necessary.” Arnold expressed his opinion in no uncertain terms: “I consider this 

problem of the highest priority in the Air Forces now.”l60 

Arnold passed the word informally, too. On the previous day, he had asked 

Brig. Gen. George C. McDonald, Spaatz’s Chief of Intelligence, who had come 

to Washington to attempt to justify a large increase in USSTAF’s intelligence 

staff, to convey his concern. McDonald recorded that Arnold told him 

524 
STALEMATE 

that at the present time one had to turn to the inside pages of the newspapers to 

find any mention of the Air Forces. He stated that among the hundreds of thousands of Air Force personnel under General Spaatz, someone should be able to 

glamorize the stories of the Air Force and give them freshness, interest and 

vitality. He pointed out that on the front page, bold head-lines would appear 

that a certain town of three hundred inhabitants, that no one had ever heard of, 

was captured by General Patton’s troops while the tremendous contributions of 

the Air Forces are found on the seventh page of the New York Times. General 

Arnold stated that he had been informed that the fault lay on the other side and 

that General Spaatz would have to correct it within his command, that he would 

not do the necessary [work] over here-it would have to begin with USSTAF 

and its cornmands.l6’ 

On November 30, Spaatz received yet another letter from Arnold, delivered 

by Colonel Smith, which elaborated on Arnold’s demands for improved public 

relations: 

As you are no doubt aware, my concern is that through proper presentation to 

the press the American people be given the facts necessary to a correct evaluation of the part air power has played in the war, to the end that the United States 

should not make the mistake of allowing through lack of knowledge the tearing 

down in postwar years of what has cost us so much blood and sweat to build 

up.’@ 

Like all the professional soldiers of his generation, Arnold had never forgotten 

the pell-mell demobilization of the U.S. armed forces that had followed World 

war I. 

Smith, on the first leg of a trip to all the combat theaters where the AAF 

operated, brought with him a list of fifty points applicable to the writing of communiques and press releases. Arnold wanted the list distributed to all AAF public relations officers (PROS) and told Spaatz, “I feel your personal attention is 

needed in insuring that the point of view is adequately presented to each PRO.” 

As a parting shot Arnold observed, “I trust that with all of us approaching the 

vital question of public relations along more or less the same lines, we may 

regain with the American public the position which we now only hold in the 

minds of our enemies.”l63 

By December 9 Spaatz had reorganized his public relations effort, installing 

Col. Hal Bowman, whom he had described as a fine officer with a first-class 

combat record, as a new Deputy Chief of Staff with the primary function of representing USSTAF to the press.164 Spaatz told Vandenberg to make a similar 

appointment.165 By the end of the month, with matters apparently satisfactorily 

in hand, USSTAF passed Rex Smith on to Ira Eaker in the Mediterranean.166 

By then the Battle of the Bulge had thoroughly tested the new public relations organization, and had graphically demonstrated once again the importance 

of air power. The American papers practically tumbled over one another praising the AAF’s efforts to stem the German tide. 

525 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Conclusions 

The last third of 1944 was for Spaatz, USSTAF, and all of the Allied forces 

in the European Theater of Operations a time of frustration. The goal of defeating the Third Reich, which had seemed tantalizingly close in the beginning of 

September, receded as the ground forces halted on the German border and an 

exceptionally wet autumn severely hampered operations both on the land and in 

the air. True, the sun refused to shine on either side, but it cannot be denied that 

this situation favored the German land forces, the Luftwaffe, and the battered oil 

plants more than the Allies. What the Allied leaders did not fully appreciate was 

that the still-imposing facade of the Nazi state was hiding a gutted, bombed-out 

building. Once they toppled the wall, which would still take some doing, nothing of consequence would remain. 

Despite Spaatz’s success in keeping oil the top priority, German oil production increased throughout the last third of the year, but remained a mere fraction 

of what it was before the campaign began. Spaatz’s fears that the Luftwaffe’s 

relative inactivity in September and October, coupled with high fighter-plane 

production and the introduction of jet fighter aircraft, presaged a resurgence in 

its effectiveness, proved exaggerated. USSTAF bomber casualties decreased 

dramatically in the fourth quarter of the year, especially in view of the fact that 

the size of its total bomber force had more than doubled from January to 

December. (See Table 6, USSTAF Bomber Losses by Quarter, 1944-1945.) 

The table shows that during the latter half of the year German fighter aircraft 

effectiveness declined and Allied losses from antiaircraft fire increased. Both 

results were to some extent the fault of the oil offensive, which had reduced the 

fuel available to German fighters for training and operations while exposing 

USSTAF’s bombers to extremely heavy concentrations of antiaircraft guns. The 

Leuna-Merseburg oil complex, for example, had heavier flak defenses than 

Berlin.167 In addition, the table, to some extent, demonstrates the often unsung 

contributions of the Fifteenth Air Force. Throughout 1944 the Fifteenth Air 

Force had only half as many bombers assigned to it as the Eighth Air Force. 

Thus, its losses suffered in the last six months of 1944 stand out dramatically. In 

fact, during the period covered by this chapter, the Fifteenth was suffering 

almost twice the rate of casualties as the Eighth.168 The Fifteenth’s lower-flying 

B-24s paid in blood for the range that enabled them to fly from Italy to the 

Reich’s synthetic oil facilities. 

By mid-September 1944 U.S. air power in Europe far exceeded the strength 

envisaged for it in AAF prewar planning. Air War Plans Division/l (AWPD/l) 

of July 1941 had called for 44 heavy-bombardment groups (2,992 aircraft), 10 

medium-bombardment groups (850 planes), and 16 fighter groups (2,080 aircraft) to operate against Germany from Britain and the Near East. By August 

31, 1944, the AAF in the European and Mediterranean Theaters of Operations 

526 
Table 6 

USSTAF Bomber Losses by Quarter, 1944-1945 

(Combined Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces) 

Anti- Enemy Other 

Year Totul Aircraft Aircraft Unknown 

Eighth AF 

Losses 

1944 

1 Qtr. 819 220 487 112 

2 Qtr. 1,116 389 637 90 

3 Qtr. 1,057 646 27 8 133 

4 Qtr. 505 332 114 59 

1945 973 624 199 150 

Total 4,470 2,211 1,715 544 

Fifteenth AF 

Losses 

1944 

1945 

Total 

1 Qtr. 267 40 

2 Qtr. 565 25 1 

3 Qtr. 665 353 

4 Qtr. 477 289 

48 1 32 1 

2,455 1,254 

168 59 

243 74 

182 120 

19 169 

7 153 

626 575 

USSTAF 

Losses 

1944 

1 Qtr. 2,086 260 655 171 

2 Qtr. 1,68 1 640 877 164 

3 Qtr. 1,722 999 470 253 

4 Qtr. 982 62 1 133 228 

1945 1,454 945 206 303 

Total 6,925 3,465 2,341 1,119 

Compiled from AAF Statistical Digest, World Wur 11, pp. 255-256, Tables 159 and 160. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

possessed 62 heavy-bombardment groups (4,980 planes), 18 medium-bombardment groups (13 13 planes), and 45 fighter groups (4,969 planes), almost twice 

the force outlined by AWPD/1 .I69 British Bomber Command added 1,87 1 more 

heavy bombers and the British 2d Tactical Air Force supplied 293 medium 

bombers and 999 fighters. 170 Against this enormous force, the Luftwaffe command on the Western Front mustered 431 fighter aircraft.171 

In addition to their numerical advantage, the Allied strategic air forces had 

gained control of their own operations. They ended the CROSSBOW campaign and 

succeeded in temporarily bombing out all production of aviation fuel. The stage 

seemed set for the rapid extinction of the German economy. Yet, althouth it had 

begun to stumble, it continued to function at least until the beginning of 1945. 

As General Hansel1 put it, the strategic bombing offensive “fatally weakened” 

Germany in the fall of 1944. The bombing of oil, with its side effects on the 

explosives and synthetic rubber industries, and of transportation, with its disruption of coal, ball bearings, and semifinished goods distribution, wreaked havoc 

on the German military machine and economy. Precision bombing had wrecked 

the oil plants in the summer 1944, but blind bombing in the autumn, although 

allowing a slight increase in production, kept the plants suppressed. Similarly, 

the blind bombing of cities containing marshaling yards dealt a body blow to the 

German rail system. Instead of being a quick, surgical means of destroying 

enemy war industry and morale, strategic bombing had developed into a weapon 

of attrition which bludgeoned Germany into submission. 

Several factors contributed to the failure of strategic bombing to end the war 

more quickly. The Combined Bomber Offensive was embraced in name only. 

Harris, following his strategy of area bombing, refused to cooperate even with 

his own Air Staff, thereby shortchanging the oil and transportation campaigns 

alike. Bomber Command’s heavy bombs inflicted more damage than the lighter 

American bombs; more heavy bombs dropped on oil targets would have significantly increased the total damage to the synthetic petroleum industry. Harris’s 

stratagem of area bombing of cities, merely because they appeared on his list of 

sixty-three cities suitable for bombing, wreaked great damage but did not necessarily contribute to a coherent anti-transportation campaign. The weather 

allowed only a few days of visual bombing, which the Eighth used to bomb oil 

targets; 70 to 80 percent of USSTAF’s effort involved radar assistance. 

Under pressure from Arnold, Spaatz had to put more bombers into the air 

and use his increased bombing capacity to the fullest. After devoting the maximum of his resources that conditions allowed against oil plants, Spaatz had to 

find targets for the rest of the bomblift. He wavered between ordnance and 

motor vehicles, which were targets requested by the ground forces, and transportation, the system advocated by Tedder. After considering such schemes as 

the HURRICANE morale sweeps throughout Germany, Spaatz finally chose transportation. No other system could absorb the force he had available, and signal 

intelligence revealed its vulnerability. The H2X radars in his heavy bombers 

528 
STALEMATE 

could at least pick out the cities that contained marshaling yards, and his fighters, when they descended to ground level, could certainly follow the roads and 

rails, shooting up any vehicles they encountered. 

The decision to bomb transportation, concurred in by Spaatz, Tedder, 

Bottomley, and, through him, Portal, would eventually result in the complete 

disruption of German economic life. It would also firmly affix to the concept of 

daylight strategic bombing the stigma of the wanton destruction of German 

cities and the callous slaughter of thousands of German noncombatants. 

529 

Chapter 15 

Victory: 

(December 16,1944-May 9,1945) 

In my opinion, Germany has been more completely 

destroyed than any nation since Carthage. I believe from 

now on that increasing evidence will become available to 

the public as to the effect of the strategic bombing on 

German War capacity.’ 

Spaatz to Lovett, May 2,1945 

From December 16, 1944, when the Germans opened their counteroffensive 

in the Ardennes, to May 9, 1945, when the Germans surrendered to the Soviets 

in Berlin, Spaatz continued to direct the forces under his command toward the 

goal of victory. His twofold mission remained as defined at the Casablanca 

Conference in January 1943: the support of the Allied ground forces, when 

required, and the strategic bombing of Germany to bring about “the progressive 

destruction and dislocation of the German military, industrial and economic system and the undermining of the morale of the German people to a point where 

their capacity for armed resistance is fatally weakened.”2 Until mid-January 

1945, Spaatz concentrated on ground support in order to help defeat the last 

major German offensive on the Western Front. After mid-January, he oversaw 

the culmination of the American portion of the Combined Bomber Offensive, 

which brought German industry to a standstill and witnessed the most controversial bombing raid in the European war, the bombing of Dresden. 

The Battle of the Bulge 

On the morning of December 16, 1944, three German armies, the Seventh 

Army, the Fifth Panzer and Sixth SS Panzer Armies, began the Ardennes counteroffensive. German commando units, some dressed in Allied uniforms, spread 

531 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

confusion behind Allied lines. The Germans had deliberately waited for a period 

of severe weather to shield them from overwhelming Allied superiority in the 

air. Carefully husbanded fuel, enough for only a few days of operations, allowed 

the German armies to advance and the Luftwaffe to fly. When the weather 

cleared, the Luftwaffe employed the last of its muscle to aid the ground troops 

and defend them from Allied air power. 

The surprise and confusion among American front-line troops was echoed at 

Allied Headquarters in Paris, where wild rumors concerning Germans in Allied 

uniforms circulated. Spaatz directed that all units under his control tighten security against sabotage. His Deputy for Administration, Maj. Gen. Hugh Knerr, 

even suggested that a restricted zone of blocked-off streets, sentry boxes, and 

pillboxes be set up around the USSTAF Headquarters complex in Paris.3 

Apparently this scheme was not carried out. As Spaatz later admitted to Arnold, 

“The offensive undertaken by the Germans on December 16th undoubtedly 

caught us off balance.”4 

Spaatz responded decisively to the need of the Allied ground forces for additional air support. He directed two of the Eighth’s fighter groups to move immediately to the Continent, if they could find proper air fields, and place themselves under Vandenberg’s operational control. Spaatz also designated the 

Eighth’s 2d Air Division, which had begun to specialize in Gee-H radar bombing, to act as a fire brigade that Vandenberg could call directly, without first 

contacting USSTAF or SHAEF. Gee-H, with a range of 300 miles, employed an 

airborne transmitter and two ground beacons to fix a target’s position; it had a 

bombing accuracy much superior to H2X alone.5 The remaining two-thirds of 

the heavy-bomber force would attack targets west of the Rhine, even if they 

obtained only temporary results, until the emergency ended.6 

Despite vile weather, which included thick ground fog in England that made 

bomber takeoffs and landings extremely treacherous, the Eighth sent out missions on December 18 and 19. On December 18, only 411 of 985 bombers 

bombed their targets; all used radar. The next day, 312 heavy bombers bombed 

tactical targets behind German lines; again, all of them employed radar-H2X 

for most of the targets and Gee-H for eight targets. On December 23, the Allies 

received help from the east-not the start of the Soviet winter offensive, but an 

area of high pressure, called by meteorologists a “Russian high,” which cleared 

away the clouds, providing five days of flying weather. The next day the Eighth 

put up every bomber that could fly-2,046-and dropped 5,052 tons of bombs, 

all visually, on airfields and communications centers in western Germany, its 

largest single-day totals of the war.7 For the first four days of clear weather the 

Luftwaffe vainly sought to keep the Allied air forces from scourging the 

Wehrmacht’s supply lines and railheads. The Eighth’s fighters alone claimed 

160 German aircraft, a figure added to the 69 claimed on December 23. The 

Eighth’s losses for December 24 to December 28 amounted to 21 bombers and 

25 fighters, while it dispatched 4,535 bomber sorties and released 11,245 tons of 

532 
VICTORY 

ordnance.8 On December 26, at a high-level staff meeting at SHAEF in Paris, 

Spaatz urged the ground forces to follow up the air attack as soon as possible, 

saying, “The Hun can’t take the pounding we have been giving him in the 

midriff indefinitely.”g The whirlwind of bombs continued to fall. Between 

December 16 and January 4, the Eighth and Ninth Air Forces dropped 35,747 

tons on tactical targets.10 For the month of January the Eighth flattened marshaling yards and communications centers west and east of the Rhine with 24,496 

tons of high explosives and incendiaries.11 

The good flying days of the Russian high enabled the Eighth and Ninth Air 

Forces to bomb airfields, communication centers, supply dumps, and enemy 

troops so fiercely that the German attack lost much of its mobility. The lack of 

mobility would soon contribute to supply shortages among German front-line 

troops. Allied ground forces halted the Germans five miles short of the Meuse 

River on December 24, and by December 26 the Americans had relieved the 

surrounded U.S. lOlst Airborne Division defending the key road junction at 

Bastogne. Allied bombing began to take an increasing toll; on December 27 a 

German unit reported that Allied heavy bombers had left the key crossroads of 

St. Vith impassable.12 In the meantime, on December 22, Patton’s Third Army 

had begun a counterattack along the southern flank of the Bulge and made 

steady progress. Although much stubborn defensive fighting on the ground lay 

ahead as the Allies reduced the Bulge, the German attack had crested and had 

begun to recede. The crisis passed. The defenders on the ground stopped the 

offensive, but air eased their task by strangling the enemy’s supply lines. The 

AAF official history put the claims of the Eighth and Ninth Air Forces for 

destruction in the period of the Bulge (December 16, 1944, through January 31, 

1945) at 11,378 motor transport vehicles, 1,161 tanks and armored fighting 

vehicles, 507 locomotives, 6,266 railroad cars, 472 gun positions, 974 rail cuts, 

421 road cuts, and 36 bridges.13 

The British Government Code and Cypher School (GC and CS), which 

decrypted the German Enigma codes and supplied high-grade signal intelligence 

(ULTRA), provided information beyond price. The Allied leadership had continuous access to copious and immediate high-grade signal intelligence. Never 

before in the history of warfare have one side’s moves been known so quickly 

and accurately to the other. In effect, Allied generals almost sat in their enemies’ command posts. They knew the daily attack plans, ration strength, and 

supply status of every large German unit. They knew when and where the 

German spearheads ran short of fuel and ammunition. And they knew German 

appreciations of Allied actions.14 Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe signals were an 

open book to their foes. 

On December 18, within six hours of its dispatch, Allied airmen knew of the 

Germans’ intention to give fighter cover against Allied fighter-bombers and 

heavy bombers attacking the Wehrmacht spearheads. Four days later the Allies 

learned of orders to have the fighters engage four-engine bombers; a subsequent 

533 
The Battle of the Bulge. The flight line (above) at a P-51 base in England, winter, 

1944-1945; an Eighth Air Force fighter (below) taking on a German locomotive, 

January 1945. Wide-ranging and persistent attacks on Reichsbuhn rolling stock added 

to the enemy’s difficulties during its last large-scale offensive effort in the west. 
VICTORY 

message revealed heavy losses. By December 26, decryptions betrayed the 

Luftwaffe’s intention to suspend its policy of attacking heavy bombers and to 

switch to the defense of German spearheads and thrust lines. On December 24, 

RAF Air Intelligence (AI) concluded from its analysis of operational signal 

intelligence that the Luftwaffe had committed all available forces to a do-or-die 

effort in which it had suffered heavy losses and that if its current scale of activity continued, its efficiency might rapidly decline. Three days later A1 observed 

that Luftwaffe forces supporting the offensive had so lost in serviceability and 

strength that they could no longer carry on without a period of bad weather for 

recuperation. 15 

At the end of December, Spaatz visited Bradley’s and Patton’s headquarters. 

He and Bradley discussed the nature and extent of the strategic air forces’ commitment to halting the German attack. Bradley expressed satisfaction and 

wanted more massive raids and bombing of communications centers behind 

German lines.16 They both agreed to play down several incidents in which 

bombs fell short, one of which was the bombing of the U.S. 4th Armored 

Division Headquarters, and the shooting down of many Allied planes by friendly 

fire. 17 By not emphasizing those incidents, they apparently hoped to defuse hard 

feelings in both branches of the service. 

The Luftwaffe’s increased effort in ground support during the battle had 

prompted Allied ground troops to fire at all overhead aircraft. On Janaury 1, as 

Spaatz flew to Hodges’s headquarters in Liege, his own plane came under 

heavy, but fortunately inaccurate, antiaircraft fire from Patton’s troops. 

Spaatz found that Hodges, too, wanted to continue hitting communications 

centers and marshaling yards in preference to carpet bombing in front of the 

troops. Spaatz left Liege with the impression that the strain of the offensive had 

begun to tell on Hodges. Spaatz commented in his Command Diary, “Hodges 

and staff did not make a very good impression and seem to lack aggressiveness.”l8 Bradley recorded a similar thought.19 In his meetings with the generals, 

Spaatz had urged them to attack immediately, while the Germans still reeled 

under the full weight of nine days of successfully applied Allied air power.20 

On New Year’s Day, Spaatz saw firsthand the work of the Luftwaffe. That 

morning a force of more than 800 German fighters, employing strict radio 

silence, had swept over sixteen Allied airfields in Belgium and Holland. They 

destroyed 196 airplanes, 36 of them American, but suffered catastrophic losses, 

mostly as a result of Allied antiaircraft fire and their own poor training. Galland, 

the German fighter chief, reported 220 planes lost, many of them piloted by irreplaceable instructor pilots and veteran squadron leaders.21 That afternoon, 

Spaatz landed at two of the attacked fields; he observed no damage at either. 

The next day, he returned to Paris where he discussed his trip with Bedell 

Smith, Eisenhower’s Chief of Staff, who agreed that the ground forces ought to 

move forward immediately. That evening, Spaatz had Air Marshal Robb, 

SHAEF Deputy Chief of Staff for Air, to dinner. Robb recruited Spaatz into a 

535 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

scheme, apparently hatched in Eisenhower’s headquarters and in the British 

Chiefs of Staff, to bring British Field Marshal Harold R.L.G. Alexander, Allied 

Commander in Chief in the Mediterranean, into the European Theater as 

Commander of the Allied Ground Forces under Eisenhower. Spaatz’s agreement, based on his knowledge of Alexander, his disapproval of Montgomery, 

and his recent unsatisfactory trip to the front, reflected his frustration with the 

ground situation22 

Eisenhower himself waffled on the issue. On January 3, after talking to 

Churchill and the British Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Field Marshal 

Alan Brooke, he appeared to be receptive to the idea, but Marshall, the U.S. 

Army Chief of Staff, vehemently opposed it. At the end of the month, when the 

two men met in southern France before the meetings of the CCS at Malta and of 

Churchill-Stalin-Roosevelt at Yalta, Marshall told Eisenhower that he would 

resign rather than accept a British ground commander. Given the now dominant 

position of the Americans in the Anglo-American coalition, Marshall’s opposition decided the matter. At the subsequent Maltamalta meetings, however, the 

Americans did agree that Tedder and Alexander should exchange positions in 

mid-March. But by then the military situation had so changed that Churchill and 

Brooke accepted Eisenhower’s decision to leave Tedder and Alexander in 

place.23 If Tedder had gone to the Mediterranean, Eisenhower wanted Spaatz as 

his air commander in chief.24 

The Battle of the Bulge, an important chapter in the annals of U.S. ground 

forces, also had an important effect on the U.S. strategic bombing effort. First, 

as a result of the battle, the Germans suffered heavy losses of conventional propeller-driven fighters. In the first three weeks of the Ardennes counteroffensive, 

the Americans alone claimed more than 600 German aircraft destroyed.25 These 

losses, combined with a massive transfer of aircraft to the Eastern Front to 

oppose the Soviets’ winter offensive, which began on January 12, relegated the 

Western Front to the status of a secondary air theater for the Luftwaffe. In addition, the Luftwaffe imposed a strict conservation policy on its remaining planes, 

forbidding them to fly over enemy territory or to engage heavy bombers in any 

but the most favorable circumstances.26 Luftwaffe inactivity gave the Eighth 

and Fifteenth Air Forces even greater operational freedom. 

Second, the Battle of the Bulge diverted the Eighth Air Force from strategic 

operations. Between December 16, 1944, and January 8, 1945, the Eighth flew 

only one strategic mission-n December 3 1, one-third of the force attacked oil 

targets deep in Germany. Fortunately, the Fifteenth Air Force picked up much of 

the slack; from December 17 through January 8, it made eleven attacks on 

German and Austrian oil targets.27 Nonetheless, strategic targets in central 

Germany gained some respite. 

Third, the Battle of the Bulge delivered the coup de grace to the Reichsbahn. 

The previous autumn’s bombing had exhausted the repair crews and all stores of 

spare parts and repair material. The system had already begun to falter, but the 

536 
VICTORY 

Battle of the Bulge opened an unstaunchable wound. The Reichsbahn strained 

every nerve and used every expedient to keep the troop and supply trains flowing to the offensive. The priority given the Wehrmacht drained the entire system. 

Thousands of cars were lost and even more mired in the huge backlogs created 

by poor coordination due to attacks on marshaling yards and disruption of 

telecommunications. By the end of the offensive, car placings (the forming of 

incoming rail cars into separate outgoing trains) in Germany stood at only onethird of what they had been during the same period in 1944. The Reichsbahn 

Direktorate of Essen and Cologne, the main shipping points of hard coal and 

brown coal respectively, fell to 39 percent and 16 percent of normal.28 Trains 

cluttered yards and sidings. By Christmas, 1,100 trains and 75,000 to 100,000 

cars stood idle.29 That number rose to 1,994 by January 18. This situation contributed to ballooning car turnaround times up from six and a half days per car in 

November 1943 to twenty days by January 1945. At times, even the highest-priority “Blitz” shipments were idled.30 Conditions were so bad that the Reichsbahn 

even resorted to the self-defeating expedient of purposely derailing trains to clear 

the tracks. On January 19, the system embargoed all freight everywhere excepting Wehrmacht and coal traffic. The resulting elimination of all piece-goods 

traffic sounded the death knell for any coordinated industrial effort.31 

The paralysis of the transportation system spread quickly to the industrial 

network. The disruption caused by the Ardennes air attacks shut down three 

major power plants in the Ruhr for lack of coal. Transmission lines downed by 

air attacks broke the region into power islands, halting production at plants that 

lacked their own generating facilities. Delivery of iron ore to the Rub’s smelters 

plummeted by 80 percent in December, raw iron production sagged by 71 percent the same month, raw steel slid by 66 percent in January, and rolling mill 

activity collapsed to 20 percent of the average during the third quarter of 1943. 

In central Germany the factories slowed. At the Krupp-Gruson Werke, shell and 

gun forgings shops closed from the lack of natural gas because the local utility 

company had no coal. Tank production declined from 114 in October to 65 in 

January for lack of parts. In December 1944, the ball-bearing industry collapsed, 

the victim of its own dispersion, which had made it extremely vulnerable to 

transportation disruption.32 

Production of weapons tumbled. Thanks to the heavy issue of weapons to 

the Volkssturm, or people’s militia, and to the units involved in the Ardennes 

offensive, which were not replaced by the factories and the rail lines, by January 

1945 Wehrmacht stocks of K-98 rifles went from ten to three days’ supply; 

stocks of Type 44 assault rifles dropped from four months’ to three weeks’ supply; and stocks of the 88mm antitank gun declined from one month’s to two 

weeks’ supply. Supplies to combat units fell by 11 percent compared with 

December.33 

The Allies, however, did not fully appreciate the magnitude of the disaster 

inflicted by their transportation bombing. For instance, they did not decrypt the 

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large commercial traffic of 20,000 weekly messages. Not until late February did 

a report commissioned by Bottomley demonstrate the value of this traffic, which 

contained a plethora of information on the German coal famine. On February 28, 

Spaatz and Portal received a fresh commercial intercept detailing the increase in 

unshipped coal tonnage at the mines and the closings of plants because of transport disorganization.34 

Higher level GC and CS interceptions partially filled in the picture. In midJanuary, German Army Group G reported the condition of the rail system as 

“very strained” in the Mainz area, “strained” at Cologne, “extremely strained” in 

the Saarbrucken district, and “unsatisfactory” in the Karlsruhe district. On 

January 28, the Armaments Ministry complained of plant closings from the lack 

of coal. In a February 3 decryption, the Japanese naval attach6 spoke of the 

Germans’ inability to move commodities such as coal from their production 

points, which adversely affected various war supplies. RAF Air Intelligence collected, by the beginning of February, massive evidence of coal shortages from 

signals sent by local armaments production coordinators. By February 8, the 

British Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) suggested that halting all coal shipments from the Ruhr would stop rail transport and have “effects as important as 

oi1.”35 It made little difference; by February coherent economic activity in 

Germany had ceased.36 

As for ammunition, a January 18 decryption of a January 10 message divulged 

a general ammunition shortage due to raw material shortages and production and 

transportation difficulties. Another decryption two days later advised that, in 

certain cases, even worthwhile artillery targets would have to be passed over. On 

March 2, a decryption revealed an order limiting expenditure of 88mm flak 

ammunition to exceptional circumstances because of serious supply deficiencies. 

Understandably, the Allies did not consider the woes of their opponents so 

much as they did their own difficulties. Hence, the counteroffensive stimulated 

unjustified pessimism within the higher echelons of the Allied command. Allied 

commanders had not lost their faith in ultimate victory, but they now perceived 

the road to victory as steeper than they had previously thought. 

The Battle of the Bulge brought about a reappraisal of long-range goals in 

USSTAF. Two weeks after the offensive started, Arnold, reflecting the thinking 

in Washington, wrote to Spaatz, “General Marshall . . . has been pressing in 

Washington for any and every plan to bring increased effort against the German 

forces. . . . Periods of about sixty days have been discussed” [emphasis in origina11.37 Arnold went on to state that he could not view “with complacency” estimates that the war in Europe would not end until the summer of 1945. 

In Paris, meanwhile, Spaatz and USSTAF had adopted a somewhat longer 

perspective. By the end of 1944, they foresaw a war of several more months 

duration if strategic air power did not return to the oil campaign and if German 

jet production continued unabated. The specter of hundreds of twin-jet-engine 

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Bomb damage from Ninth Air Force P-47s to a rail yard near Cologne, Germany. 

Me 262s, each armed with four 30mm cannons, launched against the slower 

American escort fighters and lumbering heavy bombers haunted Spaatz’s calculations. 

A particularly hair-raising report from his chief of intelligence, Brig. Gen. 

George C. McDonald, greatly impressed Spaatz when it crossed his desk on 

January 3, 1945. This report, titled “Allied Air Supremacy and German Jet 

Planes,” opened by stating dramatically, 

Maintenance of Allied Air Supremacy over Europe in 1945 is confronted by a 

serious threat. This threat menaces both continuance of our Strategic bombardment and the superiority, both offensively and defensively, of the fighter 

bomber cover under which our troops fight. This threat is the opposition of a 

large and increasing German jet plane fighter force, sustained by rapidly 

expanding capacity for. . . production. . . .38 

McDonald expressed little doubt of the Germans’ ability to have, at the most 

conservative estimate, 300 to 400 jets available for daily use by July 1, 1945, 

539 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

provided “they are given time and freedom from counter-measures.” Because 

the jets did not run on high-octane aviation fuel but on kerosene and other 

lesser-quality fuels, the bombing of oil facilities could not immobilize them as it 

had conventional fighters. Although Allied bombing had halted at least 80 percent of production at the large and complex hydrogenation and Fischer-Tropsch 

process synthetic plants, which produced aviation and other high-quality fuels, 

synthetic plants producing low-grade benzoil were more numerous, more widely 

scattered, smaller, and less complex. Their production had only fallen by half, as 

had the domestic refining of crude oil. In all, German production of finished oil 

products declined from 900,000 tons in January 1944 to 303,000 tons in 

December.39 But a small amount of almost any type of fuel would suffice for the 

Me 262. According to the report, this situation left the Allies two options: (1) 

either ignore the threat of the jets and gamble on the war’s ending before July 1 

or (2) initiate immediate countermeasures at considerable cost to the current 

bombing effort. 

Given the lowered expectations prevalent in the Allied High Command at 

the turn of the year, McDonald’s report recommended bombing the jet-engine 

plants and the airfields associated with jet testing, training, and operation. 

McDonald pointed to the successful dispersal and underground placement of 

German jet assembly plants, and warned that since the same treatment of jet 

engine plants was surely imminent, bombing had to begin immediately, not in 

three months’ time.40 He noted, “The question is not so much whether we can 

afford to initiate counter measures against jet development as whether we can 

afford not to. Such a program will be expensive for us in the dearest of all our 

resources which is visual bombing weather.” McDonald realized that his suggestion meant the diversion of substantial bomb tonnage from other strategic targets, but he added: 

Failure to take every possible precaution to neutralize this threat now may 

gravely compromise the capabilities of our entire bombardment effort within a 

few months. What is more, Allied troops have never fought successfully under 

anything less than overwhelming air superiority. The German jet program is 

capable of reversing that superiority by mid-summer.“l 

Finally, McDonald cautioned that “the Strategic Air Forces cannot be responsible for the maintenance of Allied Aerial Supremacy over Europe unless they are 

given sufficient freedom from other demands to allocate the necessary proportion of visual strategic bombing against German jet development,” and he 

requested a new directive making the priority of jet targets equal to that of oil.42 

This report had an almost galvanic effect on Spaatz, who, with Doolittle, 

visited Eisenhower on January 5 to recount their worries about the jets, and to 

request permission to begin bombing “in the near future.” They had estimated 

that 10,000 tons of visual bombing would set back the German program three 

months, which was “absolutely necessary to enable our own jet production to 

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catch up.” In addition, they emphasized the reported buildups in the Germans’ 

production of oil, construction of submarines, and manufacture of armored fighting vehicles.43 

As mentioned, the concentration of the Eighth Air Force on tactical bombing 

related to the Battle of the Bulge had slightly eased the pressure on Germany’s 

oil industry. Also, early in 1945, new mass-produced, faster, snorkle-breathing 

U-boats had begun to enter service. These new submarines might allow the 

Nazis to successfully reopen the Battle of the Atlantic, jeopardizing the Allies’ 

supply lines from the United States. The Allies had also completely lost their 

capability to decipher U-boat signals;44 a change in German code procedure had 

deprived the Allied navies of much of their knowledge of the location and intentions of the enemy. This loss accounted in part for the panic in Allied naval circles that led to pressure on the airmen to bomb submarine construction yards. As 

for tanks, intelligence indicated that, upon manufacture, they reached the front in 

less than a month. The Germans had suffered severe tank losses in the Bulge, 

and the anticipated Soviet winter offensive would cause more; thus a campaign 

against tank plants was essential in order to hamper the Germans’ ability to 

replace losses. All these factors, Spaatz and Doolittle told Eisenhower, meant 

that the Eighth should return to strategic targeting at once. Eisenhower disagreed; the critical battle situation, he insisted, still required all the strategic 

bomber help that Spaatz could spare.45 

Spaatz, however, did not give up. Latest intelligence, he said, had shown 

that the Germans would produce more oil than their minimum requirements in 

January, if unmolested by the Eighth. He probably expressed the general feeling 

in USSTAF that continuing to bomb marshaling yards and other tactical targets 

west of the Rhine would only lengthen the war46 by relieving German industry 

of the pressure of strategic bombardment. 

On January 6, with Bedell Smith’s support, Spaatz gained Eisenhower’s permission for two-thirds of the bomber force to resume oil attacks as a top priority, 

followed by tank plants and jet production, if necessary.47 The other third of his 

force, the Gee-H-equipped 2d Air Division, would assist the ground forces. 

Three days later, on January 9, Spaatz gained Smith’s consent to bomb enemy 

jet production at the same priority visual bombing level as oil.48 

Spaatz’s concern about over commitment to tactical bombing reached the 

newly constructed Pentagon in Washington. In a pair of “Eyes Only” letters to 

Arnold, both dated January 7, Spaatz expressed the general pessimism and fear 

of German jets prevalent within USSTAF. In one letter he wrote: “Our estimate 

of the situation concerning the whole German war proposition does not lead up 

to the conclusion that German strength will crack in the near future.” As for oil, 

Spaatz’s intelligence estimates indicated that the Germans could operate along 

defensive lines if they practiced the strictest economy. He predicted German 

resistance to the bitter end and concluded: “Unless our ground armies succeed in 

obtaining a significant victory over German ground armies west of the Rhine in 

54 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the reasonably near future, it will be necessary to reorient ourselves and prepare 

for a long, drawn out war.”@ 

In the second letter, Spaatz addressed Arnold’s fear of the growth of the 

Germans’ conventional fighter force. Amold had even suggested that the CCS 

might find it necessary “to revise current directives and to consider seriously the 

issuance of an overriding directive aimed at reconquest of the Luftwaffe.”sO 

Spaatz replied, “All of us here feel, however, that the distinct threat is from the 

German jet fighter rather than a buildup in strength of the [Bfl 109s and [FW] 

190s. All past experience shows that our fighter force can amply take care of 

any buildup of 109s and 190s.”51 

At a SHAEF meeting on January 9, Spaatz noted that the Bulge had kept 

bombing concentrated in the battle area, allowing unhampered jet aircraft construction. His revised intelligence estimates showed greater-than-expected 

growth of jet production and predicted that the Germans might have 300 to 400 

jets in operation by April. Jet assembly factories would have to be dealt with 

very soon in order to push back production three months.52 A day later Spaatz 

sent one of the theater’s experts on German and British jets back to Washington 

to brief Arnold. In his cover letter, Spaatz reiterated, “The jet airplane represents 

a very grave danger to us and could cause great trouble if employed in the 

proper manner.”53 

On January 11 at the Weekly Air Commanders’ Conference, Spaatz, Anderson, and Doolittle reviewed the strategic bombing situation. “From the strategic 

point of view,” lamented Anderson, “the picture is very sad!” The strategic air 

forces “were paying a tremendous price by concentrating on helping ground 

forces.” Now oil, ball bearings, aircraft factories, and submarine yards would 

all have to be hit again. Doolittle backed up Anderson “100% or possibly even 

more.” Unless the bombing of strategic targets resumed at once, German jets 

would prevent deep-penetration raids after July. Spaatz took note of Eisenhower’s agreement to release two-thirds of the Eighth to attack oil and jets. 

Then he suggested specific U-boat targets as well as armored fighting 

vehicles.54 Support for hitting the vehicle plants had originated in Eisenhower’s 

headquarters55 and reflected the needs of the ground forces. Spaatz probably 

added them as part of his agreement with Eisenhower allowing USSTAF partial 

resumption of the strategic offensive. 

“Directive No. 3 for the Strategic Air Forces in Europe,” agreed upon by 

Spaatz and Bottomley on January 12 and issued January 16, formalized the new 

strategic priorities. In his cover letter to Arnold, Spaatz stated simply, “A new 

directive is necessary at this time since we have recently had to revise our estimate of V-Day [Victory Day in Europe], and consequently must include the 

attack of target systems with a longer range application.”56 After retaining oil, 

transportation, and important industrial areas as priority targets, it added both 

the authorization to employ “the necessary amount of strategic effort” required 

to neutralize jets and the instruction that the U-boat organization “will be 

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attacked whenever possible by marginal effort or incidental to operations covered by the proceeding priorities.”57 In this case, the marginal effort would provide a substantial number of bombs for submarines because missions diverting 

from visual targets could obtain excellent H2X resolution from coastal targets. 

The Air Staff in Washington found the directive “a very much too conservative 

approach to the problem.” They asked Spaatz to consider raising the priority of 

U-boats and ground support.58 Portal, who did not agree that jets constituted a 

threat because he did not believe that the war would drag on, accepted the directive as temporary. He hoped to revise it during the CCS meetings at the end of 

January.59 

THUNDERCLAP and Dresden 

Even as Spaatz and Bottomley issued Directive No. 3, events had begun to 

overtake it. The Soviets opened their winter offensive on January 12. Overwhelming the German defenders, they drove hundreds of thousands of German 

refugees before them, conquered the Silesian industrial area (Germany’s last 

intact, unbombed production base, which also included large coal deposits), and 

reached the Oder River, forty-five miles east of Berlin, by January 31. As the 

Red offensive steamrolled forward, the Western Allies prepared to renew their 

own offensive. In the meantime, the Soviet and Anglo-American high commands and political leadership finished plans for a series of American, AngloAmerican, and Tripartite conferences at Marseilles, Malta, and Yalta. The conjunction of these events produced an aberration in strategic priorities that led 

directly to the bombing of Dresden and the loss of at least 35,000 lives. 

One impetus behind the Allies’ decision to bomb cities in eastern Germany, 

including Dresden, stemmed from a desire on the part of the British and 

Americans to support the Soviet offensive by knocking out transportation centers serving the German Eastern Front, in order to prevent the rapid shifting of 

forces among sectors along it and the transfer of troops from the west to the east. 

Berlin, as the administrative center of the nation and the nerve center and transportation nexus for a large section of the Eastern Front, would be an obvious target 

of any effort to assist the Soviets’ drive. Accordingly, on January 16 Spaatz’s chief 

of staff ordered Doolittle to take a new look at Operation THUNDERCLAP and begin 

planning its execution.60 

As mentioned in Chapter 12, the Allies first conceived of THUNDERCLAP as a 

combined Bomber Command-USSTAF daylight mission on Berlin in response 

to the German V-1 offensive during the summer of 1944. Because of opposition 

from Spaatz and others, it had been planned but not carried out. By early 

September 1944, USSTAF planners had filed it away for reconsideration when 

the situation in Germany deteriorated to the extent that one large blow on Berlin 

might shock its government into surrender. With the Germans’ Ardennes coun543 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

teroffensive turned back and the Soviets’ shattering of the front in the east, 

Spaatz must have believed that the crucial moment might come soon. 

The British, too, began to consider THUNDERCLAP. On January 22, Air 

Commodore Sidney 0. Bufton, Director of Bomber Operations and Chairman of 

the Combined Strategic Targeting Committee (a combined USSTAF and British 

Air Staff agency that selected specific strategic targets and ranked them for 

bombing by the strategic air forces) suggested to Air Marshal Bottomley the 

launching of THUNDERCLAP while the Soviet offensive was in full stride.61 He 

feared that the psychological moment would pass if it was not implemented 

before the Soviets’ momentum slowed.62 The Assistant Chief of the Air Staff 

for Operations, agreed, noting, “The German radio has recently shown signs of 

hysteria in broadcasts to the people, and a heavy air attack on the capital and 

other big towns now might well ruin already shaky morale.”63 

THUNDERCLAP soon gained adherents on the British JIC, which, while discounting its effects on morale, suggested that it be adopted directly to assist the 

Soviet offensive. In a detailed examination of its possible repercussions, the JIC, 

on January 25, 1945, observed that it would “create great confusion, interfere 

with the orderly movement of troops to the front and hamper the German military and administrative machine.”64 The committee suggested that attacks on 

Berlin might have a “political value in demonstrating to the Russians, in the best 

way open to us, a desire on the part of the British and Americans to assist them 

in the present battle.”65 

Also on January 25, Harris and Spaatz both received notice that the time for 

THUNDERCLAP had come. Bottomley, after perusing the JIC’s findings, telephoned Harris to discuss them. Harris suggested supplementing the main attack 

on Berlin with strikes against Chemnitz, Leipzig, and Dresden because these 

cities, like Berlin, would have had their vital communication links stretched thin 

by refugees from the east. They had also been relatively untouched by Harris’s 

area bombing campaign. Bottomley and Harris agreed that Spaatz must be consulted. Meanwhile in Paris, at the Weekly Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, 

the airmen examined the possible uses “of the Heavies in the new military situation.” At the end of their discussion Tedder asked whether the time had come to 

stage Operation THUNDERCLAP: presumably, he had either read the JIC report or 

had heard about it from Bufton directly. Spaatz agreed, saying that he “felt that 

this operation should be held in instant readiness, but not ordered until the 

Russians were either on the Oder in strength, or across it.” Tedder accepted 

Spaatz’s recommendation.66 

Spaatz’s consent to THUNDERCLAP did not mean his wholehearted adoption 

of terror-bombing. As will be seen, he did not believe that THUNDERCLAP would 

end the war, although he did feel that a big raid on Berlin would demonstrate 

solidarity with the Soviets and disrupt the city’s capability to aid the defense of 

the Eastern Front. Spaatz was following events there closely. The day before the 

Air Commanders’ meeting he had told a SHAEF meeting, “I don’t think we are 

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paying nearly enough attention to what is happening in the East. We are using 

the wrong end of the telescope.”67 

On the evening of January 25, the Prime Minister jumped into the question 

of bombing cities in eastern Germany. Part of his concern may have sprung from 

a British Joint Intelligence Subcommittee report, prepared for him alone, on 

“German Strategy and Capacity to Resist.” The document predicted that 

Germany might collapse by mid-April if the Soviet offensive overran them at 

their eastern defenses before they could consolidate. Alternatively, the Germans 

might hold out until November if they could stop the Soviets from conquering 

Silesia.68 Any help given the Russians on the Eastern Front would shorten the 

conflict. Churchill asked the Secretary of War for Air, Archibald Sinclair, what 

plans the RAF had made for “blasting the Germans in their retreat from 

Breslau.”@ Sinclair passed Churchill’s inquiry to Portal. Portal, hard at work 

preparing for the coming Malta and Yalta meetings, replied cautiously that oil, 

subject to the demands of the jet assembly factories and submarine yards, should 

continue to have top priority. However, he reluctantly allowed that the Allies 

should use the “available effort in one big attack on Berlin and attacks on 

Dresden, Leipzig, Chemnitz, or any other cities where a severe blitz will not 

only cause confusion in the evacuation from the east but will hamper the movement of troops from the west.”70 Portal further recommended that the CCS, 

Spaatz, and Tedder all have a chance to approve the new suggestion. 

Portal’s reply failed to assuage the Prime Minister, who shot back: 

I did not ask you last night about plans for harrying the German retreat from 

Breslau. On the contrary, I asked whether Berlin, and no doubt other large 

cities in East Germany, should not now be considered attractive targets. I am 

glad that this is under ‘examination.’ Pray report to me tomorrow what is going 

to be done.71 

This sarcastic missive prodded Bottomley, who had begun to act as Chief of the 

Air Staff because of Portal’s scheduled departure for the Mediterranean, to write 

to Harris, enclosing the JIC report and informing him of Portal’s and Churchill’s 

desires. “I am therefore to request that subject to the qualifications stated above, 

and as soon as moon and weather conditions allow, you will undertake such 

attacks with the particular object of exploiting the confused conditions which are 

likely to exist in the above mentioned cities during the successful Russian 

advance.”72 Bottomley issued this unequivocal order before consulting with 

either Spaatz or the CCS. He also informed Churchill that operations against 

cities in eastern Germany would begin as soon as conditions permitted (the 

moon would not allow deep penetrations until February 3 or 4).73 

The next day, January 28, Spaatz flew to England to celebrate the third 

anniversary of the Eighth’s formation. He lunched with Bottomley, at which 

time the two no doubt discussed bombing policy. Spaatz may also have spoken 

to Portal before the latter left for the Malta conference.74 Spaatz did not agree to 

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SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

bomb any cities in eastern Germany except Berlin. He verbally gave to Doolittle 

the following priorities: (1) oil (visual), (2) Berlin (visual or blind), (3) the Ruhr, 

(4) Munich, and (5) Hamburg. Spaatz further ordered the Eighth’s fighters (1) to 

cover the bombers, (2) to strafe oil targets, and (3) to interrupt “traffic from 

West to East toward Berlin and Dresden.”75 This verbal order implies that 

although Spaatz was sympathetic to the desire to help the Soviets, by limiting, if 

possible, German west to east military movement, he rejected the bombing of 

cities merely to produce more refugees.* This order clarified a previous one 

given to Doolittle on January 24, that stated, “Anticipating that the enemy will 

attempt to reinforce the Russian Front by rail movement of units which have 

been engaged recently on the Western Front, it is desired that your fighters be 

used until further notice to assist in an interdiction program by strafing rail 

lines.”76 Also on January 28, Spaatz’s headquarters delivered THUNDERCLAP’S 

plan to the Eighth Air Force. Among the primary aiming points were the Air 

Ministry, Gestapo headquarters, and the Alexanderplatz railway station, all in 

the governmental and administrative center of Berlin. At this point USSTAF still 

envisaged full implementation of the plan, including a follow-up raid by the 

RAF on the night after the American bombing.77 After meeting with Spaatz, 

Bottomley visited Tedder in Paris. According to Tedder they agreed to maintain 

oil as top priority when visual conditions existed, with first Berlin, then Leipzig, 

and, finally, Dresden as the next targets.78 

In the meantime Spaatz had already put in train a large operation over 

Berlin. He insisted, however, that this attack have specific aiming points such as 

“industrial plants, Administrative Headquarters or, possibly, railway stations.”79 

Thus, he confirmed the AAF’s policy of at least attempting to hit strategic targets rather than resorting to intentional area bombing. 

On January 31, Bottomley radioed the results of his meeting with Spaatz to 

Portal in Malta.80 The next day Spaatz read the same message at the Weekly 

Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, where no one present questioned it.81 

According to an intelligence briefing at the same conference, the German Sixth 

S.S. Panzer Army had left the Bulge in the west and was presumed headed 

toward the Eastern Front. In the message, Bottomley, after noting first priority to 

the main synthetic oil plants, stated, “Next in order of priority for Air Forces 

operating in the UK is attack of Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden and associated cities 

where heavy attack will cause great confusion in civilian evacuation from the 

east and hamper movement of reinforcements from other fronts.”82 

Like all the agreements between Spaatz and Bottomley since September 1944, 

this one on bombing priorities did not mean that Spaatz accepted every word as 

policy for USSTAF. Rather, it represented the usual compromise according to 

* I have found no records in Spaatz’s, Doolittle’s, or the Eighth Air Force’s files indicating a 

desire to bomb for the sake of producing “refugees.” 

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VICTORY 

Maj. Gen. Laurence S. 

Kuter, Assistant Chief of 

Staff for Plans, U.S. Army 

Air Forces, 1945. 

capabilities as described in prior directives. The Eighth would attempt to bomb 

strategic targets in Berlin, either visually or with blind-bombing techniques, while 

its fighters, after flying escort, would descend to the deck and harass west-to-east 

rail traffic. Spaatz had agreed only to continue long-standing procedures. As for 

the RAF, it also continued its long-standing policy of night area bombing. 

Even as Spaatz agreed to this new directive, the subject of strategic air targets became one of the topics of discussion at the Malta and Yalta conferences 

between the Allies fighting Germany. A severe heart attack in early January had 

temporarily removed Arnold from AAF affairs, thus depriving Marshall of his 

most trusted and influential air power adviser and leaving the AAF scrambling 

to fill the leadership void he had opened. Arnold’s absence also handicapped the 

AAF at the Malta/Yalta Conferences. Maj. Gen. Laurence S. Kuter, who 

attended for him, simply did not have the rank or prestige in those meetings that 

would have been accorded to Arnold as a matter of course. Kuter wrote to 

Arnold from Malta, “Without you we are just tolerated from bottom to top” 

[emphasis in originall.83 The AAF at this point had one five-star general, 

Arnold, but no four-star generals. Whoever headed its delegation would have 

had at least a two-grade disadvantage compared with the other chiefs, and Kuter 

had a three-star disadvantage. 

Parenthetically, the AAF delegation’s lack of stature at the conferences gave 

Spaatz the chance to strengthen his own role in its internal deliberations. At the 

Second Quebec Conference he had learned of events only after they had taken 

547 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

place. Spaatz in this case had his own representation within the AAF delegation. 

On January 27, he sent Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, his Deputy for Operations, to Malta. Spaatz ensured that Anderson went equipped with briefs presenting USSTAF’s views on the employment of U.S. air power in Europe and the 

Mediterranean. Backed by Eisenhower, Spaatz wanted the Twelfth Air Force 

transferred to the European Theater. He also instructed Anderson to emphasize 

the German jet airplane problem in discussions with the CCS.84 Kuter, who had 

some doubt as to the legitimacy of Anderson’s presence, accepted him into his 

own delegation.85 

Events at the Malta Conference reinforced Spaatz’s determination to bomb 

Berlin. General Giles, acting AAF Commander in Arnold’s absence, observed in 

a telegram to Kuter in Malta on January 3 1, “Indications are that pandemonium 

reigns in Berlin as a result Soviet advances in the East suggest that you propose 

action to have all available day and night heavy bomber aircraft directed against 

Berlin for the next few days with a view towards accentuating this condition.”86 

Kuter replied that the Allies had scheduled the operation to begin as soon as 

weather permitted.87 

Meanwhile, General Marshall was expressing views on air power contrary to 

Arnold’s. At the first Malta CCS meeting on January 30, Marshall suggested 

skip-bombing the entrances of underground German manufacturing plants. The 

airmen present discouraged the idea. Next, he reportedly expressed “his desire to 

see attacks over all of Germany, by fighters, in accordance with [what] he called 

the ‘Quesada plan,’ which he said had been turned down by his air advisers in 

Washington-and he still didn’t know why.”@ 

Outside the formal meetings he indicated his desire to bomb Berlin and 

other cities-without offending the Soviets.89 Anderson took advantage of these 

informal discussions to tell Marshall of USSTAF’s upcoming plans and pointed 

out that USSTAF had already rejected the Quesada plan in favor of its own 

Operation CLARION,90 a revision of the HURRICANE plan for a mass air assault on 

lesser communication points throughout Germany. 

The Quesada plan, named for its originator, Maj. Gen. Elwood “Pete” 

Quesada, Commander of the IX Air Support Command, called for the establishment of a force of 500 fighter-bombers controlled by the strategic air forces to 

bomb and strafe strategic targets and communications far beyond the tactical air 

force zone immediately on or behind German lines. Quesada had persuaded the 

Assistant Secretary of War for Air, Robert A. Lovett, to adopt this plan as his 

own and to campaign vigorously for its acceptance. It was one of, perhaps, the 

few instances in World War I1 in which a civilian War Department leader, 

Lovett, actually supported and advocated an operational plan to the military 

hierarchy. Lovett called the plan Jeb Stuart, after the Confederate Cavalry 

leader, and submitted it to Arnold on January 9, 1945.91 

The plan had a cool reception in AAF Headquarters. The Air Staff noted that 

the allocation of an additional 500 aircraft plus support troops was “not within 

548 
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our current AAF capabilities.” Kuter, speaking for the Air Staff, recommended 

forwarding the proposal to Spaatz without comment.92 Because the plan provided no new forces, Spaatz turned it down.93 He hoped, instead, to implement 

CLARION. By attacking numerous unbombed transportation/ communications targets in small towns throughout Germany, CLARION sought to demonstrate the 

might of Allied air power to millions of Germans who had not yet witnessed it, 

to overwhelm Reichsbahn repair crews, and to damage the infrastructure of the 

transport system. According to Anderson, his exposition of USSTAF’s plans, 

including its rejection of the Jeb Stuart plan, “greatly reassured” Marshall.94 

Marshall and Anderson also discussed Bottomley ’s message giving Berlin, 

Leipzig, and Dresden a priority second only to oil targets. Marshall emphasized 

that the Soviets must receive notification through current liaison channels (i.e., 

the U.S. Military Mission in Moscow). He also suggested that, in addition to the 

attacks on Berlin and other eastern cities, “attacks on Munich would probably be 

of great benefit because [they] would show the people that are being evacuated 

to Munich that there is no hope.”95 His suggestion may have come from intelligence reports indicating the evacuation of people and government offices from 

Berlin to Munich. Although his suggestion did not necessarily imply that 

Marshall supported indiscriminant bombing of civilians, it certainly indicated 

his willingness to demoralize the population in general and the Nazi leadership 

in particular. 

The next day Spaatz ordered Twining to attack Munich when weather and 

other priorities permitted, observing that the city was valuable not only as a 

communications target but also as a future destination in “Some evacuation 

[that] may take place from Berlin and Eastern Germany . . . as result of Russian 

advance.”96 Spaatz also confirmed that the Soviet General Staff had been notified of the Berlin mission.97 Weather and concentration on oil and on transportation prevented the Fifteenth from carrying out this order. Not until March 24 did 

the Fifteenth bomb Munich, and then under strategic circumstances much different from those at the beginning of February. 

In the message to Twining, Spaatz further noted that the January 3 1 revision 

of target priorities represented the usual division of labor between Bomber 

Command and USSTAF. Spaatz explained that the Eighth would attack Berlin, 

while Bomber Command had plans “to attack other large communications targets such as Leipzig and Dresden.”98 

The upcoming mission to Berlin, although not THUNDERCLAP (because it was 

not a combined RAF-AAF round-the-clock attack intended to kill or injure up to 

275,000 persons), was out of the ordinary. Doolittle informed Spaatz that he was 

prepared to undertake THUNDERCLAP, but he vehemently objected to the targets 

in the center of the city that USSTAF had instructed him to hit: “There are no 

basically important strictly military targets in the designated area.” Doolittle 

pointed out that to bomb the center of the city accurately he would have to bomb 

visually and take his forces over almost all the 300 heavy guns defending the 

549 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

city and risk heavy casualties to his low-flying B-24s. He also questioned the 

effectiveness of THUNDERCLAP or any bombing attack aimed at morale. In his 

opinion, the people of Berlin would have plenty of warning to take shelter, and 

“the chances of terrorizing into submission, by merely an increased concentration of bombing, a people who have been subjected to intense bombing for four 

years is extremely remote.” Finally, Doolittle appealed to Spaatz saying, “We 

will, in what may be one of our last and best remembered operations regardless 

of its effectiveness, violate the basic American principle of precision bombing of 

targets of strictly military significance for which our tactics were designed and 

our crews trained and indoctrinated.” He recommended to Spaatz that that area 

bombing be left to the RAF and that the AAF confine itself to picking precision 

military targets to assure an effective mission with a minimum of loss.99 

Doolittle felt that the raid definitely went over the line separating incidental 

damage caused by an attack on military targets and area bombing. 

Spaatz sent Doolittle a somewhat ambiguous reply. He did not even mention 

THUNDERCLAP; instead, he restated his target priorities. Visual attacks on synthetic oil plants, especially those in the Leipzig area, had first priority. He anticipated that any bombing of Berlin would not be visual, but that city “at this time” 

had a priority second only to oil. In closing, Spaatz observed, “With that in 

mind, anticipate that you will hit Berlin whenever conditions do not repeat not 

[sic] indicate possibility of visual bombing of oil targets but do permit operations to Berlin.”loo 

On February 2, bad weather forced the Eighth to postpone the Berlin mission by twenty-four hours. Weather forecasts indicated marginal weather with 

only a chance for a shallow penetration the next day. That evening Spaatz’s 

headquarters called the Eighth and insisted on a Berlin mission. The Eighth’s 

planners drew up two plans: Plan A, a raid by all bomb divisions on Berlin’s 

industrial areas of Spandau, Tegel, and Seimenstadt; and Plan B, raids on oil and 

transportation targets in western and central Germany, if weather proved too 

inclement for a deep penetration. The weather deteriorated, ruling out visuals for 

most of Germany. At USSTAF’s insistence the Eighth drew up two more plans: 

Plan C, “a Berlin attack by all B.D.s [Bombardment Divisions] on the heart of 

the ‘official’ city, east of the Tiergarten”; and Plan D, “a similar attack on 

Dresden.”lol At the same time, Spaatz recommended to Doolittle that his combat 

camera unit send still and motion picture cameramen on the raid and that he offer 

a “flight to any qualified correspondents quickly available.” Spaatz further recommended that flash news summaries and mission communiques “stress effort to 

disrupt reinforcement of Eastern Front and increase administrative confusion.”lo2 

This language indicated that he did not intend to carry out THUNDERCLAP. Instead, 

he wished to emphasize the practical aspects of the raid. Pressure from AAF 

Headquarters and Marshall must have added to his desire to punish the German 

capital posthaste. 

Doolittle complied, sending four combat cameramen with two groups and a 

550 
VICTORY 

BBC correspondent with a third. Six more combat cameramen covered the 

ground activities at three bases. In addition, the Eighth made plans to develop 

the film quickly and to title it “Inter-Allied Cooperation: Eighth Air Force 

Strategic Heavies Tactically Bomb Berlin for Soviets.” Once the film was developed, the Eighth would rush it to the Combat Camera Unit Headquarters in New 

York City and offer prints for the newsreels in London. The Eighth even went so 

far as to take sound film of the target officer, the bomber controller, and the 

fighter controller briefing Doolittle. 103 

Before he received press recommendations, Doolittle double-checked Spaatz’s 

priorities, informing him via REDLINE that the uncertain weather might allow an 

attack on Berlin but bad weather at home bases might divert the whole force to the 

Continent on its return. Then he noted a bare chance of visual conditions over oil 

targets with an alternative shallow penetration on transportation if all else failed. 

Almost desperately he asked, “Is Berlin still open to air attack? Do you want priority oil targets hit in preference to Berlin if they definitely become visual? Do you 

want center of city hit or definitely military targets, such as Spandau, on the 

Western outskirts?”lM Spaatz replied by phone annotating his copy of the message, “Told Doolittle to hit oil if visual assured; otherwise, Berlin4enter of the 

city.”105 

Spaatz’s answer clearly demonstrates his and the AAF’s order of importance 

in targeting: vital military targets, such as oil, first. He and Doolittle apparently 

disagreed over what constituted a “definitely military target.” From his position 

close to Eisenhower’s headquarters and as chief American airman in Europe, 

Spaatz would naturally take a more expansive view of military targets than 

Doolittle, who concentrated solely on operations. To Spaatz, a demonstration of 

support for the Russians and the disruption of government and rail yards in 

Berlin were justifiable goals. Doolittle thought the raid would tarnish the AAF’s 

reputation and expose his crews to too much danger for too little return. Spaatz 

thought it would show the ability of the AAF to cooperate at the highest levels 

of the alliance while remaining independent. In any case, the raid pushed the 

definition of military target to the limit, since Spaatz anticipated a nonvisual 

attack and therefore knew the raid would be wildly inaccurate. Nonetheless, it 

would seem that Spaatz hoped-albeit faintly-that a heavy raid on Berlin just 

might crack the morale of the German High Command and produce a surrender. 

In fact, he admitted at least that much when he acknowledged in 1969 that, “We 

never had as our target, in foreign [German occupied?] Europe, anything except 

a military target-xcept Berlin.”lo6 

On February 3, 1945, heavy bombers of Eighth Air Force mission No. 817 

left their fields and turned to the East, toward Germany. What was their mission? 

To give incidental aid to the Russians, assuredly yes. To comply with suggestions 

from Washington and from the Chief of Staff, also yes. But Doolittle’s and 

Spaatz’s reactions indicate an additional goal. The mission is unique among the 

approximately eight hundred Eighth Air Force missions flown under USSTAF’s 

55 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

command, for the nature and vehemence of Doolittle’s objection to his targets. 

Eleven days later, for instance, Doolittle made no objection whatsoever to hitting 

the marshaling yards in Dresden. Nor did he object to hitting the three rail yards 

in Berlin on February 26. But the whole tenor of his communications with Spaatz 

shows his perception that this was a terror raid as suggested by THUNDERCLAP. 

Likewise, Spaatz’s direct orders to “hit the center of the city” are unique. He 

knew that bombing rail yards meant bombing city centers. He often ordered 

raids on transportation and other targets within cities, but in no other instance 

did he specify it explicitly as he did for this mission. On January 16, four days 

after the start of the Societ offensive, he had THUNDERCLAP delivered to the 

Eighth Air Force. On January 25, he agreed with Tedder to have the plan ready 

for instant implementation. On January 30 and February 2, he insisted that 

Doolittle bomb the THUNDERCLAP targets. It is a reasonable surmise that Spaatz 

hoped that THUNDERCLAP might succeed. 

But Spaatz the air force commander with three years of combat experience 

differed greatly from Spaatz the Washington planning officer of 1941, who had 

approved of the morale bombing of Berlin in Air War Plan No. 1 (AWPD/l). By 

February 1945, airmen such as Harris had repeatedly had to backtrack from 

assurances about the effectiveness of bombing. If Spaatz were to espouse 

THUNDERCLAP publicly (it seems never to have been mentioned in the press 

accounts of the time), he and air power would lose prestige if the operation 

failed. Apparently, Spaatz judged the chances of the operation’s success as 

low-too low for advance publicity, but high enough to risk the effort of one 

raid, which he was under pressure to fly in any case. To Spaatz, a man famous at 

the poker table for his affinity to drawing to an inside straight, the gamble 

seemed worth it. 

The Eighth struck Berlin with more than 1,000 B-17s. Of these, 932, 

employing mostly visual methods but hampered by the need for violent evasive 

action to avoid intense flak, dropped 2,279 tons of bombs (250 tons of them 

incendiaries), losing 23 of their number to flak and none to German fighters. 

The 1st Air Division, which led the attack, bombed visually. The following 3d 

Air Division bombed visually with H2X assisting. Post attack photo reconnaissance showed severe damage to the Anhalter rail station and moderate damage 

to Tempelhof marshaling yard and the Schlesischer rail station (secondary aiming points on the THUNDERCLAP target list). In the center of the city, industrial 

and residential property suffered severe damage, while government offices along 

the Wilhelmstrasse, including the Air Ministry, Reich Chancellory, Foreign 

Office, and Gestapo headquarters (primary aiming points on the THUNDERCLAP 

target list), received numerous hits.107 Many bombs missed their aiming points 

and fell into residential areas of the city.108 For the tenth and last time the 

Eighth had bombed the civil and military government area of Berlin.109 But 

Doolittle employed only his B-17s; the more vulnerable B-24s, in keeping with 

Spaatz’s verbal directive to send at least 400 bombers against oil whenever pos552 
VICTORY 

sible, went to bomb the Magdeburg synthetic oil plant. Of the 434 B-24s dispatched, 116 bombed the oil plant. Most of the rest bombed the Magdeburg marshaling yard using H2X, when clouds obscured the primary target. 

The Germans, in accordance with their standard policy, declared the Berlin 

raid a terror-bombing attack, and stories in their own and neutral presses claimed 

20,000 dead.110 In this instance the German government and propaganda organs 

had been hit where they hurt. The AAF official history uncritically accepts a figure of 25,000.111 Recent figures based on records of the Berlin City Archives 

and the Bundesarchiv indicated losses of 2,893 dead, 729 seriously injured, 

1,205 slightly injured, and 120,000 left homeless.112 Given the relative accuracy 

of the visual bombing employed and the sparing use of fire bombs by the Eighth 

on this mission, the lower figures were probably closer to the truth. This mission, unusual because of its accuracy and low volume of fire bombs, apparently 

struck its assigned targets-rail junctions and the center of government. But the 

heavy damage inflicted on residential areas showed that, even under favorable 

conditions, AAF precision attacks on city areas had considerable “spillage” into 

the civilian population. After-attack reports show that some groups managed to 

miss the 883 square miles of Berlin altogether.113 The Berlin Chamber of 

Commerce called this raid the worst yet experienced and cited heavy damage to 

the southwestern and southeastern business sections, which caused a significant 

drop in industrial production.114 

That this mission greatly aggravated the calamitous situation in Berlin cannot be doubted. There was no proof one way or the other, however, that it significantly delayed rail movement or added to the administrative confusion of the 

capital. To the world the AAF emphasized both the “direct tactical aid” given to 

Marshal Zhukov’s advancing armies and the damage to rail stations and government buildings.115 The New York Times reported: “The raid was designed to fan 

the flames of German civilian discontent, but even more important, to snarl the 

enemy’s administrative machinery, disrupt his communications and disorganize 

his control of the Reich’s military forces pouring eastward to man the Oder 

River line.”l16 

Berlin remained centered in the Eighth’s sights. On February 5, Spaatz told 

his staff that Berlin retained its priority after oil and before transportation.117 

Later in the day, he received word from Anderson at Yalta that the Soviets had 

formally requested air attacks against Berlin and Leipzig. 118 Spaatz replied, “All 

out effort will be placed against targets mentioned whenever weather conditions 

permit.”ll9 In response to Marshall’s request the Eighth planned a raid by all 

three air divisions on the center of Munich on February 5, but it was canceled 

because of weather. On February 6, weather again caused the cancellation of a 

trip to Berlin.120 

That same day Spaatz replied to Arnold’s pessimistic note of January 14, 

informing him of the plans for CLARION, which he hoped would paralyze all traffic in Germany. He rejected the Jeb Stuart plan but noted, “For the past two 

553 
Fratricide over Berlin. The death of a B-17 by friendly bombers, February 3, 

1945. The low squadron has strayed beneath the lead squadron, directly into the 

path of its just-released bombs. No parachutes were sighted as the pictured aircraft, 

whose left stabilizer was struck and sheared off, plunged to the ground. 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

weeks we have been using the returning escort fighters in a Jeb Stuart role with 

the intention of preventing rapid movement of German troops from the Western 

to the Eastern front by strafing rail traffic.” As for Jeb Stuart, THUNDERCLAP, and 

CLARION, Spaatz observed, “Your comment on the decisiveness of results 

achieved by air power leads me to believe you might be following the chimera 

of the one air operation which will end the war.” Spaatz no longer believed such 

an animal existed. He spoke of the difficulty of exploiting and measuring the 

results of air operations. Only in the aggregate could one see that Allied air 

power had badly damaged the German economy and denied oil to the German 

military.121 

On February 6, the Eighth attempted to attack oil targets only to find clouds 

over the synthetic plants, which meant that more than 1,300 bombers hit either 

secondary targets or targets of opportunity. On February 9, another 1,300-plane 

mission against the same targets was thwarted by the weather. Secondary targets 

were again bombed.’ On February 13, USSTAF called the Eighth to report that 

the weather would be “beautiful” over Dresden and Chemnitz. The Eighth drew 

up three plans: Plan A, for a short mission over western Germany in case of 

marginal weather; Plan B, for the 1st and 3d Air Divisions to bomb Dresden and 

the 2d Division to bomb Chemnitz (after these cities’ names, the planners noted, 

“Beat’em up”); and Plan C, for the 1st and 3d Air Divisions to bomb Dresden 

and the 2d Division, in case it could not climb over the clouds to eastern 

Germany, to bomb transport and jet targets in central Germany.122 After postponing the attack for twenty-four hours because of the weather, 1,377 B-17s and 

B-24s set out on February 14 to bomb marshaling yards in Dresden and 

Chemnitz and to bomb the oil plant in Magdeburg. The 340 B-24s of the 2d Air 

Division that were redirected from Plan C because of the possibilty of visual oil 

bombing and sent against synthetic plants found bad weather and diverted to 

Magdeburg’s marshaling yards, where they dropped 811 tons of bombs (215 

tons of them fire bombs) by H2X; the 294 B-17s of the 3d Air Division that 

were diverted from Plan C because of the heavy RAF raid on Dresden the previous night, employing H2X, dropped 718 tons of bombs (228 tons of fire bombs) 

on the Chemnitz yards; and 311 B-17s of the 1st Air Division, using visually 

assisted H2X, dropped 771 tons of bombs (including 294 tons of incendiary 

bombs) on the Dresden marshaling yards.123 

But several eyewitnesses in Dresden never even noticed the American 

bombs.124 Some of the city’s inhabitants failed to pay much attention to this 

mission because on the previous night, February 13-14, 796 Lancaster heavy 

bombers of Bomber Command, in a two-wave attack, had released 2,646 tons of 

bombs, including 1,181 tons of incendiaries, into the very heart of the city. 

Much of Dresden’s antiaircraft defense, including almost all the heavy guns 

capable of reaching high altitudes, had left to serve as antitank units on the 

Eastern Front or to supplement flak defenses at points hit more often by the 

Allies. Thus, British and American raids met no opposition. The British, in par556 
VICTORY 

ticular, benefited from the lack of interference because their airborne controller 

could bring his planes in undisturbed and direct them to drop their cargoes in a 

newly developed fan-shaped pattern that maximized the coverage and effect of 

incendiary bombs. The RAF conducted a technically perfect fire-raising attack 

on the city.125 

Several factors had to combine to create the phenomenon of a fire storm. 

Weather had to be favorable4ry with low humidity. Many large fires had to be 

started in a short time. The built-up city area had to be blanketed with a bomb 

mix, that included large percentages of incendiaries and high explosives. The 

large percentage of incendiary bombs made it impossible for individual efforts 

to stop the fires, while high-explosive bombs drove the populace and most fire 

guards into shelters, discouraged fire fighters, smashed water-main networks, 

created road blocks, broke windows, and opened up buildings and holed roofs. 

Unlike a large fire, which starts at a single point and spreads by easy stages over 

the course of several hours, a fire storm’s huge blaze starts with incredible rapidity. Within twenty minutes after the first attack wave struck Hamburg (in July 

1943), two out of three buildings in a four-and-one-half square-mile area were 

ablaze. This quick buildup made fire fighting impossible. As flames broke 

through the roofs, a column of super-heated air shot up from the burning area to 

a height exceeding 13,000 feet and sucked in cooler air at its base, creating a 

street-level draft measured at thirty-three miles per hour. (To panicked individuals at ground level this wind blowing directly toward the maelstrom would have 

seemed even fiercer.) The resultant gale carried burning material and sparks 

down the streets and heated all combustibles in the area to the ignition point. 

Thus, the fire spread toward its center and was, eventually, self-limiting. 

Seventy percent of the deaths in the fire storm came as a result of carbonmonoxide poisoning. The fire consumed the free oxygen in the area and 

replaced it with the products of combustion, one of which, carbon monoxide, 

seeped into basement bomb shelters killing the occupants painlessly and silently. 

To avoid death people had to leave their shelters before the fire became too 

intense, brave the fires along the streets, and face the bombs still coming down. 

This prospect made it difficult for the authorities to convince people of the danger they risked if they stayed too long in the shelters.126 

By early morning on February 14, Ash Wednesday, a fire storm engulfed the 

middle of Dresden causing staggering loss of life. Estimates of the death toll 

range from a low of 35,000, now accepted as the best guess, to a high of 

250,000. No one will ever know the exact figure with certainty, because Silesian 

refugees, evacuees from other bombed cities, slave laborers, and other displaced 

persons had jammed into the almost untouched city. Few of the city’s residents 

and recent arrivals had ever experienced a major bombing. They had little idea 

of how to protect themselves.127 

The 311 American B-17s, which for this mission carried approximately the 

same percentage of fire bombs as the Lancasters, attacked shortly after 12:OO 

557 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

P.M. After releasing 771 tons of ordnance, they reported a low-lying haze of 

smoke that prevented observation of their bombs’ fall. Nevertheless, immediate 

post-raid analysis of strike photos taken by the attacking bombers, indicated 

“that the majority of the bombs dropped fell into heavily built-up areas of the 

city,” and stated, “damage to the city should be severe.”l28 The next day, at an 

Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, Doolittle reported that “the fires lit by 

Bomber Command the previous night had been re-kindled,” and he noted with 

“greatest reticence” that the smoke had risen to 15,000 feet.129 That same day, 

210 B-17s unable to bomb their primary target, the synthetic oil plant at 

Ruhland, diverted to their secondary target, Dresden. Using H2X, they dropped 

461 tons of bombs, all high explosives, on the stricken city.130 In all, the planes 

under Spaatz’s command had flown 521 heavy-bomber sorties and had dropped 

1,232 tons of bombs on Dresden. Their bombs mattered little, for the RAF had 

already virtually leveled the city. As a result of these raids the AAF official history, relying, in part, on immediate postmission aerial photography, stated, “If 

casualties were exceptionally high and damage to residential areas great, it was 

also evident that the city’s industrial and transportation establishments had been 

blotted out.”l31 

The Dresden raids, like earlier missions against Berlin, evoked bitter accusations of terror bombing from the German propaganda machine and strong reaction in the neutral press. A February 17 broadcast by the German Overseas 

Service in English for North America awarded Spaatz the “Order of the White 

Feather” for “acts of exceptional cowardice in bombing German cities filled 

with pitiful refugees.”l32 

This time, however, the American press joined in the uproar. On February 

16, Air Commodore C. M. Grierson of the SHAEF Air Staff held a background 

press conference. He spoke only for the SHAEF Air Staff Section, but the nature 

of the conference, which dealt with strategic bombing policy, gave some 

reporters the impression that he represented Spaatz and Harris as well. After 

touching on oil and communications bombing, Grierson, an RAF intelligence 

officer before his posting to SHAEF, discussed the use of heavy bombers 

against centers of population. He noted that large raids on population centers 

always led the Germans to bring in numerous trainloads of extra supplies and to 

evacuate the homeless. That type of relief relied, stated Grierson, 

on rapid and sound communication between the big cities and the whole of the 

interior of Germany itself, so that the destruction of not only communications 

centres, but also of towns where the relief comes from and where the evacuees 

go to, are very definitely operations which contribute greatly toward the break 

up of the German economic system. 

When Grierson was asked about the attack on Dresden and other points 

ahead of the Russian front he responded, “I should say the reasons for the attack 

are probably at least twofold. First of all they are centres to which evacuees are 

558 
VICTORY 

being moved. They are centres of communication through which traffic is moving across to the Russian front, and from the Western front to the East.” When 

asked for further cities on the list he replied, “I cannot give the list offhand. I 

think all those places through which the communications passed from West to 

East and those from North to South, and then the obvious centres of evacuation 

of population and probably emergency food storage.” When asked whether the 

aim of the Dresden attack was “to cause confusion among refugees or to blast 

communications carrying military supplies,” Grierson answered, “Primarily 

communications to prevent them moving military supplies. To stop movement 

in all directions if possible-movement of everything.”l33 

In response to other questions, the air commodore said that “further bombing attacks of German cities which are incidental and complementary to the 

communications attacks must have an affect on her [sic] internal economic system and what morale there is left to have any effect on.” Finally, Grierson 

implied that the Allies hoped to stop coal from leaving the Ruhr for, among 

other reasons, the purpose of increasing civilian suffering. 134 

Grierson had denied that the attack on Dresden was terror bombing. He had outlined a program aimed primarily on causing confusion and lowering morale by 

bombing civilian evacuees, chivying them from point to point, and denying them 

comfort, food, and heating supplies. Although he denied that the Allies had begun a 

terror-bombing campaign, he implied that the bombing of eastern German cities was 

mainly intended to produce hordes of refugees and to increase civilian suffering. 

An Associated Press correspondent at the briefing, Howard Cowan, sent a 

slightly embellished account of Grierson’s remarks to SHAEF’s censor who, 

instead of passing the story on to USSTAF’s censor because it dealt with strategic bombing policy, allowed it to go fonvard.135 On February 18, the Washington 

Star and other papers across the nation gave the story front-page treatment, much 

to the dismay of Arnold, who, along with Marshall and Secretary of War Henry L. 

Stimson, promptly asked Spaatz for an explanation. Three days after the story’s 

release, Kuter, who had returned to Washington, observed, “The Cowan story 

has given us a heavy set-back in the American Press on the question of precision 

bombing and the basic principle of the employment of the American Strategic 

Air Forces.”136 

Cowan had written: 

The Allied Air Commanders have made the long awaited decision to adopt 

deliberate terror bombing of the great German population centers as a ruthless 

expedient to hasten Hitler’s doom. . . . Their avowed purpose will be creating 

more confusion in the German traffic tangle and sapping German morale. 

Cowan went on to describe Grierson’s remarks pertaining to the strains placed 

on the German transportation system by the relief work associated with cities 

either bombed out or jammed with civilians fleeing the Soviet advance from the 

east. 137 

559 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The series of queries and responses that this story initiated between 

Washington and Paris followed on the heels of a preliminary exchange between 

Kuter and Spaatz. On February 13, Kuter, visiting Eaker at the latter’s headquarters, read, he claimed for the first time, Bottomley’s January 31 directive. There 

can be little doubt that Kuter had already seen the new directive at Yalta.138 

Apparently Eaker’s opposition to city bombiqg led Kuter to reexamine his own 

views. He felt that the directive varied too far from Directive No. 3, which the 

CCS had tacitly agreed to at Malta. He complained in a cable to Spaatz that the 

“insertion of what can be read as indiscriminate bombing of German cities is 

priority second only to synthetic oil plants.” This, said Kuter, would divert too 

much strength from the effort devoted to submarines, violating the informal 

agreements reached in Malta between the Army, the AAF, and the Navy on the 

amount of air effort to be expended on the submersibles. Kuter added that unless 

intelligence showed that the bombing of German cities would have a dramatic 

effect on ultimate victory “we are not keeping good faith with the US JCS.” He 

therefore requested the data supporting the decision to add east German cities to 

bombing priorities. Kuter did not, however, ask that the January 31 directive be 

rescinded. “It is understood,” he said, “that my questioning of your directive in 

Geieral Arnold’s name does not interfere with current execution of your directive.”139 

Giles, who had received an information copy of the cable, told Kuter that 

AAF Headquarters had no information “as to the basis of decision to attack 

German cities on a continuous number two priority.” Giles also noted that AAF 

Headquarters considered the cities as targets of opportunity that should not 

retain second priority.140 

In his reply to Kuter and Giles on February 14, Spaatz detailed his thoughts 

on the Bottomley directive and defined current USSTAF strategic policy. He 

maintained that Bottomley ’s directive referred only to Bomber Command, and 

differed in detail from his own instructions to USSTAF, which were intended to 

be temporary. He had based them on “the premise that the Russian offensive and 

the maintenance of same was [sic] of primary strategical importance.” His most 

important contribution to the Soviets’ winter offensive, he said, was the continued bombing of oil production facilities. His second most important was the 

attacking of 

transportation in major cities feeding the Russian front and concomitant disruption of administration particularly in such centers as Berlin. That these were 

important contributions to Allied solidarity is evidenced by the Russian reaction to this program and the fact that they themselves requested attacks on 

Berlin and Leipzig.14’ 

Spaatz refuted Kuter’s imputation of bad faith with the JCS: 

This program was concurred in by Gen. Marshall and he suggested its extension to include attacks on Munich. My directive at that time specified that 

560 
VICTORY 

attacks would be made on Berlin when overcast conditions prevented visual 

attacks on oil. This has since been expanded to include attacks against Dresden, 

Leipzig and Munich, of which Dresden had this date been attacked. Since these 

attacks are primarily aimed at transportation, [emphasis added] it represents 

no change in priority but merely a change in emphasis from the battle in the 

West to the battle in the East. 

As for submarines, Spaatz stated, “It is not considered that this situation has any 

influence on the amount of effort which will be placed on the submarine system 

under current directive since attacks are influenced almost entirely by weather 

areas.”142 

Giles and Arnold, who did not know exactly how Spaatz’s instructions differed from Bottomley’s directive, accepted Spaatz’s answer on faith. Speaking 

for himself and Arnold, Giles stated that Spaatz’s views, as expressed in the 

cable of February 14, were acceptable: “Providing that not involved are instructions or implications for promiscuous bombing of German cities for the purpose 

of causing civilian confusion. It has always been our view that the communications objectives in large cities were to be attacked under existing priorities as 

stated in directive number 3.”143 

This cable had hardly left Giles’s desk when Cowan’s front-page story hit 

the streets of America. Arnold radioed another message to Spaatz: “Complete 

clarification has become essential to resolve my now existing confusion as to 

directives and priorities under which the Strategic Air Forces are presently operating.” Arnold requested urgent transmission of the text of USSTAF’s current 

operating directive along with any comments Spaatz cared to make.144 

Both Giles’s and Arnold’s cables arrived in Paris after Spaatz had left for the 

Mediterranean to confer, as he did periodically, with Eaker. Because the situation required speedy response, Frederick Anderson, speaking for Spaatz, replied 

to the worried communications from the Pentagon.145 To Giles, who passed the 

messages on to Arnold, Anderson rejoined, “It has always been my policy that 

civilian populations are not suitable military objectives.” Anderson went on to 

explain the differences between Bottomley ’s directives and Spaatz’s: “Although 

in general parallel in priorities and issued after mutual consultation, [they] often 

reflect the difference in capabilities of the two forces. On this occasion, I did not 

issue a complete new Directive since it was necessary only to change emphasis 

within the Priorities of Directive Number Three.” Finally, Anderson observed 

that “such changes within the broad framework of formal Directives are almost a 

daily occurrence to keep abreast of the changing situation.”l46 Anderson next 

paraphrased for Giles the current directive to the Eighth Air Force dated January 

30, 1945. It differed little from Spaatz’s verbal orders to Doolittle on January 

28. Visual attacks on oil had first priority, bombing attacks (probably through 

overcast) on Berlin had second priority, and attacks on the Cologne-Ruhr-Kassel 

area had third priority. “With above in mind,” stated Spaatz’s directive to 

Doolittle, “anticipate you will hit Berlin whenever weather conditions do not 

561 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

indicate possibility of visual bombing of oil targets but do permit operations to 

Berlin.”147 

In his cables to Giles and then to Arnold, Anderson justified Berlin as a target on several grounds. The city served as a focal point in the supply and 

defense against the Red Army’s attack and as a suspected transshipment point 

for the Sixth S.S. Panzer Army.148 Furthermore, Berlin’s position as a center of 

communications, administration, and industry required some effort. Such effort 

would force the Luftwaffe into the air to fight; require the Luftwaffe to station 

fighters close to the city, thus removing them from the Western Front; and contain a large flak defense that, if left alone, would disperse to defend other targets.149 

Anderson told Washington that USSTAF still operated according to Directive 

No. 3 but added, “I believe that the power of the Russian advance is the greatest 

strategic factor at the present time in this war and as the situation dictates, I 

believe it should be strongly supported.”lso These answers satisfied Arnold. On 

February 19, he informed Spaatz that the two messages so far received had 

“resolved all open questions, It is now understood that you are proceeding along 

lines consistent with Directive No. Three.”l51 

Anderson next turned to limiting any public relations damage done by Cowan’s 

story. After discussions with Eisenhower, they agreed not to stir up already muddy 

waters by issuing an official statement denying the story, which would only keep it 

alive.152 With Virgil Pinkley, European manager of United Press, Anderson 

reviewed USSTAF’s position on bombing. Col. Max Boyd, USSTAF’s chief 

public relations officer, also told several reporters that there had been no change 

in policy, only “a shift of emphasis from West to East to weaken German 

defenses against the Russian Offensive.” In these talks USSTAF acknowledged 

that “attacks against targets in populous centers always have and always will 

endanger civilian lives” but emphasized that the AAF would continue to 

improve its technique to obtain the greatest possible concentration of bombs 

directly on military targets selected for attack.153 

Spaatz summarized the whole affair in a letter to Robert Lovett on February 

21: 

As you know, our strategic policy directives and the Air Ministry directives to 

R.A.F. Bomber Command parallel except that the technique of the R.A.F. operation requires the accomplishment of the same results by the use of area bombing. Our policy, of course, has remained unchanged. The technique of setting 

up on the transportation system in our recent raid on Berlin was the same as 

that used in our raids on the same city throughout last year. If there is a point of 

difference, it is merely in effectiveness since the strike was unusually good. 

The SHAEF officer giving out the interview was not authorized to talk conceming strategic air bombing policies and did not present General Eisenhower’s or 

my views.154 

562 
VICTORY 

In the years since the bombing of Dresden, several questions have recurred, 

four of which definitely touch on Spaatz’s decisions or responsibilities: 

1. Who ordered the bombing of Dresden? Although the Joint Intelligence 

Committee, the British Air Staff, Tedder, and Spaatz had all begun to consider 

aiding the Soviet offensive, Churchill must bear the responsibility for shifting 

the heavy-bomber effort to the Eastern Front. He prodded the RAF to place east 

German cities at the top of its priority list. Harris was the first to suggest 

Dresden in this connection. Spaatz, as the chief American official involved in 

setting priorities for the U.S. strategic air forces, accepted the change of targeting locale proposed by the British and ordered attacks on Berlin, Dresden, 

Munich, and associated cities. 

2. Did the Soviets request the bombing of Dresden? No, the Soviets never 

specifically asked for it. They were aware from the Tripartite negotiations at 

Yalta, however, that the British and the Americans had reserved the right to 

bomb it whenever they chose.155 In addition, at Yalta the Soviets requested “an 

action on communications [to] hinder the enemy from carrying out the shifting 

of his troops to the East from the Western Front, from Norway, and from Italy, 

in particular, to paralyze Berlin and Leipzig.”l56 Spaatz, in accordance with previous agreements, notified the Soviets twenty-four hours before the February 13 

mission and twenty-four hours prior to the February 14 mission of his intention 

to attack Dresden.157 At no time did the Soviets express a wish to halt the bombing of Dresden. 

3. Was Dresden a legitimate military target? Dresden, as the seventh-largest 

city in Germany, possessed many small workshops, factories, and perhaps 

50,000 workers employed in the arms industry;l58 none of these alone had 

attracted the interest of Allied targeting officers. In February 1945, however, 

Dresden’s position as a communications center became all important once the 

Soviets neutralized Breslau. It then became a communications linchpin of the 

southern part of the Eastern Front. The main rail lines from Leipzig and Berlin 

joined just outside the city, while the chief rail line to Prague and to Hungary 

and a main line due east to Breslau radiated from within the city. If the Allies 

could significantly retard or halt communications through Dresden, the German 

effort against the Soviets in that sector would weaken, perhaps fatally. Dresden’s 

importance as a communications center made it a legitimate military target. 

4. Did the Allied air attacks on Dresden deviate from established bombing 

policy? They did not. The RAF employed a main-force attack, as it had often 

done before, which started a fire storm-the intended, but seldom achieved, 

result of all main-force attacks on city areas. As a matter of policy, the RAF routinely bombed city areas in order, as the RAF official historians state, “to dislocate the German war economy by the destruction of what were regarded as profitable targets in it, namely the residential centres of the industrial population.”l59 

Harris, Bomber Command’s chief, believed absolutely in area bombing and kept 

a list of sixty-three German cities he meant to destroy. Two weeks after Dresden, 

563 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

in reference to a main force attack on Pforzheim, the RAF’s last area attack of the 

war, Harris, according to the minutes of an Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, 

boasted to his fellow air commanders “the whole place has been burned out. This 

attack had been what was popularly known as a deliberate terror attack.” Harris 

said that he knew “that in certain quarters, the value of these area attacks was 

disputed. Pforzheim was a town which contained innumerable small workshops 

for the manufacture of precision instruments. This attack must have destroyed 

the ‘home-work’ of the population and their equipment.” Harris finished by noting, “Bomber Command had now destroyed 63 German towns in this fashion.”l60 Of the 389 main-force attacks and 482,437 tons of bombs the RAF sent 

against German towns, Dresden had received only a single raid and 2,978 tons 

of bombs. In comparison, the RAF subjected Berlin to 24 main-force attacks 

(49,400 tons of bombs) and Essen to 28 such attacks (39,907 tons of bombs).l61 

Nor did the American attack on Dresden deviate from established AAF policy. Long after the war, in 1969, Spaatz succinctly stated his and USSTAF’s reasoning during this period, “When the Dresden operation came down, we 

bombed the military targets . . . some marshaling yards. This is what we did. 

Now maybe some of the bombs fell on Dresden, but the target was a military 

target.” Only one-third of the Eighth Air Force, carrying a high but not unusual 

percentage of incendiary bombs, attacked Dresden. As usual, when confronted 

with less-than-adequate visual conditions, the Eighth resorted to H2X to make 

its drops, which, assuming 30 to 50 percent cloud cover and standard accuracy, 

meant that only 30 percent of the bombs fell within half a mile of aiming 

points.162 Following standard procedures, the B-17s had aimed for Dresden’s 

marshaling yards located in the center of the city, and therefore dropped a good 

many bombs on the already devastated residential area. The Dresden raid was 

business as usual for the Eighth Air Force in the winter of 1944-1945. 

U.S. Bombing Policy during the Winter of 1944-1945 

The Dresden mission, however, did highlight USSTAF’s use of incendiary 

bombs and blind-bombing techniques over major German towns and cities. The 

U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe freely employed both over German cities 

but rarely over cities in German-occupied Europe. One week after Dresden and 

after the Cowan story as well, Frederick Anderson informed the RAF Director 

of Bomber Operations, “It is the policy of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in 

Europe to limit attacks to military objectives and to use precision bombing techniques. When weather conditions preclude visual bombing, military objectives 

in Germany proper suitable for ‘bombing through overcast’ technique are 

selected for attack.” Then Anderson differentiated between Germany proper and 

German-occupied territory: “Under normal conditions it is not our policy to 

attack targets in enemy occupied territory unless the target can be identified by 

visual means.”163 

564 
VICTORY 

The weather of central Europe forced the Americans to develop a technological alternative to precision daylight bombing, which, except for fairly accurate 

short-range systems such as Gee-H and Oboe, meant H2X. H2X was, of course, 

inaccurate and fit only for locating large cities. Without H2X the Eighth Air 

Force could operate for only a handful of days in the fall and winter. During the 

fourth quarter of 1944, Berlin had only seven days of visual (less than 50 percent 

cloud cover) bombing weather; Munich, southern Germany, and southern Austria 

had five days; and central and western Germany had only three days of visual 

weather. Adding days of visually assisted weather (50 percent to 80 percent cloud 

cover or more than 80 percent with large local breaks in the clouds) doubled 

these numbers.164 The AAF could not justify a force of 2,000 bombers if it flew 

only once or twice a month. Hence, inaccurate radar missions went out as often 

as weather permitted safe takeoff, landing, and travel to the target. Spaatz took 

pride in the ability of his force to fly in foul weather. In mid-March, he noted 

proudly to both Arnold and Marshall that the Eighth had become an all-weather 

force. To Marshall he wrote, “It has been my constant aim to develop an allweather air force capable of placing its impact on the enemy every day of the 

year. Progress in this field has developed at an outstanding rate and the crews flying the missions have kept pace with the developments in admirable fashion.”l65 

Similarly, he informed Arnold, “Both fighters and bombers operate in weather 

which was never conceived to be suitable for combat operations, and, as a result, 

we have been able to maintain approximately five times the pressure on the 

enemy that would have been possible if we were restricted to visual bombing.”l66 

In its use of incendiary bombs, the Eighth Air Force again demonstrated a 

policy of greater harshness toward German cities than targets in occupied territory. The standard American incendiary bomb from January 1944 on was the 

four-pound magnesium, thermite-filled, incendiary M50A 1, dropped in 500- 

pound clusters. On ignition, it burned for six to eight minutes at a temperature of 

2,300 degrees Fahrenheit.167 These incendiary bombs had no blast or fragmentation effects, consequently they were useless against personnel or hardened structures, such as concrete fortifications. Nor could they significantly damage field 

fortifications, marshaling yards, or, in the opinion of the Eighth Air Force, major 

industrial facilities. The Eighth did not even employ fire bombs against oil targets, which postwar studies indicate could well have suffered worse damage if a 

higher percentage had been included in the mix of bombs dropped on them.168 

Incendiary bombs had one function-the destruction of soft targets, that is, 

houses, commercial buildings, and administrative/governmental offices. 

In March 1945, the Eighth Air Force conducted a bombing campaign against 

German military bases, including barracks (Kasernes), the closest military 

equivalent to the civilian structures just mentioned. This campaign indicated the 

Eighth’s desired mix of bombs to achieve maximum damage on soft targets, a 

shade under 40 percent of total tonnage of fire bombs and 60 percent of total 

tonnage of high explosives.169 On February 14, the Eighth dropped 40 percent 

565 

Cities in Crisis. The Eighth Air Force 

attacked military objectives located well inside 

populated areas. Clockwise from above: Before 

and after photographs of the Tiergarten in 

Berlin show the damage to residential sections 

of the city. Incendiary and high-explosive ordnance (right) descend toward the cloud cover 

over Berlin, February 26, 1945. The roof of the 

Potsdam railroad station (opposite, below) collapsed under bombardment that same day. The 

shadow of a B-24 Liberator (opposite, left, 

above) races along the tracks leading into 

Munich’s main railroad station. The twin towers of the city’s famed Frauenkirche are on the 

horizon. Munich is laid out on the H2X radar 

screen (opposite, right, above) of a Fifteenth Air 

Force bomber. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

of total tonnage in fire bombs on Dresden, as did the RAF, whose policy and 

operational techniques called for the greatest possible damage to city areas. 

Examination of the Eighth’s attacks on Berlin from March 1944 to March 

1945 and of those in France during May and June 1944 show a dramatic contrast 

in their use of incendiaries. In May 1944, the Eighth’s heavy bombers dropped 

19,854 tons on France, 745 of them incendiaries.170 Of these, 685 tons hit 

German-occupied military airfields, targets by their very nature located at some 

distance from city areas. In June 1944,44,209 tons of the Eighth’s bombs fell on 

France, only 103 tons of them incendiaries (dropped mostly on airfields).l71 

Given Churchill’s pressure to limit civilian casualties and destruction in occupied countries and the Eighth’s policy of employing only visual bombing techniques over occupied territory, these figures seem to demonstrate the Eighth’s 

desire and ability to limit damage as much as possible to purely military targets. 

The bombing of Berlin showed the other side of the coin. From March 4, 

1944, to March 18, 1945, the Eighth sent fifteen major missions of at least 700 

tons of bombs each, and four minor missions over Berlin. These missions lost 

264 aircraft and placed 21,733 tons on the city, including 8,089 tons of incendiaries or 37 percent of the total, a figure very close to the optimum for maximum 

destruction of soft targets. Of the four major raids with the least number of 

incendiaries (less than 20 percent apiece), three including the February 3, 1945, 

raid used visual bombing methods. More than 90 percent of all bombs fell on 

three targets: military and civil government areas (12,440 tons, 4,475 tons incendiary), railroad stations (5,259 tons, 2,494 tons incendiary), and industrial targets (2,410 tons, 937 tons incendiary).l72 Those were legitimate military targets 

and served as aiming points for the Eighth’s bombardiers. Berlin’s size and the 

location of its targets, mostly in the heart of the city, meant that every bomb 

missing a target hit housing or other nonmilitary targets. 

On February 26, 1945, all three air divisions of the Eighth-1,135 heavy 

bombers-attacked three railroad stations with 2,778 tons of bombs, 44 percent 

of them fire bombs. The Schlesischer, Alexanderplatz, and Berlin-North stations 

were all located within two miles of the center of Berlin. Using H2X through 

complete overcast, the mission started large fires and killed many civilians. RAF 

Mosquito night-intruder bombers attacking twelve hours later reported fires still 

burning.173 After the February 26 mission, with its 500,000 fire bomblets, the 

typical Berliner, with reason, would have been hard put to distinguish between 

RAF area bombing and AAF precision bombing. 

A further look at Eighth Air Force operations has revealed two egregious 

examples of the gap between bombing practice and stated bombing policy: the 

target categories “city areas” and “marshaling yards.” The two most cited Eighth 

Air Force statistical summaries that cover the entire war do not list a target category “city areas” or “towns and cities.”l74 Both summaries were prepared from 

the same set of data within a month of the end of the war in Europe. 

Monthly statistical summaries of the Eighth’s operations prepared during the 

568 
VICTORY 

war, almost contemporaneously with the events they recorded, tell a different 

story. The Eighth Air Force Monthly Statistical Summary of Operations, generated at the end of each month from May 1944 to April 1945, listed a “city areas” 

target category. For calendar year 1944, the summary reported that the Eighth 

dropped 43,611 tons on “city areas.”l75 Nor did these reports make any bones 

about their targets. The report for the May 8, 1944, Berlin raid baldly states, 

“Berlin city area attacked. Bombing raid done through 10/10 undercast on PFF 

markers. Believed that the center of Berlin was well hit.”176 After reaching a 

high of 9,886 tons (41 percent incendiaries) in July 1944, when the Eighth conducted a series of H2X raids on Munich, the monthly “city area” totals steadily 

declined to 383 tons in December. 

A summary in a working paper from a USSTAF file, “Review of Bombing 

Results,” shows a similar dichotomy according to time period. From January 

1944 through January 1945, the Eighth dropped 45,036 tons on “towns and 

cities.”l77 From February 1945 through the end of the war, this summary 

showed not a single ton of bombs falling on a city area. Unless the Eighth had 

developed a perfect technique for bombing through overcast, such a result was 

simply impossible. Obviously, the word had come down to deemphasize reports 

on civilian damage. For instance, when Anderson cabled Arnold about USSTAF’s 

press policy on the Dresden controversy in February 1945, he noted, “Public relations officers have been advised to take exceptional care that the military nature 

of targets attacked in the future be specified and emphasized in all cases. As in 

the past the statement that an attack was made on such and such a city will be 

avoided; specific targets will be described.”l78 

The U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, although not explicitly listing a target 

category such as cities or towns, had an interesting definition of “industrial 

areas.” The survey placed three types of targets in “industrial areas”: (1) cities, 

towns, and urban areas; (2) public utilities (electric, gas, water, and telephone 

companies); and (3) government buildings. Given that definition the survey even 

managed to describe RAF area raids as strikes against “industrial targets.”l79 

The target category “marshaling yards” received more of the Eighth’s bomb 

tonnage than any other, somewhere between 175,000 and 200,000 tons of bombs.180 

At least 25 percent of all the Eighth Air Force bombs dropped over Europe fell on 

“marshaling yards.” One-third of the American incendiary bombs dropped over 

Germany fell on the same system. As a matter of directive and policy for most 

of the period between September 1944 and April 1945, the same period in which 

the Eighth delivered 90 percent of the total tonnage dropped on the system, marshaling yards had the highest nonvisual bombing priority. During that period the 

Eighth Air Force dropped 168,038 tons of bombs, 70 percent (117,816 tons) 

blind and 30 percent (50,222 tons) visually.181 Postwar research showed that 

only 2 percent of bombs dropped by nonvisual means landed within 1,000 feet 

of their aiming points.182 Rail yards as such, however, were poor targets for 

incendiaries. If the fire bombs landed directly on or near rail cars, they destroyed 

569 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

or damaged them; otherwise, they could do little harm to the heavy equipment or 

trackage. The Eighth realized this. Of the 9,042 tons of bombs dropped on 

French rail yards, mostly during the pre-OVERLORD transportation bombing 

phase, when the Americans took scrupulous care to avoid French civilian casualties, 90 percent were visually sighted and only 33 tons were incendiaries.183 

Even over Germany itself, during Operation CLARION, when the Eighth bombed 

dozens of small yards and junctions in lesser German towns, it dropped, over a 

two-day period of visual conditions, 7,164 tons of bombs in all, but less than 3 

tons of fire bombs.184 

In contrast, using H2X, the Eighth pummeled marshaling yards and rail stations in large German cities with high percentages of incendiary bombs. For 

example, rail targets in at least four major cities garnered the following percentages of fire bombs out of all bombs dropped on them: Cologne, 27 percent; 

Nuremberg, 30 percent; Berlin, 37 percent; and Munich, 41 percent.185 

“Marshaling yards” undoubtedly served as a euphemism for city areas. Because 

the yards themselves were not good targets for incendiaries, the prime purpose 

in employing such weapons was to take advantage of the known inaccuracy of 

H2X bombing in order to maximize the destruction of warehouses, commercial 

buildings, and residences in the general vicinity of the target. Large numbers of 

planes scattering their bombs around their mostly unseen and unverifiable aiming points surely would cause great collateral damage to any soft structures 

located nearby. 

The AAF never officially acknowledged that it had bombed German city 

areas as a matter of policy. Analysis of the Eighth’s bombardment policy, of its 

employment of incendiary bombs, and of its targeting of “city areas” and “marshaling yards” clearly reveals that, despite denials, it did engage in the deliberate 

bombing of German population centers. There were only two discernible, but 

important, differences between the AAF’s practice and the RAF’s admitted policy. First, unlike RAF Bomber Command, under the direction of Harris, the 

AAF did not consider city areas its chief and preferred target. Whereas Harris 

repeatedly and sarcastically scoffed at any other target system as a “panacea,” 

the AAF preferred to bomb oil and other recognizable and identifiable target 

systems whenever visual methods would allow. Spaatz correctly believed that 

the bombing of crucial oil and transportation targets would end the war sooner, 

with less loss of life, than area bombing. Second, the AAF in Europe never 

developed, trained for, or employed the specialized fire-raising techniques used 

by Bomber Command. To do so would have openly acknowledged a city area 

bombing policy. Under nonvisual bombing conditions (night or heavy overcast), 

however, the points of attack and the bomb loadings of the RAF and the AAF 

were virtually indistinguishable, as were their results. 

Yet American air commanders were neither fools nor hypocrites. Michael S. 

Sherry far overstates the case when he brands them technological fanatics and 

speaks of the “evil of American bombing.” His pairing them with Adolf Eich570 
VICTORY 

mann, the Nazi S.S. officer responsible for the deaths of millions of Jews 

because they, like Eichmann, seemed to personify the “banality of evil” and 

were neither frenzied nor hateful seems particularly overblown.186 The Germans 

could have stopped the bombing by surrender. The victims of the Holocaust 

could not stop the slaughter by any means, and their numbers of casualties were 

vastly greater than the numbers of casualties inflicted by Allied bombing-ven 

if the two types of death are comparable in other respects, which they are not. 

The contradiction of American bombing was that although the target category 

“marshaling yards” served as a euphemism for area bombing, the bombardment 

of marshaling yards also broke the back of the German war economy. It was the 

bombing of the yards, not the paralysis of the inland waterway system or the 

destruction of rolling stock and locomotives, that disrupted the vital car placings, severing the coal/transport nexus, shattering the geographic division of 

labor, and toppling the production edifice built by Speer.187 

Operations to the End of the War 

On February 21, 1945, Allied weather forecasters predicted clear skies over 

much of Germany for the next day, whereupon Allied air leaders, at the request 

of Eisenhower’s headquarters,l88 scheduled Operation CLARION for execution on 

February 22. CLARION, a descendant of the HURRICANE plans of autumn 1944, 

called for attacks by all available Allied strategic and tactical air power on 

German rail and water communications in the hope of disrupting the Germans’ 

economic life and front-line tactical situation. By attacking numerous unbombed 

targets near small cities and towns, the Allies also hoped to provide millions of 

Germans with proof of Allied air superiority. British and American fighters and 

bombers would spread out all over Germany blasting transport targets such as 

grade crossings, stations, barges, docks, signals, tracks, bridges, and marshaling 

yards. The plan purposely selected targets near small towns heretofore untouched 

by the war and therefore not likely to have strong antiaircraft defenses. To 

heighten their accuracy, the Eighth’s and Fifteenth’s heavy bombers came in at 

unusually low altitudes. Some of them bombed from 6,000 feet, while the Ninth’s 

medium bombers buzzed up and down the rail lines destroying locomotives and 

disrupting traffic. More than 3,500 heavy bombers and 4,900 fighters took part. 

The bombers attacked 219 transportation targets, while the fighters destroyed or 

damaged 594 locomotives and 3,803 rail cars.189 

Eisenhower’s headquarters had requested CLARION in order to assist an 

offensive by Lt. Gen. William G. Simpson’s U.S. Ninth Army, scheduled to 

begin the night of February 22-23. The Ninth meant to stage an assault crossing 

of the Ruhr River, clear the Cologne plain, seize Cologne itself, and close up to 

the Rhine, all of which he accomplished by March 7. Spaatz had been itching for 

months to go ahead with CLARION. As discussed in the previous chapter, he had 

hoped to carry out HURRICANE in October, but the weather had proved unsuit57 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

able. On February 1, at the Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, he had pressed 

for immediate execution of CLARION. 190 On February 2, Anderson had presented 

CLARION toMarshall at Malta as USSTAF’s alternative to the Jeb Stuart plan.191 

The same day Spaatz informed Twining and Eaker of his intention to order 

CLARION when conditions allowed it. When Twining objected to the special tactics called for in the plan but not the concept behind it,192 Spaatz accommodated 

him with some slight modifications to provide more safety for the heavy bombers. 

On February 5, Spaatz told Arnold that CLARION was cocked and primed, although 

he also noted that he no longer expected any single air operation to win the war.193 

The results of CLARION justified Spaatz’s caution. The operation, which took 

place on February 22-23, failed to achieve its lofty goals. It did not precipitate a 

crisis among the railway workers, overwhelm the Reichsbahn’s repair facilities, 

disrupt the railways enough to affect the front-line troops immediately, or drive 

home the war to the German people. CLARION did, however, destroy a considerable amount of rolling stock and lowered the throughput capacity of several 

main rail lines for the duration of the war. The operation added further strain and 

attrition to a system already collapsing from the cumulative effects of the 

destruction being rained upon it.194 Although Anderson probably spoke for all 

of USSTAF when, a month later, he proclaimed it “singularly effective,”l95 neither USSTAF nor the rest of the Allied airmen repeated the operation-first, 

because it required a special set of weather conditions and, second, because it 

required all Allied air forces to give up their primary missions to concentrate on 

a special project with unquantifiable results. 

CLARION did provide a side benefit for the AAF, however-the opportunity 

for USSTAF to stage a press blitz to counteract the reporting of the Dresden 

bombing. USSTAF had a United Press correspondent at Eighth Air Force to 

cover the planning; briefed the press in London and Paris; sent a planeload of 

reporters to front-line fields to cover the story; sent its own combat camera 

crews out to get movie and still footage of the operation, which it promptly 

released; and gained a fifteen-minute news spot on the domestic U.S. National 

Broadcasting Company network.196 

Each day from February 19 through March 4 the Eighth sent out more than 

1,000 heavy bombers. With the exception of CLARION, which consumed two precious days of visual bombing, the rest of the attacks-including a massive one 

on Berlin (February 26) and others on the communications centers at Munich 

(February 25), Leipzig (February 27), Halle (February 27), and Chemnitz 

(March 3)-used combinations of mostly radar and some visual bombing.197 In 

February the Luftwaffe mounted only one interception of more than 100 planes, 

for the February 9 attack on oil plants; otherwise, it offered only feeble resistance because most of its fighter effort was devoted to the hard-pressed Eastern 

Front. ULTRA intercepts showed that by the end of January the Luftwaffe had 

transferred 800 single-engine fighters to the east.198 Nonetheless, Allied intelligence noted darkly that German jets had begun to attack in numbers and forma572 
VICTORY 

tions, indicating that problems in their deployment and tactics may have been 

solved. 199 February repeated the pattern of January when the Luftwaffe, heavily 

committed to the Battle of the Bulge and the Soviet offensive, had, for the most 

part, failed to oppose strategic bombing missions. Of course, in January, 75 percent of the Eighth’s bomber effort went for tactical targets to aid the ground 

forces rather than to dislocate Germany’s economy.200 

The Eighth lost 314 bombers (49 to fighters) in January 1945 and another 

227 bombers (14 to fighters) in February.201 The Fifteenth did not lose a single 

bomber to fighters in either month, although overall it suffered heavy bomber 

losses (88 in January and 147 in February).202 USSTAF lost large numbers of 

bombers to flak when it attacked targets defended by men and matkriel released 

from other parts of Hitler’s shrinking domain. The 24 bombers lost to flak over 

Berlin on February 3 amounted to almost 15 percent of the month’s total lost to 

antiaircraft fire. Even as Germany fell from the precipice, its defenses still functioned. 

In February, freed from the support requirements imposed by the Battle of 

the Bulge, the Eighth renewed its all-out war on Germany’s economy. It fielded 

missions on twenty days in February, as did the Fifteenth. These raids, plus 

those of Bomber Command, lowered German Bergius and Fischer-Tropsch process oil production from 37,000 to 13,000 tons a month, less than 4 percent of 

January’s 1944 figure.203 For the month, USSTAF dropped more than 74,400 

tons, including some 54,000 tons on transportation targets, while Bomber 

Command added another 45,900.204 The German economy, gravely weakened 

by the loss of Silesian industry and coal, Hungarian natural oil, and Polish synthetic oil, and with its railcars creaking to a halt, collapsed under this rain of 

bombs. “By the end of February,” stated the AAF official history, “Nazi 

Germany was no longer an industrial nation.”205 

In March the twin titans of USSTAF and Bomber Command piled Ossa on 

Pelion, ranging over all parts of Germany. They dropped a wartime monthly 

high of almost 110,000 tons of death and destruction on the nearly prostrate 

Germans: USSTAF contributed 102,000 tons to that tota1.206 The Soviet army 

paused in its offensive, except in Hungary and East Prussia, to establish supply 

lines and organize the large territory they had taken from the Germans. The 

Western Allies drove the Nazis from the Rhineland and the Palatinate. After 

capturing the Ludendorff Bridge across the Rhine at Remagen on March 7, the 

Americans rapidly built up a strong bridgehead. In the last week of March, 

Montgomery’s 21 Army Group crossed the Rhine, while Bradley’s 12th Army 

Group and Devers’s 6th Army Group broke out of their Rhine bridgeheads. 

By April 1, Montgomery’s and Bradley’s troops linked up at Lippstadt, surrounding the Ruhr and pocketing an entire German army group. This group surrendered on April 18, yielding 317,000 prisoners of war. In the meantime the 

Allies had continued their drive east to the River Elbe, which they reached also 

on April 18. The Soviets renewed their offensive on April 16. They surrounded 

573 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Berlin on April 25; after grim house-to-house fighting, they completely occupied the city on May 2. German forces in Italy surrendered the same day. Hitler, 

who had refused to leave his air-raid shelter in the Nazi capital, committed suicide on April 30, issuing orders for counterattacks and scorched-earth resistance 

until the last. At 2:42 A.M. on May 7, at Reims, France, the Germans capitulated, 

effective 11:Ol P.M., May 8, to Eisenhower. At 2:OO A.M., May 9, in Berlin, the 

Germans surrendered to the Soviets. 

For most of the last ten hectic weeks of the war, business at USSTAF continued as usual. The German Me 262 jet continued to trouble the American air 

command. During March the Luftwaffe seldom sent up its piston-driven aircraft 

to contest the Eighth’s strategic raids. Those Bf 109s and FW 190s that had fuel 

used it in ground-support roles, especially on the Eastern Front. The Me 262s, 

perhaps no more than fifty at any one time, showed “considerable improvement” 

in their tactics and organization.207 The number of Eighth Air Force bombers 

lost to enemy fighters rose from fourteen in February to sixty-three in March 208- 

the greatest number of bombers lost to fighters in six months. This situation 

caused concern but fell far short of the monthly totals suffered by a smaller Eighth 

Air Force in the first six months of 1944. The Fifteenth lost seven bombers to 

fighters in March-the only bombers it lost to enemy aircraft for all of 1945.209 

On March 11, Spaatz wrote to Giles that because the American jet, the P-80, 

would not become operational until autumn 1945, the German’s “technical 

advantage must be countered by overwhelmirlg numbers of conventional fighters manned by pilots trained to both outthink and outshoot [the enemy]. . . .” 

Spaatz added, “There is little doubt that part, if not all of this force, will be committed to the task of countering our strategic operations as soon as suitable tactics have been developed.”210 

A week later, March 18, Me 262s shot down at least six bombers. The next 

day, March 19, they made a concentrated attack on another bomber formation, 

causing Anderson to tell Spaatz, “A touch of the Hun’s old cunning and aggressive spirit was apparent today.”211 In addition, the Americans spotted at least 

one formation of thirty-six jets, the largest seen up to that time. Allied intelligence remarked that the formation “betokened a much more advanced state of 

development than previous reaction seemed to indicate.”212 At the Air Commanders’ Conference on March 2 1, Doolittle informed the assembled airmen 

that “the threat which they had been anticipating had now materialized. Jets 

were now attacking in formations as large as 36 aircraft and were using more 

effective tactics.” He also spoke of new tactics employed by the Germans: 

“Besides attacking the bombers, they were attacking the fighter escort immediately on penetration in the hope of making them drop their tanks. “The time had 

come,” he said, “for an all-out operation against the G.A.F. by both the Tactical 

and Strategic Air Forces.”213 According to Doolittle, a massive two-day operation to “posthole” jet airfield runways and to drop fragmentation bombs on dispersal areas would reduce the Luftwaffe to a point at which USSTAF’s fighters 

574 
VICTORY 

could engage in offensive operations rather than tie themselves to bomber escort. 

Bottomley expressed some doubt about the necessity of such an operation, but 

Tedder recommended antiair strikes as soon as the air forces finished their commitments to support both Montgomery’s assault crossing of the Rhine and the 

massive paratroop drop planned to assist it.214 

In the last week of March the Eighth attacked the German jet airfields, 

achieving some success. Nevertheless, Doolittle reported at the next Allied Air 

Commanders’ Conference that “the jet strength of the G.A.F. was increasing 

uncomfortably.”215 A discussion of bomber priorities followed. Doolittle reiterated that the Eighth’s losses to fighters had risen sharply since an “all-time” low 

in February. At the end, Tedder summed up the feeling of the airmen present, 

including Spaatz, “that more effort should be directed against the G.A.F. to provide greater immunity to the Eighth Air Force, the Army, and supply aircraft.”216 

As Tedder apparently realized, the Allies had such overwhelming superiority 

they could easily spare more effort to extinguish the Luftwaffe completely. 

Spaatz did not spend all of March worrying about the Luftwaffe’s relatively 

feeble efforts. Other events gave him the opportunity to play the diplomat. 

During CLARION and again in early March, AAF units accidentally bombed 

Switzerland. An attack on February 22 on Schaffhausen which killed sixteen 

persons, and the attacks of March 4 on the Base1 marshaling yards (fortunately, 

only nine heavy bombers dropped 21.5 tons by visual means) and on the “industrial area” of Zurich (heavy bombers using H2X dropped 12.7 tons of bombs) 

naturally created a furor. The February 22 attack had provoked Marshall to cable 

Eisenhower, “Will you please have someone look into this and let me know 

what can be done toward preventing recurrence of these incidents?”217 The 

March bombing incidents elicited a stronger response from Marshall, who 

cabled Spaatz directly: “The successive bombing of Swiss territory now demands 

more than expressions of regret.” He ordered Spaatz to leave immediately for 

Geneva and to present to the appropriate Swiss officials information as to the 

cause of the incidents, Spaatz’s plans for corrective action, and “a formal apology.” Marshall further requested that Spaatz undertake the mission in “maximum 

secrecy” with “no publicity.”218 

This message reached Spaatz on March 6. By March 8, in Bern and in the 

company of U.S. Minister to Switzerland Leland Harrison, Spaatz extended official and personal regrets to the Swiss Foreign Minister, the Minister of War, the 

Commander in Chief of the Swiss army, and the Chief of the Swiss Air Corps. 

He briefly explained the difficulties of winter bomber operations, emphasizing 

the prohibition, previously agreed to by the Allies, against bombing within 50 

miles of the Swiss border.219 

He promised to set up two zones: one from 150 to 50 miles outside 

Switzerland within which he would forbid attacks without positive identification, and the other within 50 miles of the Swiss border, where no attacks could 

be made without his express permission. All this appeased the Swiss. In keeping 

575 
Ruin and Risk. Amid the destruction of the Reich, the Germans could mount a sometimes 

effective defense against the Allies’ aerial onslaught. Clockwise from above: Fifteenth Air Force 

raids flattened large fuel storage tanks at Torgau. The Fieseler aircraft plant (opposite, above) is 

a nearly complete wreck as an Allied soldier tours the works after war’s end. Marshaling yards 

at Eleinberg (opposite, middle) show heavy cratering in a photographic survey taken in May 

1945. The alarming successes of Me 262 fighters against American bombers and fighters in 

March 1945 led to heavy raids on jet assembly plants and airfields. An assembly line for the 

Messerschmitt wonder weapon (opposite, below) in a wooded area near Obertraubling in 

Bavaria was struck by the Fifteenth Air Force late in the war. A B-24 Liberator (below), severed 

by German flak, tumbles across the sky during a raid on submarine construction yards in Kiel, 

April 12,1945, barely three weeks before all German resistance collapsed. 

SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

General Carl A. Spaatz, Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle, and the crews of the 303d 

Bomb Group discussing the results of a raid on the oil refinery at Halle, Germany, 

March 31,1945. 

with their neutrality, they agreed to keep the forbidden zones strictly confidential in order to keep the Germans from moving additional tempting targets close 

to the Swiss borders. The Swiss, for the purposes of domestic public opinion, 

issued a communiquk after Spaatz’s departure describing the visit in general 

terms. To Marshall, Spaatz reported, “It seems evident to me that with the present restrictions which have been established, plus the fact that the importance 

of these incidents has been most forcibly impressed on our Air Forces, there 

should be little danger of any recurrence of any such violations of Swiss 

sovereignty.”220 Spaatz’s visit satisfied Marshall.221 Both men went back to 

fighting the war. 

Four days after his return from Bern, Spaatz received official word of his 

nomination as a full four-star general with date of rank from March 11, making 

him senior, by one day, to Bradley. The news found him seated at the poker 

table in his headquarters near Paris. Eisenhower’s naval aide, Captain Butcher, 

described Spaatz’s reaction. First, he ordered champagne for the house; then he 

growled, “Come on and dea1.”222 

Arnold had long sought Spaatz’s promotion. In September 1944, he had 

asked Eisenhower to recommend Spaatz for a fourth star.223 Eisenhower turned 

Arnold down, writing, “I can start off by saying that in my opinion there is no 

better all-round air officer than Spaatz. His common sense, loyalty, technical 

578 
VICTORY 

knowledge and complete readiness to cooperate are unexcelled and I wouldn’t 

trade him for any other field commander of the Air Forces that I know.”224 

Eisenhower believed that only the top American officer in a theater should hold 

four-star rank; otherwise the grade would become “spread too far.” 

Eisenhower’s promotion to the newly created five-star rank, General of the 

Army, on December 16, 1944, however, eased his objections to additional fourstar officers. On December 21, he asked Marshall to ask the President to propose 

Bradley and Spaatz for promotion.225 Congress, however, had adjourned. 

Confirmation of any nominations would have to wait. Eisenhower repeated his 

requests on January 12 and 14.226 At Marseilles on January 28, he consulted 

with Marshall, who, about to depart for the conferences at Malta and Yalta, 

agreed to nominate Bradley and Spaatz when the time came. He would not make 

any recommendations to the President, however, until he had decided on what 

other four-star promotions to send fonvard.227 

The same day, Eisenhower told Kuter, “no one could tell him that Tooey 

Spaatz was not the best operational air man in the world.” Kuter passed the assessment along to Arnold, saying that Eisenhower “then qualified his statement by 

saying Tooey was not a paper man, couldn’l write what he wanted, and couldn’t 

conduct himself adequately at a conference, but he had the utmost respect from 

everybody, ground and air, in the Theater.” Kuter also reported Eisenhower’s view 

that Spaatz’s decisions were “sound and he knew exactly what he was doing.”228 

Eventually, Marshall sent his recommendations to Roosevelt. Shortly thereafter, Congress approved them. Spaatz became the fourth most senior officer in 

the Army Air Forces. He ranked below Arnold, a five-star general, and two 

other four-star officers-Joseph T. McNarney, Deputy Supreme Commander in 

the Mediterranean, who had served as Marshall’s deputy; and George C. Kenney, 

MacArthur’s air commander. McNarney and Kenney achieved their four-star rank 

five days and two days, respectively, before Spaatz’s elevation to full general. 

The Eighth operated bombers on twenty-six days in March, dispatching 

1,000 or more bombers on twenty of them.229 On March 15, the Eighth flew a 

special mission at the request of the Manhattan Project, the code name for the 

American atomic bomb program. Intelligence available to the project indicated 

that the Germans were engaged in manufacturing thorium and uranium at 

Oranienburg, a town fifteen miles north of Berlin. Because this town was in the 

projected Soviet zone of occupation and would not therefore be open for 

exploitation by western scientists, the head of the Manhattan Project, Maj. Gen. 

Leslie R. Groves, asked Spaatz to bomb it. The Eighth sent 675 bombers with 

more than 1,400 tons of ordnance against it. Covering the true purpose of its 

mission by attacking the headquarters of the German army in nearby Zossen, the 

Eighth unleashed 672 additional bombers. Both missions succeeded in damaging 

their targets. All above-ground structures of the uranium plant were destroyed 

and the attack at Zossen incapacitated the Chief of the German General Staff, 

General Heinz Guderian.230 

579 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

The Eighth maintained its plans of operation, encountering no substantial 

interference. On March 15, Doolittle reported that only a deficiency of maintenance personnel limited his operations, not the Luftwaffe.231 As the Allied airmen watched the German economy wither under their assaults, they shifted their 

operations to targets not yet bombed to complete devastation. On March 13, 

Spaatz observed to Marshall, “There is much evidence that the German railroad 

system is becoming more and more demoralized, and that their [sic] oil position 

has almost reached the starvation point.”232 The Allies’ land advances in the 

west and the east, their violations of Swiss territory, and their discovery that the 

Germans had begun to shift large numbers of POWs still in their hands to the 

south, forced the Eighth in early March to close “the era of unrestricted strafing,” much to the relief of American fighter pilots, who had suffered most of 

their casualties from light flak on low-level missions. They would now fly specific strafing missions instead of free-lancing.233 

By midmonth, Spaatz informed Washington of a change in priorities: “We 

have our strategic program well in hand and are shifting the emphasis of our 

attacks closer to the Ground Forces, first to help them across the Rhine and then 

to exploit the crossing.”234 At the beginning of April, with the end of German 

resistance clearly in view, Spaatz cautioned his forces against making any mistakes, such as shooting down Allied planes or dropping bombs in the wrong 

places; American and Soviet fighters had engaged in a dogfight on March 18 

with a loss of six Soviet aircraft.235 “Incidents do not get severe criticism when 

the war is intense,” remarked Spaatz, “but as soon as the war is about knocked 

over. . . a small mistake is magnified.”236 

While Spaatz worried about peacetime reactions to what he regarded as 

small mistakes, political leaders concerned themselves with reactions to possible 

major blunders. On March 28, Churchill, in a note to Portal, questioned the need 

for continued area bombing: 

The moment has come when the question of bombing German cities simply for 

the sake of increasing the terror, though under other pretexts should be 

reviewed. Otherwise we shall come into control of an utterly ruined land. The 

destruction of Dresden remains a serious query against the conduct of Allied 

bombing. I am of the opinion that military objectives must henceforward be 

more strictly studied in our own interests rather than that of the enemy. The 

Foreign Secretary has spoken to me on this subject, and I feel the need for more 

precise concentration upon military objectives such as oil and communications 

behind the immediate battle-zone, rather than on mere acts of terror and wanton 

destruction, however impressive.2i7 

This minute, with its implication that the airmen were running amok, rocked 

Portal, who found it unacceptable.238 Given Churchill’s support of Harris’s 

methods throughout the war and his bullying of the Air Staff into bombing east 

German cities, one of which, he was specifically informed would be Dresden, 

the minute seemed at best churlish and at worst an attempt to shift the entire 

580 
VICTORY 

responsibility for the policy of area bombing from civilian to military leadership. 

Portal suggested that Churchill withdraw the minute.239 

Portal also asked Bottomley to obtain Harris’s comments immediately. 

Bottomley wrote of Churchill’s note to Harris, “I am sure you will agree that [it] 

misinterprets the purpose of our attacks on industrial areas in the past, and 

appears to ignore the aim given by the Combined Chiefs of Staff in their directives which have been blessed by the Heads of Government.”240 

Harris, after three years of implementing official policy, erupted in anger. 

He termed Churchill’s note “abusive” and “an insult both to the bombing policy 

of the Air Ministry and to the manner in which that policy has been executed by 

Bomber Command.” As for Dresden, Harris commented, 

The feeling, such as there is, over Dresden, could be easily explained by any 

psychiatrist. It is connected with German bands and Dresden shepherdesses. 

Actually, Dresden was a mass of munitions works, an intact government centre, 

and a key transportation point to the East. It is none of those things now. 

Not satisfied with that observation, Harris argued that area bombing ought to 

continue precisely because the Germans no longer had the ability to recover 

from it, adding: 

I therefore assume that the view under consideration is something like this: no 

doubt in the past we were justified in attacking German cities. But to do so was 

always repugnant and now that the Germans are beaten anyway we can properly abstain from proceeding with these attacks. 

He also said that he could never agree to such reasoning: 

Attacks on cities like any other act of war are intolerable unless they are strategically justified. But they are strategically justified in so far as they tend to 

shorten the war and so preserve the lives of Allied soldiers. To my mind, we 

have absolutely no right to give them up unless it is certain that they will not 

have that effect. 

Harris then paraphrased Bismarck, “I do not personally regard the whole of the 

remaining cities of Germany as worth the bones of one British Grenadier.” 

Besides, he pointed out, technical factors, such as a shortage of high-explosive 

bombs but ample supplies of incendiaries also meant either continuing area 

bombing or standing down the entire force. Finally, Harris mentioned Japan. 

“Are we going to bomb their cities flat” to help the army? Or are we going to 

bomb only their outlying factories, largely underground by the time we get 

going, and subsequently invade at the cost of 3 to 6 million casualties?”241 

On March 30, Churchill withdrew the original minute, substituting on 

April 1 a much milder one that merely requested the Air Staff to investigate 

whether “our attacks do more harm to ourselves in the long run than they do to 

the enemy’s immediate war effort.”242 On April 4, Portal replied that “at this 

advanced stage of the war no great or immediate additional advantage can be 

58 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

expected from the attack of the remaining industrial centres of Germany.”243 

The Air Staff, however, did reserve the right to use area bombing to assist the 

advance of the Allied armies or to meet any stiffened German resistance. The 

Air Staff recommended no change in current strategic directives. USSTAF’s 

comment on the British discontinuation of area bombing revealed the contradictions in its own policies: “The U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe have not at 

any time had a policy of making area bombing attacks upon German cities. Even 

our attacks against the Berlin area were always directed against military objectives.” However, USSTAF acknowledged that “our Pathfinder [H2X] attacks 

against communications centers have often resulted in an area type of bombing 

because of the inaccuracy of this type of bombing.”244 

By the beginning of April, the question of continuing to engage in area 

bombing or, indeed, of even going on with the strategic bomber offensive had 

become moot. The Allied airmen could scarcely find a strategic target in the 

detritus of the Nazi state that justified the expense of attack. 

By April 5, USSTAF acknowledged that, except for U-boat yards, all targets 

“should now be regarded as tactical targets.” Of the tactical targets, USSTAF 

accorded first priority to the Luftwaffe and second priority to communications 

centers in central and southern Germany.245 This change in emphasis did not 

affect the pace of operations: USSTAF heavy bombers flew on nineteen of the 

first twenty-five days of the month, dropping 46,628 tons of bombs mostly on 

marshaling yards (17,006 tons, less than 10 percent incendiaries), airfields 

(8,597 tons), and in ground support (10,885 tons).246 

On April 10, Tedder, noting that the strategic air forces had agreed that their 

primary objective was now direct support of the land campaign, requested 

Spaatz to put full effort on enemy rail communications, especially those in central Germany.247 Apparently Tedder and Eisenhower hoped to prevent effective 

north-to-south as well as west-to-east transfers of German men and matkriel. 

Spaatz ordered Doolittle to give enemy communications top priority and push 

airfield bombing back a notch. Spaatz added hopefully, “Wherever suitable, 

CLARION low altitude, small formation technique should be used to obtain maximum effectiveness.”248 

At last, on April 12, Spaatz and Bottomley, after consulting Tedder, agreed on 

a final directive, Strategic Directive No. 4, which brought the strategic air war in 

Europe to a close. The top priority mission of the strategic air forces was “to give 

direct assistance to the land campaign.” Operations to support the Soviet armies 

would occur only if directly requested by the Soviet High Command. Second priority went to oil supplies, particularly gasoline in storage depots, enemy lines of 

communications, and “such other missions as may be requested by the Supreme 

Commanders.” The directive next allowed policing attacks against the Luftwaffe 

and provided that the marginal effort would remain concentrated on U-boats. The 

area bombing catchall category “Important Industrial Areas” disappeared, as did 

the requirement to support clandestine intelligence activities.249 

582 
War’s End. Top to bottom: General Henry H. Arnold, General Carl A. Spaatz, and 

Lt. Gen. Hoyt S. Vandenberg celebrate victory at decoration ceremonies in 

Luxembourg on April 7, 1945; General Eisenhower and Prime Minister Churchill 

share a joke in the final days of the conflict; and General Carl A. Spaatz, Commanding General, U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, and General Jean de Lattre de 

Tassigny, Commanding General, First French Army, sign the German surrender to 

the Soviet Union in Berlin as observers for their countries, early on the morning of 

May 9,1945. 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Four days later, Spaatz formally signaled the end of the strategic effort to 

Doolittle and Twining: 

The advances of the Ground Forces have brought to a close the Strategic Air 

War waged by the United States Strategic Air Forces and the Royal Air Force 

Bomber Command. It has been won with a decisiveness becoming increasingly 

evident as our armies overrun Germany. From now on, our Strategic Air Forces 

must operate with our Tactical Air Forces in close cooperation with our 

armies.250 

On April 25, 1945, the Eighth Air Force sent out its last European bombardment 

mission. Mission no. 968 dispatched 589 B-17s and B-24s, 554 of which, using 

visual methods, unloaded 1,386 tons on the Skoda arms plant and airfields at 

Pilsen, Czechoslovakia, and on marshaling yards at Salzburg, Bad Reichenhall, 

and Hallein. The B-17s attacking Pilsen lost 6 bombers to enemy action and 

wrote off 4 more as not repairable.251 The same day the Fifteenth sent 519 

heavy bombers to Linz, losing 15. On April 26, the Fifteenth dispatched the last 

U.S. heavy-bomber mission over greater Germany to bomb targets near Klagenfurt 

in the Austrian Alps. 

The AAF in Europe and Spaatz had fought their way down a long, hard road 

from the tentative publicity mission on July 4, 1942, and the first heavy-bomber 

mission over the Rouen marshaling yards on August 17, 1942. The Luftwaffe 

had countered their operations until the very last. The Eighth lost 266 bombers 

(63 to fighters) in March 1945 and 190 more (72 to fighters) in April252 while 

the Fifteenth lost 149 bombers (7 to fighters) in March and 83 (none to fighters) 

in Apri1.253 As late as April 10, when the Eighth made its last raid on the Berlin 

area, German jets shot down 10 bombers, their highest single day’s to11.254 

The war in Europe had not yet ended for Spaatz. After witnessing the 

German surrender to the British and Americans at Reims on May 7, at Eisenhower’s behest, he accompanied Tedder to Berlin for the German surrender to 

the Soviets. The C-47 carrying Tedder, Spaatz, French General Jean de Lattre de 

Tassigny, their assistants, and press representatives, left Reims airfield at 

8:25 A.M. on May 8 and landed first at an ex-Luftwaffe field held by the Americans at Stendal, near the Elbe River. For an hour they poked about the field littered with about 150 derelict German planes in various stages of disrepair. 

When the Soviet fighter escort arrived, they flew on to Berlin. A half-hour later, 

they arrived over Berlin; the city was cloaked in haze and smoke from stillsmoldering buildings. The destruction, they testified, was awesome.255 

After reviewing a Soviet honor guard at Tempelhof airfield, they boarded 

confiscated German automobiles and drove through the outskirts of the city to 

Karlshorst, a suburb in the northeast. Their route led through numerous former 

German roadblocks. The Soviets, afraid of snipers, had cleared all Germans 

from the area. For the most part the company rode in deathly silence. 

Once they arrived, most of the party sat while Tedder, Soviet Marshal 

584 
VICTORY 

Zhukov, and other Soviet functionaries debated armistice terms. Tedder had 

brought a draft instrument of surrender similar to the one signed at Reims. For 

the next twelve hours, the Soviets tediously contested every outstanding issue 

with Tedder. At first, they refused to allow either Spaatz or de Lattre de Tassigny 

to sign but eventually relented. At 11:OO P.M., the Soviets presented the terms to 

the German plenipotentiaries, headed by Field Marshal Keitel, who signed after 

some momentary and pointless haggling.256 

Pandemonium broke loose as Soviet photographers practically mobbed the 

participants. After the signing, the Germans departed, while the Soviets laid out 

a banquet, with bottles of champagne, red wine, white wine, brandy, and vodka 

beside each plate. Toast followed toast, shots of vodka followed shots of vodka. 

Several celebrants succumbed to alcohol; one of these was Butcher, who afterwards couldn’t even remember the next few hours. Later that morning, at 

Tedder’s request, the party returned to Tempelhof directly through the heart of 

Berlin so that they could take a fuller measure of the German defeat. Then they 

returned to Reims. Spaatz had finished his part in the war against Germany. 

585 

Chapter 16 

An Assessment 

In the final phase of the war, when air superiority had been 

achieved, the potential of the strategic air offensive was 

greater than its achievement. This was primarily due to the 

difficulty of obtaining a unified and concentrated policy 

through the channels of divided command and in the conditions of divided opinion.' 

4fficial British history of the bomber offensive, 1961 

Of all the accomplishments of the air forces, the attainment 

of air supremacy was the most significant, for it made possible the invasions of the continent and gave the heavy 

bombers their opportunity to wreck the industries of the 

Reich.z 

4fficial AAF history of World War II, 1951 

Because of Spaatz's close wartime association with strategic bombing, any 

assessment of his role in the air war in Europe of necessity becomes an analysis 

of the Anglo-American strategic bombing campaign against Germany. The bald 

facts concerning that offensive have remained undisputed for over forty years. 

The heavy bombers of the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces flew 488,065 sorties, 

their fighters an additional 350,864. The two air forces dropped 1,005,729 tons 

of bombs, 28 percent of them on marshaling yards, 13 percent of them (133,807) 

on oil targets, 18 percent on aircraft targets, and the remaining 41 percent on 

lower priority targets. They claimed 15,426 German aircraft destroyed in the air, 

8,435 by heavy bombers, and lost 8,759 heavy bombers and 3,546 fighters.3 The 

AAF in the European and Mediterranean Theaters lost 35,844 men dead, 13,727 

wounded, 33,414 captured or interned, and 5,958 missing. U.S. Navy and 

Marine battle dead for all theaters totaled 36,950 and 19,733 respectively.4 The 

British Royal Air Force Bomber Command dropped an additional 1,047,412 

587 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

tons of bombs5 and lost 8,325 bombers and 55,573 personnel.6 Given the comparable quality of the manpower involved, Bomber Command's dead exceeded the 

number of British Empire officers killed in World War I by 40 percent.7 From 

October 1939 through May 1945, the RAF and the two U.S. strategic air forces 

dropped 543,054 tons of bombs (31 percent of them incendiaries) in raids 

specifically directed against the sixty-one German cities with populations 

exceeding 100,000. The strategic bombing campaign, at a minimum, killed 

250,000 people and left 7,500,000 homeless.8 Tactical Allied bombing in 

Germany added 55,000 more dead and 360,000 wounded.9 Allied air power 

destroyed 3,600,000 dwelling units, 20 percent of the German total. Overall, 

Anglo-American air power in Europe dropped 2,700,000 tons of bombs, flew 

1,440,000 bomber sorties and 2,680,000 fighter sorties, and reached peaks of 

1,300,000 men and 28,000 aircraft in combat commands.10 

Spaatz drove home a strategic air offensive that had faltered from lack of 

resources. From January 1, 1944, through May 8, 1945, he wielded a weapon of 

frightful power. That a single modern strategic multiple warhead missile, or a 

nuclear missile submarine, or a strategic bomber can each carry several times the 

one megaton dropped by USSTAF in no way diminishes the issues raised by 

Spaatz's direction of the U.S. strategic bomber offensive. He more than any 

other person must bear the responsibility and consequences for the application 

of U.S. strategic air power to Germany. 

Some analysts have criticized the selection of targets. Maj. Gen. Haywood 

S. Hansell, Jr., one of the AAF's chief strategic and targeting planners, who participated in both AWPD/1 and AWPD/42 and led a B-29 bomber command 

against Japan, has faulted the failure to bomb the eight grinding-wheel manufacturing plants" and electric power generation network.11 The United States 

Strategic Bombing Survey suggested that an investment of 12,000 to 15,000 

tons per month on German transportation targets beginning in February 1944 

instead of September 1944 would have caused the German war economy to collapse months earlier, in time for the effect of that collapse to be fully felt by the 

troops at the front. Although such arguments presuppose more detailed intelligence and more accurate intelligence evaluation than were available, their proponents were correct in concluding that the strategic bombing effort could have 

been employed more efficiently, but only if Spaatz had been free to operate in a 

vacuum, with no necessity to respond to the bureaucratic, institutional, and operational forces surrounding him. 

From March through July 1944, the needs of OVERLORD and the beachhead 

undermined USSTAF's ability to conduct unfettered strategic bombing. Once 

Spaatz and Doolittle had obtained a measure of air superiority through their 

aggressive use of long-range escort fighters, the all-consuming bureaucratic bat- 

* The loss of abrasive grinding wheels would have crippled the German armaments industry by 

denying it the ability to machine metal castings such as gun barrels, shells, and crankshafts. 

588 
ASSESSMENT 

tle between the oil and transportation plans began. Having committed himself to 

the oil plan, Spaatz could hardly shift gears by pointing to other target systems 

even more likely to bring the Nazis to heel without appearing fickle or foolish. 

CROSSBOW bombing, a requirement imposed on the strategic bombers by British 

domestic political considerations, was by far the biggest waste of blood, aircraft, 

and bombs of the entire strategic campaign. 

In the summer of 1944, USSTAF crushed the German oil industry and, by 

September 14, was able to bomb where it willed, but nature robbed the strategic 

bombing campaign of its opportunity. Four months of bad weather did not provide enough days of visual bombing to strike and restrike, if necessary, the oil 

plants, let alone other target systems requiring precise bombing. Bad weather 

forced Spaatz to condone transportation attacks on major urban marshaling yards 

which razed the yards and the towns, strangled the Reichsbahn in its own rolling 

stock, and wrecked the German war economy. By the end of January 1945 no 

new industrial target system would have made a significant difference. 

On the basis of performance, the American strategic bombing campaign fulfilled three-quarters of the Casablanca directive: it brought about “the progressive destruction and dislocation of the German military, industrial, and economic 

system;” it did not, however, undermine the morale of the German people. The 

oil campaign of the summer of 1944 was the fulfillment of the prewar doctrines 

of precision bombardment. American strategic bombers selected an indispensable military target system (oil shortages had a far greater effect on German 

armed forces than on German industry), attacked it by visual means, and brought 

aviation gasoline production to a virtual halt by September 1944. That was what 

American heavy bombers were supposed to do. 

The transportation campaign demonstrated the triumph of wartime necessity 

over prewar theory. Spaatz had produced an almost all-weather force of limited 

accuracy. The constant cloud cover during the autumn of 1944 negated any hope 

of consistent precision bombing-hence the selection of the marshaling yards, a 

target system of more economic than military importance. Any significant breakdown of the German wartime economy would eventually have dramatic consequences at the front line. Employing bombing-through-clouds techniques, often 

partially assisted by visual means, USSTAF bombed out the marshaling yards, 

wrecked the coal transportation nexus, and brought German industry to its knees. 

The U.S. strategic bombing effort inflicted severe, if not fatal, damage to the 

German military and German war economy. Independently, the effort did not 

defeat Germany, as air power advocates had hoped. The slow buildup of forces, 

thanks in part to the bottleneck in Anglo-American shipping availability, the 

diversion of strength to the Pacific and the Mediterranean, operational difficulties, intelligence errors that led to overestimation of damage inflicted, and 

debates concerning targeting prevented the most efficient application of air 

power to crucial sectors of the German war economy. However, what the bombing did accomplish was substantial in contributing to Germany’s defeat. The 

589 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Anglo-American bombing offensive brought the war to the German people long 

before their armies were forced back onto German soil. In a war in which the 

effort of civilian workers on the production lines was as essential to victory as 

the fighting of soldiers on the front lines, the very existence of the strategic 

bombing offensive encouraged U.S. and British civilians and inflicted pain and 

suffering on the enemy. The British may have devoted 40 to 50 percent of their 

total war production to the air forces; the U.S. expended up to 35 percent; and 

the Germans up to 40 percent. German war production increased throughout the 

war, reaching its peak in the third quarter of 1944. Strategic air bombardment 

undoubtedly kept that increase from going higher still. It forced the dispersion of 

factories and the building of underground facilities, made German production 

more vulnerable to transportation disruption, lowered production by forcing 

smaller, more labor-intensive production units which denied the Germans the 

manufacturing economies of scale available to their enemies, disorganized workers’ lives, and probably lowered their productivity. In ways great and smalland utterly incalculable-strategic bombing made German war production less 

efficient and less effective than it would have been if the bombers had not flown 

night after night and day after day. 

Strategic bombing also forced the Germans into an enormous defense and 

reconstruction effort, diverting their aircraft manufacture almost exclusively into 

fighter and interceptor production. The bombing of oil not only limited mobility 

but, as a side effect, also greatly reduced nitrogen production, hampering the 

manufacture of explosives and fertilizers. By 1944 Germany had two million 

soldiers, civilians, and prisoners of war engaged in ground antiaircraft defense, 

more than the total number of workers in its aircraft industry. An additional million workers were engaged in repair and rebuilding; the oil industry alone 

absorbed a quarter of a million. Speer estimated that 30 percent of total gun output and 20 percent of heavy ammunition output was intended for air defense, a 

significant loss to the ground forces of high velocity weapons suitable for antitank defense. Speer further estimated that 50 percent of electrotechnical production and one-third of the optical industry was devoted to radar and signals 

equipment for the antiaircraft effort, further starving the front lines of essential 

communications equipment. 12 

The Allied strategic bombing effort could not reasonably have been expected 

to do more. It vindicated the treasure expended on it. If in the final analysis it 

accomplished its ends more by brute force than by elegant precision, the fault lay 

in the unrealistic assumptions of prewar doctrine as to wartime accuracy, 

European weather, and radar technology. The AAF was fortunate that the great 

mass of bombers that arrived in Europe in 1944 were accompanied by large 

numbers of long-range escort fighters. If production, shipping, and manpower 

had allowed those bombers to arrive six months earlier, they might well have 

been impaled on the German air defense system. 

Strategic bombing did not achieve the last task imposed by the Casablanca 

590 
ASSESSMENT 

directive: undermining “the morale of the German people to a point where their 

capacity for armed resistance” was fatally weakened. In its pursuit of that goal, 

chiefly by means of city or area bombing, Allied strategic bombing raised questions of moral and ethical significance. During the war, area bombing was questioned on the floor of Parliament, first by the bishop of Chichester in February 

1944, and then by Richard Stokes in March 1945. Twenty-five years ago David 

Irving resurrected the ghosts of Dresden. One recent critic has written of the 

“evil of American bombing,” calling it a “sin of a peculiarly modem kind because 

it seemed so inadvertent, seemed to have involved so little choice.”l3 Another has 

noted, “The most important factor moving the AAF toward Douhetian war was 

the attitude of the country’s top civilian and military leaders,” specifically blaming Arnold, Marshall, Eisenhower, Lovett, Stimson, and Roosevelt, but not 

Spaatz, as responsible for the shift to area bombing.14 These critics and many 

others have recoiled at a policy that resulted in the death of more than 300,000 

persons. 

It was the RAF that conducted most of the area bombing and, like the AAF, 

the RAF resorted to it because weaknesses in its operational technique left it no 

choice. Bomber Command persisted in area bombing after it had developed an 

accuracy surpassing even visual bombing, as practiced by USSTAF. To belabor 

the enemy with the only weapon available was one thing, but to continue to use 

it when better means were at hand delayed the end of the war and needlessly 

killed tens of thousands. If the RAF earned any blame for its conduct of the air 

war, it was for its area bombing conducted after June 1944. 

In the autumn of 1944 and the following winter, the AAF also turned to city 

bombing, ostensibly to destroy the rail yards. Lowering of morale, although seldom mentioned, was almost certainly an added and hoped-for consequence. In 

contrast to RAF bombing, AAF nonvisual bombing never became particularly 

accurate. Arnold, Lovett, Spaatz, Eisenhower, and Marshall knew that bombingthrough-overcast techniques produced wildly imprecise results. If Stimson and 

Roosevelt did not know, it was because they did not ask. However wrong it may 

have been, the AAF’s area bombing hastened the war’s end. 

The RAF killed its hundreds of thousands, the AAF its tens of thousands. 

But opprobrium cannot be added up in a ledger book with exact amounts entered 

in each account. To whom should one assign the guilt for the 125,000 German 

civilians killed during the Russian storming of Berlin?Is How should one weigh 

the murder of 325,000 Jews by the SS at the Treblinka death camp between July 

28 and September 21, 1942?16 To those who accepted the truism that two 

wrongs never make a right, then nothing can excuse the area bombing of the 

Allied strategic campaign no matter how evil the German state. At the other 

extreme, those who believed that any means justified the end find nothing abhorrent in area bombing. Between those opinions lies a vast middle ground. Area 

bombing cannot be examined as a separate, unique phenomenon judged only by 

numbers of missions flown and bombs dropped versus people killed. A more 

591 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

valid yardstick would be the extent to which the action contributed to ending the 

war as quickly as possible with minimum loss of life. 

Placed in the context of the entire war against the European Axis, area bombing caused more civilian casualties than any other type of warfare employed by the 

British and American Allies, but area bombing-the bombing of rail yards is an 

exception-did not decisively influence the war’s outcome. Hence area bombing 

failed on both military and humanitarian grounds: it did not shorten the war and 

it took lives unnecessarily. 

For three years Spaatz commanded AAF units that were either destined for 

or serving in the war against the European Axis. From the start, on his assumption of command of the Eighth Air Force on May 10, 1942, almost until the 

German surrender in Berlin on May 9, 1945, his responsibilities grew. From the 

command of an incompletely trained force of five groups, his authority increased 

until he controlled, in one way or another, an armada of four air forces made up of 

135 groups, including 61 heavy-bomber groups and 42 fighter groups. On 

February 1, 1945, Eisenhower rated Spaatz and Bradley equally as the two 

American general officers in the Combined European and Mediterranean Theaters 

of Operation who had rendered the most valuable service in the war against the 

Germans. Of Spaatz, he commented, “Experienced and able air leader; loyal and 

cooperative; modest and selfless; always reliable.”l7 Bradley prepared a similar 

list on December 1, 1944; he ranked Spaatz second, after Bedell Smith.18 Spaatz’s 

subordinates appreciated him as well. Years after the war Doolittle observed, 

1 suppose if it were possible for one man to love another man, I love Gen. 

Spaatz. I guess it’s . . . better. . . [to say] that I idolize Gen. Spaatz. He is perhaps the only man that I have ever been closely associated with whom I have 

never known to make a bad decision.” 

According to Doolittle, it was soundness of judgment that earned Spaatz Eisenhower’s trust.19 

Spaatz must be ranked as one of the premier airmen of World War I1 with 

Harris and Tedder. Spaatz commanded the largest heavy-bomber force of all 

time at the same time he had de facto control over two large tactical air forces. 

No other airman of the war had so vast an operational responsibility. His combined force was three times larger than that commanded by Harris, the British 

strategic bomber commander. Like Harris, Spaatz eventually resorted to a type 

of area bombing, but never with the unseemly relish of his British counterpart. 

Spaatz’s effort was directed at a particular target system, rail yards, unlike 

Harris’s which was aimed at the broad target category of industrial areas. 

Although Spaatz was more cooperative with his superiors than Harris, he did not 

gain the amount of respect and admiration from the air crews that Harris didprobably because he eschewed the limelight. No government-sponsored press 

campaign extolled his efforts at the head of his command. Spaatz did not have 

the depth of strategic vision or the intellectual bent of Tedder, but he proved a 

592 
ASSESSMENT 

good coalition soldier, and his advocacy of oil was as great a factor in Germany’s 

defeat as Tedder’s advocacy of transportation. 

Coningham, Leigh-Mallory, and Eaker must rank below Spaatz. None of 

them commanded a force of comparable size. The first two were far too 

parochial in their views, and their difficult personalities did not fit them for 

larger roles. Eaker had abilities different from but equal to Spaatz’s. He was 

more outgoing, articulate, and technologically interested in his trade. Eaker 

made an excellent coalition soldier, cooperating loyally with Wilson and Slessor 

in the Mediterranean. From November 1942 to December 1943, no one could 

have done better than, and few as well as, he did as commander of the Eighth 

Air Force. Eaker was almost as close to Arnold as Spaatz was. What he didn’t 

have was Spaatz’s luck. Eaker was the right man at the right place at the wrong 

time. He lacked the bombers and crews, long-range escort fighters, drop tanks, 

and H2X radar sets his successor had in abundance. Spaatz would have done no 

better and would have suffered the same inevitable defeat over Schweinfurt, but 

he probably would have outlasted Eaker, by virtue of his stronger relationship 

with Arnold, by about two months-long enough to get to Big Week and to stay 

in command for the rest of the war. Ira Eaker knew his business, but in some 

indefinable way he lacked Spaatz’s “fire in the gut” and the ability to extract the 

last ounce of effort from his force or to stand up to Arnold. 

By the time the United States entered World War 11, Spaatz had a set of 

fixed character traits, firm beliefs, and over three decades’ experience as a military aviator, all of which greatly influenced his subsequent career. He was a 

drinker and gambler before and during the war. His personal correspondence is 

heavily laced with liquor bills and gambling checks. Like Churchill, he apparently had a large capacity for alcohol. There is no evidence whatsoever, however, of errors in judgment or decorum attributable to indulgence in spirits. Nor 

were there any whispers of overindulgence, such as those that plagued Ulysses 

S. Grant before and after the Battle of Shiloh. Spaatz’s gambling for relatively 

high stakes had no effect on the conduct of his command. (He seems to have 

broken even over the long term.) 

Spaatz had a quick mind and did not suffer fools gladly. He was taciturn and 

shy in public. As a result, he abhored staff meetings and the day-to-day minutiae 

of a vast headquarters. He surrounded himself with men he knew and trusted 

who screened out unimportant details and kept them from reaching his desk. 

This distaste for staff routine dovetailed neatly with the ways he relaxed-playing cards, darts, and guitar in his headquarters’ houses. 

Spaatz’s methods left him open to charges of cronyism. Many key members 

of his headquarters/household were World War I retreads; some had even 

trained under him at Issoudun. His chief of staff, Edward P. Curtis, and his 

director of intelligence, George C. McDonald, had both been fighter pilots in 

World War I. Each had several credited victories for shooting down German 

planes. Spaatz fought to obtain high rank for those men and others such as 

593 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Doolittle, Vandenberg, and Norstad. He did much for his friends, but he also 

chose wisely. Spaatz naturally promoted people he knew well, but he also knew 

them to be competent and capable of handling greater responsibility. 

Similarly, Spaatz benefited from his close personal relationship with Arnold. 

In the small prewar Air Corps, they served together several times; chance and personal chemistry made them friends. In those years Arnold had the opportunity to 

gauge Spaatz’s operational competence, reliability, loyalty, and dedication to the 

cause of air autonomy. Consequently, as Arnold rose in position, he gave Spaatz 

increasing responsibility. Spaatz was Arnold’s favorite. Arnold repeatedly 

placed him in positions, such as Air Corps Plans Section Chief, Special Observer 

to England, and Chief of the Air Staff, which challenged him and gave him the 

chance to prepare for the coming war as well as to advance his career. Without 

Arnold, Spaatz would not have been in the right place at the right time. Arnold 

deserves full credit for having the judgment and foresight to back Spaatz, but 

Spaatz deserves equal credit for the manner in which he fulfilled Arnold’s expectations. One need only to look at the way Arnold treated his other favorite, Ira 

Eaker, to realize that he valued achievement over friendship. If Spaatz had failed 

to perform, Arnold would surely have put him aside, too. 

Spaatz, strengthened by Arnold’s abiding friendship and support, was able 

to resist the demands of the British, the ground forces, transportation plan advocates, and others to divert his resources from daylight strategic bombing and 

autonomy for the AAF. Their relationship eased Spaatz’s administrative tasks. 

Although Arnold on occasion might gibe at his handling of men and materiel, 

each had faith that the other was doing his utmost and was doing it competently. 

Spaatz was lucky to have Arnold’s friendship and to return to Britain when supplies had begun to arrive in abundance. Good luck, however, was also the 

residue of skill. Without character and ability Spaatz could scarcely have performed so well in his climb to the heights. 

At the beginning of the war, Spaatz, as did many senior Army Air Force 

officers, espoused particular doctrines associated with daylight precision bombing and advocated the creation of U.S. military aviation as an independent service equal to the Army and the Navy. These views, which did not change, 

colored most of his wartime decisions. His years of experience with mossbacked 

ground force and naval officers and his own ignorance of and antipathy toward 

ground matters gave him little appreciation of military problems other than those 

dealing directly with air. Spaatz did poorly at Leavenworth; the curriculum of its 

Command and General Staff School concentrated almost solely on ground problems. 

Spaatz’s judgment was not infallible. Passionate beliefs in the doctrine of 

precision bombing and in the independence of air power served him well in the 

great strategic debates revolving around air power, but they limited his ability to 

judge questions affecting the combined roles of all the services. He opposed the 

North African invasion because it weakened and delayed the strategic offensive 

594 
ASSESSMENT 

against Germany. He shared an unwarranted optimism with Eisenhower and 

Eisenhower’s staff as to the feasibility of an invasion of France in 1942 or 1943. 

Given the poor initial performance of U.S. forces in French North Africa and the 

far greater resources that would have been available to the German defenders, 

such an invasion could only have resulted in disaster-as the British, based on 

their intelligence, argued. Even in mid-1943 Spaatz so overrated the effectiveness of his bombers that he ,boasted to Arnold that he could defeat Germany if 

only he could consistently get 200 heavy bombers airborne for each mission. 

Two years later, six or seven times that number could still not bring about 

Germany’s fall without the help of a tremendous ground campaign. 

Spaatz’s appreciation of OVERLORD was flawed as well. As an airman he 

doubted that the resources and matCriel expended on it justified its cost. He mistrusted the ground forces’ fighting capacity-without the support of facts. 

Similarly, in the operations before the Normandy breakout, he and the other airmen failed to understand fully the problems faced by the Army. Their criticisms 

and constant prodding for action did them little credit. Spaatz’s suggestion to 

U.S. Ambassor to Britain John G. Winant, in February 1944, of a thrust through 

Norway and Sweden might have brought his heavy bombers closer to Germany, 

but it still left the ground forces a sea away. Spaatz’s earlier suggestion to Hopkins, 

in November 1943, to seize northern Italy would have advanced the bombers but 

would have left the ground forces confronted with the difficulties of mounting a 

major campaign across the Alps. 

Although Spaatz could not view strategy broadly because of his ignorance of 

geopolitics and his dismissal of the ground forces’ perspective, he could, 

because of his expertise, bring great insight to the selection of bombing targets. 

The issue of the transportation plan versus the oil plan was such a complex skein 

of conflicting priorities and personalities that it defied a simple answer. Spaatz 

was undoubtedly correct in his contentions that the heavy-bomber offensive 

would gain air superiority over western Europe by defeating the Luftwaffe over 

Germany and that the Luftwaffe would only fight to defend vital targets within 

Germany. 

It does not follow from those contentions, however, that an attack directed 

against German tactical mobility in France was unnecessary or required no 

assistance from the heavy bombers. The transportation plan in its original form, 

which required massive air strikes from both Bomber Command and the Eighth 

Air Force, would probably have damaged the French railway system enough to 

seriously delay German reinforcements bound for Normandy. But the plan could 

not guarantee air superiority, and it implied that U.S. heavy bombers would 

serve under a British commander who did not sufficiently value strategic bombardment. Predictably, Spaatz rejected it out of hand. Even if his and LeighMallory ’s personalities had meshed perfectly, he would have fought the plan 

because of its mishandling of strategic bombers and stifling of AAF pretensions 

to autonomy. Spaatz’s fight against the transportation plan delayed its imposi595 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

tion and resulted in its modification. As a result, attritional air battles over 

Germany were ensured and an effective bridge-busting campaign was launched, 

which, even the transportation plan’s supporters admitted, added to its success. 

The oil plan, as all observers recognized, was Spaatz’s finest moment. It 

ruined the Luftwaffe as a viable air force and dashed the weapon of mobility 

from the hands of the German ground forces. He selected a compact, crucial, 

vulnerable system of targets and pursued it relentlessly. Unfortunately, the oil 

campaign was only one of two such efforts mounted by the strategic bomber 

forces; Harris pursued his area bombing of German cities with equal tenacity. 

Spaatz’s experiences in training and operations made him an excellent combat 

commander. Building on the foundation prepared by Eaker, Spaatz established the 

Eighth Air Force in Britain. He did not commit it to action until he was sure that 

he had at least trained it adequately, building on the little it had been given in the 

States. Similarly, in North Africa, he set up the Northwest African Training 

Command to bring his crews closer to the standards of his Allies and opponents. 

Yet his insistence on thorough training for and maximum performance by his air 

crews led directly to the ultimate irony of the strategic campaign. 

Given the technology available to him, Spaatz helped to produce a nearly 

all-weather force. He used the most modem radar, employed electronic countermeasures, took full advantage of ULTRA, and pushed his commanders and their 

men and machines to their limits in order to exploit all the force available to 

him. Once he had created this available force, it had to be employed. Spaatz, 

who violently objected to the killing of French civilians, sanctioned the bombing 

of transportation centers in eastern Germany, the smashing of rail stations in 

Berlin, and the demolition of marshaling yards in numerous German cities. He 

did not relish destruction for destruction’s sake: rather he fxed the problem of 

how to wield an expanding force of limited accuracy against an opponent who 

had large reserves of manpower (slave labor, women, and domestic servants) 

and machine tools (most German industry worked single shifts for much of the 

war and had ample stocks of machine tools on hand) without causing excessive 

or unnecessary collateral damage. To Spaatz, to most of his fellow soldiers, to 

his government, and to the people his government represented it was better to err 

on the side of excessive force by pulverizing the Reich, than to leave it the 

strength to resist and to kill more Allied soldiers. In the merciless logic of total 

war, Spaatz decided correctly. 

Without Spaatz and his insistence on the oil plan and his devastating campaign against the Luftwaffe before the Normandy invasion, the Allies would still 

have defeated Nazi Germany. With Spaatz, the Allies defeated Hitler and his 

henchmen months earlier than they otherwise might have. Each day beyond May 

8 would have seen the ovens of the Third Reich still operating and the combatants of both sides still suffering in battle lines throughout Europe. That the war 

in Europe ended when it did is reason enough to place Spaatz in the front rank of 

the Allied leaders of World War 11. 

596 
* * * * 

Although Spaatz’s war in Europe ended with the German surrender in 

Berlin, his service to his country continued. On July 29, 1945, he arrived 

on the island of Guam to assume command of the U.S. Strategic Air 

Forces in the Pacific, which included the Mariana Islands-based 

Twentieth Air Force, under Lt. Gen. Nathan F. Twining, and the Eighth 

Air Force, still under Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle and soon to be based 

on the island of Okinawa. After receiving authorization from President 

Harry S. Truman and General George C. Marshall, Spaatz ordered the 

dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Three weeks 

later, on September 1, 1945, Spaatz stood on the deck of the USS 

Missouri to witness the surrender of the last of the Axis powers. He was 

the only U.S. military officer to attend all three surrenders, the first in 

Reims, the second in Berlin, and the third in Tokyo Bay. After the war, 

Spaatz succeeded General Henry H. Arnold as Commanding General, 

U.S. Army Air Forces. From that post he directed the AAF’s campaign to 

separate itself from the Army. When the U.S. Air Force was established 

by Congress in September 1947, Spaatz became its first Chief of Staff. 

He retired in April 1948. Shortly thereafter, he became a columnist on 

military matters for Newsweek magazine. He worked for Newsweek until 

1961, when, at the age of seventy, he retired again. Spaatz died on July 

14, 1974. He is buried at the U.S. Air Force Academy, whose site he 

helped to select, in Colorado Springs, Colorado. 

597 

Statistical Appendices 
Source for all Statistical Appendices: Army Air Forces Statistical Digest, World War I1 

(Washington, D.C.: Office of Statistical Control, 1945). 
Appendix 1 

Aviation Personnel in the Army 

(Percent of Total Army Strength) 

Y&U 

1912 (1 Nov) 

1913 (30 Sep) 

1914 

1915 

1916 

1917 (6 Apr) 

1918 (11 Nov) 

1919 

1920 

1921 

1922 

1923 

1924 

1925 

1926 

1927 

1928 

1929 

1930 

193 1 

1932 

1933 

1934 

1935 

1936 

1937 

1938 

1939 

1940 

1941 

1942 

1943 

1944 

1945 

Number 

51 

114 

122 

208 

311 

1,218 

195,023 

25,603 

9,050 

11,649 

9,642 

9,441 

10,547 

9,670 

9,674 

10,008 

10,549 

12,131 

13,531 

14,780 

15,028 

15,099 

15,861 

16,427 

17,233 

19,147 

21,089 

23,455 

51,165 

152,125 

764,415 

2,197,114 

2,372,292 

2,282,259 

Percent 

of Total 

0.1 

0.1 

0.1 

0.2 

0.3 

0.6 

25.3 

2.7 

4.5 

5.1 

6.5 

7.2 

7.4 

7.1 

7.2 

7.5 

7.8 

7.8 

9.8 

10.6 

11.2 

11.1 

11.5 

11.7 

10.3 

10.7 

11.5 

12.4 

19.1 

10.4 

24.9 

31.4 

29.7 

24.1 

Appendix 2 

Fiscal Years 1899 to 1946 

Direct Cash Appropriations and Expenditures 

Y&U 

1899 

1909 

1912 

1913 

1914 

1915 

1916 

1917 

1918 

1919 

1920 

1921 

1922 

1923 

1924 

1925 

1926 

1927 

1928 

1929 

1930 

1931 

1932 

1933 

1934 

1935 

1936 

1937 

1938 

1939 

1940 

1941 

1942 

1943 

1944 

1945 

1946 

Grand Total 

Direct Cash 

Appropriations* 

50,000' 

30,O0O0 

125,000 

100,000 

175,000 

200,000 

80 1,000 

18,681,666 

735,000,000 

952,304,758 

28,123,503 

35,124,300 

25,648,333 

13,060,OOO 

12,626,000 

13,476,619 

15,9 1 1,19 1 

15,256,694 

21,117,494 

28,9 11,43 1 

34,910,059 

38,945,968 

31,850,892 

25,673,236 

31,037,769 

27,917,702 

45,600,444 

59,619,694 

58,851,266 

7 1,099,532 

186,562,847 

2,173,608,961 

23,049,93 5,463 

11,317,416,790 

23,655,998,000 

1,610,7 17,000 

517,100 

$64,336,985,7 12 

Expenditurest 

30,9 13,798 

23,095,257 

18,141,688 

11,015,365 

11,680,955 

14,900,264 

16,759,286 

19,437,722 

23,261,643 

28,051,563 

38,651,204 

33,046,254 

2 1,929,302 

17,372,277 

20,337,87 1 

32,026,622 

4 1,055,082 

50,875,129 

83,164,156 

108,169,717 

605,4O9,02 1 

2,554,863,420 

9,391,855,445 

13,087,279,848 

11,357,390,523 

1,349,030,427' 

$38,989,7 13,839 

*Includes appropriations for salaries, Office, Chief of Air Corps. 

tExpenditures for Jul 19XLAug 1946, data unavailable for 1899-Jun 1920. 

#Allotted to Dr. S. P. Langley for experiments in aerodynamics. 

$Allotted to pay for Wright airplane which completed tests in 1909. 

#Expenditures for July and August only. 
Appendix 3 

Combat Groups Overseas 

December 1941 to August 1945 

European Theater of Operations 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Cama Recm T~ral Heavy Mat T? 

1941Dec - 

1942Jm - 

Feb - MarAPr - 

May - Jun 1 - -1-2 

Jul 2 - 2 1 - 5 

Aug 9 - 3; 2 - 148 

Sep 9 - 43 3 1: 17; 

Oct 9 4 8; - If 23; 

Nov 7 1 5 4 If 15: 

Dec 6 1 5 f If 14 

1943 Jan 7 1 3 f If 124' 

Feb 7 1 3 i If 12; 

Mar 7 1 3 f If 12: 

Apr 12 1 3 f 1: 17: 

May 14 1 3 f If 20 

Jun 16 3 5 f 18 26; 

Jul 16 4 6 f If 28; 

Aug 17 4 7 1 2 30; 

Sep 20 4 9 4 2 35; 

Oct 204 4 11 If 2 38: 

Nov 22; 4 12 2 If 411 

Dec 26 4 17 24 11 51: 

1944 Jan 28: 4 19f 4 3 59 

Feb 31 8 21 94 3 724 

Mar 33 10 25 13: 3 84: 

Apr 39 11 32 14 3 99 

May 41 11 33 14 3 102 

Jun 41 11 33 14 3 102 

Jul 41 11 33 14 3 103 

Aug 41 11 33 14 4 103 

' Sep 41 11 32 14 4 103 

Oct 41 11 33 14 5 104 

Nov 41 13 33 14 5 106 

Dec 40 13 33 14 5 105 

1945 Jan 40 13 33 14 5 105 

Feb 40 13 35 14 5 107 

Mar 40 13 35 14 6 108 

Apr 40 13 35 15 6 109 

May 28 13 35 12 6 94 

Jun 15 13 35 12 6 81 

Jul 7 9 35 6 6 63 

Aug 7 8 33 4 4 56 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Tlo(lp Heavy Mat 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Cama Recm Total 

1- -1 

1-1- -2 

1-1- -2 

1- -1 

1- -1 

211- -4 

211- -4 

211- -4 

2 12:3 - 84' 

4 5 75 4 1 21t 

4f 6 8: 4 If 24; 

5 6 124' 4 If 29: 

5 8 13 4 14 31; 

5 8 13 4 If 311 

51 8 13 4 11 324 

6 8 14; 7 1; 36% 

8 814 7 239 

9 8 14 7 2; 40: 

9 814 7 240 

6 814 7 237 

6 8 14 7 2: 37: 

6 8 14 7 2& 37h 

7f 8 14 7 2 38; 

3: 8 14: 7 3 45: 

17 7 13 3 3 43 

20 7 13 3 3 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 13 3 2 46 

21 7 12 3 2 45 

21 5 12 3 2 43 

21 5 12 3 2 43 

21 4 12 3 2 42 

21 4 10 3 2 40 

21 4 10 3 2 40 

19 4 10 3 2 38 

13 4 10 1 2 30 

6 310 1222 

5 -10 1218 

5 - 5 1213 
Pacific Ocean Area Far East Air Forces 

Heavy Mednt Troop Heavy MedLt Troop 

Bomb Bomb Fighta Carrier Rm Total Bomb Bomb Fighter Carrier Recon Total 

2-3-25 -1- -1 

2-3- -5 1-1- -2 

2-3- -5 1-2- -3 

2-3- -5 233- -8 

2-3- -5 233- -8 

2-3- -5 233- -8 

2-3- -5 233- -8 

1-3- -4 333- -9 

2-3- -5 333- -9 

2-3- -5 333- -9 

If- 3- - 4; 4f3 3 - - 10; 

14- 3- - 44 4; 3 3 1 - 11; 

1 - 2;- - 3: 4 3 4: 1 4 125 

1- 2f- - 3: 4 3 4 2 413: 

1- 2:- - 34 4 3 4f 2 5 14f 

2- 2f- - 4: 3 345 2 114 

1; - 2: - - 3f 41 34 5 2 f 15; 

1- 2;- - 3f 5 5 5 2 417; 

1 - 2t- - 34 5 5 5 34 119 

1-2- -3 5 5 7 3; 121 

1-2- -3 5 5 7h 5 f 22; 

1-2- -3 5575 $224 

212- -5 5 5 7 5 123 

212- -5 5 6 7 5 15 245 

212- -5 5 6 8 5 23 26: 

212- -5 6 5 8 5 327 

212- -5 6 6 8 5 328 

212- -5 6 6 8 5 328 

213- -6 6 6 8 5 328 

213- -6 6 6 8 5 328 

313- -7 6 6 8 5 328 

313- -7 6 6 8 5 328 

313- -7 6 6 6 5 328 

313- -7 6 6 8 5 328 

313- -7 6 6 8 6 329 

313- -7 6 6 8 7 330 

313- -7 6 6 8 7 330 

313- -7 6 6 8 7 330 

3131-8 6 6 8 7 330 

3131-8 6 6 8 7 330 

3131-8 6 6 8 7 330 

3231-9 6 6 8 7 330 

3231-9 6 6 8 7 330 

32-1-6 6 6 8 7 330 

32- -5 6 6 8 7 330 
Appendix 3 (continued) 

Combat Groups Overseas 

December 1941 to August 1945 

China and India-Burma 

Heavy Med/Lt Troop 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Carrier Recon Total 

1941 DCX - -1- -1 

1942 Jan - -1- -1 

Feb - -1- -1 

Mar - -1- -1 

Apr - -1- -1 

May - -2- -2 

Jun 1 - 2 - -3 

Jul 1 - 2 - -3 

Aug 1 - 2 - -3 

Sep 1 1 2 - -4 

Oct 1 1 2 - -4 

Nov 1 1 2 - -4 

Dec 1 1 2 - -4 

1943 Jan 1 1 2 - -4 

Feb 2 1 2 - -5 

Mar2 12 - -5 

Apr 2 1 2 - f 5: 

May 2 1 2 - f 5a 

Jun 2 1 3 - $ 61 

Jul 2 1 3 - f 6$ 

Aug 2 1 4 - ; 71 

Sep 2 1 4 - f 7f 

Oct2 14 - f 7: 

Nov 2 1 4 f 1 8f 

Dec 2 1 4 f 8f 

1944 Jan 2 1 4 1 - 8 

Feb2 14 11 9 

Mar2 14 11 9 

Apr 2 2 6 1 1 12 

May 2 2 6 2 1 13 

Jun 2 2 6 3 1 14 

Jul 2 2 6 3 1 14 

Aug 2 2 6 4 1 15 

Sep 2 2 6 4 1 15 

Oct2264 115 

Nov 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Dec 2 2 6 6 1 17 

1945 Jan 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Feb 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Mar2 2 6 6 117 

Apr 2 2 6 6 1 17 

May 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Jun 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Jul 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Aug 2 2 6 6 1 17 

Alaska 

Heavy Med/Lt Troop 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Carrier Recon Total 

I I 

4- 4 

fl- - 1: 

fl- - 1; 

!1- - 1: 

fl- - 2; 

5 41- - 2; 

3 !1- - 24 

4 f1- - 24 

3 t1- : 2s 

3 :1- a 24 

4 fl- - 2; 

4 f 1; - -3 

9 s l! - - 3: 

9 41- - 1; 4 $1- - 1; 

3 

3 

3 

3 

3 

3 

3 

3 

1 

1 

-1- 

-1- -1 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 11- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

i 11- -2 

I 11- -2 

i fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 fl- -2 

t fl- -2 

I 11- -2 

2 fl- -2 

2 11- -2 

1-1- -2 

1-1- -2 

1-1- -2 

I 

I 

1 

1 

1 

1 

1 

I 

I 

I 

1 

1 

1 

I 

1 

1 
Twentieth Air Force 

Heavy MedLt Troop 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Carrier Recon Total 

4- -4 

4- -4 

4- -4 

4- -4 

4- -4 

8- -8 

8- -8 

10 - - 10 

12 1 - - 13 

14 1 - - 15 

16 2 - - 18 

16 4 - - 20 

18 4 - - 22 

18 4 - - 22 

21 8 - - 29 

2381- - 32 

Latin America and Atlantic Bases 

Heavy Med/Lt Troop 

Bomb Bomb Fighter Carrier Recon Total 

3 15 - 110 

3 15- 110 

3 15- 110 

3 15- 110 

3 15- 110 

3: 1 5 - 1 lo! 

3: 1 5 - 1 lo: 

3: 1 5 - 1 10: 

3: 1 5 - 1 lo! 

3: 1 5 - 1 lo: 

2f1 5 - 19: 

2f1 4 - 18: 

214-18 

214-18 

214-18 

214-18 

215-19 

11 4 - lf7i 

114-17 

114-17 

114-17 

114-17 

114- -6 

113- -5 

113- -5 

-1' 2- - If 

-1- -1 

Appendix 4 

Total Battle Casualties in Theaters against Germany 

December 1941 to August 1945 

Officers Enlisted Personnel Total Personnel 

Died Wounded* Missingt Total 

1941 Dec 1 1 

1942 Jan 18 5 - 23 

Feb 9 4 9 22 

Mar 

4 4 

1 3 

APr 

2 

Jun 1 5 6 May 

Jul 18 3 21 

Aug 24 1 4 29 

SeP 18 6 14 38 

Oct 40 6 11 57 

Nov 66 22 27 115 

DeC 98 27 34 159 

Total 1942 298 71 108 477 

1943 Jan 234 78 78 390 

Feb 226 51 122 399 

Mar 133 56 63 252 

APr 161 59 157 377 

May 245 98 170 513 

Jun 211 56 211 478 

JUl 454 127 304 885 

Aug 395 73 452 920 

SeP 233 74 231 538 

Oct 343 73 527 943 

Nov 267 71 293 631 

DeC 277 71 504 852 

Total 1943 3.179 887 3,112 7,178 

1944 Jan 474 114 655 1,243 

Feb 626 136 1,111 1.873 

Mar 639 168 1,125 1,932 

Apr 792 260 1,780 2.832 

May 790 306 1.455 2.551 

Jun 1,155 485 1,434 3.074 

Jul 996 375 1.515 2,886 

Aug 851 373 1.485 2,709 

SeP 615 314 1.365 2,294 

Oct 411 183 923 1,517 

Nov 555 183 1,116 1,854 

DeC 476 245 1,344 2,065 

Total 1944 8,380 3,142 15,308 26,830 

1945 Jan 349 219 659 1,227 

Feb 278 186 1,089 1,553 

Mar 522 318 1,264 2.104 

Apr 289 127 777 1.193 

May 3 3 18 24 

Jun 4 1 3 8 

JUl 1 1 

Aug Total 1945 1,446 854 3,810 6,110 

Date unknown 38 33 277 348 

Grand Total 13.341 4,988 22.615 40,944 

Died Wounded* Missingt Total 

20 17 3 40 

20 12 5 37 

1 1 

1 2 3 

1 5 6 

1 1 4 6 

17 2 1 20 

13 1 - 14 

18 9 12 39 

37 33 15 85 

68 49 18 135 

86 37 36 159 

281 162 102 545 

284 178 105 567 

272 180 208 660 

142 88 56 286 

180 110 136 426 

330 156 192 678 

325 143 221 689 

544 256 397 1,197 

549 176 590 1,315 

278 136 338 752 

510 166 759 1,435 

1,091 269 357 1,717 

413 252 605 1,270 

4,918 2.110 3,964 10,992 

633 257 851 1,741 

792 370 1,618 2.780 

874 360 1,578 2,812 

1,441 464 2,482 4.387 

1,146 561 1,830 3537 

1,191 528 1,718 3,437 

1,206 543 2,014 3,763 

791 460 1,893 3,144 

647 422 1,499 2,568 

456 268 1,157 1,881 

525 322 1.304 2,151 

479 372 1,544 2,395 

10,181 4,927 19.488 34,596 

337 309 806 1,452 

299 261 1.318 1,878 

417 308 1,544 2,269 

252 218 918 1,388 

3 1 17 21 

1 1 

1 1 2 

1,310 1.098 4,603 7,011 

68 75 134 477 

16,758 8.372 28,491 53,621 

Died Wounded* Missingt Total 

1 1 

38 22 3 63 

29 16 14 59 

1 1 

4 1 2 7 

3 6 9 

2 1 9 12 

35 2 4 41 

37 2 4 43 

36 15 26 77 

77 39 26 142 

134 71 45 250 

184 64 70 318 

579 233 210 1,022 

518 256 183 957 

498 231 330 1,059 

275 144 119 538 

341 169 293 803 

575 254 362 1,191 

536 199 432 1,167 

998 383 701 2,082 

944 249 1,042 2,235 

511 210 569 1,290 

853 239 1,286 2,378 

1,358 340 650 2,348 

690 323 1.109 2,122 

8.097 2937 7.076 18,170 

1.107 371 1,506 2,984 

1,418 506 2.729 4,653 

1.513 528 2,703 4,744 

2,233 724 4,262 7,219 

1,936 867 3,285 6.088 

2,346 1,013 3,152 6,511 

2,202 918 3,529 6,649 

1,642 833 3,378 5.853 

1,262 736 2,864 4,862 

867 451 2,080 3,398 

1,080 505 2,420 4,005 

955 617 2,888 4,460 

18,561 8,069 34,796 61,426 

686 528 1,465 2,679 

577 667 2,407 3,431 

939 626 2.808 4,373 

541 345 1.695 2,581 

6 4 35 45 

5 1 3 9 

2 1 3 

2,756 1,952 8,413 13,121 

106 108 611 825 

30,099 13,360 51,106 94.565 

*Wounded and evacuated. 

?Missing, interned, and captured. 

Appendix 5 

Total Battle Casualties in European Theater of Operations 

December 1941 to August 1945 

1941 Dec 

1942 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

APr 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

Jun 

Jul 

Jun 

Jul 

Total 1945 

Date unknown 

Grand Total 

Officers Enlisted Personnel Total Personnel 

Died Wounded' ' Missingt Total 

11 1 

7 1 

4 

1 1 

1 

5 

18 1 

13 3 

29 1 

38 17 

38 17 

165 41 

142 33 

151 29 

66 23 

35 7 

151 47 

153 33 

201 49 

130 39 

139 45 

256 49 

180 51 

204 52 

1,808 457 

329 72 

468 102 

452 126 

525 187 

540 174 

908 379 

642 228 

606 225 

525 250 

286 102 

410 114 

365 150 

6,056 2.109 

263 167 

180 104 

429 256 

201 75 

2 3 

3 

1,078 605 

18 24 

9,125 3,236 

- 12 

4 12 

4 

1 1 

1 

3 8 

2 21 

7 23 

8 38 

18 73 

26 81 

68 274 

40 215 

56 236 

28 117 

105 147 

152 350 

191 377 

239 489 

317 486 

182 366 

476 781 

246 477 

420 676 

2,452 4,717 

522 923 

812 1,382 

985 1,563 

1,303 2,015 

1,034 1,748 

943 2,230 

920 1,790 

925 1,756 

1,080 1,855 

535 923 

760 1,284 

810 1,325 

10,629 18,794 

457 887 

646 930 

811 1.4% 

547 823 

10 15 

3 

2,471 4,154 

209 251 

15,829 28,190 

Died Wounded' 

19 8 

19 7 

1 

1 1 

4 1 

1 

10 8 

21 20 

33 25 

38 23 

145 95 

182 107 

213 107 

90 54 

79 26 

265 90 

284 83 

304 114 

234 92 

190 67 

414 114 

261 112 

313 181 

2,829 1,147 

467 189 

587 268 

576 203 

688 332 

795 290 

835 401 

738 296 

536 284 

556 303 

293 162 

385 206 

333 224 

6,789 3,158 

270 234 

197 155 

331 224 

161 127 

3 1 

1 

%3 741 

25 36 

10,751 5,177 

Missingt Total 

3 30 

5 31 

1 1 

2 3 

4 4 

1 3 

1 6 

1 

10 28 

11 52 

10 68 

24 85 

72 312 

82 371 

132 452 

34 178 

101 206 

177 532 

212 579 

331 749 

407 733 

280 537 

709 1.237 

288 661 

531 1,025 

3,284 7,260 

675 1,331 

1,223 2,078 

1,403 2,182 

1,793 2,813 

1,283 2,368 

1,077 2,313 

1,013 2,047 

1,034 1,854 

1,074 1,933 

639 1,094 

850 1,441 

788 1,345 

12,852 22,799 

541 1,045 

731 1,083 

892 1.447 

655 943 

10 14 

1 

2,829 4,533 

255 316 

19,292 35,220 

Died Wounded' 

30 9 

26 8 

4 1 

1 

2 1 

9 1 

18 2 

23 11 

50 21 

71 42 

76 40 

310 136 

324 140 

364 136 

156 77 

114 33 

416 137 

437 116 

505 163 

364 131 

329 112 

670 163 

441 163 

517 233 

4,637 1,604 

796 261 

1.055 370 

1.028 329 

1,213 519 

1.335 464 

1.743 780 

1,380 524 

1,142 509 

1,081 553 

579 264 

795 320 

698 374 

12,845 5,267 

533 401 

377 259 

760 480 

362 202 

5 4 

4 

2,041 1,346 

43 60 

19,876 8,413 

Missing' Total 

3 42 

9 43 

1 1 

2 7 

4 5 

1 4 

4 14 

2 22 

17 51 

19 90 

28 141 

50 166 

140 586 

122 586 

188 688 

62 295 

206 353 

329 882 

403 956 

570 1,238 

724 1,219 

462 903 

1.185 2,018 

534 1,138 

951 1,701 

5,736 11,977 

1,197 2,254 

2,035 3,460 

2,388 3,745 

3,096 4,828 

2,317 4,116 

2,020 4,543 

1,933 3,837 

1,959 3,610 

2,154 3,788 

1,174 2,017 

1,610 2,725 

1,598 2.670 

23,48 1 4 1,593 

998 1,932 

1,377 2,013 

1,703 2,943 

1,202 1,766 

20 29 

4 

5,300 8,687 

464 567 

35,121 63,410 

*Wounded and evacuated. 

+Missing, interned, and captured. 

Appendix 6 

Total Battle Casualties in Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

December 1941 to August 1945 

Officers 

Died Wounded* Missing' Total 

1941 Dec 1 1 

1942 Jan 7 4 - 11 

Feb 2 3 5 10 

Mar 

1 2 

APr 

5 5 May JUn 

JUl 13 - 13 

Aug 6 2 8 

SeP 5 3 7 15 

oct 11 5 3 19 

Nov 28 5 9 42 

DeC 60 10 8 78 

Total 1942 133 30 40 203 

1943 Jan 92 45 38 175 

Feb 75 22 66 163 

Mar 67 33 35 135 

APr 126 52 52 230 

May 94 51 18 163 JUn 58 23 20 131 

JUl 253 78 65 396 

Aug 265 34 135 434 

SeP 94 29 49 172 

oct 87 24 51 162 

Nov 87 20 47 154 

DeC 73 19 84 176 

Total 1943 1,371 430 660 2,461 

1944 Jan 145 42 133 320 

Feb 158 34 299 491 

Mar 187 42 140 369 

Apr 267 73 477 817 

May 250 132 421 803 JUn 247 106 491 844 

JUl 354 117 595 1,096 

Aug 245 148 560 933 

SeP 90 64 285 439 

oct 125 81 388 594 

Nov 145 69 356 570 

Dec 111 95 534 740 

Total 1944 2,324 1,033 4,679 8,036 

1945 Jan 86 52 202 340 

Feb 98 82 443 623 

Mar 93 62 453 608 

88 52 230 370 

May 1 8 9 

APr 

Jun 1 1 3 5 

JUl 1 1 

Aw 

Total 1945 368 249 1,339 1,956 

Date unknown 20 9 68 97 

Grand Total 4,216 1,752 6,784 12,754 

1 

Enlisted Personnel Total Personnel 

Died Wi 

1 

1 

1 

13 

13 

8 

16 

35 

48 

136 

102 

59 

52 

101 

65 

41 

240 

315 

88 

96 

830 

100 

2.089 

166 

205 

298 

753 

35 1 

356 

468 

255 

91 

163 

140 

146 

3,392 

67 

102 

86 

91 

1 

347 

43 

6.007 

9 

5 

1 

1 

13 

24 

14 

67 

71 

73 

34 

84 

66 

60 

142 

84 

69 

52 

157 

71 

%3 

68 

102 

157 

132 

27 1 

127 

247 

176 

119 

106 

116 

148 

1,769 

75 

106 

84 

91 

1 

357 

39 

3,195 

Missing' 

1 

3 

2 

4 

8 

12 

30 

23 

76 

22 

35 

15 

9 

66 

183 

58 

50 

69 

74 

680 

176 

395 

175 

689 

547 

641 

1,001 

859 

425 

518 

454 

756 

6,636 

265 

587 

652 

263 

7 

1,774 

79 

9.199 

Total 

10 

6 

2 

3 

14 

13 

11 

33 

67 

74 

233 

196 

208 

108 

220 

146 

110 

448 

582 

21 5 

198 

1,056 

245 

3,732 

410 

702 

630 

1,574 

1,169 

1,124 

1,716 

1,290 

635 

787 

710 

1,050 

1 1,797 

407 

795 

822 

445 

7 

2 

2.478 

161 

18,401 

Died W 

8 

3 

2 

26 

19 

13 

27 

63 

108 

269 

194 

134 

119 

227 

159 

99 

493 

580 

182 

183 

917 

173 

3.460 

31 1 

363 

485 

1,020 

601 

603 

822 

500 

181 

288 

285 

257 

5,716 

153 

200 

179 

179 

1 

1 

2 

715 

63 

10,223 

'mnded* 

1 

13 

8 

1 

4 

18 

29 

24 

97 

116 

95 

67 

136 

117 

83 

220 

118 

98 

76 

177 

90 

1,393 

110 

136 

199 

205 

403 

233 

394 

324 

183 

187 

185 

243 

2,802 

127 

188 

146 

143 

1 

1 

606 

48 

4,944 

Missing' 

5 

2 

8 

2 

9 

7 

17 

20 

70 

61 

142 

57 

87 

33 

29 

131 

318 

137 

101 

116 

158 

1,340 

309 

694 

315 

1.166 

%8 

1.132 

1.5% 

1,419 

710 

906 

810 

1,290 

11,315 

467 

1,530 

1,105 

493 

15 

3 

3.113 

147 

15.985 

' Total 

1 

21 

16 

s 

8 

27 

21 

26 

52 

109 

152 

436 

37 1 

37 1 

243 

450 

309 

21 1 

844 

1.016 

387 

360 

1,210 

421 

6,193 

730 

1,193 

999 

2,391 

1,972 

1,968 

2,s 12 

2,243 

1,074 

1,381 

1,280 

1,790 

19,833 

747 

1,418 

1,430 

815 

16 

5 

3 

4,434 

258 

31.155 

*Wounded and evacuated. 

'Missing, interned, and captured. 

Appendix 7 

Heavy Bomber and Day Fighter Crew Losses* 

June 1943 to August 1945 

1943 1944 

Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar 

Heavy Bomber Crew Losses 

European Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 87 114 103 83 186 87 131 248 264 308 

Other Losses 86 9 (26) 10 6 (27) (22) 35 48 156 

Total Losses 173 123 77 117 211 70 126 329 410 631 

Retirements - 24 19 10 17 46 98 167 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 9 32 84 24 13 22 33 34 109 71 

Other Losses 21 17 (19) 3 (5) (17) (11) 5 14 (11) 

Total Losses 30 49 65 73 53 17 43 80 166 85 

All Theaters 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 110 172 206 128 217 135 194 309 378 400 

Retirements - 4 78 89 37 48 103 188 238 

Other Losses 141 61 (37) 45 (1) (41) (55) 53 56 150 

Total Losses 251 233 173 251 305 131 187 465 622 788 

Retirements - 46 45 12 21 41 43 25 

Day Fighter Crew Losses 

European Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 9 17 10 13 12 37 53 85 105 192 

Retirements -- -223- -43 

Other Losses 1 - (6) (19) 21 10 101 33 (52) 24 

Total Losses 10 17 4 (4) 35 50 154 118 57 219 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 52 74 93 50 12 12 54 72 61 47 

Other Losses 78 136 91 (25) (18) (54) 2 (6) 7 (10) 

Total Losses 130 245 184 181 69 7 146 156 148 94 

Retirements - 35 - 156 75 49 90 90 80 57 

All Theaters 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 76 135 158 112 64 94 137 211 196 274 

Other Losses 162 227 59 28 48 2 174 (59) (26) 91 

Total Losses 238 410 217 322 237 197 466 326 337 562 

Retirements - 48 - 182 125 101 155 174 167 197 

*Figures in parentheses indicate the excess over losses of gains resulting from foxmation of additional 

crews out of personnel returned from missing, reclassified from ground to air duties, and received from the 

U.S. as individuals rather than as crew members. 
Appendix 7 (continued) 

Heavy Bomber and Day Fighter Crew Losses* 

June 1943 to August 1945 

1944 

Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov 

Heavy Bomber Crew Losses 

European Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 371 308 239 302 203 274 130 211 

Retirements 167 191 257 342 451 347 410 410 

Other Losses 124 45 (59) 35 87 60 (8) (30) 

Total Losses 662 544 437 679 741 681 532 591 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 183 169 175 255 149 55 111 

Retirements 20 52 89 206 366 216 131 

Other Losses (22) 42 122 (9) 7 (7) (1) 

Total Losses 181 263 386 452 522 264 241 

All Theaters 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 589 500 438 571 367 347 276 

Retirements 220 274 380 640 850 590 602 

Other Losses 114 93 78 31 81 88 4 

Total Losses 923 867 896 1,242 1,298 1,025 882 

1 

84 

218 

1 

303 

316 

677 

(20) 

973 

Day Fighter Crew Losses 

European Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 207 245 458 297 385 191 144 246 

Retirements 58 47 43 66 118 319 353 340 

Other Losses (7) (21) (66) (9) 224 106 (63) 76 

Total Losses 258 271 435 354 727 616 434 662 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 85 123 137 104 113 86 61 85 

Retirements 119 112 90 138 150 87 60 124 

Other Losses (45) 1 (25) 116 16 44 6 28 

Total Losses 159 236 202 358 279 217 127 237 

All Theaters 

Combat and 

Accident Losses 338 403 628 440 536 317 283 396 

Retirements 276 242 188 260 373 527 582 552 

Other Losses (123) 29 (109) 106 209 197 43 53 

Total Losses 491 674 707 806 1,118 1,041 908 1,001 

119 

347 

(4) 

462 

151 

107 

22 

280 

290 

533 

23 

846 

246 

221 

125 

592 

72 

76 

26 

174 

399 

370 

121 

890 

*Figures in parentheses indicate the excess over losses of gains resulting from formation of 

additional crews out of personnel returned from missing, reclassified from ground to air duties, and 

received from the US. as individuals rather than as crew members. 
1945 ---- 1943 1944 1945 Total 

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug (Jun-Dec) (Jan-Aug) 

157 101 167 150 6 6 3 - 791 2,977 590 4,358 

420 379 597 690 - 70 3,233 2,086 5,389 

(63) (23) (103) (13) 28 (53) 32 4 36 489 (191) 334 

514 457 661 827 34 (47) 35 4 897 6,699 2,485 10,081 

37 85 93 46 (7) 2 - 1 217 1,546 257 2,020 

55 126 196 426 50 - 124 1,514 853 2,491 

12 48 12 35 (63) 26 (7) 7 (11) 163 70 222 

104 259 301 507 (20) 28 (7) 8 330 3,223 1,180 4,733 

217 201 279 208 17 31 29 10 1,162 4,781 992 6,935 

550 572 890 1,237 179 103 108 144 256 5,295 3,783 9,334 

(39) 27 (99) 31 (37) (36) 40 16 113 751 (97) 767 

728 800 1,070 1,476 159 98 177 170 1,531 10,827 4,678 17.036 

190 232 267 230 23 15 22 (1) 

219 162 212 307 488 - 

23 57 41 47 23 36 (24) 9 

432 451 520 584 534 51 (2) 8 

56 69 83 83 (11) 10 5 3 

60 79 80 141 96 13 - 21 13 3 19 17 25 7 (27) 

137 161 166 243 102 48 12 (24) 

322 353 456 388 71 117 114 65 

372 302 391 560 736 236 200 216 

150 118 91 144 100 124 49 73 

844 773 938 1,092 907 477 363 354 

151 

7 

108 

266 

347 

405 

210 

962 

776 

611 

700 

2,087 

2,801 978 

1,572 1,388 

370 212 

4,743 2,578 

1,046 298 

1,183 469 

158 78 

2,387 845 

4,421 1,886 

3,908 3,013 

532 849 

3,930 

2,967 

690 

7,587 

1,691 

2,057 

446 

4,194 

7,083 

7,532 

2,081 

8,861 5,748 16,696 
Appendix 8 

Aircraft in all Theaters against Germany 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1942 

Combat Airplanes 

1st Line 

2nd Line 

Total 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 

B-17 

B-24 

2nd Line 

Total 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line 

B-25 

B-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

A-20 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

Night Fighters 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

Reconnaissance 

F-4, F-5 

1st Line 

F-6 

F-7 

F-8 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

Grand Total* 

JUn 

17 

9 

26 

17 

17 

17 

9 

9 

26 

Jul 

369 

24 

393 

86 

54 

32 

86 

24 

24 

283 

80 

44 

159 

283 

445 

Aw 

567 

25 

592 

160 

114 

46 

1 

161 

50 

50 

50 

24 

24 

355 

13 1 

60 

164 

355 

2 

2 

2 

692 

SeP 

613 

25 

63 8 

24 1 

155 

86 

1 

242 

56 

55 

1 

56 

9 

9 

24 

33 

294 

133 

59 

102 

294 

13 

13 

13 

762 

Oct 

1,060 

29 

1,089 

361 

245 

116 

1 

362 

105 

77 

28 

105 

18 

18 

24 

42 

556 

184 

177 

72 

123 

556 

20 

20 

4 

24 

1,286 

Nov 

1,426 

32 

1,458 

368 

244 

124 

1 

369 

116 

92 

24 

116 

33 

33 

23 

56 

884 

253 

251 

190 

190 

884 

25 

21 

4 

8 

33 

1,690 

Dec 

1,744 

36 

1,780 

368 

246 

122 

1 

3 69 

179 

104 

75 

179 

40 

40 

19 

59 

1,058 

302 

210 

259 

88 

199 

1,058 

99 

36 

63 

16 

115 

2,065 

1943 

Jan 

1,905 

30 

1,935 

413 

293 

120 

1 

414 

212 

125 

87 

212 

43 

43 

15 

58 

1,117 

293 

177 

366 

1 20 

161 

1,117 

120 

33 

10 

77 

14 

134 

2,245 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transpotts. trainers, and communications aircraft.) 
1943 

Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec 

2,416 2,888 

29 30 

2,445 2,918 

462 557 

328 396 

134 161 

1 1 

463 558 

250 317 

161 232 

89 85 

250 317 

62 101 

62 101 

14 13 

76 114 

1.457 1,797 

336 472 

180 224 

571 649 

176 203 

- 51 

194 198 

1.457 1.797 

185 116 

54 53 

35 20 

96 43 

14 16 

199 132 

2758 3.291 

3,682 4.522 5.107 5.283 5.277 5.371 5,532 6.273 7,003 

50 74 105 120 133 166 184 198 235 

3,732 4,596 5.212 5,403 5.410 5.537 5,716 6.471 7,238 

891 1,028 1,295 1,388 1,348 1,448 1,520 843 2.167 

697 828 1.052 1,134 1.124 1,148 1.205 1,434 1.591 

194 200 243 254 224 300 315 409 576 

1 14 13 13 13 41 34 112 96 

892 1,042 1.308 1.401 1.361 1.489 1.554 1.955 2.263 

424 722 1.051 1,152 1.161 1.121 984 1.037 1,074 

236 369 438 423 399 360 252 341 378 

188 353 613 729 762 761 732 696 696 

1 1 14 10 

424 722 1.051 1,152 1,161 1,122 985 1.051 1,084 

157 165 166 155 137 126 116 112 134 

157 165 166 155 137 126 116 112 134 

32 37 37 37 31 29 28 33 33 

189 202 203 192 168 155 144 145 167 

2,022 2.443 2,394 2,366 2,407 2,451 2,744 3,042 3.392 

558 567 516 450 374 389 372 441 596 

294 359 350 333 393 259 251 232 241 

668 733 717 690 625 579 491 456 432 

263 307 341 421 653 811 1.084 1,320 1,514 

89 298 290 260 231 221 322 369 399 

150 179 180 189 188 149 185 182 165 

4 19 20 7 8 31 35 64 

2,022 2.447 2,413 386 2,414 2,459 2,775 3.077 3.456 

- 23 43 43 39 42 45 

188 164 201 

47 46 48 

27 27 27 

114 91 126 

17 19 36 

205 183 237 

222 224 225 168 239 236 

73 71 72 69 108 127 

24 40 44 22 42 52 

1 1 1 

125 113 109 76 88 56 

50 82 87 90 4 32 

272 306 312 258 243 268 

, 4,101 5.263 5,928 6,099 6,152 6.354 6,582 7,395 8,237 
Appendix 8 (continued) 

Aircraft in all Theaters against Germany 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1944 

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep 

1st Line 8,267 9.413 10,910 11,593 11,844 11,522 12,538 12,493 12,692 

2nd Line 216 206 431 469 954 907 868 1.206 1,257 

Total 8,483 9,619 11,341 12,062 12,798 12,429 13,406 13,699 13,949 

Combat Airplanes 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 2,608 2,842 3,524 3,900 4,347 4,226 4,605 4,880 4,995 

B-17 1,650 1,701 1,884 1,860 1,863 1,786 2,011 2,195 2,334 

B-24 958 1,141 1,640 2,040 2,484 2,440 2,594 2,685 2,661 

2nd Line 64 57 63 122 289 266 294 353 384 

Total 2,672 2.899 3,587 4,022 4,636 4,492 4,899 5,233 5,379 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line 

B-25 

B-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

A-20 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

1,217 1,385 1,491 1,640 1,561 1,471 1,604 1,563 1.569 

403 395 361 453 465 395 440 438 463 

814 990 1,130 1,187 1,096 1,076 1,164 1,125 1,106 

10 17 100 101 237 278 230 271 203 

1.227 1,402 1,591 1.741 1,798 1,749 1,834 1,834 1,772 

150 247 410 444 488 501 541 531 617 

150 247 410 444 488 501 541 514 549 - 17 68 

34 42 47 49 58 56 61 80 75 

184 289 457 493 546 557 602 611 692 

4,033 4,665 5,179 5,260 4,969 4,844 5,277 4,969 4,844 

809 893 1,048 1,063 1,050 905 842 643 678 

248 366 375 336 293 244 241 175 

391 328 298 274 181 139 103 

1,696 2,009 2,288 2,335 2,241 2,176 2,355 2,465 2,457 

659 819 989 1,175 1,132 1,284 1,642 1,588 1,616 

Night Fighters 50 51 47 46 66 90 94 98 93 

Other 180 199 134 31 6 6 

2nd Line 78 65 166 155 326 258 258 475 572 

Total 4,111 4,730 5,345 5,415 5,295 5,102 5,535 5,444 5,416 

Reconnaissance 

1st Line 

F-4, F-5 

F-6 

F-8 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

F-7 

259 274 306 349 479 480 511 550 667 

128 149 160 174 196 218 234 242 288 

71 76 101 119 205 192 177 195 265 

1 1 6 16 28 36 65 67 65 

59 48 38 39 50 34 35 46 49 

30 25 55 42 44 49 25 27 23 

289 299 361 391 523 529 536 577 690 

1 1 

Grand Total* 9,644 10,897 13,163 14,169 15,461 15,210 16,485 16,913 17,027 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transports, trainers, and communications aircraft.) 
1944 1945 

Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug 

13,030 13,174 12,707 12,612 12,889 13,242 13,378 12,292 9,301 6,914 6,004 

1,469 1,511 1,554 1,523 1,517 1,443 1.467 1,246 1,077 1,381 1,127 

14,499 14,685 14,261 14,135 14,406 14,685 14,845 13,538 10,378 8,295 7,131 

5,054 4,894 1,460 4,727 4,899 5.072 4,925 4,047 1,854 1,189 1,135 

2.619 2.599 2,677 2,663 2,790 2,891 2,788 2,517 1,604 1,164 1.123 

2.435 2.295 2,134 2,064 2,109 2,181 2,137 1,530 250 25 12 

575 614 631 607 644 590 634 473 419 270 70 

5,629 5,508 5,442 5,334 5,543 5,662 5,559 4,520 2,273 1,459 1,205 

1,533 1,507 1,395 1,363 1,376 1,297 1,220 1,177 951 720 715 

436 402 375 397 423 414 393 367 217 3 1 

1,097 1,105 1,020 966 953 883 827 810 734 717 714 

215 219 222 216 194 195 224 227 157 151 128 

1,748 1,726 1,617 1,579 1,570 1,492 1,444 1,404 1,108 871 843 

648 802 782 791 827 889 977 942 802 564 378 

517 490 459 439 420 395 358 315 308 297 295 

131 312 323 352 407 494 619 627 494 267 83 

71 66 63 71 70 74 92 111 77 59 52 

719 868 845 862 897 963 1,069 1,053 879 623 430 

5,053 5,203 

684 661 

2,477 2,435 

1,796 2,019 

96 88 

588 594 

5,641 5,797 

4,955 5,002 5,079 5,268 

575 562 570 625 

2,244 2,285 2,319 2,283 

2,039 2,053 2,086 2,228 

97 102 104 132 

619 612 589 538 

5,574 5,614 5,668 5,806 

1,284 5,423 5,099 3,924 3,381 

579 555 518 311 182 

2,355 2,292 2,183 1,829 1,749 

2,455 2,427 2,279 1,670 1,368 

145 148 117 114 82 

469 417 406 834 747 

6,003 5,840 5,505 4,758 4,128 

742 768 764 729 708 716 722 703 595 517 395 

307 346 352 332 317 330 338 318 285 228 135 

317 309 296 270 255 248 259 254 247 242 216 

63 57 65 79 82 89 78 78 12 6 

55 56 51 48 54 49 47 53 51 41 44 

20 18 19 17 20 46 48 18 18 67 130 

762 786 783 746 728 762 770 721 613 584 525 

17,999 18,134 17,787 17,575 17,906 18,367 18,736 17,061 13,568 10,854 9,329 
Appendix 9 

Aircraft in the European Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1942 

Combat Airplanes 

1st Line 

2nd Line 

Total 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 

B-17 

B-24 

2nd Line 

Total 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line 

B-25 

B-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-20 

2nd Line 

Total 

A-26 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

Night Fighters 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

Reconnaissance 

1st Line 

F-4. F-5 

F-6 

F-8 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

Grand Total* 

Jun 

9 

9 

9 

9 

9 

Jul 

283 

24 

307 

44 

44 

44 

24 

24 

239 

80 

159 

239 

359 

Aug 

401 

24 

425 

104 

104 

104 

24 

24 

295 

13 1 

164 

295 

2 

2 

2 

520 

SeP 

445 

24 

469 

178 

144 

34 

178 

10 

9 

1 

10 

9 

9 

24 

33 

235 

133 

102 

235 

13 

13 

13 

588 

Oct 

879 

28 

907 

296 

234 

62 

296 

61 

33 

28 

61 

18 

18 

24 

42 

484 

184 

177 

123 

484 

20 

20 

4 

24 

1,100 

Nov 

840 

19 

859 

247 

180 

67 

247 

44 

34 

10 

44 

33 

33 

11 

44 

495 

138 

251 

106 

495 

21 

21 

8 

29 

932 

Dec 

823 

24 

847 

219 

178 

41 

219 

29 

23 

6 

29 

8 

8 

8 

16 

516 

168 

177 

88 

83 

516 

51 

15 

36 

16 

67 

944 

1943 

Jan 

739 

24 

763 

- 

214 

175 

39 

214 

19 

13 

6 

19 

6 

6 

10 

16 

458 

163 

102 

120 

73 

458 

42 

18 

10 

14 

14 

56 

860 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transports. trainers, and communications aircraft.) 
1943 

Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec 

78 1 

24 

805 

255 

186 

69 

255 

17 

4 

13 

17 

6 

6 

10 

16 

432 

100 

56 

15 

176 

85 

432 

71 

19 

35 

17 

14 

85 

903 

718 1,047 1,213 1,613 1,826 2,177 2,485 2,936 3,708 4,111 

11 29 47 58 69 98 134 127 127 131 

729 1,076 1,260 1,671 1,895 2,275 2,619 3,063 3,835 4,242 

303 590 692 834 844 895 931 1,104 1,460 1.610 

229 502 599 783 820 786 835 907 1,166 1,302 

74 88 93 51 24 109 96 197 294 308 

303 590 705 846 856 907 971 1,138 1,554 1.686 

- 13 12 12 12 40 34 94 76 

18 54 121 336 450 493 484 479 467 443 

17 53 120 335 449 492 484 479 467 443 

1 1 1 1 

18 54 121 336 450 493 485 480 468 444 

1 1 1 1 1 1 

2 8 25 

2 8 25 

9 28 33 33 33 31 29 28 28 28 

11 28 33 33 33 31 29 28 36 53 

358 297 332 346 426 668 939 1,270 1,621 1,862 

56 25 16 2 2 12 93 105 188 380 

22 9 9 3 3 3 1 1 1 1 

15 

203 263 307 341 421 653 811 1,005 1,201 1,215 - 34 159 231 266 

62 

4 4 4 4 

358 297 332 346 426 668 943 1,274 1,625 1,866 

37 106 68 97 106 121 131 83 152 171 

19 17 17 11 21 20 20 20 56 79 - 18 24 3 23 36 

18 89 51 86 85 83 87 60 73 56 

2 1 1 13 24 55 60 60 - 22 

39 107 69 110 130 176 191 143 152 193 

873 1,211 1,420 1,841 2,069 2,452 2,827 3,310 4,152 4,618 
Appendix 9 (continued) 

Aircraft in the European Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1944 

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep 

1st Line 5,035 5,952 7,035 7,700 7,834 7,505 8,423 8,605 8,735 

2nd Line 98 93 136 175 517 460 473 609 637 

Total 5,133 6,045 7,171 7,875 8,351 7,965 8,896 9,214 9,372 

Combat Airplanes 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 

B-24 

2nd Line 

Total 

B-17 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line 

B-25 

B-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

A-20 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

1,774 1,965 2,259 2,562 2,937 2,929 3,304 3,435 3,398 

1,341 1,412 1,487 1,492 1,502 1,471 1,695 1,829 1,927 

433 553 772 1,070 1,435 1,458 1,609 1,606 1,471 

43 33 36 85 200 171 188 227 261 

1,817 1,998 2,295 2.647 3,137 3,100 3,492 3,662 3,659 

506 670 837 866 788 804 853 850 843 

506 670 837 866 788 804 853 850 843 

1 1 1 12 58 41 39 65 33 

507 671 838 878 846 845 892 915 876 

40 121 289 331 385 387 430 436 508 

40 121 289 331 385 387 430 419 440 

17 68 

29 37 35 35 40 39 43 46 44 

69 158 324 366 425 426 473 482 552 

2,528 2,998 3,419 3,685 3,382 3,046 3,480 3,470 3,470 

637 669 707 750 673 568 584 477 379 

1,348 1,630 1,920 1,985 1,870 1,632 1,706 1,768 1,840 

543 699 792 950 819 803 1,143 1,177 1,203 

Night Fighters - - 20 43 47 48 48 

Other 

2nd Line 4 4 21 12 188 173 191 258 289 

Total 2,532 3,002 3,440 3,697 3,570 3,219 3,671 3,728 3,759 

Reconnaissance 

1st Line 187 198 231 256 342 339 356 414 516 

F-4, F-5 79 97 118 117 115 134 131 156 184 

F-6 50 53 71 87 152 138 128 153 222 

F-8 5 15 27 35 64 67 65 

Other 21 18 43 31 31 36 12 13 10 

2nd Line 58 48 37 37 48 32 33 38 45 

Total 208 216 274 287 373 375 368 427 526 

Grand Total* 5,685 6,917 8,562 9,645 10,637 10,343 11,091 11,835 11,951 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transports, trainers, and cmmunications aircraft.) 
1944 1945 

Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul 

9,165 9,620 9,210 8,948 9,323 9,525 9,776 9,053 7,238 

750 798 860 850 887 872 897 743 536 

9.915 10,418 10,070 9,798 10,210 10,397 10,673 9,796 7,774 

3,473 3,444 3,351 3,202 3,335 3,412 3,332 2,707 

2,143 2,123 2,168 2,125 2,269 2,367 2,291 1,988 

1,330 1,321 1,183 1,077 1,066 1,045 1,041 719 

345 351 355 332 367 349 356 251 

3,818 3,795 3,706 3,534 3,702 3,761 3,688 2,958 

818 1,012 998 952 943 873 821 810 

818 1,012 998 952 943 873 821 810 

44 45 47 41 45 49 87 90 

862 1,057 1,045 993 988 922 908 900 

550 710 692 663 657 718 809 804 

419 398 371 359 344 327 320 315 

131 312 321 304 313 391 489 489 

39 37 35 44 42 42 38 33 

589 747 727 707 699 760 847 837 

,306 

,147 

159 

136 

,442 

734 

734 

27 

76 1 

775 

308 

467 

28 

803 

3,721 3.843 3,585 3,550 3,821 3,951 4,250 4,186 3,960 

356 322 257 257 239 250 244 234 202 

1,942 1,890 1,735 1,735 1,959 1,931 2,057 2,012 1,942 

1,366 1,579 1,548 1,515 1,576 1,694 1,867 1,846 1,728 

57 52 45 43 47 76 82 94 88 

319 361 417 424 424 407 392 358 339 

4,040 4,204 4,002 3,974 4,245 4,358 4,642 4,544 4,299 

603 611 584 581 567 571 564 546 463 

186 193 179 191 183 194 188 167 153 

304 308 292 266 251 244 254 250 247 

63 57 65 79 82 89 78 78 12 

3 4 6 9 9 25 24 11 6 

50 53 48 45 51 44 44 51 51 

606 615 590 590 576 596 588 557 469 

6,046 

447 

6,493 

811 

787 

24 

49 

8 60 

717 

717 

29 

746 

556 

297 

259 

27 

5 83 

3,529 

195 

1,789 

1,459 

86 

331 

3,860 

433 

144 

242 

6 

11 

41 

444 

Aug 

5,634 

427 

6,061 

792 

780 

12 

36 

828 

714 

714 

37 

751 

378 

295 

83 

26 

404 

3,368 

176 

1,749 

1,361 

82 

3 19 

3,687 

382 

135 

216 

9 

31 

391 

12,858 13,427 13,126 12,598 13,116 13,518 13,927 12,819 10,500 8,674 7,993 
Appendix 10 

Aircraft in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1942 

Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov 

1st Line 17 86 166 168 181 586 

2nd Line 1 1 1 13 

Total 17 86 167 169 182 599 

Combat Airplanes 

1943 

Jan 

- - 

Dee 

921 

12 

933 

1,166 

6 

1,172 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 17 42 56 63 65 121 

B-17 - 10 10 11 11 64 

B-24 17 32 46 52 54 57 

2nd Line 1 1 1 1 

Total 17 42 57 64 66 122 

149 

68 

81 

1 

150 

199 

118 

81 

1 

200 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line - 50 46 44 72 

B-25 - 50 46 44 58 

B-26 - 14 

2nd Line 

Total - 50 46 44 72 

150 

81 

69 

150 

193 

112 

81 

193 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-20 

A-26 

2nd Line - 12 

Total - 12 

32 

32 

11 

43 

37 

37 

5 

42 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

Night Fighters 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

72 389 

115 

542 

134 

33 

259 

659 

130 

75 

366 

44 

44 

60 59 

59 

59 

60 72 190 

84 

72 389 

116 

542 

88 

44 60 659 

Reconnaissance 

1st Line 

F-4, F-5 

F-6 

F-7 

F-8 

Other 

2nd Line 

Total 

48 

21 

78 

15 

27 

48 

63 

78 

Grand Total* 17 86 172 174 186 758 1,121 1,385 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transports, trainers, and communications aircraft.) 
1943 

Feb 

1.635 

5 

1.640 

207 

142 

65 

1 

208 

233 

157 

76 

233 

56 

56 

4 

60 

1.025 

236 

124 

556 

109 

1,025 

114 

35 

79 

114 

MZX 

2,170 

19 

2,189 

254 

167 

87 

1 

255 

299 

231 

68 

299 

99 

99 

4 

103 

1,439 

416 

202 

634 

51 

136 

1,439 

79 

34 

20 

25 

14 

93 

Apr May 

2,635 3,309 

21 27 

2.656 3,336 

301 336 

195 229 

106 107 

1 1 

302 337 

370 601 

235 368 

135 233 

370 601 

157 165 

157 165 

4 4 

161 169 

1,725 2,111 

533 551 

285 350 

668 733 

89 298 

150 179 

4 

1.725 2,115 

82 96 

30 29 

27 27 

25 40 

16 18 

98 114 

Jun 

3,494 

47 

3,541 

461 

269 

192 

1 

462 

715 

437 

278 

715 

166 

166 

4 

170 

2,048 

514 

347 

717 

290 

180 

19 

2,067 

104 

37 

27 

40 

23 

127 

Jul 

3,457 

51 

3.508 

544 

314 

230 

1 

545 

702 

422 

280 

702 

155 

155 

4 

159 

1,940 

448 

330 

690 

260 

23 

189 

20 

1,960 

116 

52 

24 

40 

26 

142 

Aug 

3,100 

35 

3.135 

453 

338 

115 

1 

454 

668 

398 

270 

668 

137 

137 

137 

1,739 

362 

290 

625 

231 

43 

188 

7 

1.746 

103 

51 

22 

30 

27 

130 

SeP 

2,886 

32 

2,918 

517 

313 

204 

1 

518 

637 

360 

277 

637 

126 

126 

126 

1,512 

296 

258 

579 

187 

43 

149 

4 

1,516 

94 

52 

20 

22 

27 

121 

Oct 

2.496 

57 

2,653 

416 

298 

118 

416 

505 

252 

253 

505 

116 

116 

116 

1,474 

267 

250 

49 1 

79 

163 

39 

185 

27 

1,501 

85 

49 

19 

1 

16 

30 

115 

Nov 

2,565 

71 

2,636 

3 83 

268 

115 

18 

401 

570 

341 

229 

13 

5 83 

104 

104 

5 

109 

1,421 

253 

23 1 

456 

119 

138 

42 

182 

31 

1,452 

87 

52 

19 

1 

15 

4 

91 

Dec 

2,892 

104 

2,996 

557 

289 

268 

20 

577 

631 

378 

253 

9 

640 

109 

109 

5 

114 

1,530 

216 

240 

432 

299 

133 

45 

165 

60 

1,590 

65 

48 

16 

1 

10 

75 

1,855 2,418 2,890 3,843 4,087 4,030 3,700 3.527 3,272 3,243 3,619 
Appendix 10 (continued) 

Aircraft in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to August 1945 

1944 

JaTl Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep 

Combat Ahlanes 

1st Line 

2nd Line 

Total 

Heavy Bombers 

1st Line 

B-24 

2nd Line 

Total 

B-17 

Medium Bombers 

1st Line 

B-25 

B-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Light Bombers 

1st Line 

A-20 

A-26 

2nd Line 

Total 

Fighters 

1st Line 

P-38 

P-39 

P-40 

P-47 

P-51 

3,232 

118 

3,350 

834 

309 

525 

21 

855 

71 1 

403 

308 

9 

720 

110 

110 

5 

115 

1,505 

172 

248 

39 1 

348 

116 

Night Fighters 50 

Other 180 

2nd Line 74 

Total 1,579 

Reconnaissance 

1st Line 72 

F-4, F-5 49 

F-6 21 

F-7 

F-8 1 

Other 1 

2nd Line 9 

Total 81 

Grand Total* 3,959 

3,461 3,875 3,893 4,010 4,017 4,115 3,888 3,957 

113 295 294 437 447 395 597 620 

3,574 4,170 4,187 4,447 4,464 4,510 4,485 4,577 

877 1,265 1,338 1,410 1,297 1,301 1,445 1,597 

289 397 368 361 315 316 366 407 

588 868 970 1,049 982 985 1,079 1,190 

24 27 37 89 95 106 126 123 

901 1,292 1,375 1,499 1,392 1,407 1,571 1,720 

715 654 774 773 667 751 713 726 

395 361 453 465 395 440 438 463 

320 293 321 308 272 311 275 263 

16 99 89 179 237 191 206 170 

731 753 863 952 904 942 919 896 

126 121 113 103 114 111 95 109 

126 121 113 103 114 111 95 109 

5 12 14 18 17 18 34 31 

131 133 127 121 131 129 129 140 

1,667 1.760 1,575 1,587 1,798 1,797 1,499 1,374 

224 341 313 377 337 258 166 299 

366 375 336 293 244 241 175 - 

328 298 274 181 139 103 

379 368 350 371 544 649 697 617 

120 197 225 313 481 499 411 413 

51 47 46 46 47 47 50 45 

199 134 31 6 6 

61 145 143 138 85 67 217 283 

1,728 1,905 1,718 1,725 1,883 1,764 1,716 1,657 

76 75 93 137 141 155 136 151 

52 42 57 81 84 103 86 104 

23 30 32 53 54 49 42 43 

1 1 

1 1 1 1 1 1 

1 2 2 2 2 8 4 

7 12 11 13 13 13 14 13 

83 87 104 150 154 168 150 164 

3,980 4,601 4,524 4,824 4,867 5,394 5,078 5,076 

- 

*Includes other aircraft not shown (transports, trainers, and communications aircraft.) 






Appendix 12 

Combat Sorties Flown, Europe 

December 1941 to August 1945 

1941 Dsc 

1942 Jan 

Feb 

MiU 

APT 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

MiU 

APr 

May 

JUn 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

A% 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

MiU 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug Total 1945 

ETO MTO 

324 

423 

534 

629 

543 

2,453 

767 

976 

1,564 

989 

3,915 

4,104 

5,531 

5,826 

9,294 

7.463 

9.624 

13,876 

63,929 

15,183 

24,425 

3 1,950 

43,434 

67,979 

96,096 

74,878 

77,976 

57,384 

52,596 

52,299 

6 1,089 

655.289 

47,477 

68.365 

111,472 

79,402 

5,565 

312,381 

70 

166 

255 

576 

1,519 

2,544 

2,166 

7.296 

4,330 

3,362 

6,478 

12,963 

12,724 

13,248 

24.370 

21.532 

20,659 

14,124 

15,856 

19,948 

169,594 

28,992 

20,568 

24,798 

30,645 

42,539 

33,947 

33,987 

37,968 

26.359 

22,607 

26,055 

28.347 

Total 

70 

166 

579 

999 

2,053 

3,173 

2,709 

9,749 

5.097 

4,338 

8,042 

13,952 

16,639 

17,352 

29,901 

27,358 

29,953 

21,587 

25.480 

33,824 

233,523 

44,175 

44.913 

56.748 

74,079 

110,518 

130.043 

108,865 

115,944 

83,743 

75,203 

78.354 

891436 

35618 12 1,012,101 

16.914 64,491 

31.348 99,713 

35,408 146,880 

41,495 120,897 

646 6,211 

125,811 438,192 

Grand Total 1,034.052 659,513 1,693,565 

Appendix 13 

Combat Sorties Flown in the European Theater of Operations 

August 1942 to May 1945 

1942 Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

Jun 

Jul 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1944 

Jun 

Jul 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May Total 1945 

Heavy Bomber 

Airborne Effective 

114 76 

183 99 

284 143 

519 27 1 

353 165 

1,453 754 

338 220 

526 313 

956 823 

449 349 

1,672 1,471 

2,107 1,268 

2,829 1,743 

2,265 1,850 

3,259 2,457 

2,831 2,117 

4,157 2,581 

5,973 4,937 

27,362 20,129 

6,367 5,027 

9,884 7,512 

11,590 8,773 

14,464 9,945 

19,825 13,975 

28,925 22,713 

23,917 18,864 

22,967 18,964 

18,268 15,617 

19,082 17,058 

17,003 15,245 

18,252 16,424 

210,544 170,117 

16,702 14,750 

22,884 19,933 

31,169 28,804 

20,514 18,180 

2,276 2,254 

93,545 83,921 

Grand Total 332,904 274,921 

MedLt Bomber 

Airborne Effective 

23 

416 

1,297 

2,611 

1,236 

1,562 

2,162 

9,307 

1,649 

3,862 

4,099 

7,416 

11,944 

11,711 

8,008 

9,182 

5,43 1 

3,633 

5,176 

7,350 

79,461 

4,457 

9,255 

17,461 

10,832 

278 

42,283 

23 

416 

904 

1,808 

52 1 

867 

994 

5,533 

1,050 

2,373 

3,025 

5,332 

8,523 

8,908 

5,839 

6,588 

3,379 

1,800 

3,224 

4,881 

54,922 

2,998 

7,902 

15,792 

9,209 

167 

36,068 

131,051 96,523 

Fighter 

Airborne Effective 

210 

240 

250 

110 

190 

1 ,OOo 

429 

450 

608 

540 

2,220 

1,997 

2,286 

2,264 

3,424 

3,396 

3,905 

5,74 1 

27,260 

7,167 

10,679 

16,261 

21,554 

36,210 

55,460 

42,953 

45,827 

33,685 

29 $8 1 

30,120 

35,487 

365,284 

26,4 18 

36,226 

62,842 

48,056 

3,011 

176,553 

200 

230 

240 

100 

180 

950 

422 

435 

584 

510 

2,109 

1,879 

2,133 

2,017 

2,987 

2,888 

3,436 

5,101 

24,501 

6,464 

9,703 

14,613 

19,216 

32,860 

50,748 

39,923 

42,409 

30,397 

27,132 

27,871 

33,242 

334,578 

24,561 

34,515 

60,199 

45,453 

2,557 

167,285 

Total 

Airborne Effective 

324 

423 

534 

629 

543 

2,453 

767 

976 

1,564 

989 

3,915 

4,104 

553 1 

5,826 

9,294 

7,463 

9,624 

13,876 

63,929 

15,183 

24,425 

3 1,950 

43,434 

67,979 

96,096 

74,878 

77,976 

57,384 

52,596 

52,299 

61,089 

655,289 

47,577 

68,365 

1 1 1,472 

79,402 

5,565 

312,381 

276 

329 

383 

37 1 

345 

1,704 

642 

748 

1,407 

859 

3,603 

3,147 

4,292 

4,771 

7,252 

5,526 

6,884 

11,032 

50,163 

12,541 

19,588 

26,411 

34,493 

55,358 

82,369 

64,626 

67,96 1 

49,393 

45,990 

46,340 

54,547 

559,617 

42,309 

62,350 

104,795 

72,842 

4,978 

287,274 

570,097 527,314 1,034,052 898,758 

Appendix 14 

Combat Sorties Flown in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to May 1945 

Heavy Bomber MedLt Bomber Fighter Total 

Airborne Effective* Airborne Effective* Airborne Effective* Airborne Effective* 

1942 Jun 70 70 

Jul 166 166 

Aug 180 71 4 255 

SeP 217 73 286 576 

Oct 280 299 940 1,519 

Nov 513 35 1 1,680 2,544 

Dec 482 244 1,440 2,166 

Total 1942 1,908 1,038 4,350 7,296 

1943 Jan 739 622 89 1 77 1 2,700 2,452 4,330 3,845 

Feb 734 585 607 503 2,021 1,755 3,362 2,843 

Mar 835 720 1,134 93 1 4,509 4,079 6,478 5,730 

APr 1,586 1,359 2,404 2,089 8,973 8,372 12,963 11,820 

May 2,152 1,890 2,283 2,099 8,289 7,653 12,724 11,642 

Jun 2,065 1,944 2,656 2,476 8,527 7,974 13,248 12,394 

Jul 3,242 2,860 4,784 4,579 16,344 15,660 24,370 23,099 

Aug 2,298 2,097 4,563 4,337 14,671 14,074 21,532 20,508 

SeP 2,909 2,339 5,429 5,011 12,321 11,771 20,659 19,121 

Oct 2,005 1,427 3,259 2,791 8,860 8,146 14,124 12,364 

Nov 1,785 1,069 3,358 2,633 10,713 9,717 15,856 13,419 

Dec 2,039 1,606 3,644 2,986 14,265 13,041 19,948 17,633 

Total 1943 22,389 18,518 35,012 31,206 112,193 104,694 169,594 154,418 

1944 Jan 4,720 3,811 4,933 4,248 19,339 18,230 28,992 26,289 

Feb 3,981 2,380 4,065 2,804 12,522 11,468 20,568 16,652 

Mar 5,996 4,202 4,141 3,437 14,661 13,413 24,798 21,052 

Apr 10,182 8,084 4,153 3,390 16,310 14,908 30,645 26,382 

May 14,432 11,584 7,028 5,787 21,079 19,652 42,539 37,023 

Jun 11,761 10,001 5,420 4,777 16,766 15,568 33,947 30,346 

Jul 12,642 10,825 5,295 4,447 16,050 14,768 33,987 30,040 

Aug 12,194 10,760 6,802 5,661 18,972 17,538 37,968 33,959 

Sep 10,056 8,509 5,002 4,152 11,301 10,467 26,359 23,128 

Oct 9,567 6,037 3,477 2,382 9,563 8,601 22,607 17,020 

Nov 9,259 6,955 4,811 3,623 11,985 10,776 26,055 21,354 

DeC 10,050 7,235 3,317 2,522 14,980 13,605 28,347 23,362 

Total 1944 114,840 90,383 58,444 47,230 183,528 168,994 356,812 306,607 

1945 Jan 4,002 2,918 2,947 2,202 9,965 9,219 16,914 14,339 

Feb 13,444 10,748 3,998 2,961 13,906 12,433 31,348 26,142 

Mar 14,939 12,737 4,971 4,056 15,498 14,583 35,408 31,376 

Apr 15,846 11,771 6,752 5,560 18,897 17,567 41,495 34,898 

May 42 36 59 51 545 502 646 589 

Total 1945 48,273 38,210 18,727 14,830 58,811 54,304 125,811 107,344 

Grand Total 187,410 147,111 113,221 93,266 358,882 327,992 659,513 568,369 

*Effective sortie figures are for Jan 1943 to May 1945. 

Appendix 15 

Fighter Sorties Flown against Germany 

January 1943 to May 1945 

European Theater of Operations Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Bombing, 

Escort Strafing Recon 

Bombing, 

Other* Total Escort Strafiig Recon Other* Total 

1943 

Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

AW 

sep 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 

429 

450 

608 

524 

1,836 

1,828 

1,679 

686 

429 

450 

608 

540 

2.220 

1,997 

2,286 

2,264 

3.424 

3,396 

1.352 286 

350 

505 

2.063 

2,393 

1,770 

3,916 

4.01 1 

4,491 

3,951 

4,161 

6,157 

34,054 

186 

312 

68 

388 

204 

94 

353 

521 

210 

151 

334 

29 1 

3,112 

876 

266 

1.698 

3.089 

2,803 

2,894 

5,843 

5,653 

5,127 

2.517 

3,182 

4,104 

38,052 

2,700 

2,021 

4,509 

8,973 

8,289 

8,527 

16,344 

14,671 

12,321 

8,860 

10,713 

14,265 

112,193 

8 

3 84 

169 

607 

1,578 

2,167 

2,890 

2,638 

5,095 

15.536 

1$93 

2.238 

8 3;433 

2,889 

3,769 

6,232 

4,486 

2,493 

2,241 

3.036 

3,713 

36,975 

1,257 

506 

105 2 

89 57 

194 67 

1,160 

500 

11,463 

3,905 

5,741 

27.260 

1944 

Jan 6,080 

Feb 10,295 

Mar 14,659 

Apr 14,072 

May 26,091 

Jun 27,970 

Jul 20,577 

Aug 23,793 

Sep 13,531 

Oct 15,659 

Nov 19,082 

Dec 15,723 

Total 207,532 

1945 

Jan 10.898 

Feb 13.261 

Mar 19,853 

Apr 16,654 

May 168 

Total 60,834 

201 

83 

8 87 

3,803 

6,405 

1 1,320 

9,098 

4,524 

1 1.056 

11,731 

7.542 

12.940 

79.590 

886 7.167 

301 10,679 

715 16,261 

3.679 21,554 

3.714 36,210 

16.170 55,460 

13,278 42,953 

17,510 45,827 

9,098 33,685 

2,491 29,881 

3,496 30.120 

6,824 35.487 

78,162 365,284 

4,526 

2,628 

4,487 

6,050 

6,746 

5,862 

8,235 

7,887 

4,513 

4,003 

4,270 

6,141 

65.348 

6,359 

4,014 

4,037 

6,844 

11,759 

8,232 

5,223 

6,461 

4,164 

4,583 

6,822 

7.988 

76.486 

- 8,454 

- 5.880 

- 6,137 

- 3,416 - 2,574 

- 2,672 

- 4,624 

- 2,624 

- 977 

- 893 

- 851 - 41.694 

- 2,592 

19,339 

12.522 

14;661 

16,310 

21,079 

16,766 

16,050 

18,972 

11,301 

9,563 

11,985 

14,980 

183.528 

9,878 

13,906 

37.31 1 

25,420 

729 

87,244 

4,473 

8,410 

452 

4,452 

362 

18,149 

1.169 26,418 

649 36,226 

5,226 62.842 

1,530 48.056 

2.31 1 

6,658 

5,340 

7,402 

6,868 

15.062 

11,749 

332 

41,413 

1 251 

- 380 

4 432 

1,400 408 

1’76 37 

1,581 1,508 

9,965 

13,906 

15.498 

18.897 

545 

58.81 1 

1,752 3,011 

10,326 176,553 14,309 

Grand 

Total 283,902 167.028 18,216 99,951 569,097 116,632 151,953 4,693 81,254 354,532 

*Includes patrol. interception, sweep, and sea-search sorties. 

Appendix 16 

Bombs Dropped against Germany 

High Explosive . 

4,500 lb 

2.000 lb 

1,000 lb 

600 lb 

550 lb (Russian) 

500 lb 

350 lb 

250 lb 

160 lb 

100 lb 

40 lb 

Individual Fragmentation 

260 lb 

90 lb 

85 lb 

30 lb 

Total 

Total 

Fragmentation Cluster 

540 lb 

480-400 lb 

360 lb 

180 lb 

120 lb 

% lb 

69 lb (Parachute) 

Total 

Individual Incendiary 

500 lb 

360 lb 

250 lb 

250 lb (British) 

200 lb (British) 

100 lb 

1943 

2,322 

36,548 

712 

296,093 

108.464 

79 

61,905 

2,707 

508,830 

5.435 

5,435 

5 

127,378 

127,383 

2,546 

9,410 

350 

145,519 

100 lb (White Phosphorous) 7 

67 lb 756 

4 lb 512 

Total 159.100 

Incendiary Cluster 

512 lb 

500 lb 335 

480 lb 

440 lb 

136 lb 748 

Total 1,083 

Class C-Fire 

165-150 gal 

110-100 gal 

50 gal 

75 gal 

Total 

Armor-Piercing 

1,600 lb 

500 lb 

Total 

Semi-Amor Piercing 

1,000 lb 

500 lb 

Total 

1944 

32,104 

350,755 

1.645 

1,865,398 

711.293 

945.636 

3,906.83 1 

1 16.955 

1,6% 

290 

118,941 

306 

991 

4 

2 

429,667 

200 

1,960 

433,130 

12,578 

2,202 

625.994 

3,475 

644,249 

1,283 

360 

475 

158,536 

126 

160,780 

727 

3,271 

722 

4,720 

1.122 

1,122 

1 1,633 

20,934 

32.567 

1945 

(Jan-Aug) 

158 

14,149 

177,666 

928,425 

12 

235,532 

512,668 

1,868,610 

81,803 

81,803 

3,670 

1,893 

3.275 

199,259 

300 

19 

208,416 

18,781 

91 

93 

34,881 

1 1,777 

65,623 

363 

108,487 

108,850 

699 

3,522 

3,249 

10 

7.480 

4 

4 

4,587 

9.981 

14,568 

Total 

158 

48,575 

564,969 

712 

1,645 

3.089,9 16 

12 

1,055,289 

79 

1,520,209 

2,707 

6,284.27 1 

198,758 

1.6% 

290 

5,435 

206,179 

3,976 

2,884 

3,279 

7 

756,304 

500 

1,979 

768,929 

33,905 

91 

93 

11,612 

350 

806,394 

15.259 

756 

512 

868,972 

1,283 

695 

838 

267,023 

874 

270,713 

1,426 

6,793 

3.97 1 

10 

12.200 

1,122 

4 

1,126 

16,220 

30.9 15 

47,135 

Appendix 17 

Tons of Bombs Dropped 

December 1941 to August 1945 

1941 Dec 

1942 Jan 

Feb 

Ma 

APr 

May 

Aw 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Ma 

JUn 

Jul 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dee 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Ma 

APr 

May 

JUn 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Ma 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Total 1945 

ETO 

I_ 

115 

357 

135 

215 

334 

612 

417 

1,713 

739 

705 

1,530 

1,130 

2,688 

2,468 

4,366 

5,072 

8,519 

6,015 

8,309 

14,114 

55,655 

14,015 

22,566 

26,539 

38,540 

56,874 

85,648 

63,062 

67,766 

52,175 

52,860 

51,413 

60,501 

591,959 

54,474 

80,348 

118,003 

69,242 

368 

322,435 

Grand Total 971,762 

MTO 

414 

482 

77 1 

1,195 

1,076 

4,410 

1,983 

1,719 

2,773 

5,053 

7,297 

8,596 

13,846 

12,584 

13,942 

7,625 

9,480 

13,564 

98,462 

19,097 

11,595 

17,440 

29,856 

46,075 

36,287 

41,769 

40,280 

29,285 

22,108 

26,695 

26,506 

346,993 

14,539 

32,661 

41,120 

44,365 

151 

132,836 

582,701 

Total Against 

Total Against Total Against Germany 

Germany 

115 

357 

549 

697 

1,105 

1,807 

1,493 

6,123 

2,722 

2,424 

4,303 

6,183 

9,985 

11,064 

18,212 

17,656 

22,461 

13,640 

17,789 

27,678 

154,117 

33,112 

34,161 

43,979 

68,396 

102,949 

121,935 

104,831 

108,046 

81,460 

74,968 

78,108 

87,007 

938,952 

69.013 

113,009 

159,123 

113,607 

519 

455,271 

1,554,463 

- 

Japan 

36 

20 

47 

68 

128 

184 

295 

299 

409 

459 

564 

752 

855 

4,080 

859 

1,147 

1,644 

2,033 

2,344 

1,845 

4,041 

4,333 

4,212 

5,013 

5,921 

11,291 

44,683 

7,885 

9,912 

12,255 

13,537 

14,715 

10,499 

10,034 

9,458 

12,849 

12,329 

15,025 

18,528 

147,026 

19,335 

23,919 

41,088 

44,007 

47,180 

50,893 

53,665 

26,869 

306,956 

502,781 

and Japan 

36 

20 

47 

68 

128 

184 

410 

656 

958 

1,156 

1,669 

2,559 

2,348 

10,203 

3,581 

3.57 1 

5,947 

8,216 

12,329 

12,909 

22,253 

21,989 

26,673 

18,653 

23,710 

38,969 

198,800 

40,997 

44,073 

56,234 

81,933 

117,664 

132,434 

114,865 

117,504 

94,309 

87,297 

93,133 

105.535 

1,085,978 

88,348 

136,928 

200.21 1 

157,614 

47.699 

50,893 

53,665 

26,869 

762,227 

2,057,244 
Appendix 18 

Tons of Bombs Dropped on German -- 1942 to 1945 

1942 (Jun-Dec) 

ETO MTO Total 

i'ar gets 

1943 ~. - 

ETO MTO Total 

Heavy Bombers 

Albania 

Austria 

Bulgaria 

Czechoslovakia 

Denmark 

France 

Greece 

Germany 

HwFry 

Italy 

Low Countries 

North Africa 

Norway 

Poland 

Rumania 

Yugoslavia 

Other* 

Total 

1,624 

36 

53 

1,713 

1,624 

36 

3,251 3,251 

3.25 1 

Mediumnight Bombers and Fighters 

Albania 

Austria 

Bulgaria 

Czechoslovakia 

Denmark 

France 

Germany 

Greece 

Hungary 

Italy 

Low countries 

North Africa 

Norway 

Poland 

Rumania 

Yugoslavia 

Other* 

Total 

All Types 

Albania 

Austria 

Bulgaria 

Czechoslovakia 

Denmark 

France 

Germany 

Greece 

Hungary 

Italy 

Low countries 

North Africa 

Norway 

Poland 

Rumania 

Yugoslavia 

Other* 

Total 

1,624 

36 

53 

1,713 

1,159 

1.159 

4,410 

4,410 

53 

4,964 

1.159 

1,159 

1,624 

36 

4,410 

53 

6.123 

14,237 

27,598 

767 

1,497 

3,353 

47,452 

8,203 

8,203 

22.440 

27.598 

767 

1,497 

3.353 

55,655 

91 

665 

347 

924 

1,453 

1,293 

23,795 

19,517 

1,382 

1,018 

50.485 

22.653 

25,324 

47.977 

91 

665 

347 

924 

1,453 

1,293 

46.448 

44,841 

1,382 

1,018 

98.462 

91 

665 

347 

15,161 

29,051 

1,293 

23.795 

767 

19,517 

1,497 

1,382 

1,018 

3,353 

97,937 

8,203 

22,653 

25,324 

56.1 80 

91 

665 

347 

23,364 

29,051 

1,293 

46,448 

767 

44,841 

1,497 

1,382 

1,018 

3.353 

154.1 17 

*Includes tonnage jettisoned. 
1944 

ETO MTO Total 

796 

60 

119,460 

295,470 

364 

12.312 

316 

287 

17.100 

446,165 

143,056 

1,369 

1,369 

145,794 

796 

60 

262,516 

296,839 

364 

13,681 

316 

287 

280 

34.552 

2,253 

8.193 

18.186 

23.849 

1,932 

19,250 

61.917 

1,144 

24,746 

17,519 

23.619 

237,440 

4,976 

104,577 

109,533 

280 

34,552 

2.253 

8.193 

23,162 

23.849 

1,932 

19,250 

166,494 

1,144 

24,746 

17519 

17,100 23i619 

591.959 346,993 

280 

34,552 

8,989 

60 

137,646 

319,319 

1,932 

19,614 

61,917 

12.312 

2253 

1,460 

25,033 

17.519 

40,719 

683,605 

148,032 

1,369 

io4.m 

1,369 

255347 

280 

34,552 

2,253 

8,989 

60 

285.678 

320,688 

1,932 

19,614 

166.494 

13,681 

1,460 

25,033 

17.519 

40.719 

938.952 

1945 (Jan-May) 

ETO MTO Total 

400 

3,564 

7.628 

198,661 

1,035 

8,101 

219.389 

21,357 

81,689 

103,046 

400 

3,564 

28,985 

280,350 

1,035 

8,101 

322,435 

38.566 

2,246 

10.612 

2.614 

27.029 

3,503 

6,329 

90,899 

1,843 

500 

36,341 

2,000 

1,253 

41,937 

40.409 

2,246 

11.112 

2,614 

63,370 

5,503 

7.582 

132.836 

38,966 

5,810 

7,628 

209,273 

2,614 

27,029 

1,035 

3,503 

14,430 

310,288 

1,843 

21,357 

82,189 

36.341 

2.000 

1,253 

144,983 

40,809 

5,810 

28,985 

29 1,462 

2,614 

63,370 

1,035 

5,503 

15,683 

455,271 

Grand Total 

ETO MTO Total 

I 

400 

4.360 

60 

142,949 

52 1,729 

364 

14,150 

1,497 

316 

287 

28.607 

714,719 

4,976 

,058 

,369 

257.043 

400 

4.360 

60 

315,565 

604,787 

364 

15,519 

1,497 

316 

287 

28,607 

97 1,762 

37 1 37 1 

73,783 74.183 

2.600 2.600 

10,439 14,799 

60 

19,110 162,059 

35,914 557,643 

3,225 3,225 

21,864 22,228 

112,741 112,741 - 14.150 

22,768 22i768 

1,497 

1,144 1,460 

26,128 26,415 

22,040 22,040 

29.948 58,555 

382.075 1,096,794 

1,843 

500 

163 37 1 

26,483 

2,000 

1,253 

200,626 

37 1 

75,626 

2,600 

10.439 

24,086 

36,414 

3,225 

21,864 

276,312 

49,251 

1,144 

26,128 

24.040 

1,843 

177.592 

83,558 

163 ,57 1 

1,369 

26,483 

2,000 

1,253 

457.669 

37 1 

76,026 

2,600 

14,799 

60 

339,651 

641.201 

3,225 

22,228 

276.3 12 

15,519 

49,251 

1,497 

1,460 

26,415 

24.040 

31:201 59:808 

582,701 1,554,463 

Appendix 19 

Tons of Bombs Dropped by Heavy Bombers on Germany 

June 1942 to May 1945 

Target 

1942 1943 1944 1945 Grand 

(Jun-Dec) (Jan-May) Total 

European Theater of Operations 

Marshaling Yards 

Oil Installations 

Airdromes and Airfields 

Railroads, Roads and Bridges 

Military Installations 

Other Specific Industries 

Aircraft Factories 

Ground Cooperation 

City Areas 

Ship Yards, Sub Pens 

Other Communications 

Miscellaneous 

Jettisoned and unidentified 

Total 

154 

543 

78 

149 

736 

53 

1,713 

5,348 

238 

5,513 

1,745 

7,030 

5,090 

18,072 

3,333 

1,083 

47,452 

89.884 

52,622 

57,810 

17,328 

45,879 

32,658 

36,726 

25,647 

42,603 

6,973 

21,937 

16,098 

446,165 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Marshaling Yards 

Oil Installations 

Airdromes and Airfields 

Railroads, Roads and Bridges 

Military Installations 

Other Specific Industries 

Aircraft Factories 

Ground Cooperation 

City Areas 

Ship Yards, Sub Pens 

Other Communications 

Miscellaneous 

Jettisoned and unidentified 

Total 

- 16,565 

8,215 

1,610 

1,558 

1,281 

36 

749 

775 

3,251 19,696 

3,251 50,485 

64,834 

46,769 

23,002 

24,399 

2,683 

12,064 

13,045 

12,073 

2,216 

8,929 

3,807 

23,619 

237,440 

100,224 

15,250 

18,825 

13,229 

15,284 

13,726 

2,472 

11,311 

4,217 

8,646 

3,516 

4,588 

8,101 

219.389 

38,298 

11,312 

3,819 

14,003 

4,580 

3,012 

8,039 

46 

1,461 

6,329 

90,899 

195,610 

68,110 

82,691 

30,557 

62,908 

53,492 

44,437 

36,958 

46,820 

34,427 

25,453 

7,921 

25,335 

7 14.7 19 

119,697 

58,081 

35,036 

40,012 

7,263 

16,634 

14,326 

20,148 

795 

2,216 

11,165 

26,754 

29,948 

382,075 

European and Mediterranean Theaters of Operations 

Marshaling Yards 

Oil Installations 

Airdromes and Airfields 

Railroads, Roads and Bridges 

Military Installations 

Other Specific Industries 

Aircraft Factories 

Ground Cooperation 

City Areas 

Ship Yards, Sub Pens 

Other Communications 

Miscellaneous 

Jettisoned and unidentified 

Total 

154 

543 

78 

149 

73 6 

3,251 

53 

4,964 

21,913 

238 

13,728 

1,610 

1,745 

8,588 

6,371 

36 

749 

18,072 

775 

23,029 

1,083 

97,937 

154,718 

99,391 

80,812 

41,727 

48,562 

44,722 

49,771 

37,720 

42,603 

9,189 

30,866 

3,807 

39,717 

683,605 

138,522 315,307 

26,562 126,191 

22,644 117,727 

27,232 70,569 

19,864 70,171 

16,738 70,126 

2,472 58,763 

19,350 57,106 

4,263 47,615 

8,646 36,643 

4,977 36,618 

4,588 34,675 

14,430 55,283 

310,288 1,096,794 

Appendix 20 

Tons of Bombs Dropped in the European Theater of Operations 

August 1942 to May 1945 

Heavy Bomber Med/Lt Bomber Fighter All Types 

HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total 

1942 

Aug 135 

Sep 215 

Oct 334 

Nov 612 

Dec 417 

Total 1,713 

1943 

Jan 739 

Feb 705 

Mar 1,530 

Apr 1,130 

May 2,654 

Jun 2,468 

Jul 3,504 

Aug 3.453 

Sep 5.515 

Oct 4,290 

Nov 5,072 

Dec 9,419 

Total 40.479 

1944 

Jan 9,651 

Feb 16,670 

Mar 16,357 

Apr 22,829 

May 33,123 

Jun 58,396 

Jul 39,483 

Aug 43,987 

Sep 34,852 

Oct 33,360 

Nov 41,210 

Dec 39,181 

Total 389,099 

1945 

Jan 39.382 

Feb 47,554 

Mar 64,323 

Apr 41,591 

May 

Total 192,850 

Grand 

Total 624,141 

- 135 

- 215 

- 334 

- 612 

- 417 

- 1.713 

- 739 

- 705 

- 1,530 

- 1,130 

23 2,677 

- 2.468 

599 4,103 258 

326 3,779 1,284 

228 5.743 2,764 

843 5,133 882 

1,796 6,868 1,424 

3,158 12,577 1,530 

6,973 47,452 8,153 

2,746 12,397 

2,476 19,146 

4,989 21,346 

4,747 27,576 

4,906 38.029 

1.229 59.625 

7.122 46,605 

5,318 49,305 

7,310 42,162 

11,727 45,087 

608 41,818 

3,888 43,069 

57,066 446.165 

1,579 

3.397 

4,998 

9,372 

15,120 

15,677 

9.873 

10,648 

5,712 

3,101 

5,436 

8,359 

93,272 

2,731 42,113 5,094 

7,446 55,000 13,554 

11,OOO 75,323 24,956 

5,362 46,953 14,528 

26,539 219,389 58.433 

- 301 

90,578 714,719 159,858 

11 

5 263 

9 1,293 

12 2.776 

- 882 

- 1,424 17 

- 1,530 7 

26 8’179 24 

- 1,579 39 

- 3,397 23 

64 5,062 131 

103 9,475 1.489 

36 15,156 3,684 

24 15.701 10,321 

10 9,883 6,567 

68 10,716 7,721 

- 5,712 4,300 - 3,101 4.574 - 5,436 4.019 

46 8,405 8.726 

351 93,623 51.594 

14 5.108 6,941 

334 13,888 10,955 

2,452 27,408 13.337 

1,152 15,680 5.689 

3.952 62,385 36,989 

- 301 67 

4,329 164,187 88,607 

5 

1 

7 

24 

1 

98 

140 

301 

577 

3 12 

505 

1,935 

920 

3,672 

4,249 

- 135 

- 215 

- 334 

- 612 

- 417 

- 1,713 

- 739 

- 705 

- 1,530 

- 2,665 

- 2,468 

- 3,762 

- 4,737 

- 8,279 

- 5,172 

- 1,130 

17 6,513 

7 10.956 

24 48.656 

39 11,269 

23 20.090 

131 21,486 

1.489 33,690 

3,689 51,927 

10,322 84,394 

6,574 55,923 

7.745 62,356 

4,301 44,864 

4,672 41,035 

4,159 50,665 

9,027 56,266 

52,171 533,965 

7.253 51,417 

11,460 72,063 

15,272 102,616 

6,609 61,808 

67 368 

40.661 288,272 

92,856 872,606 

- 135 

- 215 

- 334 

- 612 

- 417 

- 1,713 

- 739 

- 705 

- 1.530 

- 1;130 

23 2.688 

- 21468 

604 4.366 

335 5,072 

240 8,519 

843 6,015 

1,796 8.309 

3.158 14,114 

6,999 55,655 

2,746 14,015 

2,476 22.566 

5.053 26,539 

4,850 38,540 

4,947 56,874 

1,254 85,648 

7,139 63,062 

5,410 67,766 

7.311 52.175 

11,825 52,860 

748 51,413 

4,235 60,501 

57,994 59 1,959 

3,057 54,474 

8,285 80,348 

15,387 118,003 

7,434 69,242 

- 368 

34.163 322.435 

99,156 971,762 

*High Explosive. 

Appendix 21 

Tons of Bombs Dropped in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to May 1945 

Heavy Bomber Med/Lt Bomber Fighter All Types 

HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total HE* Incendiary Total 

1942 

Jun 115 

Jul 357 

Aug 346 

Sep 411 

Oct 424 

Nov 815 

Dec 783 

Total 3,251 

1943 

Jan 1,354 

Feb 1,221 

Mar 1,557 

Apr 2,777 

May 4,305 

Jun 4,732 

Jul 6,883 

Aug 5,047 

Sep 5,256 

Oct 4,180 

Nov 5,392 

Dec 7.752 

Total 50,456 

1944 

Jan 11,051 

Feb 6,611 

Mar 9.842 

Apr 20.657 

May 29,606 

Jun 23,637 

Jul 30,621 

Aug 27,660 

Sep 20,645 

Oct 15,712 

Nov 16.153 

Dec 18.308 

Total 230.503 

1945 

Jan 6,784 

Feb 24,417 

Mar 30,265 

Apr 29,181 

May 84 

Total 90,731 

Grand 

Total 374,941 

- 115 

- 357 

- 346 68 - 411 71 

- 424 297 

- 815 329 - 783 212 

- 3,251 977 

- 1,354 586 

- 1,221 488 

- 1.557 1,162 

- 2.117 1.935 

- 41305 2;334 - 4,732 3,030 

- 6.883 5.680 - 5.047 5,948 

27 5,283 7,171 

2 4.182 2,365 

- 5,392 21921 - 7.752 3,895 

- 11,051 5,947 

136 6,747 3,278 

534 10,376 5,457 

599 21,256 5,599 

749 30.355 9,908 

829 24.466 7,842 

1,562 32,183 7,038 

179 27,839 9,348 

211 20,856 6,473 

545 16,257 4,081 

1,144 17,297 6.119 

449 18,757 4.091 

6,937 237,440 75,181 

- 6,784 3,738 

91 24,508 4,789 

- 30,265 6,895 

77 29,258 9,242 

84 4 

168 90,899 24,668 

7,134 382,075 138,341 

- 115 

- 357 

68 - 414 

71 - 482 

- 297 50 50 771 

- 329 51 51 1,195 - 212 81 81 1,076 

- 977 182 - 182 4,410 

2 588 41 - 488 10 

- 1.162 54 

- 1.935 341 

1 2,335 656 - 3,030 834 

- 5,680 1,283 

- 5,948 1,589 - 7,171 1.488 

- 2,365 1,078 

- 2,921 1.167 - 3,895 1,917 

3 37,518 10,458 

41 1,981 

10 1.719 

54 2,773 - 341 5,053 

1 657 7,295 

- 1,283 13,846 - 1,589 12,584 - 1,488 13,915 

- 1.167 9,480 - 1.917 13.564 

1 10,459 98,429 

- 834 8,596 

- 1,078 7,623 

8 

34 

43 

91 

67 

50 

48 

7 

38 

3 86 

5.955 

3.278 

5.457 

5,599 

9,942 

7,885 

7,129 

9.415 

6,523 

4,129 

6,126 

4,129 

75,567 

2,079 12 

1,569 1 

1,589 18 

2,822 179 

5,686 92 

3,926 10 

2,454 3 

2,954 72 

1,900 6 

1,710 12 

3,255 17 

3.613 7 

33,557 429 

2,091 19,077 

1,570 11,458 

1,607 16,888 

3,001 29,078 

5,778 45,200 

3,936 35,405 

2,457 40.113 

3,026 39,962 

1,906 29,018 

1,722 21,503 

3,272 25,527 

3,620 26,012 

33,986 339,241 

57 3,795 3.836 124 3,960 14,358 

154 4,943 3,054 156 3,210 32,260 

152 7,047 3,621 187 3,808 40,781 

104 9,346 5,334 427 5,761 43,757 

4 39 24 63 127 

467 25,135 15,884 918 16,802 131,283 

856 139,197 60,081 1,348 61,429 573,363 

- 115 - 357 - 414 - 482 

- 771 

- 1,195 

- 4,410 

- 1.076 

2 1,983 

- 1,719 

- 2,773 - 5,053 

2 7,297 - 8,596 

- 13,846 

- 12,584 

27 13,942 

2 7,625 

- 9,480 - 13,564 

33 98,462 

20 19,097 

137 11,595 

552 17,440 

778 29,856 

875 46,075 

882 36,287 

1,656 41,769 

318 40,280 

267 29,285 

605 22,108 

1,168 26,695 

494 26,506 

7.752 346.993 

181 14,539 

401 32,661 

339 41,120 

608 44.365 

24 151 

1,553 132,836 

9,338 582,701 

*High Explosive. 

Appendix 22 

Combat Losses by Theater 

1942 Jan 

Feb 

MU 

APr 

May 

JUn 

Jul 

A% 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

MW 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aw 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

MW 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

MW 

APr 

May 

Aw 

Jun 

Jul 

Total 1945 

Grand Total 

ETO 

8 

2 

11 

17 

17 

55 

21 

24 

22 

34 

92 

98 

134 

135 

118 

201 

160 

222 

1,261 

277 

393 

55 1 

732 

761 

904 

712 

968 

758 

552 

538 

603 

7,749 

646 

580 

774 

579 

43 

2,622 

11.687 

January 1942 ti 1945 

Total Against 

Total Against Total Against Germany 

MTO 

5 

3 

6 

6 

6 

18 

42 

86 

112 

86 

83 

168 

157 

117 

256 

283 

163 

120 

87 

135 

1,767 

22 1 

268 

202 

311 

387 

419 

473 

487 

233 

263 

28 1 

324 

3,869 

189 

273 

284 

246 

17 

1,009 

6.73 1 

Germany 

5 

3 

14 

8 

17 

35 

59 

141 

133 

110 

105 

202 

249 

215 

390 

418 

28 1 

321 

247 

357 

3,028 

498 

661 

753 

1,043 

1,148 

1,323 

1,185 

1,455 

99 1 

815 

819 

927 

11,618 

835 

853 

1,058 

825 

60 

3,631 

18,418 

Japan 

5 

46 

12 

4 

50 

47 

25 

28 

30 

16 

57 

21 

341 

27 

25 

24 

40 

37 

59 

107 

86 

77 

95 

122 

120 

819 

145 

114 

138 

127 

97 

134 

109 

103 

112 

148 

235 

209 

1,671 

249 

190 

208 

242 

256 

216 

194 

144 

1,699 

4,530 

and Japan 

5 

46 

12 

4 

50 

52 

28 

42 

38 

33 

92 

80 

482 

160 

135 

129 

242 

286 

274 

497 

504 

358 

416 

369 

477 

3,847 

643 

775 

89 1 

1,170 

1,245 

1,457 

1,294 

1,558 

1,103 

963 

1,054 

1,136 

13,289 

1,084 

1,043 

1,266 

1,067 

316 

216 

194 

144 

5,330 

22,948 

Appendix 23 

Combat Losses in the European Theater of Operations 

August 1942 to May 1945 

Heavy Bomber 

Aircraft AA ocher Total 

1942 

Aug - - - - sep 2- -2 

Oct 8 - 210 

Nov 10 - 3 13 

Dec 17 - - 17 

Total 37 - 5 42 

Med/Lt Bomber Fighter All Types 

AircraftAA ocher Total AiraaftAA other Total Aircraft AA other Total 

---_ 8- -8 8- -8 

-- -- 2- -2 

---_ 1--1 9-211 

2-13 1- -1 13 - 4 17 

17 - - 17 

2-13 10 - - 10 49 - 6 55 

---- 

-- _-__ 

1943 

Jan 18 

Feb 21 

Mar 18 

Apr 28 

May 48 

Jun 78 

Jul 79 

Aug 87 

sep 46 

Oct 139 

Nov 53 

Dec 85 

Total 700 

1 

13 

12 

29 

20 

25 

38 

25 

65 

228 

- 18 3- -3 

223 1- -1 

3 21 --_ 1- -1 - 29 -- -- 5- -5 

8 69 18 211 9- 312 

-90 --__ 8--8 

10 118 11 -2 14 - - 14 

10 117 6-28 7- 310 

27 98 4228 10 - 2 12 

9 186 -- 11 13 - 1 14 

17 95 37 111 53 1 - 54 

22 172 15-6 37- 744 

108 1,036 16 23 8 47 161 1 16 178 

--_- 

---_ 

21 

22 

19 

33 

58 

86 

94 

100 

60 

152 

109 

123 

877 

- 21 

- 2 24 

- 3 22 

1 - 34 

21 13 92 

12 - 98 

30 10 134 

20 15 135 

27 31 118 

38 11 201 

33 18 160 

70 29 222 

252 132 1,261 

1944 

Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

sep 

Jun 

Jul 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 

139 27 37 203 

170 81 20 271 

178 112 55 345 

314 105 1 420 

211 122 43 376 

112 162 46 320 

80 201 71 352 

61 238 32 331 

137 207 30 374 

36 112 29 177 

50 146 13 209 

28 74 17 119 

1,516 1.587 394 3.497 

12 

4 14 

29 

125 

10 28 

25 12 

523 

2 75 

-25 

- 24 

1 18 

42 48 

93 303 

25 57 6 

1 19 69 13 

4 15 54 46 

6 32 201 60 

7 45 176 98 

7 44 147 226 

6 34 65 153 

14 91 100 294 

2 27 104 190 

226 99 198 

12 31 80 164 

28 118 141 163 

91 487 1,293 1,611 

6 69 197 35 45 277 

21 103 243 108 42 393 

91 191 234 167 150 551 

19 280 516 190 26 732 

66 340 397 248 116 761 

167 540 284 400 220 904 

108 326 150 377 185 712 

152 546 163 607 198 968 

63 357 241 422 95 758 

52 349 135 334 83 552 

54 298 131 328 79 538 

62 366 211 285 107 603 

861 3.765 2,902 3.501 1.346 7,749 

1945 

Jan 49 222 43 314 - 28 30 58 72 162 40 274 121 412 113 646 

Feb 14 157 25 196 4 68 13 85 38 208 53 299 56 433 91 580 

Mar 63 164 39 266 5 52 32 89 76 244 99 419 144 460 170 774 

Apr 72 ?7 41 190 11 18 17 46 36 207 100 343 119 302 158 579 

May 1 4 2 7 -- 5 16 15 36 6 20 17 43 -- 

Total 199 624 150 973 20 166 92 278 227 837 307 1,371 446 1,627 549 2.622 

Grand 

Total 2.452 2,439 657 5,548 131 492 192 815 1.691 2,449 1,184 5,324 4,274 5,380 2.033 11,687 

Appendix 24 

Combat Losses in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to May 1945 

Heavy Bomber MedlLt Bomber Fighter All Types 

Aixuaft AA other TotalAimaftAA Other TotalAixuaftAA other TotalAircraft AA other Total 

1942 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

See 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 

1943 

Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

Apr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 

1944 

Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

AW 

sep 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 

1945 

Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Total 

15 

-3 

-1 

-1 

-3 

-4 

1 17 

-- 

-- 4-15 

-- 3- -3 

-35-16 

--6--6 

-36- -6 

- 14 11 7 - 18 - 34 32 10 - 42 

- 54 67 17 2 86 

4 

3 

1 

1 

1 

2 

12 

1-1 

6- 

2- 

-1- 

-4- 

951 

2 3 

3 

10 

30 

46 

6 

2 

2 

2 

4 

4 

4 

8 

1 

4 

15 

11 

6 

2 

11 

12 

- 11 

-6 

-2 

- 13 

- 16 

- 10 

5 30 

13 85 

4 20 

3 37 

2 28 

3 36 

30 294 

11 1 1 

14 10 4 

85- 

24 10 5 

18 3 4 

18 2 6 

49 22 2 

13 

28 

13 

39 

25 

26 

73 

41 

55 

33 

20 

19 

385 

78 

40 

55 

109 

89 

58 

112 

113 

56 

6 

10 

7 

4 

16 

3 

12 

17 

5 

6 

15 

14 

115 

4 88 100 7 5 112 

2 52 60 20 6 86 

6 68 65 12 6 83 

3 116 144 16 8 168 

11 116 119 23 15 157 

20 81 84 7 26 117 

29 153 177 43 36 256 

27 157 181 60 42 283 

27 88 103 12 48 163 

12 50 86 9 25 120 

6 39 52 20 15 87 

10 80 93 21 21 135 

157 1,088 1,264 250 253 1,767 

8 

16 

41 

15 

31 

1 

2 

1 

3 

55 

27 12 2 

32 6 17 

32 

25 

22 1 10 

947 

748 

239 80 66 

32 

18 

30 

209 

56 

816 

30 117 118 42 61 221 

22 104 175 55 38 268 

42 89 88 41 73 202 

50 105 153 84 74 311 

69 180 102 189 96 387 

64 201 161 161 97 419 

50 135 141 222 110 473 

104 197 133 186 168 487 

44 117 33 138 62 233 

41 98 6 183 74 263 

56 120 23 137 121 281 

65 108 28 151 145 324 

637 1,571 1,161 1,589 1.119 3,869 

20 

106 

42 

105 

50 

85 

94 

91 

7 

1 

18 

619 

10 

11 

19 

65 

107 

79 

24 54 

11 128 

24 85 

24 194 

18 175 

32 196 

53 317 

51 254 

16 94 

30 140 

62 132 

77 205 

422 1,974 

28 15 7 

12 19 5 

8 13 7 

10 2 - 

-239 

9 12 1 

4 10 7 

3 20 13 

8 12 2 

4 18 3 

12 14 3 

353 

101 163 60 

50 

36 

28 

12 

70 

57 

38 

38 

52 

67 

43 

39 

18 

2 

10 

7 

441 

17 

25 

9 

17 

59 

70 

42 

54 

55 

55 

54 

36 

493 

32 

22 

170 

112 

21 

36 

71 

110 

69 

110 

933 

22 

25 

29 

11 

324 

33 

44 

56 

72 

1 

206 

48 81 2 88 99 189 

59 107 4 166 103 273 

41 110 21 170 93 284 

64 143 7 151 88 246 

214 444 34 585 390 1,009 

23 -107 17 

46 

108 

93 

65 

9 

32 1 

42 88 

39 147 

49 149 

18 83 

5 14 

153 481 

299 

- 14 5 

1 21 3 - 14 6 

3 58 23 

___ 

20 

19 

25 

20 

84 

4 

13 

7 

24 

7 

7 

Grand 

Total 847 1,313 6062,766 352 306 150 808 1,327 822 1,008 3,157 2,526 2,441 1,764 6,731 

Appendix 25 

Enemy Aircraft Destroyed 

February 1942 to August 1945 

1942 Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

A% 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

I Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug Total 1945 

Grand Total 

ETO 

3 

16 

49 

47 

54 

169 

50 

74 

142 

150 

380 

311 

575 

457 

303 

870 

222 

33 1 

3,865 

795 

741 

910 

1.29 1 

1,220 

663 

661 

1,013 

1,09 1 

353 

702 

985 

10,425 

465 

460 

750 

4,257 

28 

5,960 

20,419 

MTO 

2 

1 

43 

36 

76 

158 

194 

143 

21 1 

523 

350 

267 

3 13 

602 

483 

290 

175 

189 

3,740 

320 

377 

307 

958 

532 

562 

872 

598 

25 1 

259 

86 

117 

5,239 

8 

28 

145 

110 

29 1 

9,497 

Total 

2 

3 

17 

92 

83 

130 

327 

244 

217 

353 

673 

730 

578 

888 

1,059 

786 

1,160 

397 

520 

7,605 

1,115 

1,118 

1,217 

2,249 

1,752 

1,225 

1,533 

1,611 

1,342 

612 

788 

1,102 

15,664 

473 

488 

895 

4.367 

28 

6,25 1 

29,916 

Appendix 26 

Enemy Aircraft Destroyed in the European Theater of Operations 

August 1942 to May 1945 

By Heavy Bombers By Medkt Bombers 

Air Ground Total Air Ground Total Air Ground Total Air Ground Total 

By Fighters By All Types 

1942 Aug 2-2- 1- 1 3- 3 

16 - 16 - 16 - 16 

Oct 44 - 44 - 5- 5 49 - 49 

SeP 

Nov 47 - 47 - 47 - 47 

Dec 53 - 53 - 1- 1 54 - 54 

Total 1942 162 - 162 - 7- 7 169 - 169 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

MX 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

MX 

APr 

May 

A% 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Jun 

Jul 

Total 1944 

45 - 45 - 72 - 72 - 142 - 142 - 146 - 146 - 

293 - 293 - 527 - 527 6 - 6 

401 - 401 3 - 3 

255 - 255 10 - 10 

791 - 791 3 - 3 

106 - 106 11 - 11 

231 - 231 - 

372 - 372 - 

3,381 - 3,381 33 - 33 

582 

397 

363 

346 

380 

42 

98 

23 

65 

12 

29 

61 

2,398 

- 582 

- 397 

- 363 

- 346 

- 380 

- 42 

- 98 

- 23 

- 65 

- 12 

- 29 - 61 

- 2,398 

5 

2 

4 

8 

18 

42 

53 

38 

76 

105 

100 

45 1 

5 

2 

4 

8 

18 

42 

53 

38 

76 

105 

100 

45 1 

50 - 50 

74 - 74 

142 - 142 

150 - 150 

380 - 380 

311 - 311 

575 - 575 

457 - 457 

303 - 303 

870 - 870 

222 - 222 

331 - 331 

3,865 - 3,865 

10 - 10 203 - 203 795 - 795 

2- 2 341 1 342 740 1 741 

418 527 945 764 527 1,291 

2- 2 596 242 838 978 242 1,220 

3- 3 470 148 618 515 148 663 

3- 3 407 153 560 508 153 661 

586 440 1,026 651 440 1,091 

202 139 341 214 139 353 

492 181 673 521 181 702 

2 - 2 469 76 545 834 76 910 

2 - 2 551 437 988 576 437 1,013 

26 - 26 867 31 898 954 31 985 

50 - 50 5,602 2,375 7,977 8,050 2,375 10,425 

1945 Jan 41 - 41 - 337 87 424 378 87 465 

Feb 1- 1 1- 1 163 295 458 165 295 460 

92 - 92 8 - 8 454 3,703 4,157 554 3,703 4,257 

13 15 28 13 15 28 

MX 23 - 23 11 - 11 395 321 716 429 321 750 

APr 

May Total 1945 157 - 157 20 - 20 1,362 4,421 5,783 1,539 4,421 5,960 

Grand Total 6,098 - 6,098 103 - 103 7,422 6,796 14,218 13,623 6,796 20.419 

Appendix 27 

Enemy Aircraft Destroyed in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

July 1942 to May 1945 

1942 Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Jun 

Jul 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Awz 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May Total 1945 

By Heavy Bombers By MedLt Bombers 

Air GroundTotal Air GroundTotal 

2-2- 

1- 1- 

8-83 

6511- 

19 1 20 3 

36 6 42 6 

74 - 74 33 

47 - 47 33 

63 12 75 21 

75 100 175 27 

107 7 114 30 

81 17 98 37 

89 49 138 36 

124 42 166 88 

64 53 117 25 

84 22 106 9 

128 3 131 1 

1,244 305 1,549 454 

308 - 308 114 

135 - 135 15 

230 19 249 14 

105 74 179 2 

429 202 631 - 

242 38 280 - 226 20 246 - 336 39 375 1 

122 44 166 - 

13 5 18 - 

2 

3 10 13 7 

48 - 48 3 

1,889 451 2,340 44 

1 

9 8175 

98176 

10 13 

8 11 

18 24 

30 63 

6 39 

12 33 

2 29 

41 71 

5 42 

14 50 

90 178 

42 67 

33 42 

34 

278 732 

- 114 

- 15 - 14 

68 

1 

44 

-2 

-7 

-3 

10 54 

1 

-5 

6 

GrandTotal 3,178 770 3,948 510 306 816 

By Fighters By All Types 

Air Ground Total 

22 

16 

43 

81 

56 

57 

103 

319 

132 

115 

125 

117 

102 

81 

21 

42 

1,270 

170 

111 

103 

224 

190 

285 

376 

151 

18 

60 

34 

- 22 

9 25 

2 45 

11 92 

1 57 - 57 - 103 - 319 

33 165 

12 127 - 125 

63 180 

37 139 

25 106 

6 27 

12 54 

189 1,459 

- 170 

3 114 

17 120 

103 327 

62 252 

31 316 

120 496 

277 428 

215 233 

197 257 

32 66 

38 28 66 

1,760 1,085 2,845 

8- 8 

8 19 27 

105 18 123 

68 42 110 

189 79 268 

3,300 1,364 4,664 

Air Ground Total 

2- 2 

1- 1 

33 10 43 

22 14 36 

65 11 76 

123 35 158 

163 31 194 

137 6 143 

187 24 211 

421 102 523 

269 81 350 

233 34 267 

250 63 313 

539 63 602 

314 169 483 

170 120 290 

114 61 175 

171 18 189 

2,968 772 3,740 

320 - 320 

355 22 377 

210 97 307 

653 305 958 

432 100 532 

511 51 562 

713 159 872 

273 325 598 

31 220 251 

62 197 259 

44 42 86 

89 28 117 

3,693 1,546 5,239 

8- 8 

9 19 28 

119 26 145 

68 42 110 

204 87 291 

7,003 2,494 9,497 

Appendix 28 

Gasoline Consumption in the European Theater of Operations 

August 1942 to Mav 1945 

1942 Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Jun 

Jul 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May Total 1945 

Heavy 

Bomber 

274 

439 

7 10 

1,303 

876 

3,602 

1,234 

1,318 

2,035 

1,872 

4,528 

4,930 

8,780 

5,656 

8,181 

8,678 

933 1 

1 3,266 

70,009 

13,993 

19,641 

26,284 

31,019 

5 1,036 

57,205 

58,636 

57,230 

47,627 

53,786 

44,283 

38,693 

499,433 

43,757 

60,162 

77,497 

62,536 

29,589 

273,541 

Grand Total 846,585 

Y 

(thousands of gall&ls) 

MedLt 

Bomber 

9 

17 

34 

19 

368 

1,320 

1,747 

942 

1,113 

1,381 

6,950 

1,153 

2,470 

3,015 

4,394 

7,331 

6,848 

5,950 

5,977 

4,852 

3,289 

3,983 

4,826 

54,088 

3,630 

6,379 

12,372 

11,213 

5,725 

39,319 

100,357 

Fighter 

21 

25 

26 

11 

20 

103 

29 

60 

67 

164 

752 

697 

809 

95 1 

1,367 

1,476 

1,802 

2,384 

10,558 

3,208 

4,390 

6,674 

9,950 

15,641 

17,288 

15,115 

14,744 

12,275 

11,370 

10,816 

10,374 

131,845 

8,061 

1 1,757 

20,156 

18,020 

7,970 

65,964 

208,470 

Total 

295 

464 

736 

1,3 14 

896 

3,705 

1,263 

1,387 

2,119 

2,070 

5,299 

5,627 

9,957 

7,927 

11,295 

11,096 

12,446 

17,031 

87,517 

18,354 

26,501 

35,973 

45,363 

74,008 

81,341 

79,701 

77,95 1 

64,754 

68,445 

59,082 

53,893 

685,366 

55,448 

78,298 

110,025 

9 1,769 

43,284 

378,824 

1,155,4 12 

Appendix 29 

Gasoline Consumption in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

June 1942 to May 1945 

(thousands of gallons) 

1942 Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

Jun 

Jul 

APr 

May 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

Jun 

Jul 

APr 

May Total 1945 

Grand Total 

Heavy 

Bomber 

13 

31 

34 

42 

52 

390 

386 

948 

1,237 

1,067 

1,011 

2,335 

3,509 

3,028 

5,955 

4,205 

5,05 1 

3,22 1 

2,712 

3,046 

36,377 

7,193 

5,905 

9,954 

18,598 

27,015 

26,147 

29,373 

30,621 

25,244 

22,570 

23,864 

23,550 

250,034 

12,724 

32,574 

37,657 

37,533 

8,481 

128,969 

4 16,328 

MedLt 

Bomber 

40 

44 

173 

21 1 

148 

616 

656 

390 

63 1 

1,342 

1,74 1 

2,116 

4,376 

3,550 

4,419 

2,953 

2,205 

2,279 

26,658 

3,004 

2,360 

2,795 

3,019 

4,299 

4,744 

4,573 

5,03 1 

4,239 

2,934 

3,447 

2,321 

42,766 

1,976 

2,774 

3,170 

3,36 1 

1,27 1 

12.552 

82,592 

Fighter 

4 

12 

300 

295 

61 1 

834 

500 

937 

1,599 

2,425 

2,608 

4,050 

3,645 

3,22 1 

2,067 

2,137 

2,211 

26,234 

3,200 

2,170 

2,911 

4,518 

5,434 

5,568 

5,989 

7,199 

4,748 

3,884 

4,598 

5,3 16 

55,535 

3,94 1 

4,990 

6,664 

7,188 

1,746 

24,529 

106,909 

Total 

13 

31 

74 

90 

237 

901 

829 

2,175 

2,727 

1,957 

2,579 

5,276 

7,675 

7,752 

14,381 

1 1,400 

12,691 

8,241 

7,054 

7,536 

89,269 

13,397 

10,435 

15,660 

26,135 

36,748 

36,459 

39,935 

42,851 

34,23 1 

29,388 

3 1,909 

31,187 

348,3 3 5 

18,641 

40,338 

47,49 1 

48,082 

11,498 

166,050 

605,829 

Appendix 30 

Expenditures from Direct Appropriations by Major Project 

July 1942 to August 1945 

(thousands of dollars; figures in parenthesis are negative) 

1942 Jul 

AW 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Ma 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

A% 

Total 1945 

Procurement 

Airwft Aircraft Night Sight and Spm Missiles Ballms Gliders Modification Systans 

254,240 

436,098 

398,330 

445,727 

208,225 

432,132 

2,174,752 

824,772 

671,574 

791.800 

558,878 

686,222 

1,192,623 

659,938 

744,523 

737,753 

786.339 

832,252 

880,520 

9,367,194 

789,342 

692,13 1 

966,739 

814,996 

797.798 

658,013 

734,034 

840,857 

750,219 

465,547 

584,190 

475,712 

8,569,578 

54 1.02 1 

576.630 

852,592 

660,795 

728,663 

516,397 

548,870 

425,362 

4,850,330 

4,360 

2,000 

1,470 

1,362 

1,951 

2,844 

1,084 

15.071 

Grand Total $24.961.854 -~ ,. . $15,071 

15,061 

809 

7.557 

4,815 

6,459 

3,499 

2,573 

40,773 

2,963 

1.431 

46 1 

87 1 

437 

236 

15 

10 

110 

3 

50 

(4) 

6,583 

(2) 

(3) 

(1) 

1 

(5) 

$47,351 

707 

4,637 

2,367 

7,470 

4,014 

15,151 

34,346 

17,696 

10.670 

16,092 

8,409 

13,897 

18,245 

13,694 

12,698 

13,542 

10.215 

16,554 

13,936 

165,648 

14,521 

12,641 

13,563 

10,482 

7,670 

8,504 

4,900 

3,385 

2,638 

(4,897) 

4,600 

3,824 

81,831 

4,884 

8,001 

8,359 

9,233 

11,364 

9,565 

10,761 

11,881 

74,048 

1,363 

1,483 

4,851 

3,449 

2,554 

10,220 

23,920 

5,210 

4,086 

8,835 

6,551 

5,571 

3,161 

2,367 

3,023 

3,327 

4,525 

2,079 

2,637 

5 1,372 

5,834 

9,782 

15,565 

14,724 

18,775 

17,358 

12,509 

17,989 

17,628 

11,075 

17,498 

18,696 

177,433 

15.521 

13,436 

14,655 

13,611 

10,636 

13,057 

9,584 

7,546 

98,046 

$355,873 $350,771 

85 

31 

153 

52 

(15) 

194 

500 

73 

55 

64 

(29) 

10 

1,786 

47 

(13) 

89 

76 

175 

172 

2,505 

485 

175 

55 

(49) 

64 

90 

63 

21 

56 

35 

27 

29 

1,051 

25 

6 

8 

14 

22 

35 

28 

8 

146 

$4,202 
Appendix 30 (continued) 

Expenditures from Direct Appropriations by Major Project 

July 1942 to August 1945 

(thousands of dollars; figures in parenthesis are negative) 

1942 Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1942 

1943 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

Dec 

Total 1943 

1944 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

JUn 

Jul 

SeP 

Oct 

Nov 

DeC 

Total 1944 

1945 Jan 

Feb 

Mar 

APr 

May 

Jun 

Jul 

Aug Total 1945 

Grand Total 

Procurement 

Aircraft Aircraft Ind/Org* Miscellaneous photographic Maps/ 

Mahemme FWOil Equipment Equipment Equipment Mapping 

8.710 

10.360 

13.456 

15.065 

43.948 

21,716 

113.255 

20,508 

20,552 

45,480 

23.7 18 

32,371 

57,144 

36,075 

37,876 

49,714 

40,161 

37,051 

51,917 

452,567 

50,591 

49,724 

55,510 

51,230 

54,755 

63,448 

47,089 

42,726 

41,023 

42,682 

33,760 

29.664 

562,202 

34,787 

35,742 

40,553 

36,130 

29,604 

27,913 

27,984 

15,964 

248,677 

6,509 

4,552 

8,009 

7,723 

5,624 

9,633 

42,050 

8,993 

7,926 

39,257 

9,321 

9,365 

31.180 

33,894 

21,154 

89,572 

30,607 

29,123 

22,428 

332,820 

32,499 

30,984 

34,628 

29,543 

47,306 

86,563 

47,325 

36,416 

23,736 

(28,958) 

20,780 

37,443 

398,265 

52,351 

44,602 

82,495 

66,681 

46,508 

58,138 

65,151 

48,612 

464,538 

25.148 

31.581 

43,403 

56,681 

33,843 

61.364 

252,020 

53,843 

41,797 

27,092 

47,931 

78,006 

84,942 

7 1,023 

53,385 

49,377 

41,365 

45,889 

35,624 

630,275 

63,145 

55,566 

46,629 

36,596 

35,794 

34,604 

26,158 

29.981 

26,564 

26,563 

25,163 

19,998 

426.75 1 

21,232 

20,988 

26,396 

26,358 

29,214 

27,179 

26,975 

27,005 

205,347 

$1,376,701 $1,237,673 $13 14,393 

12,386 

14,271 

16,289 

14,842 

4,184 

10,057 

72,029 

4,223 

4,139 

47,881 

3,631 

6,180 

13,855 

23,418 

15,398 

13,584 

10,960 

10,584 

8,623 

162,476 

(2,715) 

7,463 

6,483 

7,131 

7,294 

3,458 

4,545 

5,565 

9,647 

5,712 

4,552 

4,584 

63,719 

5,845 

8,075 

7,840 

8,280 

7,649 

7,020 

6,505 

8,663 

59,877 

$358,101 

75 1 

1,200 

1,925 

2,352 

1,491 

554 

8,273 

3,807 

1,402 

2,985 

2,937 

655 

3,611 

95 8 

1,087 

1,258 

1,618 

1,321 

1,519 

23,158 

1,322 

1,143 

1,745 

1,614 

1,677 

97 1 

1,636 

2,773 

2,434 

2,706 

2,505 

2,882 

23,408 

2,143 

1,742 

2,774 

2,279 

2,239 

1,890 

1,215 

1,064 

15,346 

$70,185 

250 

15 

143 

925 

80 

1,192 

2,605 

199 

5 65 

218 

1.118 

13 

(505) 

2,322 

242 

197 

773 

923 

539 

6,604 

836 

527 

598 

602 

824 

594 

1,098 

598 

786 

1,327 

594 

648 

9,032 

674 

134 

541 

538 

570 

5 47 

637 

270 

3,911 

$22,152 

*Individual and organizational equipment. 
Non- Grand 

Procurement procurement Total 

other Test Advance* 

437 

22,466 

3,277 

959 

(3,362) 

23,772 

3,573 

18,694 

52,364 

29,622 

33.121 

29,785 

22,749 

36,481 

30,831 

36,870 

37,562 

40,468 

372,120 

50,117 

33,692 

26.078 

15,070 

6.391 

5,072 

1,991 

3,436 

5,671 

6,727 

3,928 

36 

15 8,209 

1,956 

2,575 

9,649 

3,160 

9,506 

2,613 

6.091 

1.021 

36,571 

$590.672 

2,422 

2,784 

4.439 

4.572 

2,733 

5.282 

22,232 

18,320 

6,257 

6,081 

4,068 

5,302 

8,665 

6,393 

14,497 

9,383 

5,192 

58 

8,152 

92,368 

1 1,842 

9,812 

6,694 

10,286 

6,571 

10.047 

8,117 

10,584 

8,912 

9.226 

7.269 

7.554 

106.9 14 

9.486 

8,155 

9,394 

7.830 

10,287 

9.800 

9,205 

8,625 

72,782 

$294,296 

3,051 

2,580 

3.5 67 

1,964 

3,667 

901 

15,730 

1,165 

1,765 

876 

169 

889 

1,553 

(238) 

1,139 

467 

880 

1,142 

2,020 

11,827 

1,638 

1,581 

1,217 

1,112 

1.010 

(1.024 

877 

3,485 

4,345 

3,222 

1,920 

1,680 

21,063 

1,407 

2,078 

662 

592 

342 

304 

479 

510 

6,374 

$54,994 

- 315,622 

- 510,029 

- 564,094 

- 311,307 

- 565,034 

- 2,785,484 

- 962.382 

- 789,482 

- 1,039,025 

- 696,324 

- 871,602 

- 1,461,107 - 873.449 

- 949,047 

- 519,398 

- 1,003,909 

- 976,040 

- 1,018,212 

- 1,071,128 

- 11,711,707 

- 1,022,420 

- 906,652 

- 1,175,965 

- 994,208 

- 986,366 

- 887.934 

- 890,357 

- 997,826 - 893,769 

350,829 891,799 

157,218 864,054 

330.658 803,394 

708.705 11,314,744 

104,416 795,746 

69,638 796,159 

(50,900) 1,007,019 

(27.444) 809,526 

(3 1.83 1) 856,135 

(31,862) 644,547 

(52,688) 663.641 

(63,006) 494,609 

(83,677) 6,067.382 

$625,028 $31,879,317 

31,967 347,589 

36,636 546,665 

42,868 562,266 

40.194 604,288 

42,485 353,793 

50,682 615.716 

244,832 3,030,316 

1,882 964.264 

103,863 893,345 

88,103 1,127,128 

110,959 807,283 

86,496 958,098 

150,311 1,611.418 

118,729 992,178 

102,426 1,051.473 

105,653 1,109.562 

114,925 1,090,965 

107,564 1,125,776 

98,196 1,169,324 

1,189,107 12,9003 14 

90,042 1.112.462 

104,549 1,011.201 

19 1,292 1,277.257 

92,016 1,086.224 

94,811 1,081.177 

91,745 979,679 

88,365 978,722 

100,785 1,098,611 

94,055 987,824 

78,473 970,272 

92,054 956,108 

83,435 886,829 

1,111,622 12,426,366 

90,355 886,101 

87,440 883,599 

98,338 1,105,357 

87,114 896,640 

95,052 951,187 

111,590 756,137 

89,314 752,955 

101.467 596,076 

760,670 6,828,052 

$3,306,231 $35,185,548 

*Advance payments less recoupmenu. Advance payments to contractors were charged directly to 

individual projects prior to 1 October 1944. 

Notes 

Introduction 

1. Tables, Army Air Forces, Management 

Control, Office, Director of Statistical Control, 

“Airplanes in US. Army Air Forces,” April 29, 

1942, and “U.S Army Air Forces Strength,” 

April 29, 1942, Papers of Henry H. Arnold, 

Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, 

Official File 1932-1946, folder: AF Strength, 

box 40. 

Part One 

Carrying the Flame 

From West Point to London 

Chapter 1 

Spaatz’s Early Career 

1. Frank Freidel, Over There: The Story of 

America’s First Great Overseas Crusade (New 

York: Bramhall House, 1964), p. 152. 

2. Interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by Donald 

Shaughnessey, Washington, D. C., 1959-1960, 

Arnold Oral History Project, Columbia 

University, New York, N.Y., p. 2. 

3. David R. Mets, unpublished book-length 

manuscript biography of Carl A. Spaatz, prepared from original sources and extensive interviews with Spaatz’s family and acquaintances, 

pp. 1-16, hereafter cited as Mets, “Spaatz 

Biography.” This study has the most complete 

information on Spaatz’s early life found anywhere. The study emphasizes Spaatz’s preWorld War I1 career and contains much useful 

information. For the published version of this 

work, see David R. Mets, Master of Airpower: 

General Carl A. Spaatz (Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press for the Air Force Historical 

FoundationIAerospace Education Foundation, 

1988). 

4. David R. Mets, “Carl A. Spaatz: A Model 

for Leadership,” paper presented at the joint 

American Military Institute- Air Historical 

Foundation meeting, Bolling AFB, Washington, 

D.C., April 1984, p. 3. 

5. Ibid. 

6. USMA, The Howitzer 1914 (West Point: 

USMA, 1914), p. 84. 

7. Walter T. Bonney, The Heritage of Kitty 

Hawk (New York: W.W. Norton, 1962), p. 119. 

8. Interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by Arthur 

Goldberg, May 1965, USAF Oral History 

Collection, AFHRC file no. D239.05 12-755, 

9. Minutes, Conference with Gen. Carl 

Spaatz and the Gillem Board, October 18, 1945, 

Papers of Carl A. Spaatz, Library of Congress, 

Manuscript Division, Diary File. Hereafter 

referred to as Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

10. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

1959-1960, p. 9. 

11. Memo, Brig. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Chief 

of the Air Staff, to Maj. James H. Higgs, 

September 11, 1941, Spaatz Papers, Diary. This 

memo was an official biography approved by 

Spaatz. 

12. Entries for May 5 to November 15, 1917, 

Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

13. Maurer Maurer, ed., The US. Air Service 

in World War I (Washington, D.C.: AFICHO, 

GPO, 1978), p. 97. This citation is from the 

Official Final Report of the Aviation Section, 

completed at the end of the war and printed in 

full in this volume. 

p.2. 

677 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

14. Ibid. 

15. Ibid. 

16. Freidel, Over There, p. 153. 

17. Maurer, The Air Service in World War I, 

pp. 106,112-1 13. 

18. U.S. Army Air Service, American 

Expeditionary Forces (“Gorrell History”), 

Series J, vol. 9, “The Third Aviation Instruction 

Center, Issoudun, France,” p. 202. from microfilm copy at the Air Force Historical Research 

Center (AFHRC), Maxwell AFB, Ala. Cited in 

prepublication manuscript biography of Carl A. 

Spaatz by David Mets. 

19. Report of the Secretary of War, 1919 

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1919), p. 13. 

20. Interview, 1st Lt. Charles R. D’Olive, 

interviewer unknown, June 16, 1969, New York, 

N.Y., Columbia University Oral History 

Research Office, AFHRC file no. K239.0512- 

612. 

21. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

22. War Department General Order No. 123, 

December 11, 1918. 

23. Spaatz’s Personal Notebooks, Spaatz 

Papers, Notebooks. Spaatz noted that he left 

Issoudun on August 30 and returned September 

27. 

24. Maurer, The Air Service in World War I, 

vol. 3, p. 523, contains a copy of Spaatz’s afteraction report. 

25. Edwin I. James, “Pershing’s Airmen 

All American Now,” New York Times, 

September 30, 1918, p. 2. The story’s dateline 

is September 28, 1918. 

26. Msg J-205, Mitchell to Spatz, September 

26, 1918, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

27. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

28. Dewitt S. Copp, A Few Great Captains: The 

Men and Events That Shaped the Development 

of US. Air Power (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980), p. 24. 

1959-1960, p. 12. 

1959-1960, p. 13. 

29. Ibid., pp. 22-23. 

30. Thomas H. Greer, The Development of 

Air Doctrine in the Army Air Arm, 1917-1941, 

USAF Historical Study No. 89, (Maxwell AFB, 

Ala.: Air University Press, 1955), pp. 14-15. 

31. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

1959-1960, p. 24. In the interview Spaatz gives 

the year of the hearings as 1917, but from the 

context of his remarks he seems to be refemng 

to the hearings of 1919. 

32. Ibid., p. 13. 

33. Report of the Secretary of War, Chief of 

Staff‘s Report, 1932, pp. 64-70. This contains 

an excellent discussion of the official Army 

position on the promotion list. 

34. Maurer Maurer, Aviation in the US. 

Army, 1919-1939 (Washington, D.C.: AFICHO, 

GPO, 1987), pp. 52-55,205. 

35. Compiled from Reports of the Chief of 

the Air Corps, 1921-1938. 

36. Compiled from the Reports of the 

Secretary of War, 1923-1935. 

37. Annual Report of the Chief of the Air 

Corps, 1930. 

38. Annual Report of the Chief of the Air 

Corps, 1924. 

39. Ibid. In 1986, 65 percent of Air Force 

officers were captains and lieutenants. 

40. Numbers of reserve officers used by each 

branch were compiled from the statistical sections of the Annual Reports of the Secretary of 

War, 1922-1935. 

41. Annual Report of the Secretary of War, 

Report of the Assistant Secretary of War for 

Air, 1930, p. 59. 

42. Compiled from Annual Reports of the 

Secretary of War, 1924-1933. 

43. See, for example, the Annual Report of 

the Chief of the Air Service, 1924, pp. 31-35. 

44. Report of the Surgeon General of the U.S. 

Army, 1937 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1937), 

45. Maurer, Aviation in the U.S. Army, p. 

477. Maurer bases his figures on those submitted to the Baker Board. 

46. See James P. Tate, “The Army and Its Air 

Corps: A Study in the Evolution of Army Policy 

Towards Aviation, 1919-1941 ,” unpublished 

Ph. D. dissertation, University of Indiana, 1976, 

for a thorough discussion of the air arm’s position in the interwar years. In particular see pp. 

90, 130-133, 152-156 for examples of budget 

deliberations concerning the various administrations’ attitudes toward the military aviation budget. 

47. Ltr, Office, Director of Air Service to 

Maj. Carl Spatz, Western Department, subj: 

Commendatory Letter, December 29, 1919, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

pp. 73-74. 

48. Mets, “Spaatz Biography,” pp. 79-81. 

49. Entry for October 26, 1919, Spaatz 

Papers, Notebooks. 

50. War Department Special Orders 95-0, 

para. 110, April 23, 1919. The other five recipients were Brig. Gen. William Mitchell, Lt. Col. 

Lewis H. Brereton, Lt. Col. John N. Reynolds, 

Maj. Melvin A. Hall, and Capt. Reed M. 

Chambers. Before America’s entry into World 

War I, twenty-four men, including Brereton, 

had earned the Military Aviator rating for pioneering air efforts. The National Defense Act of 

678 
NOTES 

1920, however, abolished the rating except for 

the six men who had earned it for distinguished 

service in France. 

51. Entry for May 10, 1925, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

52. Copp, Great Captains, pp. 29-30. 

53. Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea 

Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War 

II, vol. 1: Plans & Early Operations, January 

1939 to August I942 (Chicago: University of 

Chicago Press, 1948), p. 26. 

54. Ltr, Adjutant General, War Department to 

Maj. Carl Spatz, subj: Reprimand, August 6, 

1925, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

55. Entries for October-November 1924, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Alfred F. Hurley, Billy Mitchell: 

Crusader for Air Power (New York: Franklin 

Watts, 1964), p. 81. Mitchell had another reason 

for frequent visits to Detroit-the woman who 

became his second wife also lived there. 

57. Ltr, Brig. Gen. William Mitchell to Maj. 

Gen. Mason N. Patrick, August 3, 1922, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

58. Ltr, Mitchell to Spatz, June 1, 1923, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Ltr, Spatz to Mitchell, June 24, 1923, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

60. Greer, Development of Air Doctrine, p. 9. 

61. Ibid., p. 31. 

62. Ibid., pp. 3MO. 

63. Ibid., p. 37, citing Itr, Spatz to Chief of 

the Air Service, February 7, 1922. 

64. Ltr, Spatz to Capt. B. V. Baucom (Chief 

of Pursuit Training), Kelly Field, Tex., 

February 6,1923, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

65. Ltr, Spatz to 1st Lt. H. W. Cook, Air 

Corps Tactical School (ACTS), Langley Field, 

Va., February 13, 1923, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

66. Ltr, Spatz to Maj. L. H. Brereton, Kelly 

Field, Tex., April 19, 1923, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

67. Ltr, Spatz to Capt. B. V. Baucom, Kelly 

Field, San Antonio, Tex., March 14, 1924, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

68. Entry for May 11, 1925, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

69. Entry for June 30, 1925, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

70. U.S. Congress, House, Select Committee 

of Inquiry into Operations of the United Air 

Services, Hearings, 68th Cong., 2d Sess., 1925, 

part 3, p. 2246. 

71. Burke Davis, The Billy Mitchell Affair 

(New York: Random House, 1967), pp. 

72. Testimony of Maj. Carl Spatz, Air 

25 1-25 3. 

Service, U.S. Army, Court-Martial of Col. 

William Mitchell, November 9, 1925, pp. 

382-428, Modern Military Field Branch, 

National Archives and Records Administration’s (NARA) Washington National Records 

Center, Suitland, Md. 

73. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

74. Interview, Ruth Spaatz by James C. 

Hasdorff, Washington, D. C., March 3, 1981, 

USAF Oral History Collection, AFHRC file no. 

K239.0512-1266, p. 17. 

75. James Parton, “Air Force Spoken Here”: 

General Ira Eaker and the Command of the Air 

(Bethesda, Md.: Adler & Adler, 1986), p. 71. 

See pp. 68-77 of this work for a good description of the Question Mark episode. 

76. Interview, Ruth Spaatz by Hasdorff, pp. 

46-47. 

77. Copp, Great Captains, p. 84. 

78. Ltr, W. Ward Smith to Lt. Gen. Eaker, 

April 24, 1943, Library of Congress, 

Manuscript Division, Papers of Ira C. Eaker, 

Correspondence, Box 6. Smith bad been part of 

the Question Mark ground team. In this letter to 

his old friend Eaker, he used extracts of letters 

written to his son during the flight to recall past 

events. 

79. Ltr, Adjutant General, War Department, 

to Maj. Carl Spatz, subj: Distinguished Flying 

Cross, March 6,1929, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

80. Ltr, Comptroller General of the United 

States to Maj. M. T. Comagys through Chief of 

Finance, War Department, May 4, 1929, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

81. Maurer, Aviation in the US. Army, p. 

265. Maurer’s book (pp. 260-265) contains one 

of the best overall accounts of the Question 

Mark flight. 

82. Ltr, Spatz to Arnold, February 5, 1935, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary, Personal. 

83. Mets, “Spaatz Biography,” pp. 174-175. 

84. See Greer, The Development of Air 

Doctrine, pp. 46-47, for a discussion of the 

development of these planes. 

1959-1960, p. 27. 

85. Ibid., pp. 5846. 

86. Ibid., p. 61. 

87. For a thorough examination of the impact 

of Douhet and Mitchell on the ACTS, the font 

of Air Corps bomber doctrine, see the unpublished Ph.D. dissertation by Raymond Richard 

Flugel, “United States Air Power Doctrine: A 

Study of the Influence of William Mitchell and 

Giulio Douhet at the Air Corps Tactical School, 

1921-1935” (University of Oklahoma, 1965). 

This work shows how Douhet’s thought influenced Mitchell’s ideas and how the ACTS, 

679 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

through Mitchell, adopted them almost in toto. 

88. Greer, The Development of Air Doctrine, 

89. This is a rough paraphrase of a more 

detailed list found in Craven and Cate, Plans & 

Early Operations, pp. 5 1-52. 

90. John Terraine, A Time for Courage: The 

Royal Air Force in the European War, 

1939-1945 (New York: Macmillan, 1985), p. 

13. 

pp. 47-55. 

9 1. Greer, The Development of Air Doctrine, 

p. 60. 

92. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

1959-1960, p. 48. 

93. Ibid. p. 77. 

94. For a sympathetic biography of Eaker, see 

Parton, “Air Force Spoken Here”: General Ira 

Eaker and the Command of the Air. Parton 

served as Eaker’s personal aide during the war 

and supplied many firsthand anecdotes. 

Chapter 2 

Prewar Planning 

1. Entry for August 28, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. Spaatz 

kept a handwritten notebook of his experiences 

and observations in Britain in the summer of 

1940. All subsequent references to this portion 

of Spaatz’s Diary refer to the handwritten notebook not the retyped pages inserted in his 

“Diary File.” 

2. Mark S. Watson, United States Army in 

World War II, subseries: The War Department, 

Chief of Staff: Pre-War Plans and Preparations 

(Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1950), pp. 

132-136. 

3. Ibid., pp. 136-143. 

4. Ibid., p. 127. 

5. Ibid., p. 279. 

6. Phillip S. Meilinger, “Hoyt S. Vandenberg: 

The Life of a General,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1985, pp. 

424. Vandenberg joined the Plans Section in 

April 1939 and worked closely with Spaatz 

throughout the period. The two founded a solid 

professional relationship that earned 

Vandenberg Spaatz’s support throughout the 

remainder of their careers. 

7. Watson, Pre-War Plans , pp. 142-143. 

8. Irving Brinton Holley, Jr., United States 

Army in World War 11, subseries: Special 

Studies, Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement 

for the Army Air Forces (Washington, D.C.: 

OCMH, 1964), pp. 20CL201. 

9. Ibid., pp. 180,202. 

10. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, pp. 128-129. 

11. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

1959-1960, p. 44. 

12. Memo, Chief, Plans Division, to Chief of 

the Air Corps, March 4, 1941, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

13. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1940, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

14. Msg 2132, Air Attache Washington to Air 

Ministry, February 13, 1940, AIR 2/7172, 

Public Records Office, Kew, Great Britain. 

Hereafter referred to as PRO AIR 2/7172. 

15. Minute 2, Chief of the RAF Air Staff to 

Director of Plans and Director of Intelligence, 

February 7, 1940, PRO AIR 217172. This 

minute was signed by the Deputy Chief of the 

Air Staff. 

16. Msg 291, Lord Lothian to the Secretary 

of State for Air, March 1, 1940, PRO AIR 

217 1 72. 

17. Minute 12, Chief of the Air Staff to 

Secretary of State for Air, March 11, 1940, PRO 

AIR 2/7234. 

18. Msg S.5004R.W.1, Air Ministry (T.W.1). 

to Bomber, Fighter, and Coastal Commands, 

June 8, 1940, PRO AIR 2/7234. This message 

applied the restrictions specifically to Spaatz’s 

mission. See also minute 20 (S.3871), 

A.C.A.S.(T) to D.C.A.S., April 14, 1940, PRO 

AIR 2/7234, which set the general disclosure 

policy. 

19. Memo, Brig. Gen. B. K. Yount, Assistant 

Chief of the Air Corps, to Assistant Chief of 

Staff, G-2, subj: Special Instructions for 

Lieutenant Colonel Grandison Gardner, Air 

Corps, and Major Franklin 0. Carroll, Air Corps, 

Designated as Assistant Military Attaches for Air 

to England, AFHRC file no. 168.7016-13, 

Papers of Grandison Gardner. 

20. Rpt 25,712-W, Military Attache, Paris, 

subj: Partial Report of Visit of LieutenantColonel Grandison Gardner and Major Franklin 

0. Carroll to England, May 24, 1940, AFHRC 

file no. 168.7016, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

1862. 

21. Rpt A.l.l.(f), W. Grandon to Capt. 

Bateman, subj: Visits of American Officers, 

May 11, 1940, PRO AIR 2/7172. 

22. Index Listing, name index to correspon680 
NOTES 

dence of the Military Intelligence Division of 

the War Department General Staff, 1917-1941, 

NARA, Microfilm Project MI 194, reel 219, citing memo, G-2 to ND, May 16, 1940, MID file 

no. 2610-191. 

23. Ltr, Ref A.M.2223, Col. Martin F. 

Scanlon to Air Commod. A. R. Boyle, Director 

of Intelligence, RAF Staff, May 17, 1940, PRO 

AIR 2/7234. 

24. Entries for June 1, 3, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. After 

a hiatus of sixteen years Spaatz resumed his 

personal notebook/diary, presumably to refresh 

his memory for subsequent reports. There is no 

indication that he kept these notes from any 

desire to preserve “history.” 

25. Entries for June 2, 3, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

26. Rpt S.5004, Flt. Lt. W.E.N. Growdon, 

Report by the Escorting Officer on the Visits of 

Major McDonald, Colonel Spaatz and Captain 

Kelsy to Royal Air Force Units, June 24, 1940, 

PRO AIR 217234. 

27. Minute, Director of Intelligence to 

Director of Plans, June 13, 1940, PRO AIR 

217250. 

28. Watson, Pre-War Plans, pp. 92-93. Capt. 

Royal E. Ingersoll visited London for private 

and “purely exploratory” talks about naval 

cooperation against Japan. 

29. Ibid., pp. 106-107. 

30. Richard M. Leighton and Robert W. 

Coakley, United States Army in World War II, 

subseries: The War Department, Global 

Logistics and Strategy, 1940-1943 (Washington, 

D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1955), pp. 32-33. This 

work includes a discussion on the legal twists of 

the transfer and on the extent to which the equipment transferred was surplus to US. needs. 

31. J.R.M. Butler, Grand Strategy, vol. 2: 

September 1939-June 1941 (London: HMSO, 

1957), p. 243. 

32. Minute, Director of Intelligence to 

Director of Plans, June 13, 1940, PRO AIR 

2/7230. See also memo, subj: Gen. Spaatz’s 

Visit to the Air Ministry, June 1940, n.d. [ca. 

19441, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945, 

and memo, subj: Anglo-American Air 

Collaboration, Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, n.d. [ca. 19441, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945. The Air Ministry prepared 

these documents on air collaboration in response 

to a request for information on Spaatz’s 

1944-1945 command, the U.S. Strategic Air 

Forces in Europe, from the official historian, Dr. 

Bruce Hopper. 

33. Minute, Director of Plans (Slessor) to 

Deputy Director of Plans, June 17, 1940, PRO 

AIR 2/7250. Slessor postscripted this minute 

with the following admonition, “This should be 

kept very confidential and discussed with no 

one but MacDonald personally.” 

34. Minute, Plans 2 [Deputy Director of 

Plans] to Director of Plans, June 15, 1940, PRO 

AIR 2/7250. See also memo, subj: Gen. 

Spaatz’s Visit to the Air Ministry, June 1940, 

n.d. [ca. 19441, Spaatz Papers; Subject File 

1929-1945, and memo, subj: Anglo-American 

Air Collaboration, Air Ministry Air Historical 

Branch, n.d. [ca. 19441, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945. 

35. Msg 1019, Lord Lothian to Foreign 

Office, PRO PREM 3/457. 

36. Minute, Director of Plans to Air Staff 

Directors, June 20, 1940, PRO AIR 217250. 

37. Minutes, Foreign Minister to the Prime 

Minister, June 27, 1940, PRO PREM 31457. 

38. Msgs 1331, Foreign Office to Lord 

Lothian, June 30, 1940, and 1201, Lord Lothian 

to the Foreign Office, July 2, 1940, PRO PREM 

31457. 

39. Watson, Pre-War Plans, pp. 113-1 15. 

40. MID correspondence name index, citing 

memo, G-2 to Adjutant General, July 3, 1940, 

MID file no. 2345.872. Spaatz requested an 

extension in view of “expected air operations.” 

41. Minute 2, Wing Commander C. R. Porr, 

A.I.l(f) to Air Commod. A. R. Boyle, Director 

of Intelligence, June 24, 1940, PRO AIR 

2#25 1. 

42. Minute 3 and postscript, Director of Plans 

to Vice Chief of the Air Staff, June 28, 1940, 

and July 3,1940, PRO AIR 2/725 1. 

43. Minute 5 (S.5185), A.C.A.S.(G), Air 

Commodore Richard Peck, to A.I.l.(f), July 3, 

44. Entry for July 16, 1940, Battle of Britain 

45. Ibid. 

46. Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, 

The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 

1939-1945, vol. 1: Preparation (London: 

47. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 31, 1940, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

48. John Slessor, The Central Blue: The 

Autobiography of Sir John Slessor, Marshal of 

the Royal Air Force (New York: Frederick A. 

Praeger, 1957), pp. 314-316. Slessor personally 

escorted Donovan to a number of British bases. 

See Corey Ford, Donovan of O.S.S. (Boston: 

Little, 1970), pp. 9&94, for more on Donovan’s 

visit. 

49. Entry for August 2, 1940, Battle of 

1940, PRO AIR 2nm. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

HMSO, 1961), pp. 147-150. 

68 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

50. Ltr, William Donovan to Chief of the 

RAF Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Cyril 

Newall, August 27, 1940, PRO AIR 8/368. 

5 1. Ibid. 

52. Report by Squadron Leader M. Tod, 

Escorting Officer to Col. Carl Spaatz and Lt. 

Col. F.O’D. Hunter (Assistant Air Attach&) on 

a visit to No. 12 Fighter Group, August 17, 

1940, PRO AIR 2/725 1. 

53. Rpt 41532, MA London, subj: Organization Headquarters Fighter Group, August 21, 

1940, AFHRC file no. 170.2278-1, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel B 1753, frames 1277-1282. 

54. Lincoln Barnett, “General Spaatz, 

America’s No. 1 Airman in Africa,” Life, April 

19, 1943, p. 76. 

55. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 31, 1940, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Entry for August 19, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

57. Entry for August 27, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

58. Entry for July 7, 1940, Battle of Britain 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. Spaatz noted 

a “deeply rooted” jealousy between the RAF 

and the British Army. He felt that the soldiers 

had failed to appreciate the help given to them 

by the RAF in the skies over Dunkirk and were 

incensed over what they considered lack of support. As a consequence, the Army apparently 

wanted more control over RAF-Army coordination aircraft. Spaatz suspected that if the British 

Army had been properly equipped with antiaircraft weapons, it might have been a different 

story. Like the Air Corps, the RAF at this time 

had neglected to develop effective close air support doctrine. 

59. Entry for August 27, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

60. Entry for August 30, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

61. Entry for September 8, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

62. Drew Middleton, The Sky Suspended 

(New York: Longman’s Green, 1960), pp. 

156-157. Four years later when Middleton 

reminded Spaatz of the statement, Spaatz commented, “Goes to show you that colonels are 

mighty smart fellows-sometimes.” 

63. Entry for September 12, 1940, Battle of 

Britain Diary, Spaatz Papers, Notebooks. 

64. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1940, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

65. Slessor, The Central Blue, p. 316. 

66. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, pp. 104-116. See also Watson, Pre-War 

Plans, pp. 278-279. 

67. Watson, Pre-War Plans, p. 289. 

68. Ibid., pp. 289-290. 

69. Ibid., pp. 291-293. 

70. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Opera71. Watson, Pre-War Plans, pp. 371-373. 

12. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Opera73. Ibid., p. 138. 

74. Watson, Pre-War Plans, pp. 379-382. 

75. Memo, Brig. Gen. Carl Spaatz to Chief of 

the Air Corps, March 4, 1941, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

76. Memo, Chief of Air Corps to Chief of 

Staff, March [3-51, 1941, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

77. Watson, Pre-War Plans, pp. 382-383. 

78. See the complete text of the President’s 

letter given in Joint Board Document No. 355 

(Serial 707), subj: Joint Board Estimate of 

United States Overall Production Requirements, 

pp. 1-2, AFHRC file no. 145.81-23. 

79. Memo to the Chief of the Air Staff, subj: 

Notes on Preparation of AWPD/I, November 

19,1941, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

80. Copy of AWPD/l, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945. 

81. I. B. Holley, Jr., “Of Saber Charges, 

Escort Fighters, and Spacecraft,” Air University 

Review XXXIV, No. 6 (September-October 

1983): 9. 

82. Memo, Chief of Plans Division to Executive, subj: Disapproval of Change Order, March 

10, 1941, AFHRC file no. 145.91-506, January 

1937-September 1941, Pursuit Aircraft, 

AF/CHO reel A 1422, frames 1586-1587. At 

some point in the preparation or publication of 

Holley’s article, the reel frame numbers were 

misprinted 1386-1387. 

83. For a discussion of the relationship 

between a change order and procurement see 

Benjamin S. Kelsey, The Dragon’s Teeth 

(Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution 

Press, 1982), pp. 119-122. 

84. Memo, Major Vandenberg to General 

Spaatz, subj: Disapproval of Change Order, 

March 4, 1941, AFHRC file no. 145.91-506, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1422, frame 1588. 

tions, pp. 136-137. 

tions, p. 137. 

85. Ibid. 

86. Bernard Boylan, Development of the 

Long-Range Escort Fighter, USAF Historical 

Study No. 136 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: Air 

University, 1956), pp. 5Ck53. 

87. AWPD/l, tab 4, AFHRC file no. 145.81- 

23. James Lea Cate, “The Air Corps Prepares 

for War, 1939-1941,” chapter 4 in Craven and 

Cate, Plans & Early Operations, pp. 148-149, 

682 
NOTES 

presents AWPD/l ’s escort recommendations in 

very favorable light. If one did not know that 

the escort fighter called for in the plan was in 

reality a convoy defender, one would probably 

receive the impression, from Cate, that the 

framers of AWPD/I had accurately foreseen the 

consequences of the AAF’s lack of suitable 

escorts and had suggested the proper remedy. 

88. Memo, Maj. Gen. Henry H. Arnold, 

Chief of the Air Corps, to Col. Ira C. Eaker, 

subj: Additional Instructions on Trip to 

England, August 22, 1941, AFHRC file no. 

168.04-6, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1593, 

frame 570. In this memo Arnold indicated his 

intention to call a board to “critically analyze 

the whole pursuit picture.” 

89. Memo, Arnold to Eaker, subj: Letter of 

Instructions, August 20, 1941, AFHRC file no. 

168.04-6 AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1593, 

frame 57 1. 

90. Memo, Arnold to Eaker, subj: Additional 

Instructions on Trip to England, August 22, 

1941, AFHRC file no. 168.04-6 AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 1.593, frame 570. 

91. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, pp. 236-239. 

92. Ibid., p. 239, citing memo, Portal to 

Churchill, May 27, 1941. 

93. Rpt, Col. Ira C. Eaker to Chief of the Army 

Air Forces, subj: Report on Trip to England, n.d. 

[Mid-October 19411, Section 111, Fighter 

Development for the Future, p. 24, AFHRC file 

no. 168.066, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1593. 

The itinerary of Eaker’s trip, included in his 

final report, places his conversation with Portal 

on September 28. 

94. Ibid., p. 23. 

95. Report of a Board of Officers, Appointed 

to Make Recommendations with Respect to the 

Future Development of Pursuit Aircraft, Its 

Accessory Equipment and Operational Employment, to the Chief of the Army Air Forces, 

Washington, D.C., October 27, 1941, pp. 18, 

46, AFHRC file no. 168.15-5, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 161 1, frames 324 and 358. 

96. Ibid., p. 16. 

97. Ibid., pp. 4647,49. 

98. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, November 7, 1933, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

99. F. G. Swanborough, United States 

Military Aircraft Since 1909 (New York: 

Putnam, 1963), pp. 360-367. 

100. U.S. War Department, Office of 

Statistical Control, Army Air Forces Statistical 

Digest, World War I1 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1945), table 82, p. 134. 

101. See Kelsey, Dragon’s Teeth, pp. 110-112, 

for a discussion of how Air Corps procurement 

policy in the 1930s may have encouraged “conservative” designs. 

Chapter 3 

Spaatz Commands the Eighth Air Force 

I. Beirne Lay, Jr., and Sy Bartlett, Twelve 

O’clock High! (New York: Ballantine Books, 

1965), p. 64. Both Lay and Bartlett were in 

England with the Eighth Air Force in late 

1942-Bartlett, a Hollywood screen writer, as 

one of Spaatz’s personal aides, and Lay as unofficial historian and public relations man. 

“Pritchard” was an amalgam of Spaatz and 

Eaker, although in this case he seems mostly 

Spaatz. Spaatz would never have uttered the 

words placed in Pritchard’s mouth, but it was 

not unlikely that he thought them. 

2. Dewitt S. Copp, Forged in Fire: The 

Strategy and Decisions in the Air War Over 

Europe, 1940-1945 (Garden City: Doubleday 

& Co., 1982), p. 200. 

3. Ltr, Spaatz to Maj. Gen. B. D. Foulois, 

February 29, 1932, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

4. Notes, [Air Staff] Staff Meeting, 

December 7, 1941, AFHRC file no. 168.15, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 161 1, frame 170. 

5. Interview, Gen. Lauris Norstad by Hugh 

N. Ahmann, February-October 1979, USAF 

Oral History Collection, AFHRC file no. 

6. Maurice Matloff and Edwin M. Snell, 

United States Army in World War 11, subseries: 

The War Department, Strategic Planning for 

Coalition Warfare, 1941-1942 (Washington, 

D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1953),pp. 116119. 

K239.0512-1116, pp. 501-502. 

7. Ibid., pp. 102-105. 

8. Ibid., pp. 175-176. 

9. Alfred D. Chandler, The Papers of Dwight 

David Eisenhower: The War Years (Baltimore: 

Johns Hopkins Press, 1970) vol. 1, memo to the 

Chief of Staff, February 1942, item 160, pp. 

145-148; and memo to the Chief of Staff, 

February 28, 1942, item 162, pp. 149-155. Item 

160 did not have a complete date. The editors 

place it after February 16, the date Eisenhower 

assumed the post of Chief of the War Plans 

Division. 

683 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

10. Ray S. Cline, United States Army in 

World War 11, subseries: The War Department, 

Washington Command Post: The Operations 

Division (Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 

1951), pp. 154-155. 

11. Ibid., pp. 15&157. 

12. D.O. (42) 10th Meeting, War Cabinet 

Minutes, Defense Committee (Operations), 

Meeting of 1O:OO P.M. 14th April 1942, minute 

recorded on April 15, 1942, PRO PREM 

3/333/6. This minute contains the views of 

Marshall, Hopkins, Churchill, and the British 

Chiefs of Staff. 

13. Cline, Washington Command Post, p. 

151. 

14. Warren F. Kimball, ed., Churchill and 

Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, vol. 

1: Alliance Emerging (Princeton, N.J.: 

Princeton University Press, 1984), p. 393. 

15. Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, The 

Army Air Forces in World War II, vol. 2: 

Europe: Torch to Pointblank, August I942 to 

December I943 (Chicago: University of 

Chicago Press, 1949), p. 29. 

16. Memoirs of Richard D’O. Hughes, chap. 

8 “1941-1945,” pp. 13-16. Unpublished 

manuscript memoirs in the possession of 

Professor W.W. Rostow, University of Texas at 

Austin. 

17. Entry for May 10, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

18. Ibid. 

19. Entry for May 14, 1942, Command Diary, 

20. Ibid. 

2 1. Ibid. 

22. Entry for May 15,1942, Command Diary, 

23. Entry for May 16,1942, Command Diary, 

24. Ibid. 

2.5. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, pp. 623-624. 

26. Ibid., p. 624. 

27. For the ability of the British to read 

Luftwaffe codes, see F. W. Winterbotham, The 

Ultra Secret (New York: Dell, 1982), pp. 67-86. 

28. Williamson Murray, Strategy for Defeat: 

The Luftwaffe, 1933-1945 (Maxwell AFB, Ala.: 

Air University Press, 1983), pp. 134, 138. On p. 

134 Murray notes that in September 1942, 

German night defenses had 345 aircraft assigned. 

On p. 138 he gives the combat strength of the 

Luftwaffe at 4,942 aircraft. British Air Ministry, 

The Rise and Fall of the German Air Force, 

1933-1945, (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 

1983), p. 209, gives a first-line strength of 3,960 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

on December 31, 1942, of which 1,755 were 

single- or twin-engine fighters. This work was 

compiled from British Intelligence sources and 

immediate postwar investigations. 

29. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, p. 490. 

30. Entry for May 21, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

31. Entry for May 22,1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

32. Ibid. This is probably a reference to a letter from Eaker to Col. Asa N. Duncan, [Chief of 

Staff, 8th Air Force], May 10, 1942, AFHRC 

File: Brig. Gen. Eaker’s Miscellaneous Papers. 

Eaker discusses the problems involved in basing 

U.S. fighter units. 

33. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “Anglo-American 

Collaboration in the Air War over North West 

Europe,” p. 53. 

34. Ibid., p. 80. 

35. Ibid., p. 131. 

36. Ltr, Eaker to Duncan, May 10, 1942, 

AFHRC File: Brig. Gen. Eaker’s Miscellaneous 

Papers. 

37. Msg W.799, Air Ministry Whitehall 

(Slessor) to RAFDEL (Evill) Washington, D.C., 

May 9, 1942, PRO AIR 8/1052; and msg 

WX-2893, RAFDEL (Evill) to Air Ministry 

Whitehall (Slessor), May 11, 1942, PRO AIR 

811052. 

38. British Air Ministry, Air Hisorical Branch, 

RAF Narrative, “Anglo-American Collaboration,” pp. 135-136. 

39. Ibid., pp. 149-150. 

40. Entries for May 23-26, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

41. Entries for May 29-31, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

42. Entries for May 31, June 1, 1942, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

43. Entry for June 1, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

44. Entry for June 11, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

4.5. Entries for June 12-18, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

46. Entry for June 19, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

47. Entry for June 20, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

48. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 5, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

49. Kay Summersby Morgan, Past Forgetting 

(New York Simon and Schuster, 1975), p. 33. 

50. Entry for June 23,1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

684 
NOTES 

51. Ibid., entries for June 24 and 25, 1942. 

52. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, p. 628. 

53. Ibid. 

54. Ibid. 

55. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The RAF in the 

Bombing Offensive Against Germany,” vol. 4: 

“A Period of Expansion and Experiment, March 

1942-January 1943,” p. 337. 

56. Ltr, Arnold to Maj. Gen. D. D. Eisenhower, Commanding General, ETO, June 22, 

1942, Arnold Papers, Letters to Commanders in 

the Field, box 38. Arnold apparently gave Spaatz 

verbal instructions, saving the detailed policy for 

Eisenhower who, as theater commander, was 

ultimately responsible for it. 

57. Entry for June 22, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

58. Entry for June 23, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Ibid. 

60. Entry for July 15, 1942, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

61. Entry for October 22, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

62. John MacCormac, “British-U.S. Rift on 

Planes Holding Up Air Offensive,” New York 

Times, August 8, 1942. 

63. Raymond Daniell, “Joint Attack on 

Germany Near,” New York Times, August 11, 

1942. 

64. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, p. 657. 

65. Entries for August 11, 13, 18, 19, 21, 

1942, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

66. Ibid. 

67. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “Anglo-American 

Cooperation,” pp. 161-162. 

68. See entry for August 20, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary, for Spaatz’s draft. 

See Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, pp. 60841 1, for final text and discussion. 

69. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The RAF in the 

Bombing Offensive Against Germany,” vol. 4: 

“A Period of Expansion and Experiment, March 

1942-January 1943,” p. 337. 

70. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, pp. 358-359. 

71. Copp, Forged in Fire, p. 259. 

72. Entry for July 11, 1942, Command Diary, 

73. Entry for June 26, 1942, Command 

74. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

item 354; ltr, Eisenhower to Arnold, June 26, 

1942, pp. 362-363. 

75. Interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by Bruce 

C. Hopper, London, England, June 27, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945, p. 4. 

76. Entry for June 26, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

77. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, pp. 403-404. 

78. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The RAF in the 

Bombing Offensive Against Germany,” vol. 3: 

“Area Bombing and the Makeshift Force, June 

194 1-February 1942,” 

79. Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, 

The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 

1939-1945, vol. 4: Annexes and Appendices 

(London: HMSO, 1961), pp. 4-6. 

80. Ibid., pp. 135-140 and 143-147. 

81. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, pp. 178-180 and 247-248. 

For a more caustic description of the reports see 

Max Hastings, Bomber Command: The Myths 

and Reality of the Strategic Bombing Offensive, 

1939-1945 (New York Dial, 1979), pp. 10&110. 

82. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 468. For 

a negative judgment of Harris, see Charles 

Messenger, “Bomber” Harris and the Strategic 

Bombing Offensive, 1939-1945 (New York St. 

Martin’s Press, 1984). 

83. Hastings, Bomber Command, p. 135. 

84. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 1, pp. 340,464. 

85. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, p. 655. 

86. Memo, HQ VIII Bomber Command to 

Commanding Officer, 1st Provisional Wing, 

subj: Inferior Performance, August 2, 1942, 

Eaker Papers, box 1. 

87. Ltrs, Arnold to Spaatz, July 16, August 9, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

88. “Air Battle Feats Praised by Arnold,” 

New York Times, August 16, 1942, pp. 1,37. 

89. Memo, Air Staff Bomber Operations to 

DDAT, January 6, 1942, PRO AIR 20/4808. 

90. Peter Masefield, “America’s Share in Air 

Offensive: Pooling Men and Machines,” 

Sunday Times, August 16, 1942, p. 5. 

91. Eaker, Diary Notes, August 2, 1942, part 

1: February 4, 1942-July 31, 1944, Eaker 

Papers, box 1. At this time Spaatz and Eaker 

agreed that as a matter of policy no observers 

would be allowed to ride on bomber missions 

unless qualified as gunners. Eaker further noted 

that Spaatz, in fact, intended to visit the 97th 

Bomb Heavy Group in order to get some gunnery practice. 

685 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

92. Eaker, Diary Notes, August 5, 1942, 

Eaker Papers, box 1. 

93. Ronald Lewin, Ultra Goes to War: The 

First Account of World War- 11’s Greatest Secret 

Bused on Official Documents (New York: 

McGraw-Hill, 1978), p. 240. 

94. Copp, Forged in Fire, p. 286. 

95. Hughes, “Memoirs,” chap. 8, p. 24. 

96. Craven and Cate, Plans & Early Operations, p. 662. 

97. Memo, Arnold to Roosevelt, subj: Reply 

to Peter Masefield’s Criticism of Flying 

Fortresses and Liberators, August 19, 1942, 

Arnold Papers, box 45. 

98. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, August 19, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

99. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, n.d. [August 21, 

19421, Arnold Papers, box 49. 

100. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 21, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. This letter was written 

before Spaatz learned of the results of the fourth 

raid. 

101. Ltrs, Arnold to Spaatz, July 30, August 

9, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

102. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 11, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

103. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 14, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

104. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 2, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

105. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 15, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

106. Ibid., Spaatz’s diary lists several 

evenings spent with correspondents and gives 

details of the plane crash. 

107. Entry for August 20, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also Chandler, 

Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, item 440, msg 

1324, Eisenhower to Marshall, August 20, 

1942, pp. 483484. 

108. All statistics are compiled from Roger 

A. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary (London: Jane’s Publishing Inc., 1981), pp. 9-27. 

109. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 89, p. 157. 

110. Msg AGWAR R-2408, Arnold to 

Spaatz, October 25, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Eighth 

Air Force File. 

1 11. United States Strategic Bombing Survey 

(USSBS), Military Analysis Division, Weather 

Factors in Combat Bombardment Operations in 

the European Theater (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

January 1947), vol. 62, p. 2. 

112. Memo, Eighth Air Force Bomber 

Command to CG, Eighth Air Force, subj: 

Accuracy of Bombardment-4 Missions, 

August 27, 1942, Eaker Papers, box 1. 

113. Memo, CG, Eighth Air Force Bomber 

Command, to CG, Eighth Air Force, subj: Night 

Bombing, October 8, 1942, Eaker Papers, box 

1. 

114. Ltr, CG, Eighth Bomber Command, to 

CG, AAF, October 20, 1942, Eaker Papers, box 

1. 

115. Interview, Brig. Gen. Alfred R. Maxwell 

by Bruce C. Hopper, London, England, June 22, 

1945, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945, 

pp. 21-22. 

116. Ibid., p. 22. 

117. Ibid; interview, Spaatz by Hopper, June 

118. Ibid., p. 8. 

119. Interview, Gen. Laurence S. Kuter by 

Thomas A. Sturm and Hugh N. Ahmann, 

September 3Wctober 3, 1974, USAF Oral History Collection, AFHRC file no. K239.0512-810, 

p. 284. For a physical description of Park House 

and an account of a typical evening there, see 

Maj. Gen. L. S. Kuter, “Notes on Trip to 

England, France, and Italy, May 28-June 21, 

1944,” n.d. [summer 19441, pp. 3-5, AFHRC 

file no. K105.5-175. 

120. Wayne Thompson, ed., Air- Leadership: 

Proceedings of a Conference at Bolling Air 

Force Base, April 13-14, 1984 (Washington, 

D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1986), p. 42. 

121. Robert H. Ferrell, ed., The Eisenhower 

Diaries (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), pp. 

94-95, entry for June 1 I, 1943. 

122. Winston S. Churchill, The Second World 

War, vol. 4: The Hinge of Fate (Boston: 

Houghton Mifflin, 1950), pp. 432433. 

123. Matloff and Snell, Strategic Planning 

for Coalition Warfare, 1941-1942, p. 276. 

124. Ibid., p. 273. 

125. Ibid., p. 278. 

126. Entry for July 19, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. A complete draft 

of Spaatz’s “Air Plan to Support the Attack and 

Occupation of Cherbourg Peninsula’’ can be 

found in his Diary file. 

127. Entry for July 2 1, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

128. COS(42) 75th Meeting (O), July 18, 

1942, Minutes, July 20, 1942, PRO PREM 

3133319. 

129. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, July 30, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

130. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 1 I, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

131. Ibid. 

132. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

item 425, msg 1127, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

August 13, 1942, pp. 464465. 

27, 1945, p. 7. 

686 
NOTES 

133. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, 

134. Ibid. 

135. Ibid., p. 21, citing Minutes, CG, Eighth 

Air Force Commanders’ Meeting, November 

10, 1942. 

136. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

p. 550, note 1. 

137. Ibid. 

138. Msg, Arnold to Eisenhower, September 

10, 1942, Spadtz Papers, Diary. 

139. Draft msg, September 10, 1942, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

140. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

item 492, msg 2028, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

September 10, 1942, p. 550. 

141. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 21, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

142. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 24, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

143. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, July 30, 1942; 

ltrs, Spaatz to Arnold, August 24, 27, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

144. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

p. 277, citing memo from the President to 

Marshall. 

145. Entry for August 26, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

146. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

147. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 3, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

148. Memo, Arnold to Hopkins, subj: Plans 

for Operation Against the Enemy, September 3, 

1942, Arnold Papers, box 43. 

149. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

pp. 277-279. 

150. Ibid., p. 290. 

151. Ibid., pp. 290-295. 

152. Ltr, Stratemeyer [AAF Chief of Staff] to 

Spaatz, August 25, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

153. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

item 485, msg 1812, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

September 5, 1942, pp. 543-544. 

154. Ibid., p. 544, text given in note to item 

p. 52. 

485. 

155. Memo, Eisenhower to Spaatz, October 

13, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also 

Command Diary, entry for September 25, 1942. 

156. Entry for October 15, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

157. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 3, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

158. Ltr, Stratemeyer to Spaatz, September 

17, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

159. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, September 

25, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

160. See Craven and Cate, Torch to 

Pointblank, pp. 633-634, for a brief discussion 

on this problem. 

161. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 1, 

item 530, pp. 587-589, msg 2867, Eisenhower 

to Marshall, September 29, 1942, pp. 587-589. 

This cable is a substantial revision of a draft 

cable given to Eisenhower by Spaatz. 

Eisenhower’s support of AWPD/42 was hardly 

the ringing endorsement the AAF would have 

liked him to accept. Apparently Spaatz’s draft 

came directly from Arnold; Spaatz’s diary contains a copy of the draft. 

162. Ibid., item 538, ltr, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, October 7, 1942, pp. 598401. 

163. Digest of a conversation between 

General Eisenhower and General Spaatz, 

WIDEWINGS, October 29, 1942, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

164. Ibid. 

165. Ltr, Stratemeyer to Spaatz, November 

13, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

166. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, November 15, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

167. Ltr, Arnold to Eisenhower, November 

15, 1942, cited in “Notes and Extracts from 

Spaatz Diaries-1942,” Spaatz Papers, 

USSTAF File. 

168. Ltr, Stratemeyer to Spaatz, November 

20, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

169. Entry for November 23, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

170. Ibid. 

687 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Part Two 

Tempering the Blade 

The North African Campaign 

Chapter 4 

The Race for Tunisia 

1. British Air Ministry, Air Historical Branch, 

RAF Narrative, “The North African Campaign, 

November 1942-May 1943,” p. 202. 

2. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

54, citing October 30, 1942, meeting between 

Doolittle and Spaatz. 

3. James L. Cash, “The Employment of Air 

Power in the North African Campaign,” 

October 9, 1951, p. 80, AFHRC file no. 

K612.549-1, citing General of the Army 

Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Report to the CCS on 

Operations in the Mediterranean Area, 1942- 

1944 (part 1, Northwest African Campaign, 

194243). pp. 54-55. Cash’s work consists of a 

compilation of extracts of key documents from 

the campaign. 

4. bid. 

5. Memo, Air Plan to Support the Attack and 

Occupation of Cherbourg Peninsula, n.d. [ca. 

July 19, 19421, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

6. George F. Howe, United States Army in 

World War II, subseries: The Mediterranean 

Theater of Operations, Northwest Africa: 

Seizing the Initiative in the West (Washington, 

D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1957), pp. 36-37. The 

three invasion force commanders reported 

directly to Eisenhower. No overall ground commander existed. 

7. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

54. 

8. Interview, Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle by 

Lt. Col. Robert M. Burch, Maj. Ronald R. 

Fogelman, and Capt. James P. Tate, September 

26, 1970, USAF Oral History Collection, 

AFHRC file no. K239.0512-0793, p. 49. 

9. Doolittle badly needs a good biography. 

The current works on him range in quality from 

execrable to acceptable. The most useful biography is Lowell Thomas and Edward Jablonski, 

Doolittle: A Biography (Garden City, N.Y.: 

Doubleday, 1976). Also see, Quentin Reynolds, 

The Amazing Mr. Doolittle (New York: 

Appleton-Century-Cross, 1953): and Carroll V. 

Glines, Jimmy Doolittle, Daredevil Aviator and 

Scientist (New York: Macmillan, 1972). 

10. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in 

Europe (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948), 

p. 122. In the same paragraph Eisenhower noted 

that Doolittle later “became one of our really 

fine commanders.” 

11. Interview, Doolittle by Burch, Fogelman, 

and Tate, September 26, 1970, pp. 42-43. 

12. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

51. 

13. Msgs 2161, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

September 13, 1942, and 2181, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, September 14, 1942, Eisenhower PrePresidential Papers, Eisenhower Presidential 

Library, Abilene, Kan. 

14. Msg, Marshall to Eisenhower, September 

14, 1942, Verifax 240.7, item 2535, Papers of 

George C. Marshall, George C. Marshall 

Foundation, Lexington, Va. This is Marshall’s 

hand-written draft: the official cable can be 

located in the National Archives as item no. 

744, CM-OUT 4695, September 14, 1942, OPD 

TS Message File. 

15. Msg, Marshall to Eisenhower, September 

26, 1942, Marshall Papers, folder 43, box 66. 

This message bears Marshall’s hand-written and 

initialed note, “Not used Gen Clarke will take 

by hand. GCM.” 

16. Richard M. Leighton and Robert W. 

Coakley, United States Army in World War 11, 

subseries: The War Department, Global Logistics 

and Strategy, 1940-1943 (Washington, D.C.: 

OCMH, GPO, 1954), pp. 437-438. 

17. Air Marshal William Welsh, “Report on 

Operation ‘Torch’,” n.d. [early 19431, para. 30, 

p. 9. PRO AIR 2/8805. This report covers 

Welsh’s entire term as commander of the EAC 

and should be used with care, as it does not 

mention many RAF errors while being critical 

of the Americans and the British army. 

18. Rpt, “Operation ‘TORCH’-Lessons 

Learnt, Report of Investigation Carried Out in 

North Africa by Wing Commander Broad,” 

February 19, 1943, PRO AIR 20/4521. 

19. Arthur Tedder, With Prejudice: The War 

Memoirs of Marshal of the Royal Air Force 

Lord Tedder (Boston: Little, Brown, 1966), p. 

381. 

688 
NOTES 

20. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

127. 

2 1. WDTR 440-1 5, Fundamental Principles 

for the Employment of the Air Service, January 

26, 1926, sec. 1, vol. 1, paras. 3 and 4a. 

22. Ibid., sec. 4, para. 16g. 

23. WDTR 440-15, Employment of the Air 

Forces of the Army, October 15, 1935, sec. 3, 

para. 6f. 

24. Robert Frank Futrell, Ideas, Concepts, 

Doctrine: A History of Basic Thinking in the 

United States Air Force, 1907-1964 (Maxwell 

AFB, Ala.: Air University, 1971), pp. 49-51. 

25. WDFM 1-5, Employment of Aviation of 

the Army, April 15, 1940, sec. 2, para. 18b. 

26. Ibid., sec. 4, paras. 26a & b. 

27. Memo, Arnold to Spaatz, subj: Lack of 

Coordination between Ground and Air in the 

Carolinas and Louisiana Maneuvers, November 

28, 1941, Arnold Papers, folder: Maneuvers, 

box 44. 

28. Ibid. 

29. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

137. 

30. FM 31-35, “Aviation in Support of 

Ground Forces,” April 9, 1942, chap. 2, sec. 1, 

para. 6. 

3 1. Ibid. 

32. Ibid, chap. 2, sec. 1, para. 10. 

33. Ibid, chap. 2, sec. 3, para. 31. See Craven 

and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 137. 

34. Futrell, Ideas, Concepts, Doctrine, p. 66. 

35. Kent Roberts Greenfield, Army Ground 

Forces and the Air-Ground Battle Team: 

Including Light Aviation, Historical Study No. 

35 (Ft. Monroe, Va.: Air Ground Forces, 1948), 

36. Memo, Marshall to Arnold, July 10, 

1942, and memo, Arnold to Marshall, subj: AirGround Support of Armored Forces, July 20, 

1942, Arnold Papers, folder: Support of 

Armored Forces, box 42. 

37. Ltrs, Devers to Arnold, September 5, 

1942, Arnold to Devers, September 23, 1942. 

Arnold Papers, folder: Support of Armored 

Forces, box 42. 

38. Ltr, McNair to Arnold, December 30, 

1942, Arnold Papers, folder: Air-Ground 

Support, box 42. 

39. “Talk by Air Vice Marshal Sir A. 

Coningham, to Assembled British and American 

General and Senior Officers at the End of the 

Second Day of the Army Exercise,” February 16, 

1943, paras. 6-7. 

40. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” p. 202. 

pp. 11-12. 

4 1. I.S.O. Playfair and C.J.C. Molony, The 

Mediterranean and the Middle East, vol. 4: The 

Destruction of the Axis Forces in Africa 

(London: HMSO, 1966), p. 182. See also Lt. 

Gen. Anderson’s dispatch, “Operations in North 

West Africa from 8th November 1942 to 13th 

May 1943,” Supplement to the London Gazette, 

November 5, 1946, p. 5454. Anderson completed the dispatch on June 7, 1943, but the War 

Office did not publish it until after the war. A 

note to the dispatch added by the War Office 

admits the scarcity of light antiaircraft weapons. 

42. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” pp. 202-204. 

43. Welsh, “Operation Torch,” paras. 61-62, 

pp. 21-22. See also, ltr, JRf145 Air Marshal Sir 

James Robb to Air Commodore T. N. McEvoy, 

Air Ministry, July 22, 1946, Papers of James 

Robb, RAF Museum, Hendon, England. 

44. Howe, Northwest Africa, pp. 278-279, 

292. See also Anderson, dispatch, p. 5452. 

45. Ltr, AC/I623/0rg., Air Commodore in 

Charge of Administration, EAC, to Col. Zane, 

Twelfth Air Force, subj: Maintenance of Air 

Forces in the Forward Area, December 8, 1942, 

PRO AIR 23f6561. 

46. Welsh, “Operation Torch,” p. 27. Tedder, 

With Prejudice, p. 370 says that Eisenhower 

assured him that the forward AAF units were 

under Welsh’s “operational control,” but this 

seems to overstate the strength of Welsh’s position. 

47. Howe, Northwest Africa, p. 294; Playfair, 

The Destruction of the Axis Forces in Africa, p. 

183. 

48. Playfair, The Destruction of the Axis 

Forces in Africa, p. 171; F. H. Hinsley, British 

Intelligence in the Second World War: Its 

Influence on Strategy and Operations, vol. 2 

(New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 

vol. 2 pp. 487488. 

49. Anderson, dispatch, p. 5454. At this point 

in the dispatch the War Office weakened 

Anderson’s excuses by noting, “By the standards of later campaigns this enemy air activity 

was not on a serious scale. Its moral effect at 

the time, however, was increased by the inexperience of the troops and by the scarcity of light 

A.A. weapons.” 

50. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” p. 76. 

51. Ltr, JR/145, Air Marshal Robb to Air 

Commodore McEvoy, July 22, 1946, Robb 

Papers. 

52. Telephone msg, Eisenhower to Spaatz, 

689 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

November 13, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

465466,487489, 

53. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, pp. 

54. Ibid., pp. 489490 

55. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, November 23, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Ibid. 

57. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

Itr, Eisenhower to Arnold, November 21, 1942, 

item 654, pp. 750-752. 

58. Msg, Spaatz to Arnold, November 24, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 684, Msg, Eisenhower to Gen. H. L. 

Ismay, December 3, 1942, pp. 790-791. 

60. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, December 9, 

1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

61. Entry for December 2, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

62. Ibid. See also Craven and Cate, Torch to 

Pointblank, p. 108. 

63. Entry for December 2, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

64. Entry for December 3, 1942, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

65. Rpt, “Notes on Decisions Taken as Result 

of Policy Laid Down at Commander in Chief‘s 

Conference, 3rd December 1942,” PRO AIR 

23/655 8. 

66. Meeting of [AFHQ] Air Staff, December 

8, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also 

Winterbotham, The Ultra Secret, p. 146. For 

McDonald’s transfer, see ltr, Spaatz to Eaker, 

December 9, 1942, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

67. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 685, Msg, Eisenhower to Combined Chiefs 

of Staff, December 3, 1942, pp. 791-793. 

68. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” p. 77, cites Command Post 1st 

Army Situation Report on December 3, dated 

December 4, 1942. 

69. Ibid. 

70. Alfred M. Beck, Abe Bortz, Charles W. 

Lynch, Lida Mayo, and Ralph F. Weld, United 

States Army in World War 11, subseries: The 

Technical Services, The Corps of Engineers: 

The War Against Germany (Washington, D.C.: 

CMH, GPO, 1985), p. 86. 

71. Ibid., p. 87. 

72. Entries for December 3-23, 1942, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

73. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” p. 82. 

74. Howe, Northwest Africa, appendix B, 

table 9, p. 682. 

75. Playfair, The Destruction of the Axis 

Forces in Africa, citing the Italian official naval 

historian, p. 210. 

76. Ibid. 

77. Ibid., p. 190. 

78. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

108. 

79. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 705, Memo for the record dictated by 

Eisenhower to Capt. Harry Butcher, December 

10, 1942, pp. 823-825. This memo appears in a 

truncated version in Harry C. Butcher, My 

Three Years with Eisenhower: The Personal 

Diary of Harry C. Butcher, USNR Naval Aide to 

General Eisenhower, 1942-194.5, (New York: 

Simon and Schuster, 1946), p. 220. See Tedder, 

With Prejudice, pp. 372-373, for Tedder’s 

description of events. 

80. See Tedder, With Prejudice, for Tedder’s 

early career. 

81. Arthur Tedder. “Air, Land and Sea Warfare,” Royal United Services Institute Journal 

XCI (February 1946), p. 64. 

82. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 380-383. 

83. Ibid., p. 382. 

84. Memo, Brig. Gen. H. A. Craig to CINC, 

AFHQ [Eisenhower], December 23, 1942, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

85. Sir Arthur Coningham, “The Development of Tactical Air Forces,” a lecture delivered 

on February 20, 1946, Royal United Services 

Institute Journal XCI (May 1946), p. 213. 

86. Shelford Bidwell and Dominick Graham, 

Firepower: British Army Weapons and Theories 

of War, 1904-1945 (London: George Allen & 

Unwin, 1982), p. 275. 

87. Ibid., p. 263 

88. Ibid., p. 264 

89. Ibid., pp. 266265. 

90. I.S.O. Playfair, F. C. Flynn, C.J.C. 

Molony, and S. E. Toomer, The Mediterranean 

and Middle East, 11: The Germans Come to the 

Help of Their Ally (1941) (London: HMSO, 

1956), pp. 294-295. This work supplied the 

chronology for Coningham’s efforts after his 

assumption of command. 

91. Ibid., pp. 268-269. 

92. Speech, Coningham to Senior Officers, 

Tripoli, February 16,1943, PRO AIR 20/5533. 

93. “Report on Visit of Air Marshal Sir 

Trafford Leigh-Mallory to North West Africa, 

March/April, 1943,” April 1943, part 2, pp. 4, 

6-7, paras. 21-22 and 34-44, PRO AIR 

20/4521. Leigh-Mallory ’s sole purpose in visiting North Africa was to examine the tactical air 

command and control arrangements and their 

applicability to the cross-channel invasion. His 

690 
NOTES 

exposition of the scheme he found in operation 

in the WDAF should be considered authoritative. 

94. Coningham, “The Development of 

Tactical Air Forces,” p. 215. 

95. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 743, Msg 3486, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

December 29, 1942, p. 874. 

96. Ibid. 

97. Ibid. 

98. Ibid., msg 3626, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

December 29, 1942, item 746, p. 878. 

99. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 385. 

100. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

101. Ibid. 

102. Entries for January 1, 3, 18, 20, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

103. Memo, Sanders to Eisenhower, subj: 

Problems Connected with the Development of 

Allied Air Power in the North African Theater, 

November 30, 1942, PRO AIR 23/6561. 

p. 109. 

Chapter 5 

Failure and Reorganization 

1. Tedder, “Air, Land and Sea Warfare,” 

Journal of the Royal United Services Institute, 

p. 65. 

2. Maurice Matloff, United States Army in 

World War 11, subseries: The War Department, 

Strategic Planning jor Coalition Warfare, 

1943-1944 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1959), p. 

28, citing Combined Chiefs of Staff Document 

CCS 155/1, January 19, 1943. 

3. Ibid., citing CCS 166/1/D, January 21, 

1943, “The Bomber Offensive from the United 

Kingdom.” 

4. Entry for February 23, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

5. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, pp. 

114, 162-163. 

6. Msg C-150, Churchill to Roosevelt, 

September 16, 1942, in Kimball, Churchill & 

Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, vol. 

I, pp. 597-598. 

7. Minute, Portal to Churchill, October 13, 

1942, PRO AIR 8/71 1. 

8. Minute, Portal to the Secretary of State for 

Air [Archibald M. S. Sinclair], September 27, 

1942, PRO AIR 8/7 1 1. 

9. Minute, Slessor to Portal, September 26, 

1942, PRO AIR 817 1 1. 

10. Msg T.1345/2, Churchill to Hopkins, 

October 16, 1942, PRO AIR 8/71 1. 

11. Note on Air Policy, W. S. Churchill, 

October 22, 1942, PRO AIR 8/71 I. 

12. Minute, Sinclair to Churchill, October 23, 

1942, PRO AIR 8/7 1 1. 

13. Minute, Churchill to Portal and Sinclair, 

October 26, 1942, PRO AIR 8/71 1. 

14. Minute, Sinclair to Churchill, October 28, 

1942, PRO AIR 817 1 1. 

15. Minute, Portal to Churchill, November 7, 

1942, PRO AIR 817 1 1. 

16. Msg 408, Air Ministry [Portal] to RAF 

Delegation [Slessor], November 21, 1942, PRO 

AIR 8/7 1 1. 

17. W.P. (42) 580, note by the Prime Minister 

and Minister of Defence, subj: Air Policy, 

December 16, 1942, PRO PREM 3/452/1. 

18. Ibid. 

19. Leighton and Coakley, Global Logistics, 

20. W.P. (42) 616, note by the Secretary of 

State for Air, subj: Air Policy, December 29, 

1942, PRO PREM 3/452/1. 

21. Note by the Secretary of State for Air, 

subj: The Bombing Policy of the USAAF., n.d. 

[January 9, 19431, PRO AIR 8/71 1. 

22. Minute 26/3, Churchill to Sinclair, 

January 10, 1943, PRO PREM 3/452/1. 

23. Documents CCS 135, memo by the U.S. 

Chiefs of Staff, subj: Basic Strategic Concept 

for 1943, December 26, 1942; CCS 135/1, 

memo by the British Chiefs of Staff, subj: Basic 

Strategic Concept for 1943-The European 

Theater, January 2, 1943; and CCS 135/2, subj: 

American-British Strategy in 1943, January 3, 

1943, published in Department of State, 

Foreign Relations of the United States: 

Conferences at Washington, 1941-1942 and 

Casablanca, 1943 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1968), pp. 735-752 (hereafter referred to as 

FRUS). 

24. CCS 135, subj: Basic Strategic Concept 

for 1943, FRUS: Washington-Casablanca, p. 

737. 

25. CCS 135/2, subj: American-British 

Strategy, January 3, 1943, FRUS: CairoTeheran, pp. 746-747. 

26. Parton, “Air Force Spoken Here,” pp. 

pp. 677-679. 

69 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

2 17-220. 

27. Papers given to the Prime Minister by 

General Eaker (January 20, 1943), PRO PREM 

3145211. 

28. Churchill, The Hinge of Fate, p. 679. 

29. Parton, “Air Force Spoken Here,” pp. 

221-222. 

30. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

843. 

31. Elliott Roosevelt, As He Saw It (New 

York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1946), pp. 

10&102. 

32. Memo, Arnold to Stratemeyer, subj: 

Bombing of Germany by US. Bombers from 

England, February 26, 1943, Arnold Papers, 

box 49. 

33. Entry for January 19, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

34. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

35. Memo, Arnold to Stratemeyer, subj: 

Bombing of Germany by U.S. Bombers from 

England, February 26, 1943, Arnold Papers, 

box 49. 

36. CCS 166/1/D, memo by the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff, subj: The Bomber Offensive 

from the United Kingdom, January 21, 1943, 

published in FRUS: Washington-Casablanca, 

37. General Order No. 1, Headquarters Allied 

Air Force, January 7, 1943, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

38. Entry for January 17, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. This entry makes 

clear that the commander of XI1 ASC, not the 

commander of I1 Corps, would control air decisions. 

39. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 229-230. 

40. Patton has been the subject of numerous 

biographies. One of the most illuminating publications on his military thought and actions is 

Martin Blumenson, The Patton Papers (Boston: 

Houghton Mifflin, 1972-1974), in two volumes. These volumes are mostly in Patton’s 

own words and they admirably reveal his military actions and philosophy. For the general’s 

personal side, see Ladislas Farago, Patton: 

Ordeal and Triumph (New York: Ivan 

Obolensky, Inc., 1963); and Martin Blumenson, 

Patton: The Man Behind the Legend 1885-1945 

(New York: William Morrow, 1985). 

1959-1060, pp. 6-7. 

pp. 781-782. 

41. Howe, Northwest Africa, p. 447. 

42. L[ucian] K. Truscott, Command 

Missions: A Personal Story (New York: E. P. 

Dutton, 1954), pp. 144-145. In contrast to the 

proliferation of material on Patton, almost nothing has been written on Fredendall’s character 

or personality. Truscott, who served as Eisenhower’s representative at the front, had ample 

opportunity to observe Fredendall for his entire 

tour as commander of I1 Corps and to form a 

firsthand opinion. 

43. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

notes for Commander Butcher, December 10, 

1942, item 705, p. 824. 

44. Ibid., note 5, p. 938. 

45. Ibid., msg from Eisenhower to 

Fredendall, February 4, 1943, item 808, pp. 

939-94 1. 

46. XI1 ASC Report of Operations, April 9, 

1943, p. 23, NARA Record Group (RG) 337, 

Army Ground Forces Central Decimal File, file 

no. 319.1183, box 245. 

47. Ltr, Doolittle to Air Commander in Chief, 

Allied Air Forces [Spaatz], January 20, 1943, 

Papers of James H. Doolittle, Library of 

Congress, Manuscript Division, box 19. 

48. Entry for January 21, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. Craig had also 

developed a raging case of pneumonia that incapacitated him, making his replacement inevitable. The change of assignment certainly did 

Craig’s career no harm; he continued to receive 

excellent staff assignments and retired as a 

three-star general. 

49. Ltr, Doolittle to Spaatz, January 23, 1943, 

Doolittle Papers, box 19. 

50. Rpt, CG XI1 ASC [Williams] to CG, 

NATO [Eisenhower], subj: “Report of 

Operations,” April 9, 1943, p. 3, NARA, RG 

337, AGF Central File, 319.1183, box 245. 

5 1. Truscott, Command Missions, p. 144. 

52. Harry Butcher, “Manuscript of Butcher 

Diary,” pp. 168 and 197, Eisenhower Presidential Library, Abilene, Kans. This is the complete 

draft of the published Butcher Diary and contains many passages deleted from the published 

version because of security or personal considerations. 

53. Truscott, Command Missions, p. 144. 

54. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” pp. 204-205. 

55. Playfair, The Destruction of Axis Forces 

in Africa, pp. 308-309. 

56. Howe, Northwest Africa, pp. 379, 381. 

57. Ibid., p. 396; Entry for February 6, 1943, 

58. Howe, Northwest Africa, pp. 139-140. 

59. Entry for January 21, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

60. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 767, Memo of Conference at Advanced 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

692 
NOTES 

Allied Air Force Headquarters, January 21, 

1943, p. 918. 

61. Ibid., p. 919. 

62. Ibid., msg, Eisenhower to Russell Peter 

63. Entries for January 21, 22, 1943, 

64. Entries for January 27-30, 1943, 

65. Entry for February 5, 1943, Command 

66. Howe, Northwest AfYica, p. 399. 

67. Ibid. 

68. Entry for February 5, 1943, Command 

69. Ibid. 

70. Entry for January 17, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

71. Entry for February 6, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. In addition, see 

Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 141: “It was 

the only time during the war that I ever saw a 

divisional or higher headquarters so concerned 

over its own safety that it dug itself underground shelters.” 

72. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, February 8, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

73. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, February 8, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

74. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

Hartle, item 770, pp. 904905. 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

161, citing a manuscript by S/Ldr J. N. White, 

“Evolution of Air Command in the Mediterranean,” November 13,1944. 

75. Ibid., pp. 161-165. 

76. Ibid., p. 163. 

77. Entry for February 17, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

78. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

157. 

79. Playfair, The Destruction of Axis Forces 

in Africa, p. 31 1. 

80. Command Diary, entry for February 23, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

81. Entries from “Casablanca Notes,” 

January 4, 5, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 

1929-1 945. 

82. Playfair, The Destruction of the Axis 

Forces in Africa, p. 291. 

83. XI1 ASC, “Operations Report,” April 9, 

1943, p. 6, NARA, RG 337, Army Ground 

Forces Central File 319.1/83, box 245. 

84. Playfair, The Destruction of Axis Forces 

in Africa, p. 302. Playfair has the best account 

of air actions during the period, better than 

either American official history. For a good 

popular account of the action, see Martin 

Blumenson, Kasserine Pass (Boston: Houghton 

Mifflin, 1967). 

85. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

Memo, February 25,1943, item 843, p. 992. 

Chapter 6 

The Collapse of the Axis Bridgehead 

1. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 962, Itr, Eisenhower to Arnold, May 2, 

1943, p. 1107. 

2. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 607. 

3. Entry for March 1, 1943, Command Diary, 

4. Entry for March 2,1943, Command Diary, 

5. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 7, 1943, 

6. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

7. Entry for March 3, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

8. Rpt, Maj. Gen. Lloyd R. Fredendall, subj: 

Notes on Recent Operations on the Tunisian 

Front, March 10, 1943, Fredendall Papers, 

Eisenhower Presidential Library, Abilene, 

Kans. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

169-170. 

9. Entry for March 3, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

10. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

130. 

11. Ibid., p. 131; Itr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, 

March 26,1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

12. Report on Morale (United States Army 

Air Force Personnel), Col. Everett Cook to CG, 

NAAF [Spaatz], April 20, 1943, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

13. Staff Meeting, March 4, 1943, and Conference Notes, March 5, 1943, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

14. Martin R. R. Goldman, “Morale in the 

AAF in World War 11,” USAF Historical Study 

No. 78, (USAF Historical Division, Air 

University, Maxwell AFB, Ala., 1953), p. 44, 

citing rpt, Maj. Robert B. Nelson, Jr., to Air 

Surgeon, AAF, subj: Morale of Flying 

693 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Personnel, May 20, 1943, folder: Morale and 

Welfare November 23, 1942-December 30, 

1943, AGO 330.11A. Goldman provides some 

intriguing details but little insight into AAF 

morale. 

15. Ibid., p. 30. This did not completely solve 

the food situation. A postwar USAF study noted 

that overall food quality, not just British rations, 

was prevented from “developing into a disturbing problem” only by the advance into Italy, 

which increased the supply of fresh meat and 

dairy products as well as providing the benefits 

of improved and relatively abundant refrigeration of fresh produce and meats. 

16. Ibid., p. 59, which reported that movie 

showings were “easily the most consistently 

popular form of diversion in all theaters [of 

operation], and the one credited with doing the 

most good for morale.” 

17. Report on Morale, Col. Cook to Spaatz, 

April 20, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

18. 13eck et al., Corps of Engineers: War 

Againsl Germany, p. 89. 

19. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, March 26, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

20. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 986, ltr, Eisenhower to Spaatz, May 12, 

21. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 7, 1943, 

22. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 

23. Conference Notes, March 17, 1943, 

24. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 

25. Ibid., p. 574. 

26. Ibid., p. 607. 

27. lbid., pp. 607408. 

28. lbid., p. 607. 

29. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

189. 

30. Entries for January 16, 18, 1943, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

31. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

189. 

32. Staff Meeting, March 4, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

33. Entry for March 20, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers. 

34. Conference Notes, April 2, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers. Diary. 

35. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 

607. 

36. Conference Notes, April 2, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

37. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

1943, pp. 1125-1 126. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

576. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

575. 

pp. 189-190. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

38. Ltr, Spaatz to Eaker, April 8, 1943, 

39. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, pp. 

40. National Security Agency Special 

Research History no. 13 (SRH-013), “ULTRA 

History of US Strategic Air Force Europe vs. 

German Air Forces,” June 6, 1945, AF/CHO, p. 

62. 

41. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 

609. 

42. Ibid. 

43. Ibid. 

44. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

45. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 2, p. 

46. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

47. Ibid., table 102, p. 189. 

48. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

194. After the first month of the campaign the 

Twelfth Air Force did not operate B-24s which, 

because of their superior range, became the 

exclusive province of the Ninth Air Force. 

49. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

50. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, February 8, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

51. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

184; United States Army in World War II, subseries: The Pictorial Record, The War Against 

Germany and Italy: Mediterranean and 

Adjacent Areas (Washington, D.C.: OCMH, 

GPO, 1951), p. 164. 

52. See Margaret Bourke-White, “BourkeWhite Goes Bombing,” Life, March 1, 1943. 

Bourke-White flew on a raid over an Axis airfield on January 22, 1943. She credits Doolittle 

with giving her permission, and probably consulted Spaatz, a friend of hers, as well. 

53. “The Plotters of Souk-el-Spaatz,” Time, 

March 22, 1943. 

54. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, April 10, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

55. Ibid. 

56. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, April 21, 1943, 

57. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, March 26, 

58. Interview, Kuter by Sturm and Ahmann, 

59. Entry for February 23, 1943, Spaatz 

60. Entries for March 31, April 13, 27, 1943, 

608-609. 

196. 

614. 

table 120, p. 222. 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1943, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

September 3GOctober 3, 1974, p. 305. 

Papers, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

694 
NOTES 

61. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 287. 

62. Richard H. Kohn and Joseph P. Harahan, 

eds., Air Superiority in World War II and Korea, 

series: USAF Warrior Studies (Washington, 

D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1983), pp. 56-60. 

63. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

64. Solly Zuckerman, From Apes to Warlords 

(New York: Harper & Row, 1978), p. 204. 

65. Carlo D’Este, Decision in Normandy 

(New York: E. P. Dutton, 1983), pp. 218-219. 

66. Nigel Hamilton, Master of the Buttiefieid: 

Monty’s War Years 1942-1944 (New York: 

McGraw-Hill, 1983), pp. 199-200. Hamilton 

even goes to the absurd length of crediting 

Broadhurst with the development of British air 

support theory-a gross misinterpretation of 

actuality. 

67. Msg, A188, AOC, NATAF to XI1 ASC, 

March 17, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

68. Memo, HQ, XI1 ASC to OIC, NATAF, 

March 23, 1943, Command Diary, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

69. Entries for March 2.5, April 14, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

70. VIII Air Support Command, “Air 

Operations in Support of Ground Forces in 

Northwest Africa (March IS-April 5, 1943),” 

observers rpt, U.S. Army Military History 

Institute, Carlisle, Pa. 

71. Ltr, Spaatz to Stratemeyer, February 8, 

1943, Spaatz Papers. Diary. 

72. Entry for March 13, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

73. Entries for March 30, April 10, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

74. Rpt, CG, XI1 ASC [Williams] to CG, 

NATO (North African Theater of Operations) 

[Eisenhower], subj: “Report of Operations,” 

April 9, 1943, p. 8, NARA, RG 337, AGF 

Central File 319.1183, box 245. 

75. Report of the Northwest African Tactical 

Air Force on Operations, February 18-May 1 I, 

1943, n.d. [May 19431, p. 20, PRO AIR 

2015 53 5. 

76. Omar N. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story (New 

York: Henry Holt, 1951), p. 62; Omar N. 

Bradley and Clay Blair, A General’s Lqe (New 

York: Simon and Schuster, 1983), p. 147. 

77. Blumenson, The Patton Papers, vol. 2, p. 

205. 

78. Entries for March 24, 25, 1943, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

79. Howe, Northwest Africn, p. 562; NATAF 

Final Report, p. 24, PRO AIR 2015535. 

80. NATAF Final Report, p. 24, PRO AIR 

20/5535. 

81, Msg, SPEC 40 NATAF to NAAF [Spaatz], 

April 2, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. This message 

cites the text of Patton’s message. 

82. Ibid. 

83. Ltr, Coningham to AVM H.E.P. Wigglesworth, Deputy Commander, Mediterranean Air 

Command, April 5, 1943, PRO AIR 23/7439. 

84. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 41041 1. 

85. Entry for April 2, 1943, Command 

86. Entry for April 3, 1943, Command Diary, 

87. Ibid. 

88. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 41 1. 

89. NATAF Final Report, p. 24, PRO AIR 

90. Entry for April 4, 1943, Command Diary, 

91. Ibid. 

92. Blumenson, The Patton Papers, vol. 2, 

93. Ltr, Coningham to Wigglesworth, April 

5, 1943, PRO AIR 2317439. 

94. Msg SPEC46, NATAF to NAAF, April 

5, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

95. Interview, Maj. Gen. Edward P. Curtis by 

James C. Hasdorff, November 22-23, 1975, 

USAF Oral History Collection, AFHRC file no. 

K239.0512-875, p. 55. 

96. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 927, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, April 5, 

1943, p. 1071. 

97. Entry for April 5, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

98. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 928, msg, Eisenhower to Patton, April 5, 

99. Blumenson, The Parton Papers, vol. 2, p. 

100. Howe, Northwest Africa, pp. 586-587. 

101. Ibid., p. 590. 

102. Entry for April 8, 1943, Command 

103. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, 

104. Entry for April 20, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

105. NATAF Final Report, p. 28. PRO AIR 

20155 3 5. 

106. Playfair, The Destruction of Axis Forces 

in Africu, p. 447. 

107. Report on Air Operations by No. 242 

Group R.A.F. in Support of 1st Army Tunisia. 

1943, n.d. [ca. May 19431, p. 13, PRO AIR 

2317434. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

20/5535. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

pp. 208-209. 

1943, pp. 1072-1073. 

210. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

pp. 198-199. 

108. Ibid., p. 1 I. 

109. Entry for April 29, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spdatz Papers, Diary. 

695 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

110. Msg, Spaatz to Eisenhower, May 1, 

111. Ibid. 

112. Entry for May 4, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

113. Msg, Spaatz to Eisenhower, May 1, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary; Itr, Stratemeyer to 

Arnold, May 7, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

114. Ibid. 

115. Entry for May 12, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary; Tedder, With 

Prejudice, p. 399. 

116. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

117. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 7, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1 18. Ibid. 

119. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, May 6, 1943, 

folder: North African Operations, Arnold 

Papers, box 39; memo, Brig. Gen. T. J. Hanky, 

Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, to all Assistant 

Chiefs of the Air Staff, subj: Air Operations in 

North Africa, April 20, 1943, Decimal File 

370.2 Africa (16), Arnold Papers, box 104. 

120. “The Plotters of Souk-el-Spaatz,” 

(cover), Time, March 22, 1943, p. 22. 

121. Pamphlet, Bernard L. Montgomery, 

“Some Notes on High Command in War,” p. 2, 

NARA, RG 165, OPD File 384, case 39, box 

1305. 

122. Talk by Air Vice Marshal Sir A. Coningham, February 16, 1943, Tripoli, PRO AIR 

20/5535. 

123. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, February 19, 

1943, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1657A, frames 

124. Memo for the Chief of Staff from the 

Assistant Secretary of War, April 18, 1943, 

NARA, RG 165,0PD-384, box 1305. 

125. Memo for the Assistant Chief of Staff, 

Operations Division from Col. H. J. Matchett, 

Acting Assistant Chief of Staff, G-3, subj: 

General Montgomery’s Notes on “High 

Command in War,” April 24, 1943, NARA, RG 

126. Memo for the Chief of Staff from Brig. 

Gen. J. E. Hull, Acting Assistant Chief of Staff, 

OPD, April 29, 1943, NARA, RG 165, G-3 

127. Memo for General [John E.] Hull, 

Acting Assistant Chief of Staff, OPD, from Col. 

S. E. Anderson, subj: Revision of Training 

Literature, May 8, 1943, NARA, RG 165, OPD384, Case 39, box 1305. Colonel Anderson 

attempted to eliminate AGF coordination by 

insisting that input to revisions of an AAF manual need come only from the AAF. Brig. Gen. 

965-966. 

165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

(370.6-384). 

Hull overruled him, noting that revisions need 

not be unanimous. Anderson later gained much 

experience in air-ground cooperation as the 

commander of IX Bomber Command, a unit of 

medium bombers assigned to assist Lt. Gen. 

Omar Bradley’s 12th Army Group during the 

campaign in northwestern Europe. 

128. Memo for the Chief of Staff from Lt. 

Gen. Ben Lear, Commanding General, AGF, 

subj: General Montgomery’s Notes on “High 

Command in War,” May 17, 1943, NARA, RG 

165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

129. Memo for the Assistant Chief of Staff, 

G-3, from the Acting Chief of Staff, subj: 

Revision of Training Literature, May 31, 1943, 

NARA, RG 165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

130. War Department Field Manual 100-20, 

Field Service Regulations, Command and 

Employment of Air Power (Washington, D.C.: 

GPO, July 21, 1943), sec. I, para. 1-3, pp. 1-2. 

13 1. Memo for the record attached to memo 

for the Adjutant General from Brig. Gen. Ray E. 

Porter, Assistant Chief of Staff, G-3, subj: 

Publication of FM 100-20, Field Service 

Regulations, Command and Employment of Air 

Power, June 30, 1943, NARA, RG 165, G-3 

(370.6834). 

132. Memo for Col. Nelson, G-3, from Col. 

J. B. Burwell, G-3, June 24, 1943, NARA, RG 

165, G-3 (370.6-384). 

133. See entry for February 6, 1943, Command 

Diary, for mention of Spaatz’s discussion with 

Porter. See Itr, Stratemeyer to Arnold, May 7, 

1943, for a connection to Stratemeyer, and Itr, 

Kuter to Spaatz, May 25, 1943, all sources in 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

134. WDFM 100-20, “Command and Employment of Air Power,” (Washington, D.C.: 

GPO, July 21,1943), chap. 1, sec. 1, para. 2. 

135. Ibid., chap. 1, sec. 1, para. 3. 

136. Ibid., chap. 2, sec. 3, para. 15. 

137. Ibid., chap. 2, sec. 3, par. 16, subpar. b. 

138. WDFM 31-35, April 9, 1942, chap. 2, 

139. WDFM 100-20, chap. 1, sec. 1, para. 3. 

140. Ibid., chap. 2, sec. 2, para. 12. 

141. Ltr, Kuter to Spaatz, May 25, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

142. Ibid., Itr, Arnold to Spaatz, June 28, 

1943. 

143. Ltr, Kuter to Col. Glen Martin, Special 

Consultant to the Secretary of the Air Force, 

November 22, 1950, AF/CHO, “The Kuter 

Report.” 

144. WDFM 100-20, chap. 1, sec. I, para. 1. 

145. WDFM 100-20, chap. 2, sec. 3, para. 

sec. 1, para. 6. 

16, subpara. b. 

696 
NOTES 

146. 384 (S)-GNGCT (5-6-43), Memo for 

the Chief of Staff from Lt. Gen. Ben Lear, 

Commanding General, Army Ground Forces, 

subj: “General Montgomery’s Notes on ‘High 

Command’ in War,” May 17, 1943, NARA, RG 

16.5, Records of the War Department General 

and Special Staffs, G-3 370.6-384. 

147. Greenfield, “Army Ground Forces and 

the Air-Ground Battle Team,” pp. 48-50. 

148. FM 1-5, January 18, 1943, chap. 2, sec. 

3, para. 26. Also see chap. 4, sec. 3, para. 57. 

149. Ibid., chap. 5, sec. 2, par. 63, subpar. b. 

150. Ibid., chap. 3, sec. 6, para. 30. 

151. Ibid., chap. 5, sec. 1, par. 58, subpar. c. 

152. Ibid., subparas. d and e. 

153. Rpt, Maj. Gen. W. H. Walker to CG, 

AGF, subj: Report of Visit to North African 

Theater of Operations, June 12, 1943, NARA, 

RG 337, AGF File 315.1, box 242. 

154. Ltr, Brig. Gen. Paul M. Robinett to 

Marshall, December 8, 1942, Arnold Papers, 

folder: Air-Ground Support, box 42. 

155. Greenfield, “Army Ground Forces and 

the Air-Ground Battle Team,” p. 77, citing 

statements by Kern, May 13, 1943, and Ryder, 

June 18-19, 1943. 

156. Ltr, Kuter to Coningham, June 26, 1943, 

AIR PRO 2317439. 

157. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

158. Interview, Spaatz by Goldberg, May 19, 

1965, p. 25. 

159. Rpt, HQ XI1 ASC to CG, NATO, subj: 

“Report of Operations,” April 9, 1943, NARA, 

RG 337, Army Ground Forces Central Files, 

file 319.1/83, box 245. 

160. Ltr, Kuter to Col. Glen Martin, Special 

Consultant to the Secretary of the Air Force, 

November 22, 1950, AFICHO, “The Kuter 

Report.” 

161. Ltr, Spaatz to CG, AAF, subj: Employment of Support Aviation, May 27, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

162. Greenfield, “Army Ground Forces and 

the Air-Ground Battle Team,” pp. 4243. Some 

divisions were double- or triple-counted in 

these totals; the Army did not have 104 divisions in the United States on that date. 

163. Memo for Asst. CIS, A-1, NAAF, from 

Deputy ACIS, A-I, June 1, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. These figures include the last day 

of May 1943 and therefore slightly overstate 

total casualties. 

164. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 160, p. 256. These figures include the 

losses of the Ninth Air Force as well. 

Part Three 

Mediterranean Interlude 

From Pantelleria to London 

Chapter 7 

Pantelleria and Sicily 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Henry [Berliner ?], June 18, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. Blumenson, The Patton Papers, v01.2, p. 

314. 

3. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, pp. 

4 19422. 

4. Ibid. 

5. Albert N. Garland and Howard McGaw 

Smyth, United States Army in World War !I, subseries: The Mediterranean Theater of Operations, Sicily and the Surrender OfItaly (Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1965), pp. 70,73. 

6. Ibid., p. 419. See also msg 1409 for 

Marshall from Eisenhower, February 17, 1943, 

PRO AIR 2315485. 

423. 

7. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

8. Ibid. 

9. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, v01.2, 

item 982, msg NAF-219, Eisenhower to 

Combined Chiefs of Staff, May 11, 1943, p. 

1122. 

10. Ibid., item 992, msg, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, May 13, 1943, p. 1130. 

11. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

424. 

12. Ibid., p. 425. 

13. Entry for May 16, 1943, Command 

697 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

14. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 183. 

15. Entry for May 17, 1943, Command Diary, 

16. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

17. Entries for May 17, 18, 19, 1943, Com18. Entry for May 19, 1943, Command Diary, 

19. Entry for May 20, 1943, Command Diary, 

20. Ibid. 

21. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, p. 165; 

Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 

329-330. 

22. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 1091, memo for Personal Record, July 1, 

1943, p. 1231. 

23. Entry for May 22, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

24. Entry for May 23, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

25. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 1020, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, May 

25, 1943, p. 1154. 

26. bid., item 1091, memo for the Personal 

Record, July 1, 1943, p. 1231. 

27. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, pp. 

173-174. 

28. Ibid., pp. 184-185. 

29. Ibid., p. 186. 

30. Operation CORKSCREW, Minutes of Meet3 1. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 185. 

32. Ibid., p. 187. 

33. Ibid. 

34. Entry for May 28, 1943, Command Diary, 

35. Entry for June 6, 1943, Command Diary, 

36. Ibid. 

37. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

38. Entry for June 6, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

39. Entry for June 8, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also Zuckerman, Apes 

to Warlords, pp. 189-192. 

40. Entry for June 8, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

41. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 190. 

42. Ibid., p. 188. 

43. Entry for June 8, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

44. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 1046, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, June 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

425. 

mand Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

ing on May 28, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

pp. 425-426. 

9, 1943, p. 1181. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

45. Entry for June 8, 1943, Command Diary, 

46. Entry for June 9, 1943, Command Diary, 

47. Ibid. 

48. Ibid. 

49. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 1075, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, June 

26, 1943, p. 1212. 

SO. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

424. 

51. Entry for June 9, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

52. Entry for June 11, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

53. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

429, citing Times [London], June 15, 1943. 

54. Garland and Smyth, Sicily and the 

Surrender of Italy, pp. 71-72. 

55. Ibid. 

56. Msg, Spaatz and Lovett to Arnold, June 

11, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Msg, Spaatz to Mediterranean Air 

Command [Tedder ?I, July 1, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

58. Entry for June 12, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Ltr, Spaatz to Henry [Berliner?], June 18, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

60. Memo, Spaatz to Tedder, “Interim Statement of Operation CORKSCREW,” June 20, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

61. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 195. 

62. CCS Memorandum of Information No. 

143, “Pantelleria Operations,” p. 13, PRO 

PREM 3122814. 

63. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 194. 

64. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

433. 

65. Ltr, Allied Force Headquarters from Maj. 

Gen. W. L. Clutterbuck, June 13, 1943, PRO 

AIR 2313305. 

66. Hamilton, Master of the Battlefield, p. 

287. 

67. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

432. 

68. Hamilton, Master of the Battlefield, pp. 

245-272. See also Bernard L. Montgomery, The 

Memoirs of Field-Marshal the Viscount 

Montgomery of Alamein, K.G. (New York: 

World Publishing, 1958), pp. 153-164. 

69. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

443. 

70. Ibid., p. 444. 

71. C.J.C. Molony, F. C. Flynn, H. L. Davies, 

and T. P. Gleave, The Mediterranean and 

698 
NOTES 

Middle East, vol. 5, The Campaign in Sicily 

1943 and the Campaign in Italy 3rd September 

1943 to 31st March 1944 (London: HMSO, 

1973), pp. 32-33. 

72. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

445 

73. Ibid. For a thorough discussion of Axis 

air strength at the time of the invasion, see 

Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 1, pp. 

80-8 1. 

74. Ibid., p. 83. 

75. Entry for June 18, 1943, Command 

76. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, June 24, 1943, 

77. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

78. Ibid., p. 84. 

79. Ibid., p. 82. 

80. Entry for May 13, 1943, Command 

81. Entry for May 24, 1943, Command 

82. Blumenson, The Patton Papers, vol. 2, p. 254. 

83. Entry for May 22, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

84. Notes, Spaatz-Cannon conference, May 

24, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

85. Msg, SPEC-120, Coningham to Spaatz, 

June 3, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

86. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, June 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

87. Greenfield, “Army Ground Forces and 

the Air-Ground Battle Team,” p. 77, citing a 

statement by Lucas on July 21, 1943. 

88. Molony, The Campaign in Sicily and 

Italy, p. 173. 

89. Garland and Smyth, Sicily and the 

Surrender of Italy, pp. 175-182. This official 

history gives a full and balanced account ofthis 

tragedy. It concludes that no one in particular 

but everyone in general was responsible. See 

also memo, Maj. Gen. M. B. Ridgway, subj: 

Reported Loss of Transport Planes and 

Personnel Due to Friendly Fire, August 2, 1943, 

Arnold Papers, folder: Air Support of Armored 

Forces (misfiled?], box 42. 

90. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointhlank, p. 

454. 

91. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 11 15, msg, Eisenhower to Patton, July 12, 

1943, p. 1255. Spaatz’s copy is in his diary. 

92. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 14, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

93. 1st and 2nd endorsements of report by 

Commanding General, Northwest African 

Troop Carrier Command, July 20, 1943, Spaatz 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1, pp. 82-84. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

mand Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

94. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

95. Entry for June 1, 1943, Command Diary, 

96. Entry for June 21, 1943, Command 

97. Conference notes, July 5, 1943, Spaatz 

98. Entry for August 4, 1943, Command 

99. Entries for August 13, 15, 1943, Com100. Ibid. 

101. Entry for August 3, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

102. U.S. Congress, Senate, Sen. Richard B. 

Russell Presenting the Conclusions of the 

Special Committee to Visit the War Theaters, 

74th Cong., 1st Sess., October 1 I, 1943, 

Congressional Record, pp. 8189-8190. 

103. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

104. Entry for May 13, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

105. Entry for May 24, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

106. Entries for June 1, 6, 12, 21, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

107. Entry for June 27, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

108. Entry for July 12, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

109. Entry for July 13, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

110. REDLINE msg JC-6-CS, Spaatz to 

Cannon, August 7, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Cables. 

11 1. REDLINE msg CS-1-JC, Cannon to 

Spaatz, August 7, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Cables. 

112. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 365. 

11 3. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 1121, msg 140, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

July 18,1943, pp. 1263-1264. 

114. Ibid., see footnote 2 to item 1121, p. 

1265. See also msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

July 26, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

115. Entry for August 4, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

116. Entry for August 9, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

117. Slessor, The Central Blue, p. 557. 

118. Samuel Eliot Morison, History of United 

States Naval Operations in World War 11, vol. 

9: Sicily-Salerno-Anzio: January 1943-June 

1944 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1954), pp. 

21 5-216. 

699 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

119. For criticism of the Allied response to 

the evacuation, see S. W. Roskill, The War at 

Sea 1939-1945, vol. 3, part I, The Offensive 1st 

June 1943-31st May 1944 (London: HMSO, 

1960), pp. 147-150; Garland and Smyth, Sicily 

and the Surrender of Italy, pp. 41 1412. 

120. Molony, The Campaign in Sicily and 

Italy, p. 184. 

121. Roskill, The War at Sea, vol. 3, part 1, 

p. 148. For this account of the evacuation 

Roskill appears to have examined Coningham’s 

papers. 

122. Garland and Smyth, Sicily and the 

Surrender of Italy, p. 412. 

123. Roskill, The War at Sea, vol. 3, part I, 

pp. 148-149. 

124. Coningham, “The Development of 

Tactical Air Forces,” RUSI Journal XCI (May 

1946), p. 216. 

125. Entry for August 9, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

126. Entries for August 11-17, 1943, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

127. Entry for August 4, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

128. Garland and Smyth, Sicily and the 

Surrender of Italy, pp. 411-412; Roskill, The 

War at Sea, vol. 3, part 1, pp. 147-150. 

Chapter 8 

Salerno and London 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Faker, September 18, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

544. 

3. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1257, msg 476, Eisenhower to CCS, 

September 15, 1943, pp. 14241425. 

4. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

538. 

5. Morison, Sicily-Salerno-Anzio, p. 280. 

Morison’s figures are for the entire operation 

not just the counterattack period. He does not 

state just how many of the 11,000 tons of naval 

shellfire fell from September 12-1.5 as opposed 

to the preliminary assault and follow up naval 

bombardments. Nonetheless naval gunfire was, 

in most cases, more accurate than an attack and 

of comparable weight in the aggregate. 

6. Ltr, Alexander to Spaatz, September 17, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

7. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1262, msg, Eisenhower to McNarney, 

September 16, 1943, pp. 1428-1430. 

8. Ibid., item 1253, msg, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, September 14, 1943, pp. 1416-1417. 

See also Itr, Spaatz to Arnold, September 15, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

9. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 30, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

10. Msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, August 1, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

11. Msg A-2143, Spaatz to Eisenhower, 

August 27, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary; ltr, 

Spaatz to Arnold, September 15, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

12. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1253, msg 470, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

September 14, 1943, pp. 1416-1417. 

13. Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea 

Cate, The Army Air Forces in World War II, 

vol. 6: Men and Planes (Chicago: University of 

Chicago Press, 1955), pp. 516-522. 

14. Msg AV-417, Spaatz to Arnold (Eyes 

Only), August 17, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Cables. 

15. Time, September 20, 1943. pp. 66,68. 

16. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 10, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

17. Msg JC-99-CS, Spaatz to Cannon, 

September 18, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Cables. 

18. See Alan M. Osur, Blacks in the Army Air 

Forces During World War II: The Problem of 

Race Relations (Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, 

GPO, 1977), pp. 48-50. Osur identifies this 

officer as Col. Momyer. 

19. Rpt, Maj. Gen. Edwin J. House, Commanding General, XI1 ASC, to Maj. Gen. John 

K. Cannon, Deputy Commander, NATAF, subj: 

Combat Efficiency of the 99th Fighter 

Squadron, September 16, 1943, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

20. 1st endorsement, Maj. Gen. John K. 

Cannon, Deputy Commander, NATAF, to Lt. 

Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Commanding General, 

NAAF, September 18, 1943, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

21. Entry for June 4, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

22. 2nd endorsement, Lt. Gen. Carl Spaatz, 

CG, NAAF, to Gen. H. H. Arnold, CG, AAF, 

September 19, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

23. Osur, Blacks in the AAF, p. 50. 

24. Minutes, Conference with General Carl 

Spaatz and the Gillem Board, 1,000 Hours, 

October 18, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

700 
NOTES 

25. Interview, Curtis by Hasdorff, November 

26. Routing slip, Headquarters U.S. Air 

Forces Rest Camps AAFSC/MTO, May 19, 

1944, AFHRC file no. 632.217. 

27. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

item 992, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, May 

28. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

pp. 477-483. 

29. Ibid. 

30. Ronald Schaffer, Wings of Judgement: 

American Bombing in World War I1 (New 

York: Oxford University Press, 1985), p. 46. 

31. Molony, The Campaign in Sicily and 

Italy, p. 172. 

32. Ibid. 

33. JCS memo, Deane to Amold, subj: Bombing 

Objectives, June 10,1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

34. Entry for June 1, 1943, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. This presentation made 

little impression on Alan Brooke, who did not 

mention it in his own account of the day. See 

Arthur Bryant, The Turn of the Tide, A History 

of the War Years: Based on the Diaries of Field 

Marshal Lord Alan Brooke, 1939-1943 

(Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1957), p. 523. 

35. Entry for June 14, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

36. Ltr, Spaatz to Lyle G. Wilson, May 8, 

1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

37. Matloff, Strategic Planning for Coalition 

Warfare 1943-1944, p. 151. 

38. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 27, 1943, 

AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1657A, frame 1015. 

39. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

pp. 483,684. 

40. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, August 20, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

41. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, June 24, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

42. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, July 14, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

43. Msg, Marcus 914 RAFDEL to Air 

Ministry (personal for CAS), July 23, 1943, 

PRO AIR 20/1011. 

44. Msg, Welsh 78, Air Ministry [Portal] to 

RAFDEL [Welsh], July 26, 1943, PRO AIR 

20/1011. 

45. See note by the Air Staff, Welsh to 

Arnold, July 31, 1943, Arnold Papers, box 274. 

46. Msg, Marcus 133, Welsh to Portal, 

August 2, 1943, PRO AIR 20/1011. 

47. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, August 20, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. See Craven and Cate, 

Torch to Pointblank, p. 495. 

22-23, 1975, pp. 82-83. 

12, 1943, pp. 1129-1 131. 

48. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

pp. 494-496; Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, 

vol. 2, item 1145, msg NAF-303, Eisenhower 

to CCS, pp. 1296-1297. 

49. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

50. Ibid., p. 495. 

51. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisen52. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 2, 

53. CCS 303/3, August 17, 1943. 

54. Minutes, CCS lO1st Meeting, August 14, 

1943. 

55. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, August 20, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Msg. A-2143, Spaatz to Eisenhower, 

August 27, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary; msg 

6256, Eisenhower to Spaatz, August 26, 1943, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1265, msg 497, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

September 18,1943, pp. 1434-1435. 

58. For Arnold’s plan see CCS 217/1 “Plan to 

Assure the Most Effective Exploitation of the 

Combined Bomber Offensive,” October 19, 

1943. See also Craven and Cate, Torch to 

Pointblank, pp. 564-565, for the course of 

negotiations. Msg JSM-1276, Britman, 

Washington to Air Ministry, October 23, 1943, 

PRO AIR 20/4419, contained the British side of 

the decision. 

Eisenhower, October 23, 1943, PRO AIR 

20/1011. 

60. Memo, Somervell to Spaatz, October 30, 

1943, msg 3787, Eisenhower [Spaatz] to 

Arnold, October 30, 1943; msg 1420, Arnold to 

Eisenhower for Spaatz, October 31, 1943, all 

sources in Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

61. Msg W-840, Portal to Welsh, AIR PRO 

20/10 1 1. 

62. Minute, Assistant Chief of the Air Staff 

(Ops.) to the Chief of the Air Staff, October 25, 

1943, AIR PRO 20/1011. 

63. Msg 02-3387 (COS [W] 908), British 

Chiefs of Staff to Britman, Washington, PRO 

AIR 20/4419. 

64. Minute D.191/3, Churchill to Chiefs of 

Staff and Portal, PRO AIR 20/1011. 

65. Msg JSM 1290, from Joint Staff Mission, 

Washington, to War Cabinet Office, London, 

October 29, 1943, PRO AIR 20/4419. 

66. See JCS memo to the President (aboard 

the U.S.S. Iowa), November 17, 1943, and CCS 

400 “Integrated Command of US. Strategic Air 

Forces in the European-Mediterranean Area,” 

pp. 495,716-717. 

hower, pp. 379-380,393,398, 

notes to item 1231, p. 1232. 

59. Msg R-4757/698 (FAN 254), CCS to 

70 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

November 18, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheran, pp. 

203-209 plus organization charts; and pp. 

228-232. 

67. Msg, Marcus 133, Welsh to Portal, 

August 2, 1943, PRO AIR 20/1011. 

68. Arnold’s “Trip to England’ Notebook, 

August 31-September 8, 1943, Arnold Papers, 

Journals File, box 27 1. 

69. List of 23 points for Gen. Arnold’s personal action resulting from trip to England, 

September 6, [1943], HQ Eighth Air Force, 

Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff, A-2, 

Arnold Papers, Official File, box 49. 

70. Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and 

Hopkins: An Intimate History (New York: 

Harper & Brothers, rev. ed., 1950), p. 764, citing memo, Hopkins to FDR, October 4, 1943. 

71. Copp, Forged in Fire, p. 445. 

72. Memo, JCS to the President, November 

17, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheran, pp. 203-209. 

73. CCS 400, November 18, 1943, FRUS: 

Cairo-Teheren, pp. 228-232. 

74. For British arguments against setting up a 

Supreme Strategic Bombing Commander, see 

CCS 400/1 “Control of Strategic Air Forces in 

Northwest Europe and the Mediterranean,” 

memo by the British Chiefs of Staff, Cairo, 

November 26, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheran, pp. 

432-435. See also Craven and Cate, Torch to 

Pointblank, p. 748. 

75. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 446-448. 

76. Ibid. 

77. Churchill-Marshall Dinner Meeting, 

November 23, 1943, and meeting of the CCS 

with Roosevelt and Churchill, November 24, 

1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheran, pp. 326,334. 

78. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, p. 

803. See Matloff, Strategic Planning 1943-44, 

p. 381, for a concise analysis of this decision. 

79. Minutes, CCS 134th meeting, December 

4, 1943, and Minutes, CCS 138th meeting, 

December 7, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheran, pp. 

681-686 and 756-757. 

80. CCS 400/2 “Control of Strategic Air 

Forces in Northwest Europe and in the 

Mediterranean,” December 4, 1943, FRUS: 

Cairo-Teheren, pp. 787-789. 

81. Minutes, CCS 138th Meeting, December 

7, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheren, p. 751. 

82. Minutes, CCS 134th Meeting, December 

4, 1943, FRUS: Cairo-Teheren, p. 685. 

83. Arnold, Global Mission, p. 445. See also 

Trip to England, August 31, 1943-September 8, 

1943, Arnold Papers, Journals, box 271. 

84. Arnold, Global Mission, p. 450. 

85. Ibid., pp. 472473. 

86. Trip to Sextant, November 11, 

1943-December 15, 1943, Arnold Papers, 

Journals, box 272. This is Arnold’s diary of the 

trip and contains much valuable information. 

See also Copp, Forged in Fire, p. 447. 

87. Entry for December 8, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

88. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 455; Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe, 

p. 217. Both authors give the strong impression 

that Eisenhower merely approved of Spaatz’s 

appointment and did not propose it. 

89. Trip to Sextant, Arnold Papers, Journals, 

box 272. 

90. [Memo for the Record], “Principle Points 

Discussed with General Arnold,” n.d. [ca. 

December 8, 19431, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

91. Ibid. 

92. Ibid. 

93. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1428, msg W-8550, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, December 25, 1943, pp. 161 1-1612. 

94. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 455. 

95. Ibid., p. 456. 

96. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1428, msg W-8550, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, December 25, 1943, pp. 1611-1612. 

97. Entry for Qecember 9, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

98. Ibid. 

99. See Itrs, Arnold to Eaker, June 15, 1943; 

July 7, 1943; August 1, 1943; Arnold Papers, 

File BC to GB, box 49, and msg R-3550, 

Arnold to Eaker, Eaker Papers, box 16. 

100. Memo, Notes on Strategic Bombardment Conference, Gibraltar, November 8, 9, 10, 

1943, by Col. George C. McDonald, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

101. Msg W4779 (MC OUT 2784), Spaatz 

and Eaker to Arnold, November 9, 1943, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

102. Ltr, AM W. L. Welch, Head, RAF 

Delegation in Washington, to Arnold, 

December 14, 1943, AF/CHO microfilm reel 

34163, frames 1260-1261. This letter contains 

the text of Portal’s message to Arnold and is 

found in a microfilm copy of the Papers of Gen. 

Lawrence Kuter. The originals are part of the 

manuscript collections of the U.S. Air Force 

Academy at Colorado Springs. See Parton, “Air 

Force Spoken Here,” pp. 329-346. Parton, who 

examined many of the same sources, reaches 

some different conclusions in his defense of 

Eaker during this period. 

103. Msg R-7075, Arnold to Eaker, December 18, 1943, Eaker Papers, box 16. 

702 
NOTES 

104. Interview, Lt. Gen. Ira C. Eaker by 

Arthur K. Marmor, January 1966, USAF Oral 

History Collection, AFHRC file no. K239- 

0512.626, p. 13. 

105. Ltr, Eaker to Fechet, December 22, 

1943, Eaker Papers, box 7. 

106. Msg, Eaker to Arnold, December 19, 

1943, Eaker Papers, box 16. 

107. For the text of Eaker’s message to Spaatz, 

see msg AF434, Spaatz to Arnold, December 

19, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

108. Ltr, Welsh to Arnold, December 20, 

1943, AF/CHO microfilm reel 34163, frames 

1262-1263. This letter contains the text of 

Portal’s message to Arnold; the original is from 

the Kuter Papers at the Air Force Academy. 

109. Ibid. 

110. Msg R-7136, Arnold to Devers, December 20, 1943, Eaker Papers, box 16. The.attribution to Kuter can be found in Copp, Forged in 

Fire, p. 450. For an example of Kuter’s criticisms of Eaker’s performance, see memo, Kuter 

to Arnold, October 26, 1943, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5046, frame 1825. In the memo Kuter says 

with regad to the bombing record of the Eighth 

from April 1 to October 20, “Only a very small 

weight of bombers has been utilized against the 

primary targets in Pointblank, and fewer against 

the type targets now recommended by the 

Committee of Target Analysts in the USA, 

namely, Fighter Aircraft, Ball Bearings, and 

Grinding Wheels” [emphasis in the original]. 

11 1. Ltr, Arnold to Welsh, December 27, 

1943, AF/CHO microfilm reel 34163, frame 

1266, Kuter Papers, Air Force Academy. 

112. Msg A-4989, Arnold to Eaker, December 21, 1943, Eaker Papers, box 16. 

113. Msg AF434, Spaatz to Arnold, December 19, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

114. Entry for December 23, 1943, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

115. Entry for December 9, 1943, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

116. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

117. Entry for December 23, 1943, Com118. Ibid. 

1959-1960, pp. 65-66. 

mand Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

119. Forrest Pogue, George C. Marshall: 

Organizer of Victory 1943-1945 (New York: 

Viking, 1973), pp. 324325. 

120. Msg 5585, Marshall to Eisenhower, 

[received] December 24, 1943, D. D. Eisenhower Pre-Presidential Papers, Official Cable 

File, Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kans. 

121. Entry for December 25, 1943, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

122. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1428, msg W-8550, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, December 25,1943, pp. 1611-1615. 

123. Ibid., vol. 3, item 1429, msg 19181, 

Eisenhower to Eaker, December 25, 1943, pp. 

124. Entry for December 26, 1943, Com125. Ibid. 

126. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

127. Ibid., p. 65. 

128. Interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by the 

US. Air Force Academy Department of History, 

September 27,1968, p. 1.8. 

1615-1 616. 

mand Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1959-1960, p. 63. 

129. Ibid. 

130. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

p. 750. 

131. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, n.d. [late February 19441, AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 1657, frames 1082-1085. 

Spaatz received this letter on March 1 and 

returned his copy, one of only two made, with 

his reply. A copy of Spaatz’s copy, with 

Spaatz’s penciled notations faithfully transcribed, found its way into AAF files and 

thence to microfilm. 

132. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3. 

The following cables and the footnotes to them 

contain discussion of Marshall’s replies to 

Eisenhower: item 1428, msg W-8550, 

December 25, 1943; item 1440, msg W-8678, 

December 27, 1943; item 1445, msg W-8710, 

December 28, 1943; and item 1449, December 

29, 1943, pp. 1611-1614, 1622-1624, 

1626-1628, and 1630-1631. 

133. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The North African 

Campaign,” pp. 152-153. 

703 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Part Four 

The Point of the Blade 

Strategic Bombing and 

the Cross-Channel Invasion 

1. USSBS, Aircraft Division, Industry Report, 

vol. 4, 2d ed. (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947), 

p. 5. 

2. Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, The 

Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 

1939-1945, vol. 2: Endeavor (London: HMSO, 

1961), p. 83. 

19, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

364-365. 

3. Msg K-3189, Spaatz to Arnold, January 

4. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, pp. 

5. Ibid., pp. 356-357. 

Chapter 9 

The Luftwaffe Engaged 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 10, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Eighth Air Force File, 1942-1945. 

2. Msg 9524, Arnold to Spaatz, January 31, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

3. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, pp. 

705-706. 

4. Ibid. 

5. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

6. Ibid., pp. 704,729. 

7. FKUS: Cairo-Tehran, 133d meeting of the 

CCS., p. 685. 

8. Carrier Sheet, subj: “Loss Rate By Combat 

Crew Experience,” Lt. Col. H. Fay to Col. E. 

Cook, Deputy Chief of Staff USSTAF, January 

10, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

9. Memo for the Chief of Staff from Arnold, 

subj: Army Air Forces Heavy Bomber Crew 

Loss Rates in Eighth Air Force in U.K., 

December 27, 1943, Arnold Papers, Operations 

folder: box 44. 

10. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, p. 

705. 

11. Ibid., p. 639. 

12. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, p. 234. 

13. Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea 

Cate, The Army Air Forces in World War II, 

vol. 3, Europe: Argument to V-E Day, January 

1944 to May 1945 (Chicago: University of 

Chicago Press, 19.5 1), p. 26. 

14. See Murray Green, “The Pen and the 

Sword,” in John L. Frisbee, ed., The Makers of 

the United States Air Force (Washington, D.C.: 

AF/CHO, GPO, 1987) pp. 99-126 for a short 

biography of Hugh Knerr. 

15. Craven and Cate, Torch to Pointblank, 

126. 

pp. 755-756. See also Command Diary, entry 

for December 30, 1943, and conference notes, 

December 3 1, 1943, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

16. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 18, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

17. Msg, Smith to Eisenhower, January 1, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

18. Entry for January 1, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers. 

19. Sir Frederick Morgan, Overture to 

Overlord (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 

1950), p. 257. 

20. Osur, Blacks in the Army Air Forces, p. 

100, citing ltr, Eaker to Osur, December 5, 

1974. 

21. Ibid., pp. 100-102. 

22. Mattie E. Treadwell, United States Army 

in World War 11, subseries: Special Studies: The 

Woman’s Army Corps (Washington, D.C.: 

OCMH, GPO, 1954), p. 384. 

23. Entry for January 3, 1944, Command 

Dairy, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

24. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

25. Memo, Spaatz to CG, AAF [Arnold], 

subj: H2X Pathfinders for the Strategic Air 

Forces, January 14, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

26. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, January 5, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

27. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 10, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Eighth Air Force File, 

1942-1 945. 

28. Memo, Spaatz to CG/AAF, January 14, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Eighth Air Force File, 

1942-1945. 

29. Minutes of Commanders’ Meeting, 

p. 21. 

704 
NOTES 

September 10, 1943, Eaker Papers, box 20. 

30. FM 100-20, chap. 2, sec. 2, para. 13, p. 9. 

31. Ibid., para. 12, p. 8. 

32. Ibid., sec. 3, para. 16, p. 10. 

33. Memo to General Marshall, from Arnold, 

subj: CCS Air Plan for the Defeat of Germany, 

November 3, 1943, Arnold Papers, folder: JCS, 

box 43. 

34. W. W. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing 

Strategy: General Eisenhower’s Decision of 

March 25, I944 (Austin: University of Texas 

Press, 1981), pp. 17-18. 

35. Entry for January 4, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

36. Entries for May 10, 14, 15, 16, 1942, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

37. Entries for January 6,8, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

38. Memo, Spaatz to CG, Eighth Air Force, 

subj: Operational Directive, n.d. [January 11, 

19441, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

39. Msg K-3214, Spaatz to Arnold, January 

21, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

40. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 23, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

41. Ibid. 

42. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, January 23, 1944, 

43. Entry for January 22, 1944, Command 

44. Ibid. 

45. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, chart, p. 

234. 

46. Stephen L. McFarland, “The Evolution of 

the American Strategic Fighter in Europe 

194244,” The Journal of Strategic Studies X 

(June 1987), pp. 193-194; interview, Lt. Gen. 

Barney M. Giles by James C. Hasdorff, 

November 20-21 1974, USAF Oral History 

Collection, AFHRC file no. K239.0512-814, 

pp. 98-99; Benjamin S. Kelsey, The Dragon’s 

Teeth , p. 68. 

47. For a sketch of Kepner’s life see Paul F. 

Henry, “William E. Kepner: All the Way to 

Berlin,” in Frisbee, Makers of the USAF, pp. 

15 1-176. 

48. Interview, Maj. Gen. William E. Kepner 

by Bruce Hopper, July 15, 1944, VII F.C. HQ, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

49. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 317. 

50. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 22-24. 

51. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

165. Freeman also notes three additional B-17s 

written off as a result of battle damage. 

52. Ibid. See also notes of “Information 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Available Regarding Heavy Bomber Mission 11 

January,” n.d. [mid-January] Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

53. Record, telephone conference, January 12 

[13?], 1944, 1800 hrs British time, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

54. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, January 24, 1944, 

AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfim 

reel A 1657A, frames 1064-1065. 

55. Msg K-3214, Spaatz to Arnold, January 

21, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, January 23, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 24-25; Carter and Mueller, Combat 

Chronology 1941-1945, pp. 263-264. 

58. Msg AX-621, Air Ministry to USSTAF, 

February 17, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Peter Wykeham, Fighter Comand; A 

Study of Air Defence, 1914-1960 (London: 

Putnam, 1960), pp. 242-243. 

60. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 196. 

61. Denis Richards, Royal Air Force, 

1939-1945, vol. 1, The Fight at Odds (London: 

HMSO, 1953), p. 194. 

62. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 1, “The Planning and 

Preparation of the Allied Expeditionary Air 

Force for the Landings in Normandy,” pp. 

33-35. The narrative by the RAF Historical 

Section was prepared exclusively from original 

security-classified documentation. The bulk of its 

documentation comes from the Papers of Air 

Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory, which have since 

found their way from the Air Ministry to the 

Public Records Office. It is probably the best, if 

not the only, history of the AEAF and presents 

the views of Leigh-Mallory clearly and accurately. 

63. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 196. 

64. Russell F. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants: The Campaigns of France and Germany, 1944-1945 (Bloomington: Indiana 

University Press, 1981), p. 59. 

65. E. J. Kingston-McCloughry, The Direction of War: A Critique of the Political Direction and High Command in War (London: 

Jonathan Cape, 1955), p. 121. 

66. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 196. 

67. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, p. 

59. 

68. Numerous entries in Vandenberg’s 

diaries, Papers of Hoyt S. Vandenberg, Library 

of Congress, Manuscript Division; interview, 

Gen. Frederic H. Smith by James C. Hasdorff 

and Brig. Gen. Noel F. Parrish, USAF Oral 

705 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

History Collection, June 7-8, 1976, AFHRC file 

no. K 239.0512-903. 

69. For Coningham’s difficulties with LeighMallory, see D’Este, Decision in Normandy, pp. 

214, 222-225. For an example of LeighMallory’s treatment of Brereton, see Lewis H. 

Brereton, The Brereton Diaries (New York; 

William Morrow, 1946), p. 228, entry for 

December LO, 1943. 

70. Kingston-McCloughry, The Direction of 

War, p. 120. 

7 1. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, pp. 

72. I)’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 210. 

73. Ltr, Maj. Gen. William 0. Butler, 

USAAF Branch, HQ COSSAC, to Maj. Gen. 

Barney M. Giles, Chief of Air Staff, 13 

November 1943. AFHRC file no. 168, 491, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1657, frame 530. 

74. Entry for February 15, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

75. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, p. 

59. 

76. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 1, “ AEAF Planning 

and Preparation,” pp. 25-27. 

77. Entry for January 3, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

78. Charles Webster and Noble Frankland, 

The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany 

1939-1945, vol. 3, Victory (London; HMSO, 

1961), p. 16. 

79. Msg W-937818965, Morgan to 

Eisenhower, January 9, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. See note at bottom of copy in Spaatz’s 

diary, which gives his comments to Butler. 

80. Msg R-8127, Marshall to Spaatz and 

Morgan, January 15, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

81. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1423, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

December 17,1943, pp. 1604-1607. 

82. Ibid., item 1470, msg, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, January 31, 1944. pp. 1648-1649. 

83. Ibid. 

84. Ihid. 

85. Ibid., item 1472, msg 6490, Eisenhower 

86. Ltr, Arnold to Eisenhower, January 17, 

87. Conference notes, Spaatz, Eaker, Giles, 

88. Ehtry for January 17, 1944, Command 

89. Ihid. 

90. Entry for January 22, 1944, Command 

58-59. 

to Smith, January 5, 1944, pp. 1651-1652. 

1944, Arnold Papers, Correspondence. 

January 9, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

91. Entry for January 24, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

92. Msg K-3189, Spaatz to Arnold, January 

19, 1944, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

93. Ibid. See notes on Eisenhower’s corrections on copy in Spaatz’s files. 

94. Entry for June 20, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

95. Entry for January 21, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

96. Entry for January 20, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

97. Entry for January 24, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

98. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, February 1, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. Margin notes on this document indicate Spaatz did not send it to Amold, 

but instead retained it for his own files. 

99. Memo, to General Spaatz, subj: “Conference at Air Chief Marshal Leigh-Mallory’s 

Headquarters,” from F. L. Anderson, February 

4, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

100. Ltr, Portal to Spaatz, February 15, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

101. Ibid. 

102. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

103. Conference notes, February 19, 1944, 

104. Ibid. 

p. 109. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

105. Msg IE-129 cs [REDLINE], Spaatz to 

Eaker, February 19, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Cables File. 

106. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 32. 

107. Ibid., p. 31. See also Itr, Spaatz to 

Arnold, January 23, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary; 

interview, Col. R. D. Hughes by Bruce C. 

Hopper, London, March 20, 1944, p. 1, Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945; Hughes stated, 

“We were all resigned to losing 150-200 heavies on the first initial show.” 

108. Msg. Spaatz to Eaker, February 19, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. The message was 

cancelled by Spaatz before transmission to 

Eaker. 

109. Entry for February 19, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

110. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 32. 

11 1. Ibid. 

112. Bernard Boylan, Development of the 

Long-Range Escort Fighter (USAF Historical 

Study No. 139 K101-136, 1955), p. 180. 

113. Roger Freeman, Mighty Eighth War 

706 
NOTES 

Diary (London: Jane’s, 1981), pp. 183, 297. 

Also see Kelsey, Dragon’s Teeth, pp. 134-135. 

Kelsey made the first P-38 test flight, served as 

the project officer for the P-38’s development, 

and in 1943-1944 commanded the Eighth Air 

Forces Operational Engineering Section. In his 

view, the performance of P-38s in Europe was 

hampered by their pilot’s poor opinion of their 

performance an opinion, not shared by P-38 

pilots in other theaters of operation. 

114. Interview, Williamson by Hopper, June 

14, 1944. 

115. Ibid. 

116. Haywood S. Hansell, The Air Plan That 

Defeated Hitler (Atlanta: Higgins-Mc Arthubongin0 and Porter, 1972), p. 181. 

1 17. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

118. Interview, Williamson by Hopper, June 

119. Ibid. 

120. Compiled from Bomb Group Mission 

reports found in Freeman, Mighty Eighth War 

Diary, pp. 183-1 88. 

121. Murray, Strategy ,for Defeat, p. 242; 

Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E, p. 43. 

122. Combined Operational Planning 

Committee, “Third Periodic Report on Enemy 

Daylight Fighter Defenses and Interception 

Tactics, Period 15 February 1944-2 March 

1944,” March 26, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945. 

p. 34. 

14, 1944. 

123. Murray, Strategy for Defeut, p. 242. 

124. Ibid., p. 234. 

125. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

126. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The RAF in the 

Bombing Offensive Against Germany,” vol. 5, 

“The Full Offensive, February 1943-February 

1944,” p. 164. 

127. Ibid., p. 165. 

128. Ibid. 

129. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Dav, 

p. 45. 

pp. 45-47; Murray, Strategy for Defeat, pp. 

253-255. 

130. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

I3 1. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, n.d. [early March 

132. Ibid. 

133. Ibid. 

134. Ibid. 

135. Interview, Hughes by Hopper, March 

136. Ibid. 

137. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

pp. 43-44. 

19441, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

20, 1944. 

Air Offensive, vol. 3, p. 23. 

138. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 447. 

139. Interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by the 

Air Force Academy Department of History, 

September 27, 1968, p. 17. 

140. Entry for February 10, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

141. Ibid. 

142. Conference notes, April 10, 1944, 

143. Ibid. 

144. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 3, pp. 24-25. 

145. Max Hastings, Bomber Command (New 

York: Dial, 1980), pp. 263-268; Murray, 

Strategy for Defeat, pp. 216-222. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

146. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, p. 220. 

147. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 3, p. 27. 

148. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, pp. 

21 6-220. 

149. AEAF/MS 22007/Air Ops., “‘OVERLORD’ Employment of Bomber Forces in 

Relation to the Outline Plans,” February 12, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

150. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

pp. 46-47 and 50. See also Arthur Tedder, With 

Prejudice, p. 489. 

151. Memo, Assistant Director of Intelligence, 

USSTAF [Hughes] to Deputy Commander for 

Operations, “Planning Conference at Norfolk 

House,” January 25, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

152. Draft msg, Spaatz to Arnold, February 7, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

153. Ibid. 

154. Memo, Assistant Director of Intelligence, 

USSTAF [Hughes] to CG, USSTAF [Spaatz], subject “Conference Held at AEAF Headquarters, 

Stanmore 15 February 1944,” February 15, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

155. AEAF/MS 22007/Air Ops., February 12, 

1944, p. 1. 

156. Memo, Hughes to Spaatz, February 15, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

157. Ibid. 

158. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 235. 

159. Memo, Hughes to Spaatz, February 15, 

160. Ibid. 

161. Ibid. 

162. Entry for February 15, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

163. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1539, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, February 

9, 1944,~. 1715. 

164. Entry for February 17, 1944, Command 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

707 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

165. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 228. 

166. Entry for February 17, 1944, Command 

167. Entry for February 19, 1944, Command 

168. Msg K-3769, Spaatz to Arnold, Spaatz 

169. Entry for February 19, 1944, Command 

170. Ibid. 

171. Msg K-3769, Spaatz to Arnold, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

172. Msg F-347, Arnold to Spaatz, February 

20, 1944, Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

173. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 

498-499; Hastings, Bomber Command, pp. 274-275; 

Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, p. 80. 

174. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 508. 

175. Ibid., pp. 508-509. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Paper, Diary. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

176. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1575, memo, Eisenhower to Tedder, 

February 29,1944, pp. 1755-1756. 

177. Ibid. 

178. Ibid. 

179. Ibid. 

180. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 5 10-51 1, 

181. Ibid. 

182. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 

pp. 498-499. 

183. Forrest C. Pogue, United States Army in 

World War It, subseries: The European Theater of 

Operations, The Supreme Command (Washington, 

D.C.: GPO, 1954), p. 124. 

184. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, table LIII, p. 

240. 

185. Ibid., table LII, p. 239. 

186. Ibid., table L, p. 235. 

187. AAF, Statistical Digest, World War II pp. 

100-101, table 69, and pp. 254-255, table 158. 

Chapter 10 

The Luftwaffe Defeated 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 6. 1944, 

2. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 

3. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1585, msg B-252, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, March 20, 1944, pp. 1766-1767. 

4. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 1, 1944, 

AFHRC: file no. 168.491,AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1657A, frames 1079-1089. 

5. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 124. 

6. Msg C.O.S.(W)l210, Air Ministry to 

British Military Mission, Washington, D.C., 

March 13, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary; and CCS 

520, Control of Strategic Bombing for 

OVERLORD, March 17, 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5535, frames 377-379. 

7. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 125. 

8. Ibid. 

9. Ibid. 

10. Interview, Hughes by Hopper, March 20, 

11. Ibid. 

12. Plan for the Completion of the Combined 

Bomber Offensive, March 5, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

p. 499. 

1944. 

13. Ibid. 

14. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

p. 31 

15. Ibid., p. 32. 

16. Plan for Completion of the CBO, March 

5, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

17. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 519. 

18. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 128. 

19. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 6, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

20. Memo, Arnold to the Chief of Staff, subj: 

Combined Bomber Offensive, March 13, 1944, 

Arnold Papers, Correspondence. 

21. Ltr, Giles to Spaatz, March 16, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

22. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 516-517. 

23. Teletype conference, Spaatz to AAF HQ, 

Washington, D.C., March 16, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

24. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 518-519. 

25. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1601, memo, March 22, 1944, pp. 

1782-1785. 

26. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 28. 

27. Ltr, Eaker to Arnold, April 8, 1944, 

AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1658, frames 893-896. 

28. CAS/Misc/61, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

29. Drew Middleton, “Boss of the Heavyweights,” Saturday Evening Post, May 20, 

1944. See also Hamilton, Master of the 

708 
NOTES 

Battlefield, p. 582. 

30. CASiMiscl61, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

3 1. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

32. CAS/Misc/61, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

33. Ibid. 

34. Ibid. 

35. Ltr, Eaker to Arnold, April 8, 1944, 

AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1658, frames 893-896. 

36. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 81. 

37. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 32. See also Rostow, PreInvasion Bombing Strategy, p. 52. 

38. See Henry D. Lytton, “Bombing Policy in 

the Rome and Pre-Normandy Invasion Aerial 

Campaigns of World War 11: Bridge-Bombing 

Strategy Vindicated and Railyard-Bombing 

Strategy Invalidated,” Military Affairs (April 

1983) pp. 53-58; Charles F. Kindleberger, 

“World War I1 Strategy,” Encounter 

(November 1978) pp. 3942; Walt W. Rostow, 

“The Controversy over World War I1 

Bombing,” Encounter (August-September 

1980) pp. 1OC-101. 

39. Hastings, Bomber Command, p. 277, cites 

conversation with Air Commodore Sidney 0. 

Bufton of the Air Ministry Planning Staff. 

40. Stephen E. Amhrose, The Supreme 

Commander: The War Years of General Dwight 

D. Eisenhower (Garden City, N.Y.: Douhleday, 

1970), p. 372. 

41. Ltr, Eaker to Arnold, April 8, 1944, 

AFHRC file no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1658, frames 893-896. 

42. Msg U-60193, Weekly Message no. 10, 

Spaatz to Arnold (Eyes Only), March 26, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

43. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 236. 

44. Memo, Spaatz to Portal, “Use of Strategic 

Bombers in Support of OVERLORD,” March 31, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

p. 45. 

45. Ibid. 

46. Ibid. 

47. Msg W-12257, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

48. Msg B-225, Eisenhower to Marshall, 

49. Ibid. 

50. Entry for March 24, 1944, Hoyt S. 

51. Ibid., Vandenberg Diary, March 27, 

52. Ibid. 

53. AEAF/MS. 22005, Policy Governing 

Bombing Attacks on Railway Centers by U.S. 

March 1, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

March 6, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Vandenberg Papers, Diary, box 1. 

1944. 

IXth Air Force, March 10, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

54. Ltr, Spaatz to Leigh-Mallory, March 15, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

55. Ltr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, March 18, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also Itr, Spaatz 

to Leigh-Mallory, March 18, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

56. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 503. 

57. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vo1.3, 

item 1549, memorandum [for the record], 

March 20,1944, p. 1776. 

58. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 123. 

59. Hastings, Bomber Command, p. 267. 

60. COPC/S.501/10/INT, Combined Operational Planning Committee, “Fourth Periodic 

Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter Defenses 

and Interception Tactics. Period 3 March 

1944-31 March 1944,” April 6, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

61. Eighth Air Force figures compiled from 

individual mission reports summarized in 

Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary. RAF 

losses compiled from two separate documents: 

COPC/S.501/10 INT, March 12, 1944, and 

COPC/S.501/10 INT, April 6, 1944. 

62. AAF, Statistical Digest, World War II, 

table 102, p. 190. 

63. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, table LII, p. 

239, and table LIII, p. 240. 

64. Msg K-4164, Weekly Message no. 8, 

Spaatz to Arnold (Eyes Only), March 11, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

65. Interview, Kepner by Hopper, July 15, 

1944. 

66. Minutes, Commanders’ Meeting, January 

21, 1943, AFHRC file no. 520.141-1, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5871, frame 1217. 

67. Interview, Gen. Earle E. Partridge by 

Thomas A. Sturm and Hugh N. Ahann, April 

23-25, 1974, USAF Oral History Collection, 

AFHRC file no. K239.0512-729, p. 239. Partridge served as Doolittle’s deputy commander 

from January to May 1944. In June 1944 he 

took over the Eighth’s 3d Bombardment 

Division from Maj. Gen. Curtis E. LeMay. 

Before going to Britain, Partridge spent eight 

months as the operations officer and chief of 

staff of the Twelfth and Fifteenth Air Forces in 

the Mediterranean. 

68. Minutes, Commanders’ Meeting, January 

21, 1943, AF/CHO microfilm 520.141-1 

“Commanders’ Meetings,” reel A 5871, frame 

1217. For examples of Doolittle’s earlier thinking, see rpt, Doolittle to Arnold, subj: Escort 

Diary. 

709 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Fighters, May 22, 1943, and rpt, Doolittle to 

Arnold, subj: Long Range Fighters, May 23, 

1943, both in Doolittle Papers, box 19. In these 

documents Doolittle speaks of sending fighters 

on low-level sweeps ahead of escorted bomber 

formations to catch enemy aircraft on their 

fields and to strafe and bomb the fields. He 

implied an aggressive stance on the part of the 

escorting fighters by noting their capabilities of 

either preventing attacking fighters from “getting set” or of driving away heavily armored 

twin-engine fighters. 

69. Entry for February 3, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

70. Memo, General Hansel1 from Lt. Col. J. 

H. Goddard, subj: Notes on Staff Meeting Held 

in Room 3E1046, 2:30 p.m., February 7, 1944; 

Maj. Gen. B. M. Giles presiding, February 7, 

1944, AFHRC “8th Air Force Policy” File. 

71. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Eighth Air 

Force Tactical Development, August 1943-May 

1945,”July 1945, AFHRC file no. 520.04.11, p. 

SO. This source is also available within General 

Kepner’s personal files, AFHRC file no. 

168.6005-192, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1722. 

72. Air Corps Field Manual 1-5, “Employment of Aviation in the Army,” April 15, 1940, 

chap. 4, sec. 3, para. 66, subpara. a, pp. 40-41; 

Army Air Forces Field Manual 1-5, 

“Employment of Aviation in the Army,” 

January 18, 1943, chap. 4, sec. 3, para. 56, subpara. a, p. 35. 

73. FM 1-5, January 18, 1943, chap. 4, sec. 

3, para. 66, subpara. b, p. 36 

74. Army Air Force Field Manual 1-15, 

“Tactics and Technique of Air Fighting,” April 

10, 1942, chap. 1, sec. 1, para. 3, subpara. c, p. 

2. 

75. FM 1-15, April 10, 1942, chap. 5, sec. 7, 

para. 62, p. 37. 

76. Ibid. 

77. Ibid. 

78. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Eighth Air 

Force Tactical Development, August 1943-May 

1945,”~. 127. 

79. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, subj: Long Range 

Fighter Sweeps, April 10, 1944, AFHRC file 

no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1658, 

frames 1065-1070. 

80. Adolph Galland, The First and the Last: 

The German Fighter Force in World War I1 

(Mesa, Ariz.: Champlin Museum Press, 1986), 

p. 276. This is a reprint of the 1955 British edition. 

81. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Eighth Air 

Force Tactical Development, August 1942-May 

1945,” p. 52. 

82. Director of Operations (AD) Minute 

20849, subj: “American Long-Range Fighter 

Tactics, 26 April 1944,” PRO AIR 20/860. 

83. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, subj: “Long-Range 

Fighter Sweeps, 10 April 1944,” AFHRC File 

no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1658, 

frames 1065-1070. 

84. Ltr, Doolittle to Leigh-Mallory, March 

22, 1944, Doolittle Papers, box 19. 

85. Boylan, Long-Range Escort Fighter, pp. 

18 1-1 82. 

86. Memo, CG, VIII Fighter Command to 

CG, 8th Air Force, subj: “Tactics and Techniques 

of Long-Range Fighter Escort” (E-A-58), July 

25, 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5200, 

frames 142-161. 

87. FM 1-5, April 15, 1940, chap. 4, sec. 1, 

para. 59, subpara. b, pp. 37-38. 

88. FM 1-5, January 18, 1943, chap.4, sec. 1, 

para. 48, subpara. g, p. 32. 

89. Murray, Strategyfor Defeat, p. 244. 

90. Ibid. 

91. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Eighth Air 

Force Tactical Development, August 1942-May 

1945,”~. 127. 

92. Ibid., p. SO. 

93. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

1, pp. 32G323. 

94. Roger A. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War 

Manual (London: Jane’s, 1984), p. 72. 

95. Ltr, The Air Surgeon, Maj. Gen. N. W. 

Grant, to Arnold, March 29, 1944, Arnold 

Papers, Official Decimal File, box 91. 

96. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, 1933-1945, p. 288. See also 

Boylan, Long-Range Fighter Escort, pp. 

97. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

98. Boylan, Long-Range Fighter Escort, pp. 

99. Josef Schmid and Walter Grabmann, 

“The German Air Force Versus the Allies in the 

West,” vol. 2, “The Struggle for Air Supremacy 

over the Reich: 1 January 1944-31 March 

1944,” USAF Historical Study no. 158 (1954), 

p. 82. Lt. Gen. Schmid commanded the 

Luftwaffe’s I Fighter Corps during 1944. His 

force had responsibility for the defense of central Germany. This unpublished work is part of 

the USAF’s German air generals’ monograph 

project, which produced forty-two studies dealing with various aspects of the war from the 

Luftwaffe’s perspective. 

100. Josef Schmid, “The Employment of the 

German Luftwaffe Against the Allies in the 

West, 1943 to 1945,” vol. 3, “Air Battles over 

203-204. 

German Air Force, 1933-1945, p. 296. 

208-2 10. 

710 
NOTES 

the Reich’s Territory in Defense of the Vital 

Resources of the German Luftwaffe from 1 

April 1944 to D-Day (June 6, 1944),” p. 4. 

101. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of 

the German Air Force, pp. 292-293. Murray, 

Strategy,for Defeat, pp. 230-23 1. 

102. Walter Grabmann, “German Air Force 

Air Defense Operations” USAF Historical 

Study no. 164, (l9S6), pp. 735-736. 

103. Memo, “Tactics of Long-Range Fighter 

Escort,” July 25, 1944, p. 2; AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5200. 

104. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

195. 

105. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, pp. 

242-243. 

106. Msg K-4082, Spaatz to Arnold, March 

7, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Cables. This message 

was prepared by Spaatz’s staff. 

107. Ibid. 

108. COPC/S.SOI/IO/INT, April 6, 1944, 

109. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

110. Ibid., pp, 89-90. 

I1 1. Murray, Strategy,for Defeat, p. 182. 

112. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

I 13. Murray. Strategy,for Defeat, p. 225. 

114. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

90, 126,213. 

115. Schmid and Grabmann, “The GAF versus the Western Allies,” vol. 2, pp. 186187. 

116. COPC/S.SOI/lO/INT, April 6, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. My 

description of the raid relies heavily on information contained in this document. 

117. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

196. 

I1 8. Ibid., figures compiled from various 

mission summaries within the book. 

1 19. Murray, Strategy for D@t, table L, p. 

235. 

120. Ibid., appendix 4, p. 345. 

121. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 66. 

122. Compiled from Freeman, Mighty Eighth 

War Diary. 

123. COPC/S.501/10/INT, May 8, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5219, frames 

1422-1 453. 

124. Transcript, telephone conversation between Brig. Gen. Orvil A. Anderson and Maj. 

Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, April 28, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

125. Msg U--60496, Weekly Message no. I I, 

April 2, 1944, Spaatz to Arnold, Spaatz Papers, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

195. 

126. 

Diary. 

126. Msg U-60771, Spaatz to Surles, April 9, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

127. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, April 18, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also Itr, Spaatz to 

Arnold, April 10, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary 

for a detailed history of the development of the 

USSTAF’s ideas on fighter sweeps. As an overwhelming amount of anecdotal evidence 

demonstrated, U.S. fighter pilots took their 

briefings literally. They shot at cows in the 

fields, pedestrians, bicycle riders, farm carts, 

and any moving civilian or military vehicle. Not 

surprisingly the German population felt far 

more resentment toward fighter pilots, who 

appeared to make personalized attacks directed 

against individual Germans, than against 

bomber crews who killed, unseen, thousands of 

people from 20,000 or more feet up. Anecdotal 

evidence also suggests more retaliation by the 

German civil population against shot down 

fighter pilots than against bomber crews. 

128. Memo, Statistical Control to CG, 

USSTAF, “Enemy Aircraft Destroyed on the 

Ground,” April 18, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

129. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 104, p. 198. 

130. Barry D. Watts, The Foundations of US 

Air Doctrine: The Problem of Friction in War 

(Maxwell AFB, Ah.: Air University Press, 

13 1. Compiled from Freeman, Mighty Eighth 

132. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, table L, p. 

133. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

134. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, appendix 4, 

135. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 102, p. 190. 

136. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, tables LII 

and LIII, pp. 239-240. 

137. Ibid., p. 278. 

138. Compiled from Eighth Air Force mission reports in Freeman, Mighty Eighth War 

Diary. 

1984), pp. 80-81. 

War Diary. 

235. 

table 2, p. 8. 

p. 345. 

139. Ibid. 

140. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, April 3, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

141. Ltr, Arnold to Twining [and all other 

Air Force Commanders], February 1 I, 1944, 

Eaker Papers. 

142. Ltr, Doolittle to VIII Fighter Command 

and All Bombardment Divisions, subj: 

Retention of Personnel Completing Combat 

Tour, February 17, 1944, Doolittle Papers, box 

71 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

19. 

143. 1st Endorsement, Itr, 8th AF to CG, 

AAF, “Policy on Relief of Combat Crews,” 

March 4, 1944, Doolittle Papers, box 19. 

144. Ibid. 

145. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

200. 

146. Memo to Arnold from the Air Surgeon, 

March 29, 1944, Arnold Papers, Official 

Decimal File, box 91. 

147. Msg U-60910, Spaatz to Amold, April 

13, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. USSTAF 

Public Relations Office prepared this message 

and sent it over Spaatz’s signature. 

148. Transcript, telephone conversation 

between Lt. Gen. James H. Doolittle and Maj. 

Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, March 9, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

149. Ibid. 

150. COPC/S.501/10/INT, May 8, 1944 

“Period 1 April 1944-30 April 1944. AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5219, frames 1404-1419. 

15 1. Maj. Gen. Frederick Anderson’s Official 

Journal, entry for April 12, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

USSTAF file. 

152. Entry for April 13, 1944, Anderson’s 

Official Journal. 

153. Entry for January 18, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

154. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, April 16, 1944. In 

this cover letter Spaatz explained the transmission of his letter to Portal, a copy of which he 

also sent to Arnold notated “not sent” and 

“copy given to Amb. Winant.” 

155. Ltr, Spaatz to Portal, April 13, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

156. Ltr, Portal to Spaatz, April 14, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

157. Ltr, Sinclair to Winant, [n.d.] enclosed 

in ltr, Winant to Spaatz, April 18, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

158. Ltr, Portal to Spaatz, April 14, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

159. Entry for April 17, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

160. Entry for April 19, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

161. Ibid. 

162. Entry for April 20, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

163. Entry for May 14, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

164. Draft Itr, Spaatz to Arnold [ca. March 6, 

19441, March 6, 19441, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

This annotated draft does not indicate whether 

Spaatz based a finished letter on it. 

165. Ibid., msg AX-621, Air Ministry to 

USSTAF, February 17, 1944. 

166. Ltr, Frederick L. Anderson to AM Sir 

Douglas Evill, Air Ministry, March 5, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

167. Teletype conference transcript, March 17, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

168. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E day, 

169. Msg U-60045, Spaatz to Arnold, March 

23, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. This message 

contains the text of Wilson’s directive, the 

MAAF reply, and Portal’s reply to Wilson. 

pp. 373-384. 

170. lbid. 

171. Ibid. 

172. Msg WAR-13234, Arnold to Spaatz, 

March 23, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

173. Msg WAR-13235, Arnold to Portal, 

March 23, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. Copy 

sent to Spaatz as well. 

174. Ltr, Arnold to Dill, March 23, 1944, 

Arnold Papers “JCS” folder: box 43. 

175. Msg AX-779, Portal to Arnold, March 

25, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

176. Msg 021638, Portal to Dill, March 25, 

1944, Arnold Papers, Official File 1932-1946, 

box 49. 

177. Msg U-60100, Spaatz to Arnold, March 

24, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

178. Msg WAR-13745, Arnold to Spaatz, 

March 24,1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

179. Msg 14086, Spaata Papers, Diary. 

180. Msg AX-902, Portal to Arnold, March 

26, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

181. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 174. 

182. Interview, Hughes by Hopper, June 13, 

1944. 

183. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 4, appendix 49 (table 

xxxviii), p. 516. 

184. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 521. 

185. H. L. Ismay, The Memoirs of General 

Lord Ismay (New York: Viking Press, 1960), p. 

349. 

186. Winston Churchill, The Second World 

War, vol. 5, Closing the Ring (London: Cassell, 

1952), p. 466. 

187. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1630, Itr, Eisenhower to Churchill, April 5, 

188. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 522-529. 

189. Memo for the record, subj: Meeting of 

April 15, n.d. [April 15, 19441, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

190. D/SAC/TS.100, Itr, Tedder to Spaatz, 

April 19,1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

191. Ibid., pp. 538-539; report of Col. 

1944, pp. 1809-1810. 

712 
NOTES 

Seibert, G-2 for Gen. Bradley, n.d. [ca. April 

19, 19441, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

192. Entry for April 19, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

193. Pogue, The Supreme Command, pp. 

163-164, Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, 

p. 403. 

194. Entry for April 19 , 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

195. Transcript, telephone conversation 

between Spaatz and Anderson, April 20, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

196. F. L. Anderson’s Official Journal, entry 

for April 19, 1944, Spaatz Papers, USSTAF 

file. 

197. Ibid. 

198. COPC/S.S01/10/INT, May 8, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5219, frame 142.5. 

199. F. L. Anderson’s Official Journal, entry 

April 19, 1944, Spaatz Papers, USSTAF file. 

200. Draft of teletype text to be sent to 

Arnold, April 8, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary, 

marked “never sent.” 

201. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 306307. 

202. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing, p. 148, 

note 28. Rostow maintains that in a personal 

conversation with one of the authors of the 

British Official History of the Strategic Bomber 

Offensive, Noble Frankland, he was told that 

Spaatz had confirmed in an interview with 

Frankland his threat of resignation. In addition, 

see Hansell, The Air Plan That Defeated Hitler, 

pp. 235-236. Hansell, who cites no sources, 

also claims that Spaatz threatened to quit unless 

he got two days over the oil targets. Conversely, 

Frankland has stated in a letter to this author 

dated January 3, 1986 that he has no record in 

his interviews of Spaatz confirming the resignation threat. Frankland wrote, “Whether or not he 

[Spaatz] threatened to resign his command over 

the issue I do not know.” 

203. Entry for April 19, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

204. Ibid. 

205. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 175 

206. Entry for April 20, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

207. COPC/S.S01/10/INT, May 8, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5219, frames 

1412-1413. 

208. Entry for April 21, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

209. Compiled from Freeman, Mighty Eighth 

War Diary. 

210. AAF Statistical Digest, World War II, 

table 159, p. 255. 

21 1. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, tables LII 

and LIII, pp. 239-240. 

212. Interview, Spaatz by Shaughnessey, 

1959-1960, p. 73. 

213. Memo, Spaatz to Doolittle and Twining, 

March 2, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

214. Interview, Doolittle by Burch, 

Fogelman, and Tate, September 26, 1970. 

Chapter 11 

Final Preparations for the Invasion 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, May 10, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. AAF Statistical Digest: World War 11, table 

160, p. 256. 

3. Notes of Meeting Held in the Air C.-inC.’s Office, 6th May 1944, TLM/MS.136/15, 

May 11, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

4. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 2, 

p. 104. 

5. Ibid., p. 105. 

6. Ibid., memo, Maxwell to Spaatz, May 16, 

1944; COPC/SSOl/lO/INT., Combined Operational Planning Committee, “Sixth Periodic 

Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter Defenses 

and Interception Tactics, Period 1 May 1944-3 1 

May 1944,” June 29, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Subject File 1929-1945. 

7. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

8. Munay, Strategy for Defeat, p. 273. 

9. Galland, The First and the Last, p. 280. 

10. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

11. Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich 

12. Ibid., pp. 346-347. 

13. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

252-254. 

14. AAF, Ultra and the History of the United 

States Strategic Air Forces in Europe vs. The 

German Air Force (Frederick, Md.: University 

Publications of America, 1985), pp. 98-99. This 

study was completed by USSTAF no later than 

September 24, 1945. 

243. 

pp. 176-177. 

(New York Macmillan, 1970), p. 346. 

713 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

15. Ibid., p. 99. 

16. Ibid. 

17. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

p. 52. 

18. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, appendix 32, pp. 321-325. 

19. AAF, Ultra and USSTAF, p. 104. For a 

full and personal appreciation of the value of 

ULTRA to USSTAF, see Diane F. Putney, ed., 

ULTRA and the Army Air Forces in World War II 

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, AF/CHO, 1987). For 

the issue of targeting the oil plants, see pp. 

35-38. This is an interview with U.S. Supreme 

Court Justice Lewis F. Powell, Jr., who served 

as an ULTRA liaison officer attached to Spaatz’s 

headquarters. 

20. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, pp. 502-503. 

21. Msg AX-119, Portal to Bottomley, May 

3, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

22. Interview, Hughes by Hopper, June 13, 

1944. See also msg AX-I 19, CAS (Portal) to 

DCAS (Bottomley), May 3, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

23. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 179. 

24. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, appendix 49, p. 516. 

25. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 179. 

26. Draft of proposed teletype to General 

Arnold, April 8, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary, 

marked “never sent.” 

27. Entry for April 22, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

28. Draft Itr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, April 22, 

1944, marked “shown to General Eisenhower 

unsigned,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

29. Ibid. 

30. Entry for April 23, 1944, Command 

3 1. Ibid. 

32. Ibid. 

33. Notes of meeting at General Wilson’s 

34. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 526. 

35. Ibid., pp. 526527. 

36. Ibid., p. 528. 

37. Ibid. 

38. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1658, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, April 

29, 1944, pp. 1838-1839. 

39. Ibid., transcript, telephone conversation 

between Doolittle and Spaatz, April 22, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

HQ, April 30, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

40. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 528-529. 

41. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1662, Itr, Eisenhower to Churchill, May 2, 

1944, pp. 184244. 

42. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 529. 

43. Ibid., p. 530. 

44. Ibid. 

45. Ibid., pp. 530-531. 

46. Churchill, Closing the Ring, pp. 466467. 

47. Ibid., p. 467. 

48. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO “Effectiveness of Air Attack Against Rail Transportation 

in the Battle of France,” June 1, 1945, p. 164, 

AFHRC 138.4-37. This study based its figures 

on statistics supplied by the Defense Passive, 

the French organization responsible for calculating casualties resulting from air attacks. 

49. Draft ltr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, April 22, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary, marked “shown to 

General Eisenhower unsigned.” 

50. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

pp. 4142. 

51. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

52. Ibid., p. 157. 

53. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

54. Interview, Smith by Hasdorff and 

Parrish, June 7-8, 1976, pp. 84-85. Smith’s fellow brigadier generals were David Schlatter, 

Richard Nugent, 0. P. Weyland, and Ralph 

Stearley. 

55. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

p. 62. 

56. Msg U-61689, Spaatz to Arnold, May 4, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

57. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

58. TLM/MS.136/15, Minutes of Meeting of 

6 and 11 May 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

59. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

p. 64. 

60. Lytton, “Bombing Policy,” Military 

Affuirs (April 1983), 56. 

61. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

appendix D, pp. 116-118. This appendix contains a copy of a mission report prepared by the 

365th’~ commanding officer. 

62. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 158. 

63. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Effectiveness of Air Attack Against Rail Transportation in the Battle of France,” pp. 27 and 31, 

AFHRC 138.4-37. 

64. Rostow, Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy, 

p. 61. 

65. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 158. 

66. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 537. 

pp. 374-375. 

2, pp. 11 1-1 12. 

pp. 63-64. 

714 
NOTES 

67. AAF Evaluation Board, ETO, “Effectiveness of Air Attack Against Transportation 

in the Battle of France,” p. 164, AFHRC file no. 

138.4-37. 

68. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 1, “AEAF Planning 

and Preparation,” p. 173, citing minutes from 

Churchill to the British Chiefs of Staff and the 

Supreme Commander. 

69. Msg S-51984, Smith to Marshall, May 

17, 1944, Walter Bedell Smith Papers, Eisenhower Presidential Library, Abilene, Kans.; 

Walter Bedell Smith, Eisenhower’s Six Great 

Dec,isions: Europe 1944-1945 (New York: 

Longmans, Green, 1956), p. 38; Chandler, 

Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, note 3 to item 

1630, p. 1810. 

70. Blumenson, The Patton Papers, vol. 2, p. 

456. 

71. Draft of presentation, May 15, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

72. For an excellent discussion of Montgomery’s briefing and the controversy generated by the phase-lines, see D’Este, Decision in 

Normandy, pp. 90-104. 

73. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 156. 

74. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. I, “AEAF Planning 

and Preparation,” p. 178. 

75. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 158-159. I could find no record of aircraft 

losses attributed only to the bridge campaign. 

Given the low-altitude type of attack, the relative abundance of light antiaircraft artillery, and 

the Germans’ desperate need to defend the 

bridges, losses were probably heavy. 

76. USSBS, Transportation Division, The 

Effects of Strategic Bombing on German 

Transportation (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1947), p. 53. 

77. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

78. Ibid., pp. 155, 160. 

79. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 538-543; 

pp. 154-15s. 

Zuckerman, Apes to Warlord.s, pp. 256258. 

80. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 162-166. 

8 1. Ibid. 

82. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The RAF in the 

Bombing Offensive Against Germany,” vol. 6, 

“The Final Phase, March 1944-May 1945,” p. 

25. 

83. Entry for May 23, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

84. Entry for June 1, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

85. Ibid. 

86. Entry for June 1, 1944, Command Diary, 

87. Entry for June 2, 1944, Vandenberg 

88. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

89. Entry for June 3, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

90. Entry for June 3, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

91. Entry for June 3, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

92. Entry for June 6, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

93. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, June 27, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary; Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, pp. 188-193. 

94. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, p. 329. 

95. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, June 27, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

96. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, n.d.[late February 

19441, AFHRC File No. 168.491, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 1657A, frames 1082-1085. 

97. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 155. 

98. Ibid. 

99. Eighth Air Force Statistical Summary of 

Operations, August 17, 1942, May 8, 1945, 

June 10, 1945, p. 47. 

100. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, December 1944, with year-end 

summary, n.d. [early January 19451, p. 17. 

101. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

256-259. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

2, pp. 104-10s. 

715 
SPAA‘E AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Part Five 

The Mortal Blow 

Normandy to Berlin 

Chapter 12 

Summer 1944 

CROSSBOW, THUNDERCLAP 

and Strategic Bombing 

1. Entry for June 17, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, June 1944, n.d. [July 19441, 

AFICHO microfilm reel A 5874, frame 1398. 

3. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, pp. 329-330. 

4. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 2, 

5. Ibid. See also AF/CHO Research 

Collection, SRH-013, Ultra: History of US 

Strategic Air Forces Europe vs. German Air 

Forces, pp. 197-206. 

6. SRH-013, Ultra History of USSTAF, p. 

197. 

7. Ibid., p. 196. 

8. Ibid., pp. 201-202. 

9. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 2, 

10. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

11. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 252. 

12. Terraine, A Time for Courage, pp. 

13. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

14. Entry for June 18, 1944, Vandenberg 

15. Entry for June 18, 1944, Command Diary, 

16. Ibid. 

17. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

18. Ibid. 

19. Ibid., p. 531. 

20. Ibid. 

21. Ibid. 

22. Ltr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, June 28, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. Craven and Cate, 

Argument to V-E Day, p. 880, note that the copy 

of the document available to them carried the 

notation, “Carried to General E. by Gen. S., 

June 29,1944.” 

23. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vo1.3, 

p. 220. 

pp. 220-221. 

German Air Force, pp. 332-333. 

546547. 

note to item 17.58, p. 1933. 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

p. 528. 

item 1763, msg, Eisenhower to Marshall, June 

19, 1944, pp. 19361937. 

24. Ibid., item 1771, memo, Eisenhower to 

CIS, SHAEF [Smith], June 23, 1944, pp. 

19461 947. 

25. Ibid., item 1786, memo, Eisenhower to 

DSC, SHAEF [Tedder], June 29, 1944, pp. 

1960-1961. 

26. Ltr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, July 10, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

27. Ibid. 

28. Ibid. 

29. Entry for July 10, 1944, Command Diary, 

30. Ibid. 

31. Ibid., ltr, Spaatz to Tedder, July 15, 1944. 

32. Memo, subj: Joint Air Staff-USSTAF 

CROSSBOW Committee, F. L. Anderson to 

Spaatz, July 21,1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

33. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

34. Ibid., p. 534. 

35. Ibid., p. 540. 

36. Minute, Portal to Churchill, June 20, 

1944, PRO PREM 311412. 

37. Minute, ACAS(P)/8235, ACAS(1) to 

Under Secretary of State (C), June 22, 1944, 

PRO AIR 201842. 

38. Minute, Portal to Churchill, June 21, 

1944, PRO PREM 311412. 

39. Entry for June 20, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

40. Eighth Air Force Target Summary, 

“Statistical Summary of All Bomber Attacks, 

Alphabetically by Location, Period 17 August 

1942-8 May, 1945,” n.d. [May 31, 19451, pp. 

7-8, AFICHO microfilm reel A 5875, starting at 

frame 610. 

41. Memo to Brig. Gen. George C. McDonald, Director of Intelligence, USSTAF, 

subj: Operation “SHATTER,” June 27, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5616, frame 523. 

42. Minute VCAS 1803, VCAS to CAS, 

subj: CROSSBOW, July 2, 1944, PRO AIR 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

p. 533. 

716 
NOTES 

8/1229. 

43. Extract from COS(44) 219th Meeting 

(0), July 3, 1944, PRO AIR 8/1229. 

44. Ibid., extract from Minutes of COS(44) 

220th meeting (0). July 4, 1944. 

45. Ibid., minute, CAS (Portal) to DCAS 

(Bottomley), July 5, 1944. 

46. Ibid., COS(44) 598 (0), subj: CROSSBOW: 

Question of Retaliation, July 5, 1944. 

47. 222d Meeting of the British Chiefs of 

Staff, cited in memo, Kuter to Arnold, August 

9, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

48. Memo by the Air Staff, subj: Attack on 

German Civilian Morale, July 22, 1944, PRO 

AIR 20/3227. 

49. Memo to DCAS from D.B.Ops, S.6, July 

28, 1944, PRO AIR 20/3227. 

SO. Entry for July 21, 1944, Command Diary, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

51. Memo, Anderson to Director of Operations, July 21, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 

1929-1 945. 

52. See table [Eighth Air Force Tonnage 

Dropped by Type Target], n.d. [ca. late May 

194.51, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5871, frame 

1363. This is a work sheet or draft of statistical 

bombing information collected by USSTAF; the 

column “Towns & Cities” was dropped from 

the final publication of this compilation. 

53. COS(44) 650(0), Attack on German 

Civilian Morale, August 2, 1944, PRO AIR 

20/483 1. See attached note “Operation 

THUNDERCLAP,” August 1, 1944. 

54. Ibid. 

55. Joint Board Numbered Document 355 

(Serial 707), subj: Joint Board Estimate of 

United States Over-All Production Requirements, September 11, 1941, AFHRC file no. 

145.81-23, AF/CHO microfilm reel A1370, 

starting frame 1413. 

56. Ltr, Kuter to Anderson, August 15, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Memo for Maj. Gen. F. L. Anderson, 

subj: “Attack on German Civilian Morale,” 

from Col. Charles G. Williamson, September 

12, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

58. Extract from COS(44) 257th Meeting 

(0), August 3, 1944, PRO AIR 8/1229. 

59. Draft D.B.Ops comments on Attack on 

the German Government Machine, Outline Plan 

by Joint Planning Staff, J.P.(44)203(0) Revised 

Preliminary Draft, August 15, 1944, PRO AIR 

20/483 1. 

60. J.P.(44) 203 Final, Attack on the German 

Government Machine, August 17, 1944, PRO 

AIR 20/8152. 

61. B.0ps.l .comments on Attack on the 

German Government Machine to Wing Commander Ford-Kelsey, August 6, 1944, PRO AIR 

20/483 1. 

62. COS(44) 774(0), Minute (D(K) 4/4) by 

the Prime Minister, Attack on the German 

Government Machine, August 28, 1944 [Minute 

dated August 23, 19441, PRO AIR 20/8152. 

63. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 63M39. This chapter demonstrated no understanding of the background of THUNDERCLAP and 

presented a somewhat confused account of the 

proposed operation. 

64. “Notes of the 81st Allied Air Commanders’ Conference Held on Thursday, 24th August 

1944, at HQ AEAF-1100 Hours,” Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

65. Ltr, Spaatz to Eisenhower, August 24, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

66. 1st endorsement, Eisenhower to Spaatz, 

August 28, 1944, Spaatz Paper, Diary. 

67. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

68. Entry for September 9, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

69. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. I, p. 89, citing a Joint Planning 

Committee Appreciation dated August 1, 1935. 

70. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 159, p. 255; Freeman, Mighty Eighth War 

Diary, pp. 256282. 

71. AAF Statistical Digest, World War II, 

table 159, p. 255. 

72. Ibid. 

73. Ibid., table 59, p. 255. 

74. Ibid., table 60, p. 256. 

75. Murray, Strategy for Defeat, p. 177. 

76. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, p. 285. 

77. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

362. 

78. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, p. 286. 

79. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

361-362. 

80. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1786, memo, Eisenhower to Tedder, June 

29, 1944, pp. 1960-1961. 

81. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

82. Ibid. See also AAF Statistical Digest, 

World War 11, table 159, p. 255. 

83. Roger Freeman, The US Strategic 

Bomber (London: Macdonald and Jane’s, 

1975), pp. 153-154. This work’s section on 

operational statistics extracts most of the vital 

bomber statistics from the AAF Statistical 

Digest, World War 11, and presents them in a 

283-307. 

717 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

more compact, useful, and more widely available form. 

84. SRH-013, Ultra History of USSTAF, p. 

217. 

85. Ibid., p. 225. 

86. Daily Intelligence Summary, August 18, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. Although unmarked, 

this appears to be an ULTRA summary. 

87. Compiled from Freeman, Mighty Eighth 

War Diary, pp. 31 1-336. 

88. COPC/S.501/1O/INT. “Ninth Periodic 

Report of Enemy Daylight Fighter Defences 

and Interception Tactics, 1 August 1944-31 

August 1944,” September 15, 1944, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5220, frames 1551-1570. 

89. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 298. 

90. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 509. 

91. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, pp. 

255-256, tables 159 and 160. 

92. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, pp. 

350-35 1. 

93. Ibid. 

94. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2,pp. 510-511. 

95. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Ofensive, vol. 4, appendix 49 (table xxxviii), p. 516. 

96. Speer, Inside the Third Reich, p. 406. 

97. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 306. 

98. Ltr, Eaker to Arnold, June 1, 1944, 

AFHRC File no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1658, frames 957-958. 

99. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

312. 

100. Table, Inventory Aging Record, Heavy 

Bomber Combat Crew Experience Level, n.d. 

[late 19441, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5614, 

frames 636637. 

101. Eighth Air Force Narrative Summary, 

July 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5814, 

frame 310. 

102. Ltr, B. M. Giles to Spaatz, June 19, 

103. Ibid. 

104. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, July 21, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

105. Msg U-65737, Spaatz to Arnold, July 

3 1, 1944, War Department Communications 

Center (WDCC) Message File, reel 828, 

Modern Military Field Branch, NARA. 

106. Compiled from individual mission 

reports in Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, 

pp. 234-306. 

107. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

270-273. 

108. Msg U-64841, Spaatz to Arnold, July 

13,1944 WDCC, reel 828. 

109. Msg WARX-71515, Arnold to Spaatz 

and Eaker, July 27, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

110. Ibid. 

11 1. Msg U-65658, Spaatz to Arnold, July 

112. Ibid. 

113. Ibid. 

114. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, August 14, 1944, 

115. Ibid. 

116. Ltr, Arnold to Col. James W. Wilson, 

subj: “Instructions,” August 14, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

117. Memo, Lt. Col. James W. Wilson to 

CG, AAF, subj: Combat Crew Morale in the 

Eighth Air Force, September 15, 1944, AFHRC 

File no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

1658, frames 1429-1431. 

118. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 306307. See also the report of the USSTAF 

Surgeon General, Memorandum Report on 

Morale of Combat Crew Personnel of the Eighth 

Air Force, August 31, 1944, AFHRC File no. 

519.701, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5737, frames 

188-189. This report undermined the credibility 

of the diplomatic reports by pointing out that the 

U.S. Consul interviewed only two crews. 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

29, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Chapter 13 

Summer 1944 

Heavy Bombers in Close Air Support 

1. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, p. 

2. Ibid., p. 237. 

3. Gordon A. Harrison, United States Army in 

World War 11, subseries: The European Theater 

of Operations, Cross-Channel Attack (Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1951), p. 284. 

4. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 552. 

5. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 268. 

Zuckerman also attended this meeting. 

6. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, p. 

620. 

233. 

718 
NOTES 

7. Entries for May and June 1944, Vandenberg Papers, Diary, box 1. 

8. Entry for June 6, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box. 1. 

9. Entry for June 7, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box. 1. 

lO.Interview, Spaatz by Hopper, June 27, 

1945, p. 13. 

11. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 214. 

D’Este, who has based this section of his work 

on AEAF historical files has by far the most 

complete and reliable account of the air command situation in Normandy. 

12. Ibid., p. 215. 

13. Ibid. 

14. Nigel Hamilton, Master of the Battlefield, 

p. 648. 

15. Entry for June 15, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. In this reference Montgomery’s old and famous desert army, the 

British 8th Army, was confused with the new 

2nd British Army just established on the beachhead. 

16. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 268. 

17. Entry for June 15, 1944, Vandenberg 

18. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 223. 

19. Minutes of Daily Air Commanders’ 

Meeting, June 15, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945; Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 

552. 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

20. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 552. 

21. Ibid. 

22. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 224. 

23. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 268. 

Zuckerman incorrectly identifies Schlatter as 

belonging to USSTAF rather than Ninth Air 

Force. 

24. Ibid., p. 270. 

25. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 552. 

26. Ibid. 

27. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 270. 

28. Entry for June 15, 1944, Command 

29. Ibid. 

30. Entry for June 17, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

3 1. Entry for June 27, 1944, daily reflections 

on the course of the battle by Air Chief Marshal 

Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory, dictated to Flight 

Lieutenant Hilary St. George Saunders, June 5, 

1944-August 15, 1944, PRO AIR 37/784. 

32. Leigh-Mallory Diary, June 29, 1944, 

PRO AIR 371784. 

33. Leigh-Mallory Diary, July 1, 1944, PRO 

AIR 371784. 

34. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 557-559. 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

35. Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, p. 

36. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 557. 

37. Leigh-Mallory Diary, July 8, 9, 10, 1944, 

38. Tedder, With Prejudice, pp. 559-560. 

39. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 313. 

40. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 4, “The Breakout and 

the Advance to the Lower Rhine, June 

1944-September 1944,” p. 23. 

41. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 276. 

42. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 4, “Breakout and 

Advance,” p. 24. This narrative contains a 

detailed description of Zuckerman’s report. 

43. Zuckerman, Apes to Warlords, p. 277. 

44. Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, pp. 

45. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 561. 

46. Leigh-Mallory Diary, July 8,9, 10, 1944, 

47. Ibid. 

48. Leigh-Mallory Diary, July 11, 12, 1944, 

49. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 565. 

50. British Air Ministry, Air Historical 

Branch, RAF Narrative, “The Liberation of 

North West Europe,” vol. 4, “Breakout and 

Advance,” p. 52. This monograph has detailed 

examinations of several of the heavy-bomber 

ground support operations. 

51. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, pp. 

370-378. This book offers particularly good 

insights into British methods, performance, and 

personalities during the Normandy campaign. 

52. See Webster and Frankland, The 

Strategic Air Offensive, vol. 3, pp. 166-173, for 

a discussion in the improvement in British accuracy for the last year of the war. Much of this 

improvement came from Bomber Command’s 

use of electronic bombing aids, such as Oboe 

and Gee-H, whose accuracy surpassed that of 

the American-employed H2X. For similar coverage and a comparison of the average bomb 

weight carried by U.S. and British heavy 

bombers, see the Report of the British Bombing 

Survey Unit (BBSU), “The Strategic Air War 

Against Germany 1939-1945” (London: BBSU, 

1947), pp. 42-50. A copy of this work can be 

found in the files of the AFHRC file no. 

51 2.552-1 l(c). Effectiveness is a combination 

of accuracy and bomb damage. The evidence 

indicates that Bomber Command, on the whole, 

delivered more of its bombs closer to its aiming 

435. 

PRO AIR 371784. 

43-37, 

PRO AIR 371784. 

PRO AIR 371784. 

719 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

points than USSTAF. In any case many British 

bombs were much larger than American ones 

and, when on target, inflicted a higher degree of 

damage. German reports of damage to oil targets after AAF and RAF raids speak of the 

greater damage caused by heavier British ordnance. 

53. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 571. 

54. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 385. 

55. Leigh-Mallory Diary, July 18, 19, 1944, 

56. Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, p. 

57. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story p. 330. 

58. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, p. 

137. 

59. Ralph Bennett, Ultra in the West: The 

Normandy Campaign, 1944-1945 (New York: 

Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1980), pp. 99-101. 

60. Omar N. Bradley, Memorandum [for the 

Record], subj: “Combined Air and Ground 

Operations west of St. LB on Tuesday, 25 July 

1944,” July 25, 1944, Chester B. Hanson 

Diaries, U.S. Army Military History Institute, 

Carlisle Barracks, Pa. This memo purports to 

have been written on the day of the second 

COBRA bombing. Although it was certainly 

written as a justification of Bradley’s actions 

during the period, it seems entirely too polished 

and knowledgeable for a document written at 

the time and under stressful circumstances. I 

assume this memo was written some time after 

the event, perhaps soon after the war, and 

inserted in the files, probably by Hanson, 

Bradley’s personal aide-de-camp. It was probably written closer in time to the actual events 

than Bradley’s 1951 memoirs and is at least as 

authentic. See also Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, 

PRO AIR 37/784. 

439. 

p. 339. 

61. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 338. 

62. Martin Blumenson, United States in 

World War 11, subseries: European Theater of 

Operations: Breakout and Pursuit (Washington, 

D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1961), p. 220. Blumenson’s account of COBRA is by far the most 

detailed, accurate, and objective published to 

date. 

63. Ibid. 

64. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 341. 

65. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

220. See also the report by Col. Harold W. 

Ohkle to CG, USSTAF, August 14, 1944, subj: 

“Report on Investigation,” Spaatz Papers, 

Subject File 1929-1945. 

66. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

220. 

67. Ibid.; Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 340. 

68. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 330. 

69. Ibid., p. 339. 

70. Ibid., p. 340. Bradley says Spaatz attended, but Vandenberg’s diary implies that 

Spaatz did not attend. I could find no record in 

Spaatz’s papers to confirm his presence. 

General Quesada in his USAF oral history interview of May 12-13, 1975, places Spaatz and 

Doolittle at the meeting. 

71. Ibid., p. 341. 

72. Ibid. 

73. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

221. 

74. Entry for July 19, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

75. Interview, Lt. Gen. Elwood A. Quesada 

by Lt. Col. Steve Long and Lt. Col. Ralph 

Stephenson, May 12-13, 1975, USAF Oral 

History Collection, AFHRC file no. K239.0512- 

838. 

76. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 271. 

77. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 3, 

item 1833, msg S-55586, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, July 15, 1944, p. 2008. See also the 

editor’s notes to this source for Marshall’s 

refusal. 

78. Entries for July 19-22, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diaries. 

79. Bradley Commentary on World War 11, 

Chester B. Hansen Collection, U.S. Army 

Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pa. 

80. Ibid. 

81. Ibid. 

82. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 384. 

D’Este obtained the use of Tedder’s diary from 

Tedder’s son. 

83. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 564. 

84. Ltr, Montgomery to Maj. Gen. Frank 

Simpson, Director of Military Operation, cited 

in R. Lamb, Montgomery in Europe 1943-1944 

(London: Buchan and Enright, 1983), pp. 

126-127. 

85. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 564. 

86. Entry for July 19, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary; box l.Interview, Smith by 

Hasdorff and Panish, June 74,1976, pp. 95-96. 

87. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 341. 

88. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

221. 

89. Special Report on Operations July 24 and 

25, HQ, Eighth Air Force, n.d. [ca. August 9, 

19441, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5050, frame 

1185; entry for July 23, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

90. Minutes of the 53d Allied Air Commanders’ Conference, July 24, 1944, Spaatz 

Papen, Subject File 1929-1945. 

720 
NOTES 

91. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

92. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

93. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

94. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, p. 347. 

95. Entry for July 24, 1944, Vandenberg 

96. Ibid. 

97. Ibid. 

98. Memo for Gen. Spaatz’s Diary, subj: 

“Operation COBRA,” from Maj. Gen. Frederick 

L. Anderson, July 24, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

99. Entry for July 24, 1944, Vandenberg 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

100. Bradley, A Soldier’s Story, pp. 347-348; 

Bradley’s memo for the record of July 25, 1944, 

Hanson Collection. 

101. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 228. 

102. Ibid. 

103. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

240. 

104. D’Este, Decision in Normandy, p. 393. 

See also Air P/W Interrogation Detachment 

Report, “A.P.W.LU.(Ninth AF Adv.) 63/1945,” 

May 29, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 

1929-1945. Bayerlein was a favorite of postwar American interrogators because of his 

excellent English, which enabled him to present 

his case more sympathetically than some of his 

compatriots. 

105. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 231. 

106. Bennett, ULTRA in the West, p. 102. 

107. Blumenson, Breakout and Pursuit, p. 

246. 

108. Ibid., p. 236. Blumenson bases his figures on a USSTAF report of August 14, 1944. 

A possible contributing factor to McNair’s 

death was his complete deafness. He may not 

have been aware of dropping bombs until it was 

too late to take cover. 

p. 230. 

231. 

2, p. 229. 

Papers, Diary, box 1. 

109. Ibid. 

110. Entry for July 25, 1944, Diary of Chester 

B. Hanson, U.S. Army Military History Institute, 

Carlisle Barracks, Pa. 

11 1. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 234. Craven and Cate put the figure at thirty - 

five “heavies” and forty-two mediums. In his 

diary for July 26, Spaatz, in looking at the bomb 

plots presented to him by Doolittle, estimated 

that “approximately sixty heavy bombers 

dropped short.” Entry for July 26, 1944, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

112. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

113. Ibid., p. 233. 

114. Interview, Quesada by Long and Stephenson, May 12-13,1975. 

115. “Special Report on Operations July 24 

and 25, 1944,” Col. Walter K. Todd, Deputy 

Chief of Staff for Operations to Commanding 

General, Eighth Air Force, n.d. [ca. August 8, 

19441, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5050, frames 

1181-1204. 

116. Entry for July 26, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

117. Ibid.; see also “Minutes of Combat 

Wing and Group Commanders Meeting,” HQ, 

First Bombardment Division, July 27, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5050, frames 

1283-1284, and memo to General Doolittle, 

subj: “Bombing of Tactical Targets in Support 

of the 1st Army Assault,” n.d. [August 1, 

1944?], AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5050, frame 

1101. 

118. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Manual 

pp. 23, 47, 234. This recent work contains a 

most detailed and accurate account of day-today operations of the Eighth Air Force. Its 

description of the typical mission is unequaled. 

119. Entry for July 26, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

120. Ibid. 

121. Ltr, Brig. Gen. George C. McDonald, 

Director of Intelligence, USSTAF, to Brig. Gen. 

Thomas D. White, Assistant Chief of the Air 

Staff, Intelligence, July 25, 1944, Papers of 

George C. McDonald, Air Force Academy. 

122. Ltr, White to McDonald, August 1, 

1944, McDonald Papers, Air Force Academy. 

White’s comment is in a handwritten postscript. 

123. Eighth Air Force, Statistical Summary 

of Eighth Air Force Operations, 17 August 

1942-May 1945, n.d. [May 31, 19451, p. 31, 

Table on Bombing Accuracy. 

124. By mid-1944 the Eighth Air Force had 

approximately two B-17 groups for every B-24 

group; Fifteenth Air Force had the opposite 

ratio. An absolutely fair comparison of bombing 

accuracy between the two forces would have to 

account for such factors as opposition over target, escort, weather over target, distance to the 

target, and availability and type of electronic 

aiming assistance. The following figures, which 

convey only a very rough measure of the 

Eighth’s and Fifteenth’s accuracy, are from the 

forces’ final statistical reports (Statistical 

Summary of Eighth Air Force Operations, 17 

August 1942-8 May 1945, prepared June 10, 

1945. Fifteenth Air Force Summary of Its 

p. 234. 

72 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Results and Operations, 1 November 1943-8 

May 1945, prepared May 20,1945). 

Eighth Fifteenth 

Air Force Air Force 

January 1944 35 31 

February 39 18 

March 31 19 

April 29 18 

May 37 23 

June 40 33 

July 37 33 

August 45 44 

September-October 38 45 

November-December 25 34 

January 1945 29 35 

February 49 33 

March 38 52 

April 59 81 

Eighth Air Force figures cite the percentage 

of bombs falling within 1,000 feet of the preassigned mean point of impact (MPI) on visual 

missions under conditions of good to fair visibility. Fifteenth Air Force figures merely give 

the total percentage of bombs within 1,000 feet 

of the briefed MPI, apparently without regard to 

visibility. 

125. “Eighth Air Force to CG, USSTAF,” all 

figures taken from Special Report of Operations, July 24, 25, 1944, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5050 frames 1181-1 197. 

126. Eighth Air Force, Statistical Summary 

of Operations, 17 August 1942-8 May 1945, p. 

3 1. Some of this increase in accuracy can be 

attributed to the equipping of some of the 2nd 

Air Division’s B-24s with advanced radar aids 

not made available to the other divisions. 

127. Ltr, Bradley to Eisenhower, July 28, 

1944, Omar N. Bradley Papers, U.S. Army 

Military History Institute, Carlisle, Pa., Correspondence with Eisenhower. 

128. Vandenberg officially became Commanding General of the Ninth Air Force on 

August 7, 1944. 

129. Entry for August 5, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary; entry for August 5, 

1944, Vandenberg Papers, Diary, box 1. 

130. Entry for August 7, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary 

13 1. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

132. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, p. 

204. 

133. Ltr, Doolittle to Spaatz, August 10, 1944, 

Doolittle Papers, box 18; Freeman, Mighty 

Eighth War Diary, p. 3 19. 

134. C. P. Stacey, Official History of the 

Canadian Army in the Second World War, vol. 3, 

The Victory Campaign: The Operations in 

North-West Europe, 1944-1945 (Ottawa: The 

Queen’s Printer and Controller of Stationery, 

135. Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, p. 

204. Hamilton, Master of the Battlefield, p. 785, 

contains a misleading account of the Eighth’s 

performance on August 8. In this hagiography 

of Montgomery the author claims that, after the 

brilliant initial Canadian breakout, bombers of 

Spaatz’s Eighth Air Force ran amok, bombing 

their own troops and causing more casualties 

than on the first day of COBRA, when Collins 

had to close down the offensive and start again 

the following day. 

136. “Report of Bombing Results by Units of 

1st Bombardment Division, 8 August 1944,” 

n.d. [ca. August 10, 19441, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5050, frames 1647-1657. 

137. Entry for August 9, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

138. Ihid. 

139. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 661. 

140. Stacey, The Victory Campaign, pp. 

pp. 250-25 1. 

1960), pp. 223-224. 

243-245. 

Chapter 14 

Stalemate on the German Frontier 

1 Msg U-68483, Spaatz to Arnold, 119. 

September 24, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, October 1, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

3. Haywood S. Hansell, Jr., The Strategic Air 

War Against Germany and Japan: A Memoir 

(Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1986), p. 

4. Michael S. Sherry, The Rise of American 

Air Power: The Creation of Armageddon (New 

Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1987), p. 

259. 

5. Ronald Schaffer, Wings of Judgement, p. 

103. 

722 
NOTES 

6. Memo, Eaker to Spaatz, subj: “Items on 

Conference Agenda during General Spaatz’s 

Visit to MAAF,” August 29, 1944, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

7. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

8. Ibid. 

9. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, September I, 1944, 

10. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, September I, 1944, 

I 1. Ibid. 

12. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, August 27, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1.3. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, September I, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

14. Entry for September 1, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

IS. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

item 1930, msg FWD-13605, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, September 2, 1944, p. 21 1. 

16. Ibid., item 1931, msg FWD-13657, 

Eisenhower to Arnold, September 3, 1944, pp. 

21 1:2-2113. 

1’7. Ltr, Arnold to Eisenhower, September 6, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

18. Ibid. 

19. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 29, 

20. Matloff, Strategic Planning 1943-1944, 

21. Hastings, Bomber Command, p. 302. 

22. Webster and Frankland, The Strutegic Air 

2.3. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 612. 

24. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 2, p. 80. 

25. Hastings, Bomber Command, pp. 

323.~337. See also Webster and Frankland, The 

Strategic Air Oflensive, vol. 3, pp. 80-93. 

26. Webster and Frankland, The Strutegic Air 

Oflensive, vol. 3, p. 60, note 1. 

27. Ibid., pp. 58-59. 

28. Msg Octagon 29, Portal and Arnold to 

Bottomley and Spaatz, September 15, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also Webster and 

Frankland, The Strategic Air Offensive, vol. 4, 

pp. 170-172, appendix 8, xxxix. 

29. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 62. 

30. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, n.d. [c.a. September 

19, 19441, Spaatz Papers, Diary. This is misfiled 

in Spaatz’s papers, having been erroneously 

annotated “23 October?” Spaatz’s reply to this 

letter is dated September 30, 1944. This source 

appears to be Arnold’s letter to Spaatz of 

September 19 cited in Craven and Cate, 

Argument to V-E Day, p. 622, note 80. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

p.511. 

Qfensive, vol. 4, pp. 47, 50-5 1. 

31. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 29, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

32. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

Itr, Eisenhower to Marshall, September 18, 

1944, pp. 2157-2159 and Itr, Spaatz to Arnold, 

September 30, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Eisenhower described Spaatz as “disturbed.” 

Spaatz spoke of Eisenhower as “disconcerted.” 

33. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, p. 673. 

34. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, September 30, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

35. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

item 1954, msg FWD-14819, Eisenhower to 

Arnold, p. 2145. 

36. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 274. 

37. Ltr, Arnold to Eisenhower, September 6, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

38. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

item 1986, Itr, Eisenhower to A.H.M. Sinclair 

(Secretary of State for Air), September 2, 1944, 

39. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 275. 

40. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 622. 

41. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, September 20, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

42. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, October 1, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

43. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

pp. 666-668. The information cited by Craven 

and Cate, although dated after September 1944, 

pertains equally to this earlier period. Spaatz 

would surely have known of the relative inaccuracy of H2X by September 1, 1944. 

44. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

45. SHDCS/S.1020/44, Minute, Robb to CG, 

USSTAF subj: “Employment of Strategic Air 

Forces,“ September 17, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

46. Webster and Frankland, The Strutegic Air 

Oflensive, vol. 4, pp. 172-173, appendix 8, XI, 

has a complete text of this directive. 

47. “Directive Agreed by D.C.A.S., R.A.F. 

and Lt. Gen. Carl Spaatz, 23 September 1944,” 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

48. Ibid. A list of “Relative Priorities” is 

attached to Spaatz’s copy of the directive. For 

an example of bow quickly these relative priorities would shift in the light of new perceptions, 

see TLM/F/S.34, “Notes of the 100th Air 

Commanders’ Conference,” September 26, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

49. TLM/F/S.34, “Notes of the 100th Air 

Commanders’ Conference,” September 26, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

50. TLM/F/S.34, “Notes of the lOlst Air 

p. 21x0. 

2, p. 512. 

723 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Commanders’ Conference,” September 29, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

5 1. Ibid. 

52. Ibid. 

53. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 639, implies that the HURRICANE plans were 

of solely British origin. However, Spaatz’s 

Command Diary for early October, his correspondence, and the minutes of the 102d Air 

Commander’s Meeting show that Spaatz and 

USSTAF not only participated heavily in the 

development of the schemes but initiated them. 

54. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, October 1, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

55. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, October 4, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

56. Memo, Spaatz to CG’s 8th and 15th Air 

Forces, subj: “Enemy Oil Production,” October 

3, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Entry for October 3, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

58. Msg W-40454, Arnold to Spaatz, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

59. Pogue, The Supreme Command, pp, 

302-308. 

60. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

item 2063, msg S-63616, Eisenhower to 

Marshall, October 23, 1944, pp. 2247-2248. 

61. Pogue, The Supreme Command, p. 308. 

62. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

63. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 675. 

64. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

65. Ibid., p. 68. 

66. DCS/TS.lOO, “Notes on Air Policy to be 

Adopted with View to a Rapid Defeat of 

Germany,” October 25, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

pp. 647--649. 

Ofensive, vol. 3, p. 84, note 3. 

67. Ibid. 

68. Ibid. 

69. Ibid. 

70. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 526. 

71. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, pp. 178-179 Appendix 8 xiii 

(b) is a copy of “Directive No. 2 for the Strategic 

Air Forces in Europe.” 

72. Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 177-178, appendix 8, 

xliii (a). 

73. Ibid., vol. 3, p. 84, note 3. 

74. Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 43 1-433. appendix 40. 

75. The literature dealing with the Allies’ 

pause at the German border, their logistics 

problems, and Eisenhower’s decision to support 

Montgomery is voluminous, acrimonious, and 

tendentious. For some of the most rational 

accounts, read Weigley, Eisenhower’s Lieutenants, pp. 277-319; Charles B. MacDonald, 

United States Army in World War 11, subseries: 

The European Theater of Operations, The 

Siegfried Line Campaign (Washington, D.C.: 

OCMH, GPO, 1963), pp. 119-175, and Ambrose, 

The Supreme Commander, pp. 504-552. 

76. Memo for the CG, Eighth Air Force, subj: 

“Cargo Trucking Operations, 29 August-30 

September,” n.d. [October 19441, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5875, frames, 1149-1 154. 

77. Ibid. 

78. Ltr, Spaatz to Amold, November 6, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

79. MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign, p. 198. 

80. Ibid. 

81. Ltr, Kuter to Giles, November 3, 1944, 

AF/CHO, manuscript and collected material for 

proposed volume of the correspondence of Gen. 

H. H. Arnold, European Theater of Operations, 

item 220, pp. 540-542. This letter summarizes 

the reports of Col. Sidney F. Griffin and Lt. 

Col. Arthur C. Carlson. 

82. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

83. TLM/F/S.34, “Notes of the 98th Allied 

Air Commanders’ Conference held at A.E.A.F., 

Versailles,” September 20, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Subject File 1929-1945. 

84. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

348-353. 

85. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, December 13, 

1944, Spaatz Papers Diary. 

86. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, December 13, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

87. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 667. 

88. HQ, Eighth Air Force, Operational 

Analysis Section, “Report on Bombing Accuracy 

Eighth Air Force, 1 September-31 December 

1944,” pp. 5-7, April 20, 22, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

89. USSBS, Military Analysis Division, 

Bombing Accuracy: USAF Heavy & Medium 

Bombers in the ETO, vol. 63 (Washington, 

D.C.: GPO, n.d. [ca. 1947]), p. 4. 

90. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, p. 335, appendix 32, iv: 

Report of 5th October, Speer to Hitler. 

91. Ibid., vol. 4, p. 517, appendix 49, xxxix. 

92. For German production, see ibid.; for the 

Eighth Air Force, see Eighth Air Force Monthly 

Summaries of Operations, September, October, 

November, and December 1944, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5871, frames 927-1292; for 

the Fifteenth Air Force, see “Statistical Story of 

348-349. 

724 
NOTES 

the Fifteenth Air Force.” n.d. [June 19451, p. 

10, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 6432, frame 81 1; 

and for the RAF, see Webster and Frankland, 

The Strategic Air Offensive, vol. 3, pp. 84, 

233-234. 

93. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Oflensive, vol. 4, p. 5 16, appendix 49, xxxviii. 

94. USSBS, Oil Division, Oil Division Final 

Report, vol. 109 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1947), p. 121. 

95. Ibid., p. 4. 

96. USSBS, Military Analysis Division, Air 

Force Rate of Operations, vol. 61 (Washington, 

D.C.: GPO, 1947), p. 33. 

97. Ibid., pp. 66 and 85. 

98. Memo 55-24, Headquarters Eighth Air 

Force, Office of the Commanding General, 

Standard Operating Procedures: Operations, 

subj.: Attack of Secondary and Last Resort 

Targets, October 29, 1944, AFHRC file no. 

99. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

100. Alfred C. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must 

Roll for Victory: Allied Air Power and the 

German War Economy 1944-1945,’’ Ph.D. dissertation, University of North Carolina at 

Chapel Hill, 1985, pp. 207-208. 

101. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 526. 

102. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” pp. 

282-283.287. 

103 Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 527. 

104. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” pp. 

105. Ibid., p. 304. 

106. COPC/S. 501/10/INT, “Tenth Periodic 

Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter Defenses 

and Interception Tactics. Period 1 September 

1944-30 September 1944,” October 15, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5220, frames 

158-1593. 

107. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

354-355. 

108. Ltr, Anderson to Arnold, September 3, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

109. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, September 21, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

110. Ltr, Doolittle to Spaatz, September 28, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

11 1. Ltr, Doolittle to Spaatz, October 18, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

112. Ibid. 

113. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, October 1, 1944, 

114. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, October 4, 1944, 

5 19.5991-1. 

338-339. 

298-299. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2, pp. 408409. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

15, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2, p. 525. 

115. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

116. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, October 4, 1944, 

117. “Notes on Conference at Bari,” October 

118. Ltr, Spaatz to Portal, October 20, 1944, 

119. Ltr, Spaatz to Robb, October 20, 1944, 

120. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

121. Ibid., vol. 3, part 2, p. 409. 

122. Entry for October 21, 1944, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

123. MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign, p. 390. 

124. “Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Meeting,” November 7, 1944, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

125. MacDonald, The Siegfried Line Campaign, pp. 405406. 

126. Ibid., pp. 411414; for the subsequent 

fighting see pp. 411439. 

127. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold (Eyes Only) 

December 13, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

128. “Notes of Meeting Held at S.H.A.E.F. 

on Tuesday, 5 December, at 14:30 Hours to 

Discuss the Employment of Strategic Air 

Forces,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

129. Ibid. 

130. Ibid. 

13 1. Ibid. 

132. Entries for December 6-8, 1944, 

Command Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

133. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 4, pp. 494495, appendix 49, 

xxii. 

134. Ibid., p. 500, appendix 49, xxvii. 

135. Ibid., p. 325, appendix 32, iv. 

136. A.D.I. (K) Rpt 373/1945, “The Birth, 

Life and Death of the German Day Fighter Arm 

as Related by Adolf Galland,” August 15, 1945, 

p. 57, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

137. Ibid. 

138. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

pp. 157-159, table 89. 

139. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of 

the German Air Force, p. 373; see also A.D.I. 

(K) 373/1945, p. 59. 

140. A.D.I. (K) Rpt 373/1945, p. 57. 

141. Ibid., p. 59. 

142. Ibid. 

143. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, p. 

255, table 159. 

144. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

725 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

375, 384,386. 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

145. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, November 5, 

146. Ibid. 

147. Ibid. 

148. Ibid. 

149. COPC/S.501/10/INT, “Twelfth Periodic 

Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter Defences 

and Interception Tactics, Period 3 November 

1944-16 December 1944,” December 26, 1944, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5220, frames 

16341658. 

150. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, December 15, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

151. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, November 30, 

1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1658, frame 

1155. 

152. Ltr, Giles to Spaatz, December 1 I, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

153. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, December 13, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

154. Ibid. 

155. Ltr, Giles to Spaatz, June 8, 1944, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

156. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz (Eyes Only) 

September 26, 1944, annotated “to Anderson 

for reply. CS,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

157. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold (Eyes Only) 

October 10, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

158. Craven and Cate, Men and Planes, p. 

159. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, November 19, 

160. Ibid. 

161. ”Resume of General Arnold’s Remarks 

on Saturday, 18 November, 12 Noon” Ln.d.1, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

162. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, November 26, 

1944. Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

163. Ibid. 

164. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, December 9, 

1944. Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

165. Ltr, Spaatz to Vandenberg, December 

12, 1944. Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

166. Ltr, Brig. Gen. E. P. Curtis, Chief of 

Staff, USSTAF, to Lt. Gen. Ira C. Eaker, CG, 

MAAF, December 30, 1944. Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

167. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of 

the German Air Force, Q. 356. 

168. Based on figures compiled from 

Freeman, The U.S. Strategic Bomber, pp. 

153-157. 

169. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, 

table 90, p. 160 and table 89, p. 159. 

170. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 596. 

171. Ibid., p. 595. 

46. 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, May 2, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2. CCS 166/I/D, January 21, 1943, title: 

The Bomber Offensive from the United 

Kingdom, cited in Matloff, Strategic 

Planning 1943-1944, p. 28. 

3. USSTAF, Daily Staff Meeting, 

December 21, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

4. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 7, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

5. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Manual, 

p. 241. 

6. Minutes of a meeting held on 

December 20, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

7. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, 

pp. 398400,404. 

8. Ibid., pp. 398407. 

9. Notes of meeting held in Chief of 

Staff’s office, December 26, 1944, Robb 

Papers, RAF Museum. 

Chapter 15 

Victory 

10. Memo, Office of the Director of 

Operations, USSTAF, subj: Air Effort 

Against Tactical Targets for Period 16 

December 19444 January 1945 Inclusive, 

January 5, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

11. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E 

Day, p. 706. 

12. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, 

part 2, p. 449. 

13. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E 

Day, p. 711. 

14. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, 

part 2, pp. 443-450. 

15. Ibid., pp. 444-449. 

16. Entry for December 31, Command 

Diary, 1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

17. Entry for December 31, 1944, Hobart 

R. Gay Papers, Diary, U.S. Army Military 

History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pa. Gay 

was on Patton’s staff. 

726 
NOTES 

18. Entry for January 1, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

19. Bradley and Blair, A General’s Life, p. 

363. 

20. Entry for January 1, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

21. British Air Ministry, Rise and Full of the 

German Air Force, p. 380. 

22. Entry for January 2, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

23. Ambrose, The Supreme Commander, pp. 

581-588; Pogue, Organizer of Victory, pp. 

5 1 1-5 12. 

24. Ltr, Kuter to Arnold, Roundup No. 1, 

January 28, 1945, Kuter’s Notes on Trip to 

Malta & Yalta, AF/CHO. 

25. Memo, USSTAF Directorate of Operations, to Col. F. Miller, January 5, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

26. British Air Ministry, Rise and Fall of the 

German Air Force, pp. 38G381. 

27. COPC/S.510/10/INT., “Thirteenth 

Periodic Report of Enemy Daylight Fighter 

Defences and Interception Tactics,” February 

12. 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5520, 

frames 167G1690. 

28. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” p. 

329. The next few paragraphs are based almost 

exclusively on the exhaustive and authoritative 

research of Mierzejewski. I can offer only a 

quick gloss on the mass of detail and analysis 

contained in this outstanding work. 

29. USSBS, Transportation Division, The 

Effects of Strategic Bombing on German 

Trunsportation (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1947), vol. 200, p. 53. 

30. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” p. 

33;!. 

31. Ibid., p. 335. 

32. Ibid., pp. 359-360,368-369. 

33. Ibid., pp. 376-377. 

34. Ibid.. D. 411. 

35: Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 607. 

36. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” p. 

429. 

37. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, December 30, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

38. Rpt, subj: “Allied Air Supremacy and 

German Jet Planes,” Director of Intelligence, 

USSTAF, to Lt. Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, Janury 3, 

1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

39. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, appendix 49, xxxviii, p. 516. 

40. Intelligence Report, subj: “Allied Air 

Supremacy and German Jet Planes,” Director of 

Intelligence, USSTAF, to Lt. Gen. Carl A. 

Spaatz, January 3, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

41. Ibid. 

42. Ibid. 

43. Entry for January 5, 1945, Command 

44. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

45. Entry for January 5, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

46. Msg, Anderson to Spaatz, Janury 5, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also entry for January 

7, 1945, Vandenberg Papers, Diary, box 1; 

memo for the record, Lt. Gen. Giles, January 5, 

1945, on conference with Anderson and 

Winant, AFHRC file no. 168.491. AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 1658, frames 1463-1466. 

47. SHAEF Meetings, January 6, 1945, Robb 

Papers, RAF Museum. 

48. Entries for January 8,9, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

49. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 7, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. This letter is a reply to 

Arnold’s of December 14, 1944. 

50. Ltr, Arnold to Spaatz, December 30, 

1944, AFHRC File no. 168.491, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 1658, frame 1178. 

51. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 7, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. This letter is a reply to 

Arnold’s three letters of December 30, 1944. 

52. SHAEF Meetings, January 9, 1945, Robb 

Papers, RAF Museum. 

53. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 10, 1945, 

Arnold Papers, Correspondence with Field 

Commanders. 

54. “Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference held at S.H.A.E.F., 11 January, 

1945, at 11:30 Hours,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

55. Minutes of USSTAF Staff Meeting, 

January 16, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary; msg, 

Air Staff SHAEF to Chairman Combined 

Strategic Targeting Committee, January 13, 

1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5543, frame 

229. 

56. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, January 16, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

57. Directive No. 3 for the Strategic Air 

Forces in Europe, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

58. Memo for General Kuter, subj: Comments 

on Strategic Directive No. 3 by AC/AS Plans, 

AFHRC File no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 1658A, frames 1471-1472. 

59. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 97. In addition, see msg 

SX-588, Bottomley to Spaatz, January 15, 

1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5543, frame 

155. 

60. Msg U-68114, Curtis (signed Spaatz) to 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

2, p. 853. 

727 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Doolittle, January 16, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5046, frame 1819. 

61. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 99. 

62. Minute, D.B.OPs (Bufton) to DCAS 

(Bottomley), January 22, 1945, PRO AIR 

20/3227. 

63. Minute, ACAS (Ops.) to DCAS, January 

23, 1945, PRO AIR 20/3227. 

64. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 100. 

65. Ibid. 

66. “Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference held at S.H.A.E.F. on 25 January, 

1945, at 11:30 Hours,” Spaatz Papers, Diary, 

and msg UA-53427, Spaatz to Doolittle, 

January 28, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Cables. 

67. SHAEF Meetings, January 24, 1945, 

Robb Papers, RAF Museum. 

68. J.I.C.(45) 22 (0) (Final), subj: German 

Strategy and Capacity to Resist, January 21, 

1945, PRO PREM 3/193/6A. 

69. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 3, p. 101. 

70. Ibid. 

71. Ibid., p. 103. 

72. Ibid., vol. 4, p. 301, appendix 28, Itr, 

73. Ibid., vol. 3, p. 104. 

74. Msg S-77217, Bottomley to Portal, 

January 31, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5543, frames 1405-1406. 

75. Entry for January 28, 1945, Command 

Diary, Spaatz Papers, Diary. See also A-2 

[Intelligence] Planning Notes for the Eighth Air 

Force, 28 January-3 February 1945, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5884, frames 1639-1641. 

These notes centered on planning for oil missions if visibility allowed. Otherwise they concentrated on a Berlin strike. The note for 

February 3 spoke of a “verbal USSTAF directive that requires 400 aircraft on any of the four 

active synthetic oil plants” (frame 1641). 

76. Msg SP-184, Spaatz to Doolittle, January 

24, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

77. Msg UA-53417, Spaatz to Doolittle, 

January 28, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Cables; and 

[THUNDERCLAP Target List], January 28, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Subject File 1929-1945. 

78. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 659. 

79. Combined Strategic Targets Committee, 

Minutes of the 16th Meeting held at the Air 

Ministry on Friday, 2nd February, 1945, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5221, frame 1256; 

see also the THUNDERCLAP Target List, January 

28, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Subject File 

1929-1945. This list shows the “primary aiming 

Bottomley to Harris, January 27, 1945. 

points” as Friedrichstrasse (main line and 

underground station), the Air Ministry, Gestapo 

HQ, the Foreign Office and governmental agencies, the Alexanderplatz railway station, and 

two bridges over the River Spree. 

80. Msg S-77217, Bottomley to Portal, 

January 31, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5543, frames 1405-1406. 

81. “Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference held at S.H.A.E.F., on 1 February, 

1945, at 11:30 Hours,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

82. Msg S-77217, Bottomley to Portal, 

January 31, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5543, frames 1405-1406. 

83. Ltr, Kuter to Arnold, Roundup No. 2, 

January 31, 1945, Arnold Papers, 

Correspondence. 

84. Minutes of [USSTAF] Staff Meeting, 

January 26, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

85. Ltr, Kuter to Arnold, Roundup No. 2, 

January 31, 1945, Arnold Papers, Correspondence. 

86. Msg War-29863 (Hearth 88), Giles to 

Kuter, signed Arnold, January 31, 1945, War 

Department Classified Message Center 

(WDCMC), NARA, microfilm reel 1347. 

87. Msg Cricket-35, Kuter to Giles, February 

1, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5543, frame 

1372. 

88. Ltr, Anderson to Spaatz (Eyes Only), 

February 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary; 

Foreign Relations of the United States 

Diplomatic Papers: The Conferences at Malta 

and Yalta 1945 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. 

Department of State, GPO, 1955), pp. 468-469, 

Minutes of 182d Meeting of the Combined 

Chiefs of Staff, January 30, 1945. 

89. Ltr, Anderson to Spaatz (Eyes Only), 

February 2,1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

90. Ibid. 

91. Memo, R.A.L. [Lovett] to Arnold, 

January 9, 1945; enclosed in ltr, Arnold to 

Spaatz, January 14, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

92. Excerpts from memo, Kuter to Arnold, 

January 11, 1945; enclosed in ltr, Arnold to 

Spaatz, January 14, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

93. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, Febreuary 5, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

94. Ltr, Anderson to Spaatz, (Eyes Only), 

February 2,1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

95. Msg Cricket-40, Anderson to Spaatz, 

February 1, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5543, frame 1354. 

96. Msg UAX-53637, Spaatz to Twining, 

February 2,1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

97. Minutes of [USSTAF] Staff Meeting, 

February 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

728 
NOTES 

98. Msg UAX-53637, Spaatz to Twining, 

February 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

99. Msg CS-93-JD (REDLINE), Doolittle to 

Spaatz, January 30, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5046, frame 1808. For Doolittle’s opinions on the shortcomings of the B-24 as compared to the B-17 see Itr, Doolittle to Giles, 

January 25, 1945, AFHRC file no. 168.491, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1657A, frames 

827-83 1. Doolittle noted that the B-24 flew at 

24,000 feet compared to the B-17’s 28,000 

feet, and therefore suffered higher flak 

losses. 

100. Msg JD-104-CS (REDLINE), Spaatz to 

Doolittle, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5046, 

frame 1818, January 30, 1945. 

101. [Eighth Air Force] A-2 Planning Notes, 

January 30, 1945, AFHRC file no. 520.321, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5884, frame 1639. 

Also see msg D-61064, Doolittle to Spaatz, 

February 2, 1945, and msg D-61068, Doolittle 

to Spaatz, February 2, 1945, AFHRC file no. 

519.332 February 1-19, 1945. 

102. Msg UA-53649, Spaatz to Doolittle, 

February 2, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 

5046, frame 1809. 

103. Memo (D-W-33), Major J. Rifkin, 

Assistant D/Ops, to DCS Ops, February 2, 

1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 5046. 

104. Msg CS-96-JD (REDLINE), Doolittle to 

Spaatz, February 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, 

Cables. 

10.5. Ibid. This notation is signed C. S. [Carl 

Spaatz]. 

106. Spaatz may have recalled portions of the 

prewar AWPD/I plan in connection with bombing Berlin. AWPD/I (tab. 3, p. 3) had stated, in 

August 1941, “Immediately after some very 

apparent results of air attacks on the material 

objective listed above [power plants, oil, and 

transportation] or immediately after some major 

set-back of the German ground forces, it may 

become highly profitable to deliver a large 

scale, all-out attack on the civil population of 

Berlin. In this event, any or all of the bombardment forces may be diverted for this mission.” 

See also interview, Gen. Carl A. Spaatz by 

Murray Green, August 8, 1969, Green 

Collection on “Hap” Arnold, U.S. Air Force 

Academy Archives, Colorado Springs, Colo., p. 

5. For an alternate view on THUNDERCLAP see 

Mark A. Clodfelter, “Culmination Dresden: 

1945” Aerospace Historian XXVI, no. 3 

(September 1979), 134-147 (in particular, pages 

142-1 44). 

107. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, February 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frame 333; Freeman, Mighty 

Eighth War Diary, pp. 432433; “THUNDERCLAP 

Target List,” Spaatz Papers, Subject File 

1929-1945. 

108. Memo D-M-8, HQ 1st Air Division, 

Office Director of Intelligence, subj: Immediate 

Interpretation Report No. 229,4 February 1945. 

AFHRC file no. 525.332, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel B 5287. 

109. Eighth Air Force Target Summary: 

Statistical Summary of All Bomber Attacks, 3 1 

May 1945, pp. 7-8, AFHRC file no. 520.3084- 

1, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5875, frames 

6 18-6 19. 

110. New York Times, February 6, 1945, citing Swedish news service stories based on 

reports from returning plane passengers. 

11 1. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 726. 

112. Figures cited by Professor Doctor Olaf 

Groehler, Akademie der Wissenschaften der 

DDR, Zentralinstitute fur Geschichte, Berlin, in 

letter to Mr. Herman Wolk, Office of Air Force 

History, March 6, 1990. Given the number of 

homeless, Professor Groehler assessed the raid 

as the heaviest to hit Berlin during the war. 

113. 3rd Air Division Mission Report of 

February 3, 1945, n.d. [ca. early February 

19451, Eighth Air Force Mission Reports, RG 

18, NARA. 

114. USSBS, Area Studies Division, A Brief 

Study qf the Effects of Area Bombing on Berlin, 

Augshurg, Bochum, Leipzig, Hagen, Dortmund. 

Oherhausen, Schweinfurt, and Bremen, vol. 39 

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947), pp. 35-36. 

1 15. Translation of Allied propaganda leaflet 

dropped on Holland, “The Flying Dutchman 

No. 101,” February 5, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5823, frame 150-151. 

116. Sydney Gruson, “3000-Ton Blow Hits 

Berlin in Steady Bombing of Reich,” New York 

Times, February 4, 1945, pp. 1 and 5. 

117. Minutes of [USSTAF] Staff Meeting, 

February 5, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

118. Msg Argonaut-23, Anderson to Spaatz, 

February 5, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5544, frame 703. 

Spaatz to Anderson, AF/CHO microfilm reel B 

5046, frame 699, February 5, 1945. 

120. A-2 Planning Notes, AFGRC file no. 

520.321, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5884, 

frame 1640. 

121. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, February 5, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

122. A-2 Planning Notes, February 13, 1945, 

AFHRC file no. 520.321, AF/CHO microfilm 

119. Msg USSTAF-MAIN-IN 15905, 

729 
SPAATL AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

reel A 5884, frame 1643. 

123. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 

439; Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, February 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frames 313-382. 

124. Alexander McKee, Dresden 1945: The 

Devil’s Tinder Box (New York: E. P. Dutton, 

1984), pp. 21 1-243, in particular, p. 225. 

125. USSBS, Area Studies Division, Area 

Studies Division Report, vol. 31 (Washington, 

D.C.: GPO, 1947), p. 5, for an excellent discussion of Bomber Command’s new techniques 

and accuracy. 

126. USSBS, Physical Damage Division, Fire 

Raids on German Cities, vol. 193 (Washington, 

127. The bombing of Dresden has given birth 

to a large body of literature, both of accusation 

and justification. In addition to the previously 

cited works by David Irving and Alexander 

McKee, both highly critical of Allied policy, 

one should read the official AAF historical 

study on Dresden, “Historical Analysis of the 

14-15 February 1945 Bombing of Dresden,” 

prepared by Chief Historian Charles Angell in 

1953, which can be found in the AF/CHO 

Dresden Subject File; and Melden E. Smith, 

“The Bombing of Dresden Reconsidered: A 

Study in Wartime Decision Making,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Boston University, 

1971. 

128. HQ, 1st Air Division, Office of the 

Director of Intelligence, “Immediate Interpretation Report No. 232, 0530 hours, 15 February 

1945,” AFHRC file No. 525.332, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel B 5288, frame 676. 

129. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference held at S.H.A.E.F., Versailles, on 

Thursday, 15th February 1945, at 11:30, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

130. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, February 1945, p. 22; Freeman, 

Mighty Eighth War Diary, p. 440. 

13 1. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 731. 

132. Excerpts of Broadcast of February 17, 

1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

133. Msg UA-64471, Anderson to Arnold, 

February 19, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

134. Ibid. 

135. Ibid. 

136. Ltr, Kuter to Anderson, February 21, 

1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5534, frames 

412413. 

137. Msg WAR-39722, Col. Rex Smith to 

Spaatz, signed Arnold, February 18, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

D.C.: GPO, 1947). pp. 1,35-37,47. 

138. See the cover sheet for the January 31 

Directive, which clearly indicates that Kuter’s 

delegation received two copies, msg S-77217 

(CM-IN-l08), Bottomley to Portal, January 31, 

1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 1122. See also 

msg Cricket-35, Kuter to Giles, January 31, 

1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 1122; and 

Cricket-40, Anderson to Spaatz, signed Kuter, 

February 1, 1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 

1122. 

13314), Kuter to Spaatz, February 13, 1945, 

WDCMC, microfilm reel 1152. 

140. Msg WAR-37181, Giles to Kuter, 

February 14, 1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 

1352. 

14466), Spaatz to Kuter, February 14, 1945, 

WDCMC, microfilm reel 1152. Spaatz also sent 

a copy of this message to Giles. 

139. Msg MX-46131 (WDCMC, CM-IN141. Msg UAX-64205 (WDCMC, CM-IN142. Ibid. 

143. Msg WAR-39222, Giles to Spaatz, 

February 17, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

144. Msg WAR-39730, Arnold to Spaatz, 

February 18, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

145. Memo, Anderson to Spaatz, February 

19, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

146. Msg UA-64462, Spaatz to Arnold [for 

Giles], February 18, 1945. Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

147. Msg UA-64470, Anderson to Arnold, 

signed Spaatz, February 18, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

148. Ibid. 

149. Ibid., msg UA-64462. 

150. Ibid., msg UA-64470. 

151. Msg WAR-39954, Arnold to Spaatz, 

February 19, 1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 

1354. 

152. Msg UA-64484, Anderson to Arnold, 

February 19, 1945, WDCMC, microfilm reel 

1155. 

153. Msg UA-64603, Anderson to Arnold, 

February 20, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

154. Ltr, Spaatz to Lovett, February 21, 

1945. Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

155. Msg Argonaut-43, Anderson to Spaatz, 

February 7, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5544, frame 635. See also FRUS: Malta-Yalta, 

Minutes, Second Tripartite Military Meeting, 

February 6,1945, pp. 641-644. 

156. FRUS: Malta-Yalta, First Plenary 

Meeting, February 4, 1945, CCS minutes, p. 

583. 

157. Angell, Analysis of the Bombing of 

Dresden, pp. 14-16. 

158. Ibid., p. 5. 

730 
NOTES 

159. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 3, p. 44. 

160. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, March 1, 194.5, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

161. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 4, pp. 484486, appendix 49, 

xiv. 

162. HQ, Eighth Air Force, Operational 

Analysis Section, “Report on Bombing 

Accuracy, 1 September 1944-3 1 December 

1944,” April 20, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Subject 

File 1929-1945; interview, Spaatz by Green, 

August 8, 1969, p. 5. 

163. Memo, Anderson to Director of Bomber 

Ops., subject: “Bombardment Policy in Regard 

to Enemy Occupied Territories,” February 21, 

1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5534, frame 

415: see also ibid., microfilm reel A 5534, 

frame 388, HQ, USSTAF, Office of the Deputy 

Commander, Operations, Circular, subj: 

“Bombardment Policy,” March 1, 1945. 

164. USSBS, Military Analysis Division, 

Weather Factors in Combat Bombardment 

Operations in the European Theater, vol. 62 

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947), p. 29. 

165. Ltr, Spaatz to Marshall, March 13, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

166. Ltr, Spaatz to Arnold, March 14, 1945. 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

167. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Manual, p. 

225. 

168. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 795, citing USSBS, Oil Division Final 

Report. 

169. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, March 194.5, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frame 455. 

170. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, May 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel 

A 5875, frame 1327. 

171. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, June 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel 

A 5875, frame 1398. 

172. Eighth Air Force Target Summary, 

Statistical Summary of All Bomber Attacks, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5875, frames 

173. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, February 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frame 333. 

174. See Eighth Air Force Target Summary, 

n.d., [ca. May 31, 19451, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, starting frame 610; and Eighth Air 

Force Statistical Summary of Operations, 

European Theater, August 17-May 8, 1945, 

June 10,1945, AF/CHO. 

618-619. 

175. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, December 1944, with a summary of 

the year, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5875, starting frame 129; table: Distribution of Bomb 

Tonnage by Type of Target. 

176. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, May 1944, AF/CHO microfilm reel 

A 5874, frame 1317. 

177. “A Review of Bombing Results January 

1943-May 1945,” n.d. AF/CHO microfilm reel 

A 5871, frame 1364. This list adds 1,425 tons 

for January 1945; otherwise, its monthly totals 

are exactly the same as those found in the 

Monthly Summary of Operations. 

178. Msg UA-64603, Anderson to Arnold, 

signed Spaatz, February 20, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

179. USSBS, Air Force Rate of Operations, .. 

pp. 32,56. 

180. The Statistical Summarv of Eighth Air - 

Force Operations lists for Germany only 

174,633 tons, not counting 6,520 tons dropped 

on “railroad shops and stations” and 5,409 tons 

on “communications centers.” “A Review of 

Bombing Results” lists 199,524 tons on “Marshaling Yards.” 

181. USSBS, Air Force Rate of Operations, 

exhibit e. 

182. Ibid., p. 85. 

183. Eighth Air Force Statistical Summary of 

Operations, p. 41. 

184. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, February 1945. 

185. Derived from Eighth Air Force Target 

Summary, Statistical Summary of all Bomber 

Attacks, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5875, starting frame 610. 

186. Sherry, The Rise of American Air 

Power, pp. 252-254. 

187. Mierzejewski, “Wheels Must Roll,” p. 

429. 

188. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 732. 

189. “Summary of CLARION,” Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

190. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, February 1, 1945, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

191. Ltr, Anderson to Spaatz, (Eyes Only), 

February 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

192. Msg XVAF E-0695, Twining to Spaatz, 

February 3, 1945, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5544, frame 827. 

193. Ltr, Spaatz to Anderson, February 5, 

1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

194. USSBS, The Effects of Strategic 

Bombing on German Transportation, p. 16; 

73 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

USSBS, Military Analysis Division, The Impact 

of the Allied Air Efforts on German Logistics, 

vol. 64a (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947), pp. 

60-61. 

195. Ltr, Anderson to Brig. Gen. Joe L. 

Loutzenheiser, Chief, Operational Plans 

Division, HQ, AAF, March 20, 1945, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5534, free 344345. 

196. Msg, Anderson to Spaatz, February 22, 

1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

197. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

442456. 

198. Hinsley, British Intelligence, vol. 3, part 

2, p. 613. 

199. COPC/S. 501/10/INT, “Fourteenth 

Periodic Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter 

Defenses and Interception Tactics, Period 3 

February-28 February 1945,” March 5, 1945, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5520, frames 

200. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

201. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, p. 

202. Ibid., p. 256, table 160. 

203. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air Offensive, vol. 4, p. 516, appendix 49, 

xxxviii. 

204. Figures for USSTAF from “Review of 

Bombing Results,” AF/CHO microfilm reel A 

5871, frames 1363-1364. 

205. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 729. 

206. Ibid. 

207. COPC/S. 50 1 / 1 O/INT, “Fifteenth 

Periodic Report on Enemy Daylight Fighter 

Defenses and Interception Tactics, Period 1 

March-31 March 1945,” April 11, 1945, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5219, frames 

208. AAF Statistical Digest, World War II, p. 

209. Ibid., p. 256, table 160. 

210. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, March 11, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

211. Memo, Anderson to Spaatz, subject: 

Report on Jet Tactics Against Heavy Bombers 

on Mission of 18 March,” March 19, 1945, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 5534, frame 355. 

2 12. COPC/S,501/10/INT, “Fifteenth 

Periodic Report,” April 11, 1945, AF/CHO 

microfilm reel A 5219, frames 1731-1760 

[para. 391. 

213. “Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, held at Forward S.H.A.E.F., 

Reims, on Wednesday, 21st March 1945, at 

11:30 Hours,” Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

1702-1 7 19. 

p. 722. 

255, table 159. 

1731-1760. 

255, table 159. 

214. Ibid. 

215. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, Reims, March 29, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

216. Ibid. 

217. Msg WX-43671, Marshall to Eisenhower, February 26, 1945, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

218. Msg WAR47850, Marshall to Spaatz, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

219. Ltr, Spaatz to Chief of Staff, U.S. Army, 

“Report on Visit to Switzerland, 7-8 March 

1945,” March 10, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

220. Ibid. 

221. Msg WAR-53409, Marshall to Spaatz, 

n.d. [ca. mid-March], Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

222. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 769-770. 

223. Ltr, Arnold to Eisenhower, September 4, 

1944, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

224. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

pp. 2129-2131, item 1941, Itr, Eisenhower to 

Arnold, September 11, 1944. 

225. Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 2367-2368, item 2191, 

msg S-71794, Eisenhower to Marshall, December 21, 1944. 

226. Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 2424-2428, item 2237, 

Itr, Eisenhower to Marshall, January 12, 1945, 

and item 2238, msg S-74901/SG 962, 

Eisenhower to Marshall, January 14, 1944. 

227. Ibid., vol. 4, pp. 2460-2461, item 2264, 

Conference Notes, January 28, 1945. 

228. Ltr, Kuter to Arnold, January 28, 1945, 

Arnold Papers, Correspondence. 

229. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, March 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frame 403. 

230. Vincent C. Jones, United States Army in 

World War 11, subseries: Special Studies, 

Manhattan: The Army and the Atomic Bomb 

(Washington, D.C.: CMH, GPO, 1985). pp. 

287-288; Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, 

p. 464; Leslie R. Groves, Now It Can Be Told: 

The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York: 

Harper & Brothers, 1962), pp. 230-231; and 

msg SP-201, Spaatz to Marshall, March 15, 

1945; and msg UAX-66143, Spaatz to 

Marshall, March 19, 1945, Spaatz Papers, 

Diary. 

231. Notes of Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, Reims, March 15, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

232. Ltr, Spaatz to Marshall, (Eyes Only), 

March 13,1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

233. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, Reims, March 8, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

732 
NOTES 

234. Ltr, Spaatz to Giles, March 19, 1945, 

Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

235. Msg MX-23614, US Military Mission 

in Moscow to Spaatz, April 3, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

236. [USSTAF] Weekly Staff Meeting No. 

16, April 2, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

237. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic 

Air OfSensive, vol. 3, p. 112. 

238. Ibid., p. 117. 

239. Ibid. 

240. Dudley Saward, Bomber Harris: The 

Stor)) of Sir Arthur Harris, Marshal of the Royal 

Air Force (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 

1985), pp. 291-292, ltr, Bottomley to Harris, 

March 28, 1945. 

24.1. Ibid., pp. 292-294, ltr, Harris to 

Bottomley, March 29, 1945. 

242. Ibid., pp. 294-295, Minute, Churchill to 

Chief of the Air Staff, April 1, 1945. 

24.3. Ibid., pp. 295-297, Note by the Air 

Staff, COS(45)238(0), Portal to Churchill, 

“Area Bombing.” 

244. Memo, F. L. Anderson, subj: “Comments 

Re Cablegram WAR 65558 (USSTAF IN28993),” 10 April 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5616, frame 154. 

245. Notes of the Allied Air Commanders’ 

Conference, Reims, April 5, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

246. Eighth Air Force Monthly Summary of 

Operations, April 1945, AF/CHO microfilm 

reel A 5875, frames 509-580, p. 3. 

247. Msg FWD-18890, Tedder to Spaatz, 

signed Eisenhower, April 10, 1945, Spaatz 

Papers, Diary. 

248. Msg UA-67340, Spaatz to Doolittle, 

April 11, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

249. Directive No. 4 For the Strategic Air 

Forces in Europe, April 13, 1945, AFHRC File 

no. 168.491, AF/CHO microfilm reel A 1658, 

frame 857. 

250. Msg JD-117-CS (REDLINE), Spaatz to 

Doolittle, April 16, 1945, Spaatz Papers, Diary. 

251. Freeman, Mighty Eighth War Diary, pp. 

496497. 

252. AAF Statistical Digest, World War 11, p. 

255, table 159. 

253. Ibid., p. 256, table 160. 

254. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, 

p. 152. 

255. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, pp. 837-838. Butcher went with the 

press party and shared quarters with Spaatz and 

Tedder. 

256. Tedder, With Prejudice, p. 685. 

Chapter 16 

Assessment 

1. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Ojferzsive, vol. 3, p. 310. 

2. Craven and Cate, Argument to V-E Day, p. 

792. 

3. Eighth Air Force Statistical Summary of 

Operations, June 10, 1945; Statistical Story of 

the Fifteenth Air Force, n.d. [ca. June 194.51, 

AF/CHO microfilm reel A 6432, beginning 

frame 800. 

4. Surprisingly, after almost fifty years, U.S. 

casualty figures are open to question. For AAF 

numbers I have used what is considered the 

definitive War Department/Department of the 

Army casualty report. See Department of the 

Army, Statistical and Accounting Branch, 

Office of the Adjutant General, “Army Battle 

Casualties and Nonbattle Deaths in World War 

11, Final Report, 7 December 1941-31 

December 1946” (Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, June 1, 1953), pp. 84-88. 

Unfortunately, this publication does not break 

down casualties by numbered air force or lower 

AAF unit. See p. 5 of the work for a summary 

chart which reveals that, overall, the AAF suffered 52,173 deaths among battle casualties. 

Nor does the AAF have comprehensive casualty 

reports for World War 11-era numbered air 

forces and smaller units. For the Eighth Air 

Force, the Eighth Air Force Association offers a 

figure of approximately 26,000 deaths. Kenneth 

P. Werrell in “The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War 11: Costs and Accomplishments,” The Journal of American History 

LXXIII (December 1986). p. 708, cites a figure 

of 29,000 deaths for USSTAF in Europe. This 

seems reasonable. Accurate casualty figures for 

the Fifteenth Air Force might well show that the 

organization made a more substantial contribution to European losses than is generally 

acknowledged. For Navy and Marine deaths, see 

Department of Defense, American Forces 

Information Service, Defense 91: Almanac 

(September/October 1991), p. 47, Chart Service 

Casualties in Major War and Conflicts (as of 

733 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

September 30, 1990). 

5. British Bombing Survey Unit, “The 

Strategic Air War Against Germany 1939- 

6. Webster and Frankland, The Strategic Air 

Offensive, vol. 4, appendices xl and xli, pp. 

439440. 

1945,” pp. 242-243. 

7. Terraine, A Time for Courage, p. 682. 

8. USSBS, Area Studies Division, Area 

Studies Division, vol. 3 1, (Washington, D.C.: 

GPO, 2nd ed., 1947). p. 3. 

9. LJSSBS, Summary Report (European War) 

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1945), p. 15. 

10. Ibid. 

11. Hansell, The Strategic Air War, pp. 

12. R. J. Overy, The Air War (New York, 

13G13 1. 

N.Y.: Stein and Day, 1980), p. 157. 

13. Sherry, The Rise of American Air Power, 

14. Schaffer, Wings of Judgement, p. 106. 

15. John Keegan, “Berlin,” MHQ: The 

Quarterly Journal of Military History I1 (Winter 

1990), pp. 82-83. 

16. Yitzak Arad, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka: 

The Operation Rheinhard Death Camps 

(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987), 

p. 392. 

17. Chandler, Eisenhower’s Papers, vol. 4, 

item 2271, memo [for the Record], February 1, 

1945, pp. 2466-2469. 

18. Ltr, Bradley to Eisenhower, December 1, 

1944, Bradley Papers, Correspondence with 

Eisenhower. 

19. Interview, Doolittle by Burch, Fogelman, 

and Tate, September 26, 1970, p. 53. 

p. 254. 

734 
Glossary 

Glossary 

A/Cmdr 

AAF 

AASC 

ABC 

ABC-1 

ACM 

ACS 

ADGB 

AEAF 

AEF 

AF13 

AFHQ 

AGF 

AGWAR 

AHB 

A1 

Air Corps 

Air Service 

AM 

AMC 

ANVIL~RAGOON 

AOC 

APHRODITE 

AR 

ARCADIA 

ABC-2 

ARGUMENT 

ASP 

AVALANCHE 

AVM 

AWPD 

AWPD/l 

AWPD/42 

Air Commodore 

Army Air Forces, U.S. Army 

Allied Air Support Command 

American British Staff Conversations 

Anglo-American agreement to make Germany the no. 1 enemy 

Anglo-Amencan agreement on allocation of U.S. aircraft production 

Air Chief Marshal 

Assistant Chief of Staff 

Air Defense of Great Britain 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force 

American Expeditionary Force 

Air Force Base 

Allied Force Headquarters 

Army Ground Forces, U.S. Amy 

Adjutant General, War Department 

Air Historical Branch (RAF) 

Air Intelligence (RAF) 

Army Air Branch 1926-1941 

Army Air Branch 1920-1926 

Air Marshal 

Air Matkriel Command 

Allied invasion of southern France, executed August 1944 

Air Officer Commanding (RAF) 

Project to use radio controlled bombers to crash into German targets 

Army regulations 

Anglo-American conference in Washington, 

Joint operation against German aircraft industry by Eighth and 

Air support party 

Invasion of Italy at Salerno, executed September 1943 

Air Vice-Marshal 

Air War Plans Division 

Air War Plans Division/ Plan Number 1 (1941) 

Air War Plan Division/ Plan (1942) 

December 1941-January 1942 

Fifteenth Air Forces, February 1944 

Bluie West 1 Narsarssuak, Greenland 

BOLERO Scheduled buildup of American forces in Britain, 1942 

737 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

ccs 

CG 

CINC 

CLARION 

CNO 

co 

COBRA 

CORKSCREW 

COSSAC 

CROSSBOW 

CSTC 

DFC 

DSC 

DSCAEF 

EAC 

EOU 

ETO 

ETO USA 

FDM 

Flak 

FLAX 

FM 

GAF 

GC and CS 

GOC 

GOODWOOD 

GYMNAST 

HB 

HURRICANE I 

HURRICANE I1 

HUSKY 

IAF 

IFF 

JCS 

JEB %WART 

738 

US.-British Combined Chiefs of Staff 

Commanding General 

Commander in Chief 

Allied air operation against German rail system, February 1945 

Chief of Naval Operations 

Commanding Officer 

Air support operation for breakout of American First Army at St. L8, 

Invasion of Pantelleria, executed June 1943 

Chief of Staff, Supreme Allied Commander, established 1943 

Allied bombing effort to counter German V-1 and V-2 effort 

Combined Strategic Targeting Committee 

France, executed July 24-25, 1944 

Distinguished Flying Cross 

Distinguished Service Cross 

Deputy Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force 

Eastern Air Command 

Economic Objective Unit of OSS, stationed in U.S. Embassy, 

European Theater of Operations 

European Theater of Operations, US. Army 

London. Provided targeting information to AAF 

Field Marshal (German) 

German acronym for antiaircraft artillery (Fliegerubwehvkunone) 

Allied air operation to cut off German air transport into Tunisia, April 1943 

Field manual 

German Air Force 

Government Code and Cypher School 

General Officer Commanding (British) 

British attack on German positions in Normandy, executed July 18, 1944 

Plan to invade Casablanca 

Heavy bomber 

Plan for Allied air operation against the Ruhr, not executed 

Plan for Allied air operation against German communications, 

Invasion of Sicily, executed July 1943 

not executed 

Italian Air Force 

Identification Friend or Foe 

Joint Chiefs of Staff 

Plan for strategic fighter-bomber force in Europe, late 1944, 

not executed 
GLOSSARY 

JUNIOR Code name for establishment of Twelfth Air Force 

Luf twaffe German Air Force, 1933-1945 

MAAF Mediterranean Allied Air Force 

MAC Mediterranean Air Command 

MARKET-GARDEN Allied airborne and land offensive across Holland, executed 

MEW Microwave Early Warning (Radar) 

MTO Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

MTOUSA 

September 1944 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations, U.S. Army 

NAAF 

NAAFTCC 

NACAF 

NAPRW 

NASAF 

NATAF 

NATO 

NATOUSA 

Northwest African Air Forces 

Northwest African Air Forces Troop Carrier Command 

Northwest African Coastal Air Force 

Northwest African Photographic Reconnaissance Wing 

Northwest African Strategic Air Force 

Northwest African Tactical Air Force 

North African Theater of Operations 

North African Theater of Operations, U.S. Army 

OCAC 

OCAS 

OCTAGON 

OPD 

oss Office of Strategic Services 

OVERLORD 

Office of the Chief of the Air Corps 

Office of the Chief of the Air Service 

Second Quebec Conference between the Americans and the British 

Operations Plans Division, War Department General Staff 

The cross-channel invasion from Britain to Normandy, executed 

August-September 1944 

June 6. 1944 

PFF 

PINETREE 

POINTBLANK 

QUEEN 

Pathfinder aircraft equipped with early versions of H2X radar 

Code name for VIII Bomber Command and later Eighth Air Force 

American strategic bombing effort before the cross-Channel 

Heavy bomber mission in support of American First Army, 

Headquarters 

invasion, executed June 1943-May 1944 

executed November 1944 

RAF British Royal Air Force 

RAFDEL 

RAINBOW No. 5 

Royal Air Force Delegation to Washington D.C., 1939-1945 

Joint Army-Navy War Plan calling for the major effort against 

Germany and defense of the Pacific, partially executed immediately 

after Pearl Harbor 

REDLINE AAF communication circuit set up to provide private, high-level 

communication between senior AAF officers in Europe and in 

the Mediterranean 

739 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Reichsbahn 

ROUNDUP 

SLdr 

SATIN 

SCAEF 

SHAEF 

SHA~TER 

SLEDGEHAMMER 

SOE 

sos 

SUPER-GYMNAST 

THUNDERCLAP 

TORCH 

ULTRA 

USAFBI 

USMA 

USSBS 

USSTAF 

WAAC 

WAC 

WD 

WDAF 

WDFM 

WDGS 

WEARY - WILLIE 

Wehrmacht 

WIDEWINGS 

WD 

“Y” Service 

The German state railway system 

Plan for Anglo-American invasion of France in Fall 1942, not executed 

Squadron Leader 

Plan for American offensive in Southern Tunisia, January 1943, 

not executed 

Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force 

Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force 

Plan for bombing small towns in Germany, July 1944, not executed 

Plan for Allied invasion of France in the spring of 1943, not executed 

Special Operations Executive (clandestine British intelligence 

Service of Supply, U.S. Army 

Invasion of North Africa, later became TORCH 

organization) 

Plan for terror bombing of Berlin, executed February 3, 1945 

Allied invasion of North Africa, executed November 8, 1942 

British code name for intelligence gathered by decrypting 

German wireless communications enciphered on the Enigma 

machine in World War I1 

U.S. Army Forces in the British Isles 

US. Military Academy, West Point, New York 

U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey 

U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe 

Women’s Auxiliary Army Corps, U.S. Army 

Women’s Army Corps, U.S. Army 

War Department 

Western Desert Air Force 

War Department Field Manual 

War Department General Staff 

Project to send radio-controlled war-weary heavy bombers 

against Germany, not executed 

German Armed Forces, 1933-1945 

Code name Eighth Air Force and later USSTAF Headquarters 

War Plans Division, War Department General Staff 

British radio-telephone intercept organization 

740 
Bibliography 

Bibliography 

Manuscript Collections 

Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Washington, D.C. 

Papers of Carl Andrew Spaatz 

These papers, which comprise 379 containers, form the foundation of this 

volume. They were given to the Library of Congress by General Spaatz and the 

U.S. Air Force in 1948. They are divided into eight series, two of which proved 

of particular importance to this book-Diary and Notebooks, 1910-1953, and 

Subject File, 1929-1945. The diary file does not consist of Spaatz’s private 

recollections and reminiscences. Rather, it contains copies of correspondence, 

cables, reports, meetings, and office diaries arranged chronologically, and 

personally selected by Spaatz at the time he received them for inclusion in this 

file. I could find no evidence of a systematic exclusion of derogatory or sensitive 

material from this file. The Subject File, which makes up half the collection, is a 

mixture of nuggets of historical gold and trivia. This file grudgingly yields 

extremely valuable information about almost every imaginable aspect of the air 

war in Europe. Archivists at the Library of Congress note that, year in and year 

out, the Spaatz collection is heavily used by researchers. 

Papers of Henry H. Arnold 

Papers of Hoyt S. Vandenberg 

Papers of Ira C. Eaker 

Papers of James H. Doolittle 

Papers of Nathan F. Twining 

Papers of Frank M. Andrews 

These collections, listed in order of their importance to this work, flesh out 

the full details of Spaatz’s relationships with six of his most important contemporaries. The Arnold collection provides copies of Arnold-Spaatz and 

Arnold-Eisenhower correspondence unavailable elsewhere. Arnold’s personal 

notebooks on the great Anglo-American political and military conferences 

supply unique insights into his and the AAF’s thinking. Vandenberg’s diary 

gives useful information on his relationship with Spaatz, the extent of Spaatz’s 

control of the Ninth Air Force, and relationship with Leigh-Mallory. The Eaker, 

743 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Doolittle, and Twining collections contain occasional pieces of correspondence 

and insight into the thinking of both men. 

Center for Air Force History (CAFH), Washington, D.C. 

Microfilm Collection 

This microfilm collection of at least 17,000 reels is one of three microfilm 

copies of the paper records of the Air Force Historical Research Center 

(AFHRC) at Maxwell AFB, Alabama. AFHRC and the Washington National 

Records Center, Suitland, Maryland, store the other two copies of this film. 

Among the varied items included on the microfilm are personal papers, 

USSTAF office files, historical files of numerous AAF organizations, series of 

Eighth Air Force and Fifteenth Air Force statistical reports, mission reports, and 

special reports on operations, tactics, and significant events. Unfortunately, the 

file does not have a detailed finding aid, thus researchers are reduced to timeconsuming and often fruitless searches for pertinent material. AF/CHO refers to 

the center’s former designation-The Office of Air Force History. 

AF/CHO. Dresden Subject File. 

AF/CHO. USAF Historical Research Studies Collection. 

AF/CHO. Air Force Oral History Collection 

Interview of Maj. Gen. Frederick L. Anderson, K239.512-607 

Interview of Gen. Orvil Anderson, K239.512-898 

Interview of Gen. Samuel E. Anderson, K239.512-905 

Interviews of Lt. Gen. Arthur C. Agan, K239.512-857,899 

Interviews of Gen. James H. Doolittle, K239.512-623,625,793,799 

Interview of Maj. Gen. Edward P. Curtis, K239.512-875 

Interviews of Gen. Ira C. Eaker, K239.512-626,627,799,868,918 

Interviews of Lt. Gen. Barney M. Giles, K239.2512-779, 804 

Interviews of Maj. Gen. James P. Hodges, K239.512-565,799 

Interview of Gen. Laurence S. Kuter, K239.512-810 

Interview of Gen. Lauris Norstad, K239.512-1116 

Interview of 1st Lt. Charles R. D’Olive, K239.512-612 

Interview of Gen. Earle E. Partridge, K239.2512-729 

Interview of Lt. Gen. Elwood R. Quesada, K239.512-838 

Interview of Gen. Frederic H. Smith, K239.512-903 

Interviews of Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, K239.512-583,754,755,767 

Interview of Mrs. Carl A. Spaatz (Ruth), K239.512-1266 

Interview of Maj. Gen. Arthur Vanaman, K239.512-1030 

The foregoing interviews and files contain unique information on controversial 

or obscure incidents or technical and doctrinal points. Like all oral histories, these 

must be used with circumspection. 

744 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Numbered AAF/USAF Historical Studies 

39. Layman, Martha E. “Legislation Relating to the Air Corps Personnel and Training 

70. Hennessey, Juliette. “Tactical Operations of the Eighth Air Force, 6 June 1944-8 May 

78. Goldman, Martin R. R. “Morale in the AAF in World War 11.” (1953). 

88. Ackerman, Robert W. “The Employment of Strategic Bombers in a Tactical Role, 

158. Schmid, Josef, and Grabmann, Walter. “The German Air Force Versus the Allies in the 

159. Schmid, Josef. “The German Air Force Versus the Allies in the West: The German Air 

164. Grabmann, Walter. “German Air Force Air Defense Operations.” (1956). 

Programs, 1907-1939.” (1945). 

1945.” (1952). 

1941-1951.” (1953). 

West: The Air War in the West.” (1954). 

Defense.” (1954). 

These works are of uneven quality but provide technical details not readily 

available elsewhere. The German generals monograph project (150-195) gives a 

valuable inside look at various aspects of the Luftwaffe. 

U.S. Air Force Academy Library, Colorado Springs, Colorado 

Papers of Lawrence S. Kuter 

Papers of George C. McDonald 

Kuter’s papers supply useful information on his participation in the North 

African campaign, Eaker’s removal from command of the Eighth Air Force, the 

Yalta Conference, and the Dresden controversy. McDonald served as Spaatz’s 

intelligence chief throughout the war. His papers help to establish what Spaatz 

knew and when he knew it. 

U.S. Army Military History Institute, Carlisle, Pennsylvania 

Papers of Omar N. Bradley 

Papers of Hobart Gay 

Papers of Chester Hanson 

This collection supplies useful information on the ground Army’s attitude 

toward the AAF and Spaatz. 

Royal Air Force (RAF) Museum, Hendon, England 

Papers of Air Chief Marshal James Robb 

These papers contain transcripts of high-level meetings at SHAEF during 

745 
SPAA-SZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

the Battle of the Bulge. They also supply handwritten notebooks of daily affairs 

in North Africa, North African photos, and notes by the marshal on William 

Welsh’s Final TORCH Report. 

Public Records and Documents, 

Unpublished 

U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) 

National Archives, Washington, D. C. 

Record Group 18-Records of the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps 

Record Group 107-Records of the Office of the Secretary of War 

Record 165-Records of the War Department General Staff 

Assistant Secretary of War for Air Files 

Assistant Chief of Staff Files 

Intelligence Files 

Record Group 337-Records of the Army Ground Forces 

Washington National Records Center, Suitland, Maryland 

Record Group 18-Records of the Office of the Chief of the Air Corps 

Reference Collection 

Air Adjutant General Central Cable Files 

War Department Classified Message Center File, 1942-1 947 

Eisenhower Presidential Library, Abilene, Kansas 

Papers of Lloyd R. Fredendall 

Unpublished portions of the Butcher Diary 

The War Department Classified Message Center File is one of the most 

historically valuable and least-known collections of records dealing with U.S. 

military history. It contains microfilm copies of every message sent or received 

(including information copies of intratheater messages) by the War Department, 

the General Staff and all its branches, and by the GHQ, AAF, as well as transcripts of the wartime transatlantic teletype and telephone conversations between 

Marshall and Eisenhower, Roosevelt and Churchill, and all others who used the 

circuits. Although these records, unfortunately, cannot be searched by subject, a 

researcher who already has a reasonable citation, including date of origin, can 

746 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

obtain a copy of all of the key high-level messages and cables of the war. The 

Operations Division records contain information on training and high-level 

telegrams. G-3 and AGF records give background on air-ground relations and 

training manuals. The Fredendall Papers (one small folder) and Butcher’s diary 

give insights into the North African campaign. 

The Public Records Office (PRO), Kew, England 

PRO AIR/2 

PRO AIR/8 

PRO AIRD 

PRO AIR/20 

PRO AIR/23 

The PRO contains records of the Air Ministry and miscellaneous correspondence from field commanders and is the most important source for Portal’s 

and Bottomley’s wartime thoughts and actions. The field correspondence gives 

crucial data from Coningham, Tedder, and Welsh. 

PRO AIR/37 

These records of Leigh-Mallory ’s Allied Expeditionary Air Force, including 

his daily post-D-day diary and many records concerning the background and 

formation of the AEAF, form a key source for the study of OVERLORD. 

PRO AIR/41 

These RAF historical monographs give the RAF’s own view of its activities 

and include valuable documentation and insights not available elsewhere. 

PRO CAB/101 

These records contain copies of the British World War I1 official histories 

with additional information and backup documents not released at the time of 

publication. 

PRO PREM/3 

These records of the Prime Minister as Secretary of Defense and war leader 

provide Churchill’s views unfiltered for postwar publication. 

British Air Ministry, Air Historical Branch, London England 

Unpublished, undated campaign narratives by the RAF: 

747 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Anglo-American Collaboration in the Air War over North West Europe 

The Liberation of North West Europe 

Vol. 1 : The Planning and Preparation of the Allied Expeditionary Air Force for the 

Vol. 4: The Breakout and the Advance to the Lower Rhine, June 1944September 

Landings in Normandy 

1944 

The North African Campaign, November 1942-May 1943 

The RAF in the Bombing Offensive Against Germany 

Vol. 3: Area Bombing and the Makeshift Force, June 1941-February 1942 

Vol. 4: A Period of Expansion and Experiment, March 1942-Janurary 1943 

Vol. 5: The Full Offensive, February 1943-February 1944 

Vol. 6: The Final Phase, March 1944-May 1945 

The RAF narrative histories were security-classified monographs intended 

for internal RAF use; as such, they are unusually frank in their criticisms of both 

the RAF and its sister services. They are of uneven quality, but represent a 

valuable historical source well worth examination. Microfilm copies of all listed 

narratives but the first are available at the Center for Air Force History, Washington, D.C. The office also maintains an extensive annotated index of RAF 

records given to the PRO and backup documentation for its historical monographs. 

Public Records and Documents, 

Published 

U.S. Official Histories 

Craven, Wesley Frank, and Cate, James Lea, eds. The Army Air Forces in World 

War II,4 of 7 vols: 

Vol. 1: Plans & Early Operations, January 1939 to August 1942. Chicago: 

Vol. 2: Europe: Torch to Pointblank, August 1942 to December 1943. Chicago: 

Vol. 3: Europe: Argument to V-E Day, January 1944 to May 1945. Chicago: 

Vol. 6: Men and Planes. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1955. 

University of Chicago Press, 1948. 

University of Chicago Press, 1949. 

University of Chicago Press, 1951. 

Craven and Cate, recently reprinted by the Center for Air Force History, is 

the starting point for any serious study of the AAF in World War 11. One of its 

chief faults, however, is its lack of perspective concerning air problems. It tends 

748 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

to be subjective and is somewhat unreliable for enemy casualty and loss figures. 

On many doctrinal points it fails to present an objective viewpoint. Because the 

combat volumes are all well over thirty years old they lack the benefit of more 

recent scholarship. In addition, the source materials for several of the work’s 

chapters seem to have been scattered or broken up, so it is difficult to identify and 

locate key documents used by the original authors. Despite quibbles about a few 

judgments and statistics, Craven and Cate nevertheless remains the authoritative 

history of the AAF during the war. 

UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR I1 

Subseries: The War Department 

Cline, Ray S. Washington Command Post: The Operations Division.Washington, D.C.: OCMH, 

Coakley, Robert W., and Leighton, Richard M. Global Logistics and Strategy, 1943-1945. 

Leighton, Robert W., and Coakley, Richard M. Global Logistics and Strategy, 1940-1943. 

Matloff, Maurice, and Snell, Edwin M. Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare, 1941-1 942. 

Matloff, Maurice. Strategic Planning for Coalition Warfare, 1943-1 944. Washington, D.C.: 

Watson, Mark S. Chief of Staff: Pre-War Plans and Preparations. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, 

GPO, 1951. 

Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1968. 

Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1955. 

Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1953. 

OCMH, GPO, 1959. 

GPO, 1950. 

Subseries: The European Theater of Operations 

Blumenson, Martin. Breakout and Pursuit. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1961. 

Harrison, Gordon A. Cross-Channel Attack. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1951. 

MacDonald, Charles B. The Siegfried Line Campaign. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1963. 

Pope, Forrest C. The Supreme Command. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1954. 

Subseries: The Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

Garland, Albert N., and Smyth, Howard McGaw. Sicily and the Surrender of Italy. Washington, 

Howe, George F. Northwest Africa: Seizing the Initiative in the West. Washington, D.C.: 

D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1965. 

OCMH, GPO, 1957. 

Subseries: The Army Ground Forces and Miscellaneous 

Beck, Alfred M.; Bortz, Abe; Lynch, Charles W.; Mayo, Lida; and Weld, Ralph. The Corps of 

Holley, Irving Brinton, Jr. Buying Aircraft: Mate‘riel Procurement for the Army Air Forces. 

Jones, Vincent C. Manhattan: The Army and the Atomic Bomb.Washington, D.C.: CMH, GPO, 

Palmer, Robert R.; Wiley, Bell I.; and Keart, William R. The Procurement and Training of 

Treadwell, Mattie E. The Women’s Army Corps. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1954. 

United States Army. Office of the Chief of History. The War Against Germany and Italy: 

Engineers: The War Against Germany. Washington, D.C.: CMH, GPO, 1985. 

Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1964. 

1985. 

Ground Combat Troops. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 1948. 

749 
SPAArZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Mediterranean and Adjacent Areas: The Pictorial Record. Washington, D.C.: OCMH, GPO, 

1951. 

The Army “green series,” published by the Office of the Chief of Military 

History (OCMH), now the Center of Military History (CMH), and produced by 

the US. Government Printing Office (GPO), supplies information on air-ground 

support, technical aspects of procurement, and prewar planning. Pogue’s volume 

on the Supreme Command, Matloff‘s two volumes on Strategic Planning, and 

Leighton’s and Coakley ’s two volumes on logistics provide essential information 

on high-level planning and give adequate treatment to air issues. 

Unitled States Strategic Bombing Survey (USSBS) 

Aircraft Division. Industry Report, Vol. 4,2d ed. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947 

Area Studies Division. Area Studies Division Report, Vol. 31. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947. 

Area Studies Division. A Brief Study of the Effects of Area Bombing on Berlin, Augsburg, 

Bochum, Leipzig, Hagen, Dortmund, Oberhausen, and Bremen, Vol. 39. Washington, D.C.: 

GPO, 1947. 

Military Analysis Division. The Defeat of the German Air Force, Vol. 59. Washington, D.C.: 

GPO, 1947. 

Military Analysis Division. Air Force Rate of Operations, Vol. 61. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

1947 

Military Analysis Division. Weather Factors in Combat Bombardment Operations in the 

European Theater, Vol. 62. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947. 

Military Analysis Division. Bombing Accuracy: USAAF Heavy & Medium Bombers in the 

ETO, Vol. 63. Washington, D.C.: GPO, n.d. [ca. 19471. 

Military Analysis Division. The Impact of the Allied Air Effort on German Logistics, Vol. 64a. 

Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947. 

Oil Division. Oil Division FinalReport, Vol. 109. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947. 

Physical Damage Division. Fire Raids on German Cities, Vol. 193. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 

Summary Report (European War). Vol. 1. Washington, D.C.: GPO, September 30, 1945. 

Transportation Division. The Effects of Strategic Bombing on German Transportation, Vol. 

1947. 

200. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1947. 

The Strategic Bombing Survey began its studies before the end of the war in 

Europe and collected an extraordinary amount of data about all phases of U.S. 

strategic bombing in Europe and Japan. The various published reports of this 

independent, but AAF-dominated, group deserve careful scrutiny by anyone 

interested in the technical aspects of the American strategic bombing offensive. 

U.S. Government and Air Force Publications 

Boylan, Bernard. Development of the Long-Range Escort Fighter. U.S. Air Force Historical 

Carter, Kit C., and Mueller, Robert, eds. The Army Air Forces in World War II: Combat 

Frisbee, John L. Makers of the United States Air Force. Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 

Study No. 139.1955. 

Chronology. Washington, D.C.: AFICHO, GPO, 1973. 

1987. 

750 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Futrell, Robert Frank. Ideas, Concepts, Doctrine: A History of Basic Thinking in the United 

States Air Force, 1907-1964. Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.: Air University Press, 1971. 

Greenfield, Kent Roberts. Army Ground Forces and the Air-Ground Battle Team: Including 

Organic Light Aviation. Historical Study No. 35, Ft. Monroe, Va.: Air Ground Forces, 1948. 

Greer, Thomas H. The Development of Air Doctrine in the Army Air Arm, 191 7-1941, US. Air 

Force Historical Study No. 89. Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.: Air University Press, 1955. 

Hansell, Haywood S., Jr. The Strategic Air War Against Germany and Japan: A Memoir. 

Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1986. 

Kohn, Richard H., and Harahan, Joseph P., eds. Air Superiority in World War I1 and Korea. 

Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1983. 

Maurer, Maurer. Aviation in the US. Army, 1919-1939. Washington D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 

1987. 

,- ed. The US. Air Service in World War I, Vols. 1 and 3. Washington D.C.: AFICHO, 

GPO, 1978. 

Momyer, William W. Airpower in Three Wars. Washington, D.C.: AFICHO, GPO, 1978. 

Mortensen, Daniel R. A Pattern for Joint Operations: World War 11 Close Air Support, North 

Africa. Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO and CMH, 1987. 

Murray, Williamson. Strategy for Defeat: The Luftwaffe, 1933-1945. Maxwell Air Force Base, 

Ala.: Air University Press, 1983. 

Osur, Alan M. Blacks in the Army Air Forces During World War 11: The Problem of Race 

Relations. Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1977. 

Putney, Diane T., ed. ULTRA and the Army Air Forces in World War 11: An Interview with 

Associate Justice of the US. Supreme Court Lewis F. Powell, Jr. Washington, D.C.: 

AF/CHO, GPO, 1987. 

Thompson, Wayne, ed. Air Leadership: Proceedings of a Conference at Bolling Air Force 

Base, April 13-14,1984. Washington, D.C.: AF/CHO, GPO, 1986. 

US. Congress, House. Select Committee Inquiry into the Operations of the United Air Services, 

Hearings. 68th Cong., 2d Sess., 1924. 

US. Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States: The Conferences at Cairo 

and Teheran. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1961. 

US. Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States: The Conferences at Malta 

and Yalta, 1945. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1955. 

US. Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States: The Conferences at Washington, 1941-1942, and Casablanca, 1943. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1968. 

US. Military Academy. The Howitzer 1914. West Point: USMA, 1914. 

US. National Security Agency. ULTRA: History of US Strategic Air Force Europe vs. The German Air Forces. NSA Special Research History No. 13, June 1945. 

U.S. War Department. Annual Reports of the Chief of the Air Service and Air Corps, 

1921-1938. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1921-1938. 

U.S. War Department. Annual Reports of the Secretary of War, the Chief of Staff, and the 

Assistant Secretaries of War, 1919-1941. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1919-1941. 

U.S. War Department. Office of Statistical Control. Army Air Forces Statistical Digest, World 

War 11. Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1945. 

Watts, Lt. Col. Bany D. The Foundations of US Air Doctrine: The Problems of Friction in 

War. Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.: Air University Press, 1984. 

The AAF Statistical Digest is a prime source for the quantitative analysis of 

AAF operations in this book. Murray’s book provides data on both the AAF and 

the Luftwaffe, but, unfortunately, the author concluded his study in September 

1944. One copy of the Annual Reports of the Secretary of War is available in 

the Army Library in the Pentagon, while a copy of the Reports of the Chief of 

the Air Corps is in the CAFH reference library. Greenfield’s study gives the 

Army Ground Forces’ view of close air support. Putney’s work has an excellent 

introduction on World War I1 intelligence. 

75 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

British Official Histories 

Butler, J.R.M. Grand Strategy. Vol. 2: September 1939-June 1941. London: HMSO, 1957. 

Ehrrnan, John. Grand Strategy. Vol. 5: August 1943-September 1944.London: HMSO, 

Gibbs, Norman H. Grand Strategy. Vol. 1: Rearmament Policy. London: HMSO, 1976. 

Great Britain, Air Ministry. The Rise and Fall of the German Air Force, 1933-1945. New 

York: St. Martin’s Press, 1983. 

Gwyer, J.M.A., and Butler, J.R.M. Grand Strategy. Vol. 3, parts 1 and 2: June 

1941-August 1942. London: HMSO, 1964. 

Hinsley, F. H. British Intelligence in the Second World War: Its Influence on Strategy and 

Operations. Vols. 1,2, and 3 of 4 in 5 books. London: HMSO, 1979-1988. 

Playfair, I.S.O., Flynn, F. C., Molony, C.J.C., and Toomer, S. E. The Mediterranean and 

Middle East, Vol. 2: The Germans Come to the Help of Their Ally (1941). London: 

HMSO, 1956. 

Playfair, I.S.O., Molony, C.J.C., Flynn, F. C., and Gleave, F. L. The Mediterranean and the 

Middle East. Vol. 4: The Destruction of the Axis Forces in Africa. London: HMSO, 

1966. 

Richards, Denis. The Royal Air Force, 1939-1945. Vol. 1: The Fight at Odds. London: 

HMSO, 1953. 

Richards, Denis, and Saunders, Hilary St. George. The Royal Air Force. Vol. 2: The Fight 

.4vails. London: HMSO, 1954. 

Roskill, S. W. The War at Sea, 1939-1945. Vol. 3, part 1: The Offensive 1st June 

1943-31st May 1944. London: HMSO, 1960. 

Webster, Charles, and Frankland, Noble. The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany, 

1939-1945. London: HMSO, 1961. 

Vol. 1 : Preparation parts, 1,2, and 3. 

Vol. 2: Endeavor, part 4. 

Vol. 3: Victory. 

Vol. 4: Annexes and Appendices. 

1956. 

Hinsley’s works constitute the definitive British intelligence histories of 

the war. They have precise information on the all-important ULTRA organization as well as other sources of information. We are unlikely ever to get 

government information on the activities of Allied intelligence other than in 

this series. The Air Ministry history of the Luftwaffe, originally published in 

1947 as a security-classified document, is based on Luftwaffe records 

captured by the British and postwar interrogations of Luftwaffe and other 

high Nazi officials. Because of the fragmentary nature of surviving 

Luftwaffe documentation-almost 90 percent of it was destroyed at the end 

of the war-the work still presents one of the best comprehensive views of 

the Gt:rman air arm. Webster and Frankland’s supply valuable operational, 

strategic, and statistical data. Playfair’s volume, while glossing over some 

British shortcomings, is a good integrated history of the campaign. All 

British Official Histories are published through Her Majesty’s Stationery 

Office (HMSO). 

British Bombing Survey Unit (BBSU) 

The Strategic Air War Against Germany, 1939-1940 

752 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

This document, completed in 1947, is the final report of the BBSU. It served 

as a statistical basis for many of the assessments of bombing results contained in 

the British official history of the strategic bombing offensive and stands in its 

own right as a useful summary of the bombing campaign. 

Dissertations 

Davis, Richard Green. “The Bomber Baron: Carl Andrew Spaatz and the Army Air Forces in 

Fanton, Jonathan Foster. “Robert A. Lovett: The War Years” (Ph.D., Yale University, 1978). 

Flugel, Raymond Richard. “United States Air Power Doctrine: A Study of the Influence of William 

Mitchell and Giulio Douhet at the Air Corps Tactical School, 1921-1935” (Ph.D., University of 

Oklahoma, 1965). 

Julian, Thomas Anthony. “Operation FRANTIC and the Search for American-Soviet Military 

Collaboration, 1941-1944” (Ph.D., Syracuse University, 1967). 

Meilinger, Phillip Stanley. “Hoyt S. Vandenberg: The Life of a General” (Ph.D., University of 

Michigan, 1985). 

Mierzejewski, Alfred C. “Wheels Must Roll for Victory: Allied Air Power and the German War 

Economy, 1944-1945” (Ph.D., University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1985). 

Reynolds, Jon A. “Education and Training for High Command: General Hoyt S. Vandenberg’s 

Early Career” (Ph.D., Duke University, 1980). 

Smith, Melden E., Jr. “The Bombing of Dresden Reconsidered” (Ph.D., Boston University, 1971). 

Tate, James P. “The Army and Its Air Corps: A Study of the Evolution of Army Policy Towards 

Europe, 1942-194s” (PhD., George Washington University, 1986). 

Aviation, 1919-1941” (Ph.D., Indiana University, 1976). 

Mierzejewski’s work is a masterly exposition of the effects of Allied 

bombing on the German transportation system and the fatal damage done to the 

German war economy by the choking off of its coal distribution system. Tate 

shows that, contrary to myth, the Army made a sincere effort to support its air 

arm, despite limited resources. The works on Vandenberg and Lovett give 

useful details on the careers of those important men. Meilinger’s work has 

recently been published by Indiana University Press. 

Articles 

Barnett, Lincoln. “General Spaatz: America’s No. 1 Airman in Africa,”Life (April 19, 1943): 72-84. 

Beaumont, Roger. “The Bomber Offensive as a Second Front,” Journal of Contemporary History 

Bottomley, Norman H. “The Strategic Air Offensive Against Germany,” Royal United Services 

Coningham, Arthur. “The Development of Tactical Air Forces,” Royal United Services Institute 

Davis, Richard G. “Operation Thunderclap: the U.S. Army Air Forces and the Bombing of Berlin, 

__ . “Carl A. Spaatz and the Development of the Royal Air Force-U.S. Army Air Corps 

__ . “RAF-AAF Higher Command Structures and Relationships, 194245,” Air Power History 

XXII (January 1987): 3-19. 

Institute Journal XCIII (May 1948): 225-239. 

Journal XCI (May 1946): 21 1-226. 

“The Journal of Strategic Studies XIV (March 1991): 90-1 11. 

Relationship, 1939-1940,” The Journal ofMilitary History LIV (October 1990): 453-472. 

XXXVIII (Summer 1991) : 20-28. 

153 
SPAA’TZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

-. . “Bombing Strategy Shifts, 1944-45,” Air Power History XXXVI (Winter 1989): 3345. 

Eaker, Ira C. “Part 11: Memories of Six Air Chiefs,” Aerospace Historian XX (December 1973): 

-. . “Gen. Carl A. Spaatz, USAF,” Air Force Magazine LVlI (September 1974): 43-53. 

Holley,, Irving B., Jr. “Of Sabre Charges, Escort Fighters, and Space Craft,” Air University Review 

Jacobs, W. A. “Strategic Bombing and American National Strategy, 1941-1943,” Military Affairs L 

Keegan, John. “Berlin,” MHQ: The Quarterly Journal ofMilitary History I1 (Winter 1990): 72-83. 

Kindleberger, Charles F. “World War 11 Strategy,” Encounter LIII (November 1978): 3942. 

Lloyd, Hugh. “Allied Air Power in the Mediterranean 1940-45,” Royal United Services Institute 

Journal XCII (November 1947): 554-566. 

Lytton, Henry D. “Bombing Policy in the Rome and Pre-Normandy Aerial Campaigns of World War 

11: Bridge-Bombing Strategy Vindicated and Railroad-Bombing Strategy Invalidated,” Military 

Affairs XLVII (April 1983): 55-58. 

McFarland, Stephen L. “The Evolution of the American Strategic Fighter in Europe, 194244.” The 

Journal of Strategic Studies X (June 1987): 189-208. 

Murray, Williamson. “Attrition and the Luftwaffe,” Air University Review XXIV (March-April 

1983): 66-77. 

Rostow, Walt W. “The Controversy Over World War I1 Bombing,” Encounter LV (AugustSeptember 1980): 1W102. 

Simpson, Albert F. ‘‘Tactical Air Doctrine-Tunisia and Korea,” Air University Quarterly Review 

IV (Summer 1951): 5-20. 

Spaatz, Carl. “Strategic Air Power: Fulfillment of a Concept,” Foreign Affairs XXV (April 1946): 

Sullivan, John J. “The Botched Air Support of Operation Cobra,” Parameters XVIII (March 1988): 

Tedder, Arthur. “Air, Land and Sea Warfare,” Royal United Services Institute Journal XCI 

“TRAINING: Experiment Proved?” Time (September 20,1943): 66,68. 

Werrell, Kenneth P. “The Strategic Bombing of Germany in World War 11,” The Journal of 

Wolk, Herman S. “Men Who Made the Air Force,” Air University Review, XXV (September-Octo- 

-, “Prelude to D-Day: The Bomber Offensive,” Air Force Magazine LVII (June 1974): 60-67. 

Wyman, David S. “Why Auschwitz Was Never Bombed,” Commentary LXV (May 1978): 137-146. 

188--197. 

XXXIV (September-December, 1983): 2-1 1. 

(July 1986): 133-139. 

385 -.396. 

97-1 10. 

(February 1946): 59-68. 

American History LXXIII (December 1986): 702-7 13. 

ber 1’972): 9-23. 

Tedder’s and Coningham’s RUSI lectures are important to understanding 

their views on air doctrine and its application during World War 11. 

Memoirs, Biographies, and 

Published Personal Papers 

Ambrose, Stephen E. The Supreme Commander: The War Years of General Dwight D. Eisenhower. 

Arnold, Henry H. Global Mission. New York: Harper & Row, 1949. 

Blumenson, Martin, ed. The Patton Papers. Vol. 2: 1940-1945. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974. 

Bradley, Omar N. A Soldier’s Story. New York: Henry Holt, 1951. 

Bradley, Omar N., and Blair, Clay. A General‘s Life. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983. 

Brereton, Lewis H. The Brereton Diaries: The War in the Pacific, Middle East and Europe, 3 

Butcher, Harry C. My Three Years with Eisenhower, The Personal Diary of Harry C. Butcher, USNR 

New York: Doubleday, 1970. 

October 1941-8 May 1945. New York William Morrow, 1946. 

754 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

NavalAide to General Eisenhower, 1942-1945. New York Simon & Schuster, 1946. 

Brown, 1976. 

more: John Hopkins Press, 1970. 

1950. 

H. “Hap” Arnold. New York: Viking, 1982. 

Carver, Michael, ed. The War Lords: Military Commanders of the Twentieth Century. Boston: Little, 

Chandler, Alfred D., ed. The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower: The War Years. 4 vols. BaltiChurchill, Winston S. The Second World War. Vol. 4: The Hinge of Fate. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 

Coffey, Thomas M. HAP: The Story of the US Air Force and the Man Who Built It: General Henry 

Eisenhower, David. Eisenhower: At War, 1943-1945. New York Random House, 1986. 

~- . Crusade in Europe. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1948. 

Ford, Corey. Donovan of OSS. Boston: Little, Brown, 1970. 

Galland, Adolph. The First and the Last: The Rise and Fall of the German Fighter Forces, 

Groves, Leslie R. Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project. New York Harper & 

Hamilton, Nigel. Master of the Battlefield: Monty’s War Years, 1942-1944. New York McGrawHarmon, E. N., and MacKaye, Milton. Combat Commander: Autobiography of a Soldier. New York: 

Harris, Arthur. Bomber Oflensive. New York: Macmillan, 1947. 

Hurley, Alfred F. Billy Mitchell: Crusader for Air Power. New York: Franklin Watts, 1964. 

James, D. Clayton. A Time for Giants: The Politics of the American High Command in World War 

Kelsey, Benjamin S. The Dragon’s Teeth. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1982. 

Kingston-McClourghry, E. J. The Direction of War: A Critique of the Political Direction and High 

Larrabee, Eric. Commander in Chiej? Franklin Delano Roosevelt, His Lieutenants, and Their War. 

Lay, Beime, Jr., and Bartlett, Sy. Twelve O’clock High! New York: Ballantine Books, 1965. 

Lowenheim, Francis L.; Langley, Harold D.; and Jonas, Manfred, eds. Roosevelt and Churchill: 

Their Secret Wartime Correspondence. New York: Saturday Review Press/E. P. Dutton, 1975. 

Meilinger, Philli p. Hoyt S. Vandenberg: The Life of a General. Bloomington: Indiana University 

Press, 1989. 

Mets, David R. Master of Airpower: General Carl A. Spaatz. Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 1988. 

Montgomery, Bemard L. The Memories of Field-Marshal the Viscount Montgomery of Alamein. 

Parton, James. “Air Force Spoken Here”: General Ira Eaker & the Command of the Air. Bethesda, 

Pogue, Forrest C. George C. Marshall: Ordeal and Hope, 1939-1942. New York: Viking, 1966. 

-- . George C. Marshall: Organizer of Victory, 1943-1945. New York: Viking, 1973. 

Puryear, Edgar F. Stars in Flight: A Study in Air Force Leadership. Novato, Calif.: Presidio Press, 

Roosevelt, Elliot. As He Saw It. New York Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1946. 

Saward, Dudley. Bomber Harris: The Story of Sir Arthur Harris, Marshal of the Royal Air Force. 

Shenvood, Robert E. Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History. New York Harper & Brothers, 

Slessor, John. The Central Blue: Recollections and Reflections. London: Cassell, 1956. 

Smith, Walter Bedell. Eisenhower’s Six Great Decisions: Europe, 1944-1945. New York: 

Speer, Albert. Inside the Third Reich. New York: Macmillan, 1970. 

Tedder, Arthur. With Prejudice: The War Memoirs of Marshal of the Royal Air Force, Lord Tedder 

Truscott, Lucian K. Command Decisions: A Personal Story. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1954. 

Zuckerman, Solly. From Apes to Warlords. New York: Harper & Row, 1978. 

1938-1945. New York: Henry Holt, 1954. 

Brothers, 1962. 

Hill, 1983. 

Prentice-Hall, 1970. 

11. New York: Franklin Watts, 1987. 

Command in War. New York: Praeger, 1956. 

New York: Harper & Row, 1987. 

New York: World Publishing, 1958. 

Md.: Adler & Adler, 1986. 

1981. 

Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1985. 

1950. 

Longmans, Green, 1956. 

GCB. Boston: Little, Brown, 1966. 

755 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Arnold’s memoirs, although hastily ghost-written and poorly edited, are still 

superior to any biography written about him. Tedder and Zuckerman, both of 

whom knew Spaatz well, also yield important information, especially on the 

transportation plan. Eisenhower’s papers are extremely valuable, especially if 

one is unable to make the haj to Abilene, Kansas, to check the originals. They 

must be used with care, however, because comments on personnel serving with 

or under him have been severely edited. Ambrose’s biography of Eisenhower is 

probably the best military biography of the Supreme Commander. Anyone 

wishing to appreciate Spaatz’s contributions as a pioneer aviator and as the 

second Commanding General of the AAF and the first Chief of Staff of the 

USAF should start with Mets’s biography published in 1988, which covers 

Spaatx’s entire career before, during, and after World War 11, concentrating on 

Spaatz the man. Prior to the publication of Mets’s book, Alfred Goldberg’s 

fourteen-page article on Spaatz in The War Lords was the only published and 

reasonably widely available biography of Spaatz. 

Monographs and Secondary 

Sources 

Arad, Yitzak. Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka: The Operation Reinhard Death Camps. Bloomington: 

Beck, EIarl R. Under the Bombs: The German Home Front, 1942-1945. Lexington: University Press 

Bennetl, Ralph. Ultra in the West: The Normandy Campaign of 1944-1945. New York: Charles 

Bidwell, Shelford, and Graham, Dominick. Fire Power: British Army Weapons and Theories of War, 

Cornparato, Frank E. Age of Great Guns: Cannon Kings and Cannoneers Who Forged the 

Copp, Dewitt S. A Few Great Captains: The Men and Events That Shaped the Development of U.S. 

. Forged in Fire: The Strategy and Decisions in the Air War Over Europe, 1940-1945. 

Indiana University Press, 1987. 

of Kentucky, 1986. 

Scribner’s Sons, 1980. 

1904-1945. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1982. 

Firepower of Artillery. Harrisburg, Pa.: Stackpole, 1965. 

Air Power. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1980. 

Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1982. 

Davis, 13urke. The Billy Mitchell AfSair. New York: Random House, 1967. 

D’Este, Carlo. Decision in Normandy. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1983. 

Frankland, Noble. Bomber Offensive: The Devastation of Europe. New York: Ballantine, 1970. 

Freeman, Roger A. The US Strategic Bomber. London: Macdonald and Jane’s, 1975. 

-. Mighty Eighth War Manual. London: Jane’s, 1984. 

Freidel, Frank. Over There: The Story of America’s First Overseas Crusade. New York: Bramhall 

Gilbert, Martin S. Auschwitz and the Allies. New York Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1981. 

Hansell, Haywood S. The Air Plan That Defeated Hitler. Atlanta: Higgins-McArthurLongino and 

Hastings, Max. Bomber Command. New York: Dial, 1980. 

Irving, IDavid. The Destruction of Dresden. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964. 

Kahn, David. The Codebreakers: The Story of Secret Writing. New York Macmillan, 1967. 

Lewin, Ronald. ULTRA Goes to War: The First Account of World War Il’s Greatest Secret Basd on 

. Mighty Eighth War Diary. London: Jane’s, 1981. 

House, 1964. 

Porter, 1972. 

756 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Ojficial Documents. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978. 

McKee, Alexander. Dresden 1945: The Devil‘s Tinderbox. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1984. 

Mierzejewski, Alfred C. The Collapse of the German War Economy, 1944--1945: Allied Air Power 

Morison, Samuel Eliot. History of United States Naval Operations in World War 11. Vol. 9: SicilyOrpen, Neil. Airlift to Warsaw: The Rising of 1944. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1984. 

Overy, R. J. The Air War, 1939-1945. New York Stein and Day, 1981. 

Rostow, W. W. Pre-Invasion Bombing Strategy: General Eisenhower’s Decision of March 25, 

Schaffer, Ronald. Wings of Judgement: American Bombing in World War 11. New York: Oxford 

Sherry, Michael S. The Rise of American Air Power: The Creation of Armageddon. New Haven: 

Stanley, Roy M. World War I1 Photo Intelligence. New York Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1981. 

Temiine, John. A Time for Courage: In the Royal Air Force in the European War, 1939-1945. New 

Vemer, Anthony. The Bomber Offensive. Rev. ed. London: Pan Books, 1974. 

Weigley, Russell F. Eisenhower’s Lieutenants: The Campaign of France and Germany, 1944-1945. 

Winterbotham, F. W. The Ultra Secret. New York Dell, 1979. 

Wykeham, Peter. Fighter Command: A Study of Air Defence, 1914-1960. London: Putnam, 1960. 

Wyman, David S. The Abandonment of the Jews: America and the Holocaust, 1941-1945. New 

and the German National Railway. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988. 

Salerno-Anzio, January 1943-June 1944. Boston: Little, Brown, 1954. 

1944. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981. 

University Press, 1985. 

Yale University Press, 1987. 

York Macmillan, 1985. 

Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981. 

York: Pantheon. 1984. 

Roger Freeman’s books on the Eighth Air Force, although written for trivia 

buffs, give an accurate and colorful picture of equipment, tactics, and operations 

of the American heavy-bomber forces in Europe. Weigley ’s book on northwestern Europe is the best single account of the campaign, while D’Este has 

written an excellent account of Normandy. John Tenaine’s work on the RAF 

also is worthwhile. Frankland’s short work for the Ballantine War Series 

presents an interesting contrast to his official endeavors. In the Ballantine work 

Frankland draws conclusions apparently denied to him in an official role; for 

instance, he gives Spaatz the laurel for winning the bomber offensive. 

Schaffer’s book is a well-researched, balanced account of the moral dilemma 

faced by the AAF when the pursuit of victory led it beyond precision bombing 

to city bombing. Sherry offers good research and stimulating writing in an 

ultimately unsuccessful attempt to apply anti-Vietnam War morality to 

American bombing in World War 11. Both books make a stronger case for the 

immorality of bombing Japan than Germany, focusing on the AAF’s massive 

fire raid on Tokyo and on the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The 

current social trends rejecting nuclear war and open racism, one unheard of and 

the other not questioned in the 1940s, make the war against Japan a hot topic of 

modern research. The atrocities and racism of the Japanese regime are 

dismissed as cultural differences. Such a case cannot be made for the Germans. 

They belonged to the mainstream of Western culture, were Caucasian to a fault, 

and committed atrocities on a numbing scale. 

757 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Unpublished Material 

Cabell, C.P. Unpublished autobiography. 

Hughes, Richard D’O. Unpublished autobiography. 

Miets, David. Untitled manuscript biography of Spaatz, 1982. 

The Hughes autobiography gives useful inside details on the Eighth Air 

Force and USSTAF. I thank Professor W. W. Rostow for giving me the wartime 

chapters of this work. The edited version of Mets’s work, published under the 

title Muster ofAir Power, is included under Memoirs, Biographies, and Published 

Personal Papers above. This manuscript is particularly strong on Spaatz’s preWorld. War I1 career and benefits from Mets’s numerous interviews with 

Spaatz’s family and associates. General Cabell was one of the AAF’s leading 

intelligence officers. He also served in combat, leading a wing of Eighth Air 

Force lheavy bombers. He was present in Spaatz’s headquarters at Park House on 

the da:y of the initial Big Week mission, and he gives an important account of 

the events of that evening. The CAFH archives contains a copy of this work. 

758 
Index 

Index 

Axhen, Germany, raid on: 376, 482 

AAF. See UNted States Army Air 

AAF Evaluation Board, targets oE 410 

AAF Office of Information Services: 

ABC tallcs, agreements in: 7-0 

ABC-1 

ForceS. 

524 

report submittat 59 

theater air forces created by: 71 

ABC-2, report submitted: 59 

Afrika Kovps: 136 

Air Commanders Conference: 572, 574. 

see also Allied Air commanders 

Conference 

Air Corps Tactical School: vii, 28, 131. 

See also Air Service Tactical 

School. 

attended by Spaatz: 14 

tenets OE 29-31 

Aircraft types (British) 

Bea~ighter: 176 

Boston Bomber. 90 

Hurricane: 53, 64, 125. 139 

kcaster: 94, 556, 557 

Mosquito: 307 

Spitfire: 29, 53, 64. 90, 96, 125, 137, 

139, 144. 183, 195, 203, 225, 241. 

364, 371, 463 

Aircraft types (French) 

Aircraft types (Japanese) 

Wellington: 48 

Morane: 14 

Zero: 29 

Bf 109: 323,371. 372, 512, 542, 574 

Bf 110: 53, 64, 65, 370 

FW 190. 100, 371, 372, 373, 512, 

Ju 52: 191% 195 

Ju 87 (Stuka): 205 

Ju 88 323 

Me 210 372 

Me 262 484, 512, 539-540, 574 

Aircraft types (German) 

542, 574 

Aircraft types (U.S.) 

A-20 40, 171, 183 

A-36 248. 316 

B-9: 28 

B-10: 28,32 

B-17 24, 28, 30, 31, 38, 40, 42, 45, 

62, 64. 72, 74, 77, 79, 81, 82, 83, 

85, 90.96, 97, 98, 100, 103, 104, 

109, 132, 140, 142, 157, 163, 191, 

195, 1%. 198, 199, 200, 233. 234, 

235, 253, 261, 262, 263, 268, 271, 

303, 359,365, 371, 393, 395. 

439-440, 448, 468, 478, 552, 556, 

557, 558, 564 

B-24 31. 40, 97, 103. 104, 195, 253, 

257, 260. 262, 263, 303, 359, 365, 

393, 395, 398, 439. 448, 462, 468, 

478, 501, 503, 512, 526, 550, 552, 

556, 584 

B-26 40, 198 

B-29 31, 32, 260, 264, 311, 588 

c-47 85,584 

C-54 272 

DB-7: 171 

DH-4: 14 

P-26 28, 29 

B-25: 40,74, 125, 198, 262 

P-38: 65,66, 74, n, 79.85, %, 100, 

104, 109, 139, 174, 191, 264, 288, 

303. 312, 321.322, 361, 371, 376 

P40: 29, 40, 65, 74, 171, 176, 183, 

P47 65. 66, 174,303,322, 357, 361, 

P-39 74, 183, 259 

225,233,239 

371, 376, 396, 408, 512 

309, 316, 321. 323, 357, 361, 367, 

371, 372, 373, 376, 396, 512 

P-51: 31, 62, 65, 66, 275. 288, 297, 

P-80 512, 574 

YB40: 62 

Air Defence of Great Britain (ADGB) 

established: 80 

Fighter Command redesignated: 307 

Air Divisions. See Divisions (USAAF) 

Air Force Combat Command 

Air Force Manual 2-1: 119 

Air Forces (numbered, British) 

form& 58 

761 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

1st Tactical: 31% 

26 Tactical: 273% 307, 309, 310, 318, 

338, 364, 409. 454, 456, 489. 521, 

5% 

Air Foms (nm- US.) 

Foh 82, 88 

Eighh (see indiviahl entry under 

Ninth 156, 196, 2.40, 249, 250, 

Eighth Air Force) 

260-261, 262, 267, 273, 276, 277, 

278, 290. 299, 307, 309, 316, 317, 

318. 319. 323. 331. 332, 335, 336, 

338, 355, 357, 364, 371, 408, 414, 

41’7. 454,456, 462, 466, 484, 485, 

489. 514, 515, 518, 533 

Twelfth: 103, 109-110. 114, 115, 116, 

124. 128, 130, 139, 141, 143. 144, 

14::. 152, 156. 163, 171, 178, 185, 

196, 247, 249, 250, 261, 264, 265, 

273, 298, 31% 354, 360.417, 484. 

548,564 

Thirteenth: 273 

Fifteenth: 223, 264-268, 273, 274, 

278,283,290,315, 319, 321, 323, 

346, 351. 354, 358, 379, 383, 

384-390, 395, 400, 417, 434, 439, 

440, 443, 448, 479, 490, SOO, 504, 

5@5, 506. 514, 526, 536, 549, 571, 

573, 574, 584, 587 

Air Liaison offica (ALO) 

function oE 149-150 

introduced in Sicily: 243 

Airlifi, supplies to the front 501-503 

Air Service Tactical School: 19 

Air superiority 

AAF over Germany: 367. 367, 

373-379. 414415,570-571 

AAF on D-Day: 341, 414418 

Allid 531-532 

assesment oE 587 

dehd 75 

in North Africa: 121, 145, 299 

PONIBLANK and OVERLORD, 

requirements for 303, 312, 333 

strategy, role in: 93, 109, 214-216, 

299 

U.S. loss of over Germany: 287 

USSTAF over Germany: 358 

Wwn: 587. 588, 595 

established in Middle East 150 

Air Sup011 Control Headquartas (ASC) 

Air support doctrine. see also Close air 

SYPa 

&tined in North Africa: 210-220 

Air supremacy. see Air superiarity. 

Air Transport Waz 189 

Air War Hans Division (AWPD) 

form& 60 

reports by: 60-62. 111-112 

Alam Halfa, defense oE 150 

Albany, New York 4 

Albert Canal, Belgium 

bridge targets at: 408 

Alexander, Harold R.L.G. 

British Army commander in Chief, 

Commander. 18 Army Gmy 178. 

Italian operations planned by: 250 

NAAF air support pkd by: 256 

Pantelleria operations prepared by: 

Mediterranean: 181, 204 

181 

231 

pund forces, SHAEE 536 

proposed as commander of Allied 

Alexandria, Virginix 67 

Algeria 

Allied conno1 of: 123 

Eisenhower hq m 230 

AFHQ in: 173, 174 

aviation engineers m 145 

intelligence activity moved to: 190 

invasion forces’ departure hm: 137 

NAAF Hq moved from: 189 

Allen, Teny 

commands; 1st Inf Div: 203 

Allied Air comaraders Conference: 

544, 546, 558, 564, 572 

Allied Air Control Conference: 544, 

546, 558 

Allied Air Forces 

Algiers: 147, IT’, 178, 186, 277 

Allied Occupafion oE 123,128 

Algiers Task Force: 125 

replaced by Nw African Air Forces: 

178 

structure oE 152-154 

weakness oE 171 

abolish& 484-489 

command and cantrol in: 454 

Allied Expeditionary Air Force (AEAF) 

md structure OE 307-318, 454, 

467 

used by: 482 

heavy bombers for close air support 

hq at Stanmore: 294 

~perations, Mar-Apr 44: 364 

762 
INDEX 

plans for OVERLORD submitted by: 

preinvasion operations: 410412, 

rocket sites assaulted by: 432 

:330-339, 406 

415-416 

spaah, disagr-ents with 285, 355, 

357 

targeting plan disputed by: 345-352 

targets for CROSSBOW: 430-431 

targets for COBRA: 468470 

WarKherdons Room: 455 

USSTAF, relationship with: 355-357 

Allied-Fdrce Headqua~ters (AFHQ): 140, 

143. 147 

Eisenhower hq in Algiers: 173 

organization of 178-180 

press communiques from: 188 

air command for OVERLORD settled 

air strength in North Africa: 121 

air superiority dochine redefined by: 

airfields in North Africa: 128 

airpower performance in North Africa: 

air war, Wwn, assessed: 588-596 

AUies: 368 

by: 341-344 

210-220, 516 

145-146 

antishiping campaign of 189-196 

AKcADlA conference agreements by: 

68-69 

Battle of the Bulge faced by: 531. 

bombing characterized: 571 

bombing effects revealed in Japanese 

bombing efforts, WWII: 588, 590 

bombing ethics questioned: 591 

campaign in Tunisia: viii 

collapse of Axis bridgehead in North 

defense in Tunisia: 173 

drive across France: 421, 439, 

532-533 

cipher: 442 

mca: 201-210 

453454, 462, 472, 474, 483, 501, 

503, 515-516, 518-519 

526 

drive at Gman border halted by: 

goals for OVERLORD: 395-396 

invasion of Italy: 223, 255-260 

invasion of North Africa: 123-154 

invasion of Sicily: 243-253 

invasion of Sicily planned by: 

initial opation~ for D-Day: 424426 

239-243 

MEW developed by: 513, 514 

naval activities in Atlantic: 113 

North African operations acoelerated 

by: 185-200 

THuNDERcu\p affected by: 543-563 

operations. Mar-Apr 44: 356-377 

Pantelld operations: 225-238 

preinvasion operations: 408-418 

reorganized in North Africa: 164-184 

strafing of French targets, directives 

on: 410 

strategic bombardment campaign 

initiated by: 296-300 

strategic bombardment from 

Mediterranean: 262-280 

strategic bombardment plan Wted 

by: 347-352 

strategic plans in Middle East 

106-116, 155-164 

targeting priorities against Germany 

set by: 284, 490, 492497, 500 

V-1 flying bombs, reaction to: 428 

weaknesses in logistics: 123-124 

Westem Jkert, lessons oE 152 

Alp: 595 

American Volunteer oroup: 28 

Amhose, Stephen E.: 352 

American Expeditiomy Force (AEF): 5 

Anderson, Frederick L. (Fred): 105, 333. 

335,350,428,490,524,549 

aircraft losses, reaction to: 322 

Berlin bombing favored by: 549, 

bombing of civilian population, views 

bombing directives received by: 391, 

HURRICANE II planned by: 495 

Malta Conference, representative at 

561-562 

on: 434, 561, 564 

434 

548, 572 

381 

317, 321, 391. 470 

RAF press wllounma reaction to: 

Spaatz’s dpty for operations: 290, 312, 

SIRANGLE, effects reviewed by: 404 

strategic targeting plans, views on: 

Yalta Conference, representative at 

35&351 

553 

182,300 

by: 143 

Anderson, Kenneth A. N.: 173, 181, 

air power in North Africa controlled 

763 
SPAAT2 AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

air support pled for by: 143. 145, 

army organized by: 136 

assessment oE 171-172, 177 

Bizerte, advance on led by: 139 

Conmander, 1st British Army: 128. 

Luftwaffe air attacks, complaints 

176, 209 

219, 220 

hut 140 

Ande€wn, orvil A. 

Berlin raid viewed by: 378 

Doolittle's operations officer 469 

CG, IX Bomber Command: 309 

Allied organization in Middle East, 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 

CG. ETO 101, 155 

operational readiness rates defended 

War Dept Air Board served by: 131 

Anderwn, Samuel E. 

Andrews, Frank M.: 24 

views on: 174 

1612-1 63 

by: 104 

Anglo-AmeIican StandaKliZation of 

Antwap, Belgium: 521-522 

-GOON (Operation): 484 

Anzio, Italy, assault on: 321 

&HRODIE (remote control aircraft) 

Arabs, attack on RAF fields In Iraq: 146 

ARWRA Conference: 68 

Ardennies counteroffensive: 504-505, 

Alms comminee: 47 

initiate& 429 

effects of: 71 

511, 517, 521-522, 531-543. See 

also Battle of the Bulge 

ARGUMENT (Operation) 

Armies (numbered, British) 

ordered by USSTAF: 319-321 

1st 128, 135-136, 139. 140, 142, 

143, 145, 153, 164, 167, 172, 203, 

205, 208-210 

2d: 307, 311. 454, 457, 458. 461 

8th: 135% 136, 147, 150, 173, 178, 

181, 202, 203, 212, 213, 239, 241, 

243. 260 

Armies (numbered, Canadian) 

Armies (numbered, German) 

1st 479, 48142 

Fijiedh 503 

F$h Pmec 531 

Seventh 472, 531 

Sixth 1% 

Sixrh SS Panzer: 531, 546, 562 

Tenth 147 

First 307,309, 454, 463, 482, 515 

Third: 307, 309, 472, 515, 533 

Fifth: 127, 164, 230. 256, 260 

Seventh: 241, 243 

Ninth: 571 

Armies (numbered, Italian) 

Armies (numbered, US.) 

Army Air Control center (AACC): 

149-151 

Army Air Service. See United States 

Army Air Support StaE Section 

Army Coqeration Command 

Army Air sexvice 

FM 31-35 drafted by: 133 

form& 149 

dissolved: 307 

differences on air support doctrine: 

European Theater of Operations: 92, 

organization of: 72 

Army Ground Forces 

212, 214, 216-218 

101 

Army Group G (German): 538 

Army Groups (numbered) 

6th: 484, 517, 573 

lul: 307, 515, 517, 573 

18: 178, 181 

21: 307, 404, 406, 409. 454. 461, 

503,573 

Army Service Forces: 290 

Army Services of Supply, organized: 72 

Arnold, Henry H. ("Hap"): 7, 24, 31, 

41, 56, 367, 80, 82, 83, 85, 92, 

156, 178, 1%. 210, 218, 219, 236, 

314, 315, 352, 356, 376, 386, 387, 

404, 437, 495, 513, 514, 516, 

244, 257, 287-288, 290, 297, 300, 

519-5m,532,541.553.564,572 

aircraft aid to Britain opposed by: 59 

air support doctrine approved by: 214, 

aircraft reallocaticm to England by: 81, 

assessment of: 32 

"Billy" Mitchell supported by: 20 

black pilots, performance studied by: 

bombing effort, disappointments over: 

bombing of Balkans agreed to by: 

215 

85. 111 

258 

103-104 

387 

764 
INDEX 

bombing of Italy, view on: 262,264 

Cairo Conference, reflections on: 273 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 162, 

CG, AAF: 90, 421 

close air support by heavy bombers 

viewed by: 458 

Commandex, WAC: 37 

Combiied Bomber Operation, 

supported by: 336-337 

command pblems faced by: 

umtindon of intensive bombing 

Doolittle supported by for CG 

Dpty C/S for Air 57-58 

Eaker moved to Mediterranean by: 

Eakex, relationship with: 31-33, 531, 

Eighth AF move to England planned 

Eisenhower paceived by: 115 

furloughs opposed by: 44W7 

fears growth of German fighter force, 

heart attack suffered by: 547 

internment of U.S. ailcraft studied by: 

164 

305-306, 387-389, 393 

urged by: 109-110 

Twelfth AF: 127 

274-279 

593 

by: 75-76 

1945: 522, 538 

448-450 

132-1 33 

maneuvers of 1941 analyzed by: 

Marshall-King-Hopkins mission 

Me 262, reaction to: 512 

morale investigated by: 378, 448450 

North African lessons circulated by: 

Ploesti issue raised by: 385 

population bombing, reaction to: 

press coverage, angered by: 304-305 

press coverage for AAF sought by: 

prewar planning by: 60, 62, 71, 72 

pmmotions of: 9-10 

public image of AAF promoted by: 

Quebec Conference, issues raised by: 

raid on Romania planned by: 260 

redeploymem views on: 96-99 

Roosevelt, meeting with: 37 

detailed by: 108 

21 1 

435-436, 495, 591 

198 

102,448-450 

485-490 

share of victory. concern over 415 

Spaatz assessed by: 421 

Spaatz's increased effort urged by: 

Spaak move to North Africa 

523-526 

agproved by: 142 

578-579 

467, 579,594 

spaak promotion recommended by: 

Spaak. relationship with: 31-35, 115, 

strategy proposed by: 80, 111-114 

support of Combined Bomber 

support of more active fighter foxce 

terror bombing press story, reaction 

USSTAF control viewed by: 270-271, 

Offensive by: 336-337 

by: 300-303 

to: 559-561 

527 

Associated Press 

correspondent: 559 

cultivated by Spaatz: 103 

Atlantic Ocean, feny route across: 

Atomic bomb 579 

Attack aviation, organized: 17 

Augsburg, Germany 

Luftwaffe defense oE 369 

MAAF targets in: 319 

air feny route to: 69 

purchases aircraft from US.: 40 

Australia-New Zealand Army Corps: 

Austria 

77-78, 79 

Auswalia 

148 

German fighters withdrawn from: 518 

oil targets in. 536 

Aviation Engineer Battalion, 809th: 145 

AWPD. See Air War Plans Division 

AWPD/l: 60-62, 71, 74, 76, 97, 111, 

objectives evaluated: 484, 526-527, 

policy on area bombing: 543,552 

112. 115, 260. 435 

588 

AWPDl42 

prepared for aircraft production. 

111-113 

Axis. 167. See dm Germany; Italy. 

assessment of, WWII: 592 

bridgehead shattered in North Africa: 

codes broken: 121 

counterattack in North Africa: 

200-210 

765 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

173-1 74 

defeat in Tunisia: viii 

heavy bombardment in Tunisia faced 

Italy defended by: 2-267 

key passes from French gained by: 

oil i~dustry attacked: 341, 384-393, 

Pandleria defended by: 225-238 

plans against m Sicily: 239-243 

resurgence in Libya: 69 

Sicily defended by: 243-253 

siege of Tobruk by: 150 

strategic bombardment against: 280, 

strategy against: 155-164, 172 

supplies in North Africa. tonnage: 

supplies interdicted in North Africa: 

Tunisia surrendered by: 210 

by: 196-200 

172 

440 

296-306 

145-146 

185-200 

Badoglio, Pietro 

secret armistice with Allies made by: 

Bad Reichenhall, Germany. raid on: 584 

255 

Bagby, sally Spaatz's executive officer: 294 

Baghdad, Iraq: 116 

Bailey, Sidney: 45 

Baker, Newton D.. Sec of War: 7 

Baldwin, Stanley 

Prime Minister (British): 30 

Balkans 

Gerrnan vations in: 354 

targeb in: 384-386, 387, 400 

Barksdale Field (later AFB), Louisiana: 

Basel, Switzerland 

BmeK, Axthur 

25 

accidental bombing of: 575 

Commander, Army Co-operation 

Command: 149 

Bastogne, Belgium, action at: 533 

Bataan, Philippines, smender of: 1% 

BAT~EAXE (Operation): 150 

Battle of the Atlantic: 113, 160 

Allied victoxy and effects of: 288 new threat of: 541 

Battle (of Britain: 41-56, 186 

Battle (of Cassino: 385 

Battle of Crete: 146 

Battle of the Bulge: 504-505,525. See 

also Ardemes counteroffensive 

Allied pessimism m 538 

aircraft losses in: 519 

effects on strategic bombardment: 

536-538 

German equipment lost in: 533 

launched: 531 

Luftwaf€e umunitment to: 573 

Bay of Biscay: 230 

Bayerlein, Fritz 

Normandy bomtxudment described 

by: 472 

Beattie, Ed 

Belgium 

press coverage by: 83, 102, 383 

AAF fighters moved to: 521 

Allied airfields attacked in: 535 

US. aircraft purchased by: 40 

transportation targets in studid 330 

Bendix Trophy 

awarded to Doolittle, 1931: 125 

Benghazi, Tripoli US. bases at: 262 

Berlin, Camany: 469 

Battle of Berh 306 

bombing in examined: 567-570 

casualties inflicted by Soviets in: 591 

cloud cover over: 564 

fighter escort range to: 361-364 

final raid of the war on: 584 

German surrenda to Soviets in: ix, 

Luftwaffe defense responsibility 

raids on: 358, 370, 371, 381, 394, 

bombq casualties m 435, 595 

584-585 

assigned: 369 

3%. 432, 439. 545, 550-552 553. 

557, 560-561, 572, 584 

repd attacks against studied: 

435438, 543, 549-550 

strategic importance of: 45,434, 

us. losses on raids over: 373.394 

Ass? c/s, Plans, Eighth AF: 74 

548-549,562-564 

Berliner, Henry 

Bern, Swi~~~~land. 575 

Bidwell, Shelford 

"Big Blow": 518-519 

"Big Week": 319-326, 358, 593 

British military themy, views on: 148 

assessment of: 326-327 

losses compared: 377 

766 
INDEX 

missions in: 319-326 

planning for: 318 

Biscari, Sicily, Sield at: 239 

Biskra, Algaia: U.S. airfield at: 145 

Bismarck, on0 van 

paraphrased by Harris: 581 

BisseU. Clayton 

staff, war Plans Div: 60 

Bizerte, Tunisia 

driveon: 125 

plans for capturing airfield at: 137 

Black pilots in AAF: 257-260 

Bletchley Park, blank 98, 140, 514. 

Bluie West (BWI) Field, Greenland: 82 

BLUNDERBUSS: 510 

BOLERO: 70 

Boccadifalco, Sicily 

Axis airfield raided at 195 

Bohlm, Germany, raid on: 398 

Bolling Field (lam AFB), Washington. 

B& Algeria 

see also ULTRA. 

11.C.: 32, 75, 85 

Allied airfield at 128, 186 

plans for capturing airfield at: 137 

port seized: 139 

Boralxxa Island, U.S. garrison at: 69 

Borizzo, Sicily 

Bottomley, Nman H.: 495 

Axis airfield raided at 195 

Dpty Chief, Air Staff (RAF): 88, 315, 

bomber escort, views on: 575 

German wal famine, report by: 538 

targeting directives issued by: 

targeting piorities of: 391, 492, 

391, 487 

THUNDERCLAP studied by: 544-545 

492494, 500, 560, 561-562, 582 

528-529, 542, 581 

Bougie, Algaia 

Luftwaf€e sinks Allied ship at: 139, 

occupation of: 137, 139, 171 

171 

Boulogne, France, beachhead at: 70 

Bourguebw Ridge 

Bourke-White, Margaret 

Bowman. Hal 

Boyd, Max 

Boyertown, Pennsylvania. 3 

bombs dropped on: 462 

Ljfe magazine photojournalist 198 

press officer, USSTAF: 525 

chief, press relations. USSTAF: 562 

Boyle. Archibald 

Bradley, FoUett 

Chief of Intelligence, RAF: 43, 45 

mtind training forces cow. 

245 

Bradley, Omar N.: 409. 481, 501 

air support in North Africa, 

dissatisfied with: 209,217 

assessed by Eisenhower: 592 

Battle of the Bulge, role in: 535 

Brerem viewed by: 467 

CG, Twelfth Army hup: 573 

CG, US. First Army: 307. 454, 

command, relationship with: 467468 

Dpty Corps Commander, North 

heavy bomber employment assessed 

Normandy breakthrough led by: 472, 

promoted to four-star rank: 579 

Sicily padrop. role in: 244 

St. L.6 breakthrough executed by: 516 

St L.6 raid, reaction to: 470471 

targeted for bombing: 94 

Allied organization in Mediterranean 

"Big We& targets selected by: 321 

CG, Ninth AF: 273, 276, 307. 309, 

463-464.479 

AGica: 203, 219 

by: 464466, 470-471 

474476, 482 

Bremen, Gmany 

Brereton, Louis H.: 464 

viewed by: 174 

310, 316, 318, 355, 462 

COBRA PlarUMX: 467 

commander, First Allied Airbome 

command, relationship with: 457. 462, 

strategic targeting, views on: 355 

Gman retreat from: 545 

MAAF target in: 321 

neutralization of: 563 

Brest, France 

raid on: 94 

submarine pens targeted in: 113 

Brigades (British) 

36th: 137 

British Admiralty: 45 

British Air Ministry: 96, 385.486 

area bombing supported by: 487 

bombing policy of: 581 

Army: 466467 

467, 468 

Breslau, Germany 

Casablanca conference, participation 

767 
SPAAlE AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

in: 157-164 

94 

494-495 

by: 425 

Gee radio aid accuracy questioned by: 

HURRICANES I and II planned by: 

Luftwaffe strength, Jun 44, estimated 

morale bombing proposed by: 437 

operational question: 88 

V-1 sites targeted by: 428 

US. intelligence liaison to: 274 

WWII planning by: 80 

British Air Staff 

bettrx control over Harris sought by: 

496. 527 

strategic bombardment plans disputed 

by: 348-349 

British Chiefs of Staff: 435 

Arnold, relationship with: 522-523 

Balkan targets viewed by: 385 

bombing French civilians, views on: 

CaSiblanCa Conference, views at: 161, 

crosschannel invasion postponed by: 

Drerden bombing, responsibility for: 

end of war pp-edicted by: 496 

moving bomb groups to Italy, view 

OVERLORD, responsibility in: 344 

OVEWRD command tmctme viewed 

Ploesti decisions of: 390 

Quebec Conference. views at: 

reprisal raids discussed by: 433, 434, 

Tehran, strategy planning by: 223 

bombing of French targets considered 

401402 

162 

107-108 

5a 

011: 264-266 

by: 313, 337 

486490 

435436 

British Defence Committee 

by: 4243 

British Expeditionary Fore. 136, 171 

British Govemment Code and Cypher 

School. See also ULTRA 

capability of: 98, 533 

Metlitmanean operations: 141 

report on rail system in Germany: 538 

British Joint Intelligence Committee: 514 

Berlin bombing studied by: 436437, 

Dreden bombing responsibility shared 

54 

by: 563 

497, 500 

reviewed by: 348-349 

British Joint Staff Mission 

"saturation" bombing viewed by: 266 

British Mediterranean Fleet 

bombing of Pantelleria by: 233-234 

British Military Delegatioxx 387 

British Military Mission in Washingtorx 

British Minishy of Economic Warfare: 

strategic bombardment plan dispted 

Gman resistance studied by: 545 

strategic bombardment assessed by: 

strategic bombardment targets 

59 

284 

by: 348 

v-1 policy assessed by: 434 

British Special Operations Executive 

(SOE): 487n 

Broadhmt, Hany: 243 

commander, WAF: 201 

command, issues of: 458, 467 

Montgomery, relatiomhip with: 241, 

311 

Bmke, Alan: 409,536 

bombing of Rome discussed by: 261 

Chief, Imperial General Staff: 347, 

strategic bombardment plan, views on: 

transportation plan supported by: 402 

raids on: 303,305,306,322 

460 

347-348 

Bmwick, Germany 

Bnuc, Germany, raid on: 398 

Bucharest, Romania, targeted: 385. 386 

Budapest, Hungary. targeted: 385 

Bufton. Sidney 0. 

Dir, Bomber Operations (RAF): 544 

THUNDERCLAP launching suggested 

by: 544 

Bullitt, William C. 

Bundesarchiv, casualty records m 553 

Burma, issue at Quebec Conference: 488 

Bushey Heath, England: 293 

Bushy Park, England 

Eighth AF Hq: 104, 293 

SHAEF Hq: 293, 294, 314 

German surrender to Soviets 

Spaatz's combat missions observed 

US. Ambassador to France: 38 

Butcher, Hany: 328.578 

witnessed by: 585 

768 
INDEX 

by: 199 

Spaatz's status described by; 249 

Dpty Commander, AEAF: 311-312 

replaced by Vandenberg: 354 

RAF night navigation indicted by: 94 

Butler, William 0.: 333 

Butt Report 

cabell. c. P.: 322 

USflAF rep on Joint Planning 

committee: 335 

Caen, France: 411, 457 

action at 454, 460, 474 

short bombing oE 481 

stalemate at 458 

Cagliari Sardinia, Allied raid on: 198 

Cairo Conference: 267-271. 277, 338, 

Arnold's assessment of: 273, 315 

conferences in: 267-271 

intelligence activity moved fmm: 190 

Joint Operations Staff in: 147 

387 

Cairo, Egypt 174 

Cambridge, Englank 146 

Canada 

U.S. aircraft purchased by: 40 

U.S. civilian instructors in: 42 

losses of to liiendly bombardment 

Canadian Army 

480, 481-482 

Candee, Robert C.: 92 

Cannon, John K. 

258-260 

black pilots, report on prepared by: 

CC;, Twelfth AF: 273,484-485 

Commander, NW African Training 

Command: 181, 230 

Command: 142, 170, 174 

commander, XII Air Support 

Coningham's dpty: 242-243, 247 

Dpty Commander, NATAF: 257 

NASAF airfield at 229 

Cape Bon, Tunisia: 123 

Capri Italy, rest facilities at 259 

Carolina maneuvers: 167 

Cmll, Franklin 0. 

Casablanca: 230 

observer in England: 42 

Allied Occupafion oE 123 

directives assessed: 589, 590-591 

 conference^: 155-164, 173, 178. 

183-184, 239, 284, 310, 531 

facility assessed by Spaatz: 142 

invasion force: 127-128 

U.S. air base at 153 

Casablanca Task Force: 127,128 

Castelvetrano, Sicily, Allied raid on: 199 

Caucasus, Gman offensive to: 11 1 

Chandler, Albtxt B., U.S. Senator: 246 

Chaney, James E.: 82 

Chief, Special Army Observer Group: 

new plans to British presented by: 80, 

59 

81 

Charlottesville. Virginia 

Roosevelt speech in: 45 

Chartres, France, cargo airlift to: 501 

"Chattanooga Choochoo" mission: 410 

Chamor& France: 5 

Chemnie, Germany 

communications center attacked at 

targets studied: 544, 545,556 

572 

Chenndt, Claire: 28-29 

Chequers, England: 96 

Cherwell, Lord 

bridge targets for interdiction 

suggested by: 404 

Chiang Kai-shek 

Cairo Conference attended by: 268 

Chief of Air Coq 

Arnold 32 

Westover: 32 

Chief of Air Staff (RAF): 79, 81, 283. 

See also Portal, Charles A. 

Chief of Staff (AAF): 551. See also 

Giles, Barney 

Chief of Staff, Supreme Allied 

Command (COSSAC): 294 

Christmas Island, U.S. garrison at: 69 

directives: 43, 318 

Churchill, Winston S.: 71. 147. 310, 

382, 383, 385, 400, 432, 536 

Anzio priority supported by: 321 

area bombing questioned by: 58&582 

bombing of east Gexman cities 

bombing of Rome discussed by: 261 

bombing policies of: 390, 567, 

Cairo Conferences, views at 270-271 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 

crosschannel invasion plans, shift 

favored by: 545, 563 

580-582 

152-153, 155-164 

favored by: 107 

769 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

exetation of war criminals suggested 

Harris, relationship with. 95-% 

invasion of North Ma directed by: 

jolted by Japanese military successes: 

Montgomery, views on: 460 

OVERLORD command viewed by: 

Quebec Conference. views at 264. 

RAI: press release, concern over: 

qmd raids discussed by: 433, 434 

Roosevelt, pre-ww11 talks with: 46 

single air commander agreed to by: 

Spanish invasion opposed by: 230 

strategic bombardment buildup, views 

by: 437 

69 

337-338, 341-344 

483484 

382-383 

152 

orc 266 

Smegy oE 328 

Tehran Conference, views at' 267, 

trmprtation plan questioned by: 390 

transportation plan delayed by: 

273 

400-408 

V-1 attacks, reaction to: 428 

-ON (operation) 

adopted by USSTAF: 548-549 

effects of: 575 

effom expanded in: 572-573 

execution of scheduled: 571-572 

incendiaries used in: 570 

plms for: 553, 556 

Clark, Bennett C. ("Champ") 

U.S. Senator: 246 

Clark, Mark W.: 113 

CG. Army Ground Form, EID: 101 

CG, Fifth Army: 164. 170, 231, 256 

Comander, II Corps: 92 

heavy bombers in: 453-482, 516-517 

heavy bombers for opposed by 

North Africa. viii. 121, 153, 200-220 

priority assigned to: 215-216 

Sicily: 243 

Commander, 1st British Div: 227, 229 

Pantelleria communications analyzed 

Pantelleria operations. participation in: 

Close air support 

spaalz: 423424 

CluDerback, Walter E. 

by: 238 

231-235 

COBRA (operation): 463479,515 

air suppat for ground form in: 463 

assessed. 475-479 

unnmand structure for: 468 

dates manged for: 468 

commander, w Army corps: 463, 

Collins, J. Lawton ("Iighmin' Joe") 

472, 474 

Cologne, Germany 

bridge charges set off in: 510 

raids on: 94, 508, 561-562, 570 

rail system seained in: 538 

seizure of planned: 571 

organized for black troops: 294 

coal shipments decreased h: 537 

Combat Support Wing 

Combined Airborne Hq: 466 

Combined Bomber Offensive: 263,279. 

280. See &o USSTAF 

accepted by Combined Chiefs of 

staff: 260 

analyzed: 527 

Andrews assigned to: 155-156 

"Big Week" mounted by: 319-326 

directed by Combined Chiefs of Staf2 

264,265,488 

384-390 

Fifteenth AF, participation in: 

fixst mission of: 252 

Mediterranean, participation in: 280 

phases of: 333-334 

plan, reorganization of: 488 

pre-invasion, utility oE 327-339, 409 

preparation for: 123 

role of, JunSep 44: 423-424, 454 

Spaaa's responsibility in: 283 

success over Luftwaffe oE 345 

tactics of: 424 

targeting plans disputed: 345-352 

target selection for: 284,428430 

Combined Chiefs of Staff ((33): 543, 

bombing of Balkans approved by: 

bombmg of Ploesti, views on: 385, 

bombing of Rome authorized by: 261 

Cairo conferences, participation in: 

545 

388-389 

388-389 

271. 339 

in: 155464,310 

approved by: 284 

Casablana confereq participation 

Combined Bomber Offensive targets 

770 
INDEX 

Combined Bomber Of€ensive directed 

by: 260, 264-265, 267, 268, 280 

command arrangements, smggle with: 

387, 388-389 

command assignments of: 496 

command and control of: 271 

directives received at Quebec 

German jet fighter threat faced by: 

invasion of Italy directed by: 255,256 

Italian opexations decided by: 263, 

Malta meeting, participation in: 548 

Ninth AF missions assigned by: 355 

~RD, responsibilities ix 344, 

OVERLORD command, views on: 339 

Quebec Conference, participation in: 

strategic bombardment, views on: 266 

targets in SE Europe approved by: 

Tehran Conference strategy planned 

US. troop in Ireland awved by: 

Conference: 487, 581 

539. 542 

264 

SUPER-GYMNAST drop@ by: 69 

345. 352 

THUNDERCLAP approved by: 494 

264,484-490 

388-389 

by: 223 

81 

Combined Strategic Targeting 

Committee, USSTAF: 544 

Combined War Room, Cairo: 147 

Comiso, Sicily, airfield at: 239 

Commands (numhed) 

VIE Air Service: 72, 127 

VIII Air Support: 72, 90, 91, 108, 

VIII Bomber 71, 72, 98, 162, 290 

VIII Fightex: 72, 303-304, 316, 376. 

IX Air suppoa: 309,548 

IX Bomber: 309,317 

IX Fighter: 307,317, 318, 414 

IX Tactical Air: 464 

IX Troop Carrier: 309, 413, 414 

XI1 Air Service: 181 

XI1 Air Support. 142, 164, 170-171, 

187 

478 

173, 174, 176, 181, 183, 200, 

201-205, 207-210, 218, 219, 233, 

238, 241-243, 247, 248, 258, 259 

XI1 Bomber: 127, 170, 191 

XU Tactical Air: 484-485 

committee of operations Analysts 

strategic bomb% targets selected by: 

284 

Amold at 32 

481482 

Command and General Staff School 

Commonwealth army, short bombing of: 

Condor Legion, strafing tactics in: 366 

air suppo~z doctrine of: 212, 215, 

COninghm& Arthur: 248,464 

217-218 

my-air control system aQpted by: 

150-152. 180 

assessment of: 593 

attitude of: 247 

background of: 148 

bridge busting supported by: 406 

CG. NATAF: 157, 177, 181-182, 

183-184, 218,232 

Chief, Allied Air Support Commad 

174. 178 

Commandex, 2d Tactical AF: 273% 

279, 307, 310, 489 

heavy bombardment for close air 

support acapted by: 517 

leadership m Middle East 146, 

2w204 

455-458, 46142 

mistakes cited: 251-253 

Montgomery, relationship with: 311, 

Normandy situation described by: 454 

Pantelleria operations planned by: 

Patton, dispute with: 203-206 

Leigh-Mdq. relatiionship with: 

456, 461, 467 

232-233 

short bombing by RAF survived by: 

Sicilian operations planned by: 

targeting assessed by: 494 

targeting priorities assessed by: 191 

Anderson hq at 173, 174 

Spaatz hq at 189,209.231, 233 

CORKSCREW (operation): 225,233 

assumption of priority: 227,238 

Corps (numbered, British) 

5: 172 

9: 207 

Corps (numbered, Canadian) 

2d: 480 

Corps (numbered, French) 

XIX: 164, 170, 178 

482 

239-243, 250 

Constantine 

77 1 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Corps (numbed German) 

I Fighter 369, 370, 376 

11 Parachute: 464,470 

LXXXlE 464. 470 

Corps (numbered, U.S.) 

I Amor& 167 

II: 153, 136, 170-172, 174, 178, 202, 

203, 206, 207, 208-210, 218, 242, 

247 

IV .Armored: 217 

VI: 243 

w: 463 

VI Ccorps Area: 20 

Corregidor, Philippines 

SW~eIIder of: 126 

Corsica, photo reconnaissance of: 241 

COSSAC. See Chief of Staff, Supreme 

Allied Command 

cotentin Peninsula, France 

COuntIXair 

crosschannel invasion, role in: 107 

campaign launched by RAF. 151 

Sicily: 240-241 

Spaatz experience with: 301, 367 

tactics created for: 367 

chief supply officer, RAF: 85 

AP correspondent: 559 

Dmden report by: 559-561 

repercussions of story by: 562 

Craig, Howard A: 81, 147-148, 174 

CG, XU Air Support Conman& 170, 

delegate to London: 70 

gains insight on RAF air control: 151 

"misuse of air power" objected to by: 

Courtney, Christopher 

Cowan, Howard 

1'76, 177 

143 

Craig, Malin 

Chief of Staff, U.S. Army: 38 

CROSSBOW (Operation): 426428, 

429432, 450 

divenion of resources to: 330, 406 

instiillations attack& 305, 317 

Joint Committee, role in: 432 

losses in: 439 

Luftwaffe reaction to: 3% 

OVI~RD. effect on: 398, 417-418 

priority of: 332, 391, 393 

redirected: 468 

role of: 296 

targets: 391-393, 428, 505-506 

CRUSADER (Operation): 150 

CULVERIN: 510 

curmingham Andrew 

Pantelleiia bombardment observed by: 

Pantelleria operations, preparations by: 

Straits of Messina, failure to close of: 

233, 234 

231 

251 

cums, Edward P. (red) 

cumss, Glen: 4 

Cuny Bill: 19 

Spaatz's chief of staff: 206,248,593 

D'Albiac, J. H. 

Darlan, Jean F. 

Chief, 2d Tactical AF: 310 

Commander in Chief, Vichy French 

Forces: 123 

Davis, Benjamin O., Jr. 

CO, 99th Fighter Squadron: 230, 

258-260 

Davison, Trubee 

Dayton, Ohio: 57 

Ass't Sec of War for Air: 32 

DhY 

Normandy: 414418 

Sicily: 243-244 

Decimononnu, Sardinia 

AAF raid on 

Axis airfield at 199 

de Gaulle, Charles: 408 

de Guingand, Francis (Freddie): 457 

Dempsey. Miles 

CG, British 2d Army: 307, 458 

Desert Training Center: 135, 167 

Dessau, Germany, RAF targets in: 45 

de Tassigny, Jean de Latee 

accepts German surrendec 584-585 

Devers, Jacob L: 167, 275 

Commander, Armmed Force: 135 

commander, m 263 

Commander, 6th Army Group: 484, 

moving of bomb groups to Italy 

573 

opposed by: 263, 264 

Dim France, raid on: 498 

Dill, Field Marshal John 

head of British Militasy Delegation in 

Washington: 387 

Directorate of Ground Support 

Director General of R&D 146 

FM 31-35 p.oduced by: 133 

772 
INDEX 

Divisions (numbered, British) 

1st: 227 

1st Airborne: 457 

78th: 139, 140, 142, 172 

3d Infantxy: 480 

4th: 480 

17th SS Panzer Grder: 472 

Panzer Leh~ 472, 482 

Divisions (Luftwaffe) 

7th Fighter: 369 

Divisions (numbered, Polish) 

1st: 480 

1st Polish Armored: 480 

Divisions (numbered, US.) 

1st Armor& 139, 142, 173, 217 

1st Infantxy: 135, 464 

2dhmk464 

3d Armor& 464 

4th Armord 535 

9th Infanhy: 474 

30th Infanay: 470, 474 

34th Infanby: 207, 217 

82d Airbome: 230.481 

lOlst Airborne: 481, 533 

1st Bombardment 303, 384, 440, 475, 

2d Bombardment: 303. 373, 448. 462, 

3d Bombardment 303. 371, 373, 382, 

converted to air divisions: 478 

Djebel Abiod, Tunisia 

British spearhead to: 139 

Djedeida, Tunisia 

Allied advance to: 139 

Djidjelli, Algeria 

Allied airfield at: 137 

Donovan. William J.: 56 

Doolittle, James H.: 245, 247, 2S0, 288. 

300, 316, 394, 432, 464. 490, 495, 

524, 540, 546, 561, 580, 582 

air superiority achieved by: 588 

B-?5 and B-36 groups converted to 

background oE 125-126 

Berlin raids: 433, 438, 439, 549-550 

"Big Week' targets selected by: 321, 

campaign against LuftwaEe: 299-302, 

Divisions (numbered, Canadian) 

Divisions (numbered, German) 

Divisions (USAAF) 

478-479, 552. 556 

478-479, 480, 532, 541 

396. 478479, 552. 556 

observer to England: 48-49 

B-17 groups by: 262-263 

326 

339 

433, 440, 470, 475 

190, 219, 251 

CG, Eighth AF: 223, 273. 292, 394, 

CG, NASAF: 157, 170, 176, 186, 

CG, Twelfth AF: 109 

close air support by heavy bombers 

accepted by: 517 

command of Air Farces for TORCH 

by: 108 

Counterair experience oE 367 

crew rotation policy oE 380, -7 

CROSSBOW missions dispatched by: 

Dresden bombing reported by: 558 

German jet threat assessed by: 

Gibraltar meeting, participant in: 

391-393, 416 

574-575 

1W142 

Leigh-Md~, ~latiianship with: 455 

Luftwaffe's increasing strength, 

reaction to: 512-513 

MARKIX-GARDEB assessed by: 503 

"misuse of air power" objected to: 

morale bombing questioned by: 550 

Pantelleria bombing directed by: 233 

pathfinders employed by: 296-298 

preinvasion operations, views on: 411 

RAF press announcement, reaction to: 

reassigned: 273, 276 

refuses to cooperate with EAC 147 

Spaatz, relationship with: 593 

Spaatz, assessment by: 592 

strategic bombardment, views on: 541, 

tactics of: 359-364, 367 

targeting priorities assessed by: 191 

Tokyo Raid led by: 125 

Chief, RAF Coastal Command: 337 

Chief, RAF Fighter Commank 80, 

Commandex in Chief, Middle East: 

Douhet, Giulio, theories of: 29, 261, 484 

Dover, England, German attacks on: 51 

Dow Field, Maine: 81 

Dowding, Hugh 

be& Germany 

143 

oil plan discussed by: 402 

381, 384 

542 

Douglas, Sholto 

86, 310 

156 

AOC, Fighter Command 310 

773 
SPAAT2 AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

AM bombing of: 556, 558-559, 561, 

567, 572 

bornbing of in suppart of Eastem 

Front 543,545,546,550,563-564, 

581 

RAF bombing of: 48, 49, 556-559 

Spaatz's responsibility in bombing of: 

terror bombing associated with: 

563-564 

580-581 

Drop tankx 61. 593 

considered for WWII: 64-65 

esa3rt range increased by: 357 

Spaatz's first encounter with: 18 

Duiiburg, Germany. raid on: 508 

Dunan, Asa N. 

CJS, Eighth AF: 74 

lost at sea: 141 

Dunkirk France: 40 

evacuation: 43 

Duntan Delmar 

conlmander, Nw African Air service 

Command 181. 230 

Duxfml, England 

355th Fighter Group at 384 

Eagle Squadrons 

Eaka, Ira C.: 79, 86, 93, 103, 158. 266, 

transfer ftom RAF to AAF: 88 

306, 316, 470, 484, 525, 560, 561, 

5 72 

AAF Hq in England set up by: 82 

air command saucture in m, 1944, 

viewed by: 485 

Arnold, relationship with: 31-32, 593 

messment oE 593 

background of: 31-33 

"Big Week," alerted for: 319 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 

CG, Eighth AF: 115, 266, 267, 271, 

VM Bomber Command established 

flight endurance flight pposed by: 

Mission No. 1 led by: 98 

moved to Meditmanean: 233, 272, 

moving bombardment groups to Italy, 

nonvisual bombing initiated by: 298 

162-1 64. 

288 

by: 71 

22 

2'14-279 

views on: 262. 264-265 

operational readiness rates defended 

prewar planning by: 62-64 

racial views of: 294 

Spaatz described by: 352 

strategic bombardment target selection, 

strategy supported by: 11 1-1 13 

tactics of: 298299,300 

weariness of troop assessed by: 

by: 104 

views on: 349 

445446 

172, 182 

Eastem Air Command (EAC): 147. 163, 

forward air base for: 139 

mission of: 143-144, 152, 164, 191 

TORCH, supposed and organized 

hastily by: 136 

reassignment oE 178 

shortages in: 128 

strength of: 125 

Eastem Front 574. See also Dresden 

antiaircraft guns, shpped of: 398 

assessment of: 111 

German trac to: 559 

German weakness on: 440, 445, 550 

Luftwaffe on: 80,445,572-573 

shift of bombing effort to: 563, 582 

winter offensive on: 536, 544. 556 

East Prussia, Red Anny in: 573 

Eden, Anthony 

Egyps WAF in: 13% 

Eichmann, AQlf 

Jewish Holocaust, involvement in: 571 

Eighth Air Force: v& ix, 126, 144, 156, 

257, 264, 271, 299, 318, 388. 400, 

404, 455.526, 545, 561. See also 

Air Forces (numbered, U.S.); 

United States Strategic Air Forces 

airfield bombing campaign of: 406 

airlift operations by: 501, 503 area bombing, policy of: 508, 

ARGUMENT, operations: 319-321, 323 

assessment of, WWII: 587 

authmized to search and destmy 

enemy fighters: 53 

B-17, backbone of: 72 

Battle of the Bulge operations: 

504-505, 532-536, 541 

Berlin raids by: 370-371, 376-377, 

432433, 547, 549, 550-551, 567 

bombing accuracy of: 110, 463, 

Foreign Secretary (British): 402 

551-552, 556. 567-570 

774 
INDEX 

476477,478-480.492, m, 516. 

553 

buildup oE 70, 260 

cities raided by: 262, 306. 418, 470, 

bombing of North Italian 

CLARION, role in. 571-573, 575 

close air support missions of: 453, 

460, 462, 477482, 503, 531-533 

COBRA, role in: 464-465, 468, 470, 

472, 477480 

Communication centers attacked by: 

572 

control over: 267-268, 283 

CROSSBOW operations: 391-392,426, 

Doolittle assumes command of: 108, 

Dresden raids, role in: 556-559, 564 

Eaker moved from command oE 

early operations: 90, 93.98-100, 

equipped with pathfiiers: 296-298, 

established: 71 

evaluabd 478, 480 

fighter escort for: 360, 364. 371, 376, 

incendiary bombing by: 556-558, 564, 

Gaman submarine campaign launched 

hq at Bushy Park 104-105, 294 

ineffectiveness of: 164 

installations in England: 83-84 

integrity achieved by: 86-90 

intement problems in: 445,448 

JUNIOR, aided by: 110 

"kills" on the ground recorded by: 

losses, 285. 287-288, 290.446, 511 

losses, Aug 43: 373-376 

losses, Oct 43 373-376 

losses, 44-45: 528 

losses, Jan-May 44: 417 

losses, Mar 44: 358, 370-371, 377, 

losses, May 44: 395,417 

losses, Jul 44: 440 

losses, Aug 44: 443 

553, 557 

Communications by: 256 

428,430432,443 

223,273 

272-278 

103-104, 119 

306 

414, 52&522,546 

570 

by: 113 

365,373 

losses, Jan-Feb 44: 339 

392 

losses, Sep 44-May 45: 439 

losses, Dec 44: 532 

losses, Jan 45 573 

losses, Feb 45 573, 574 

losses, Mar 45: 574, 584 

losses, Apr 45: 584 

losses, WWII: 587 

Luftwaffe threat to: 511-514, 

Manhattan Project supported by: 579 

W-GARDFN, role in: 501.503 

military bases raided by: 564.567 

mission oE 110 

Mission No. 1: 98, 303 

Mission No. 494: 472 

Mission No. 817: 551 

Mission No. 968 (fd in WWIQ: 

morale problems in: 445-446.450 

move to England: 74-75, 77-78 

movement delayed by Battle of 

oil targets smk by: 439-440, 

OvERuIRD, role in: 314-315, 331, 

P-51s assigned to: 64, 316 

parallel bombing by: 476-480 

517-519, 573, 574 

584 

Midway: 80-82 

553-556 

332 

perSolNle1 seen@: 16on 

P0l"K op?ations: 355 

preinvasion role of 424. 426,428, 

press coverage of: 304, 550-551 

QUEEN. role in: 515-517 

radar bombing by: 439-440, 462463, 

492, 504, 532, 553, 564, 568, 575 

RAF, relationship with: 268 

reorganized: 478 

rotation, policy in: 445446,448 

senators' visit to: 246 

short bombing in: 479480 

sorties, 'Big Week": 326, 358 

Spaatz m command oE viii, 33.64 

strahg missions of: 580 

skength, May 44: 395 

structure oE 72 

tactics: 359, 360-361, 367-371, 416, 

targeting jxionties for: 326, 332,346, 

THUNDERCLAP, role in: 435-438,546, 

tonnage dropped by: 417418,435, 

430 

424,476477,480 

347,351-3~,377-379,440,490 

552 

775 
SPAAT2 AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

4‘70, 472, 504-506, 508-510, 

5:32-533,556.567-570, 587 

TORCH, role in: 97, 108, 109 

trahing in Englank 85 

transportation targets struck by: 

49-410, 414, 417, 506, 508-510. 

532-534, 552, 553, 567, 571, 573 

unified command considered for: 

1’14-1 16 

weather effects on: 303,305,323, 

3&,368-369.374,375, 440, 

413470, 490.492, 50%504, 550, 

556 

YB-40 tested by: 62 

Eisenhower, Dwight D.: viii 96, 172 

191, 230, 245, 263-264, 312, 348, 

349, 351, 352, 354. 357, 384, 

390-394, 404, 416, 421, 423, 429, 

431. 454, 475. 524, 540 

by: 249-253 

AAlF in Mediterranean reorganized 

AAlF officers pmoted by: 189 

AEAF assessed by: 485-487 

AFHQ of: 143, 147, 173 

aircraft losses. concern over: 392 

“Air Preparation Plan” of: 335 

area bombing assessed by: 591 

arrives in London: 313-314 

Axis in North Afiica, surprise over: 

B-2!k for Middle East suggested by: 

Battle of the Bulge, decisions on: 541, 

Balin raid favored by: 432, 436438 

bombing from Italy, views on: 264, 

bombing of Rome discussed by: 261 

Bradley assessed by: 592 

British, relationship with: 86, 88 

CG, US. Army, North African 

140 

260 

542 

2(i, 266 

Theater of Operations: 155, 164, 

167, 174, 181, 204 

chief, War Plaol~ Div: 69-70 

civilian casualties, views on: 388, 

400403 

close air support by heavy bombers 

assessed by: 459, 474, 481, 496, 

516-517 

supprted by: 337-339 

Combined Bomber Offensive 

command structure confusion faced 

bll: 312-315, 454, 485-490, 536 

coningham-Patton dispute, angered 

by: 216-217 

umsultation with Free French on 

bombing of targets in France 408 

control of air power, view on: 143 

CROSSBOW. assigned top priority by: 

Doolittle, relationship with: 126-127 

Eaker’s reassignment, views on: 

Eighth AF operations halted by: 109 

enemy air attaclcs reported by: 144 

ETO command assumed by: 82,91 

Redendall assessed by: 136, 183-184 

German ordnance targets favored by: 

German surrender accepted by: 584 

429-431 

276-279 

494 

halt in operations, Nov 44, opposed 

hq at Bushy Park 293 

invasion of Spain, views on: 231 

invasion postponement studied by: 

investigation of firing on paratroaps 

MARKE~-GARDEN adapted by 501 

Marshall’s confidence in: 100-101 

Mission No. 1 leader selected by: 98 

Montgomq, relationship with: 

morale bombing opposed by: 436437 

North Afiican air power organized by: 

North Afiican air support assessed by: 

North Afiican offensive postponed by: 

NAAF support in Italy praised by: 

oil offensive declared by: 392 400 

OVERLORD “Air Preparation” plan, 

by: 515 

107-108 

ordered by: 244 

460463, 536 

146 

209-210, 215, 219 

145 

256 

views on: 335 

OVERLORD cormnand mangements 

OVERLORD operations plan, views on: 

by: 336-339. 341-344, 345,353 

412, 415, 416, 594 

409 

229,231 

233, 234 

ov5uDRD plan formally presented to: 

Pantelleria assault prepared by: 227, 

Pantelleria bombardment observed by: 

Pantelleria capitulation, views on: 238 

776 
INDM 

plea for reinforcements: 257 

press release on tenw bombq, 

pressure to secure Tunisia applied by: 

prestige oE 267 

promoted to five-star rank: 579 

publicity of war controlled by: 103 

Roosevelt visit with: 268 

SHAEF reorgd by: 489490 

6th Army Group controlled by: 484 

Spaatz appointed single air 

commander by: 152-154 

Spaatz appointed Acting Dpty 

Commander in Chief for Air, North 

Akicaby: 142 

592 

272 

Viii 

reaction to: 562 

141 

Spaatz assessed by: 106, 140. 579, 

Spaatz as CG, USSTAF, endorsed by: 

Spaatz summoned to North Africa by: 

strategic targeting settled by: 349-352 

submarine pen targets ordered by: 113 

Supreme Commander, Allied 

Expeditionary Force: 270-271, 307, 

354, 458459 

Tecider, relationship with: viii 

TORCH air forces authorized by: 109 

transpoaation targets, decision on: 

unified air command planned by: 

USSTAF removal from SHAEF 

V-1 sites, attack ordered by: 428 

Vandenberg for CG. Ninth AF 

Vichy forces command gained by: 

351-352, 393 

1 14-1 15 

cmtrol objected to by: 484489 

favored by: 466-467 

123 

El Alamein, Egypt: 146, 181 

Battle of: 150, 201 

German retreat to: 106 

Allied drive to: 574 

Axis bombed at: 203 

Axis airfield hit on: 198 

targeted for bombing: 94, 163, 306 

Cammander, GHQ Air Force: 47 

Elbe River: 584 

El Guettar, Tunisia 

Elmas, Sardinia 

Emden Germany 

hons, Delos c.: 53 

Enemy Objectives Unit (Eov), OSS 

intedction campaign prepared by: 

USSTAF target intelligence section: 

404 

tactical plan oE 350 

347 

Enfidaville, Tunisia 

Allied drive for 208 

buildup in: 368, 70-72, 74, 77-85, 

cargo airlift from: 501, 503 

civilian conhibution to WWII in: 590 

control of U.S. forces in: 86-90, 93 

military thmy in: 148-149 

purchase of aircraft by: 40.64-66 

strategic bombardment from: 262 

tours of duty in: 4464l.8 

U.S. military obsaven m 414 

U.S. manufactures for: 38 

V-1 threat against: 424 

England: 51, 53 

96, 108, 111 

shipkg losses oE 160 

English Channel, naval support in: 93 

Enigma 

as element of UL%: 425 

German codes decrypted with: 98, 

LOCUST cracked by: 141 

decreases in coal shipments fmm: 537 

141, 533 

Essen, Germany 

European Theater of Operations (ETO): 

71. 82, 92, 113, 114, 421 

air theater of operations: 11 1 

aircraft strength in: 526 

command in: 115 

importance of ULTRA in: 137 

press coverage for: 97 

reorg- 155, 484489 

WACS in: 294 

British Vice Chief of Air Staff: 315 

Evill, Douglas 

Faid Pass, Axis victory at: 172, 173 

Fairbanks, Alaska: 32 

Falake, France. action at: 481 

Far Eastem Air Force (British): 146 

Farmer, Howard 16 

Fechet, James 

Feriana-Kassexine 

Ass't Chief of Staff: 32, 275 

Gman forces pounded by Allies at: 

183 

777 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Fatying of aircraft 81 

G~der-RestwCk mute: 271 

Hawaii-&&& mute.: 69 

Maine-J-abrador-Iceland-Engld 

Ma~~akech. terminus oE 153 

ina~ in: 187-188 

77-78 

Field Manual 1-5 

fighter support doctrine in: 359-360, 

366 

replaced by FM 1002& 298 

revision oE 216-218 

TR 44CL15 superceded by: 131 

close air support doctrine in: 360 

applied in North Africa: 134-135 

revision rmmmen& 213 

role of air support defined in: 

Field ]Manual 1-15 

Field Manual 31-35 

133-135, 214-215 

Field Manual 10020 

air doctrine institutionalizad in: 

mixed messages sent by: 298-299 

defense of Ausbia by: 369 

capability of: 361 

change in tactics oE 358-361, 364 

importance oE 478, 520-521, 590, 

RAF, use by US. bombers: 364 

Spaatz's view oE 59-60, 64 

Fighter Wing Control Room, hnction 

OE 201 

Fkt Allied Airborne Army: 466,503 

Fischer-Tropsch 

211-212, 216219 

Fighter Command Ostmark 

Fighter escort 

593 

process for fuel: 445 

FIAX (Operatian): 191, 195-1%. 220 

Florennes, Belgium 

Florid;& air proving grounds in: 428 

cargo airlift to: 503 

The Flying Game 

authored by Amold 33 

Flying Tigers: 29 

FM. See Field Manual 

Foggia, Italy: 273 

captlrred: 260 

supply base at: 264 

Fort Benning, Georgia 

command post exercises at: 133, 135 

Fort k, New Jersey: 81 

Fort Leavenworth, Kansas: 23-24 

Fort Sam Houston, Texas: 5 

Foulois, Benjamin D.: 7. 24 

C0,lst Am Squadron 5 

France. Set? 0Lr0 D-Day 

AirseMceiix30 

Allied invasion of planraed: 70, 223, 

Allied targets in: 98, 113, 317, 390. 

analysis of bombing in: 567, 570 

armed forces to North Afiica from: 

armistice sought by: 44 

Battle of France: 43 

assessment of Germans in: 595 

bomb% of civilians in, ummn over 

casualties from bombing: 351,461 

drive across: 438, 439, 470472, 474, 

information on Allied radar leaked by: 

invasion of sourhem: 484 

Luftwaffe fighters in: 368,424 

Luftwaffe bombers moved to: 241 

rail system, effects of bombing on: 

rail targets assigned for bombing: 353 

rail targets studied: 330, 332, 409-410 

SHAEF in: 490 

transportation targets in: 391, 395 

U.S. manufacturing capacity available 

aircraft purchased by: 40 

283 

410411 

123, 137 

400-403, 408, 412413 

501 

47 

401 

for: 38 

V-1 Sites in: 393, 426429 

Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany 

Luftwaffe responsibility for: 369 

raid on: 306 

Frank, Walter H. 

CG, WI Air Service Command: 127 

Fredendall, Lloyd R.: 127, 167-170, 182 

appreciation of tactical air learned by: 

assessment of by Eisenhower: 136, 

background oE 168, 170 

CG, II Corps: 167 

command post exercises led by: 135 

offensive in North &a, prepared 

Free French government 

opinion on bombing of French sought 

187 

183-184 

by: 172-174. 176 

408 

778 
INDEX 

Spaatz, confrontaton with: 176-177 

Vicefief, RAF Air Staff: 88, 146 

in North Africa: 164, 173, 178, 595 

Freeman. wilfied 

French Army 

Gafsa, Tunisia 

cq,tud 203 

Gallagher, wes 

Galland, Adolph 

Patton hq at‘ 204 

RAF press release, role in: 383 

fighter force employment assessed by: 

Goerhg policy disputed by: 368 

losses in Ardennes reported by: 535 

tactics plarmed by: 518 

U.S. tactics, views on: 360 

518-519 

Gander, Newfoundland, feny route: 271 

Garher, Grandison 

Gehebchreik cypher machine: 510 

observer to England: 42 

Geilbenberg. Edmd 

restoration of fuel production assigned 

Lo: 443 

Gela, Sicily, invasion oE 227, 239, 244 

Gee-H: 94, 532. See also H2X; Radar, 

RAF “Y Service 

radar bombing with: 532, 564 

Chief, Ferry Command: 81 

staff, Air war Plans Div: 60 

Gemian Air Force. See Luftwa!Te. 

Gemian Air Transport Service 

losses, North Africa: 196 

Allied drive at border halted by: 526 

Allied drive in North Afiica halted 

by: 142. 153 

Ardennes counteroffensive oE 

504-505, 522, 531-542 

bridgehead at Tunis of: 140 

capitulation oE 574 

counterattack in France of: 480 

counteroffensive of, 1944: 483 

High Cornman& ix, 551 

offensive in North Africa oE 173-174 

paratmops from Bizare: 139 

George, Harold L. 

German Army 

resistance during Allied br-ugh 

oE 482 

464472, 474-475 

resistance in Normandy oE 454, 

retreat in North Africa of: 183 

winter offensive in Russia oE 543, 

545 

German Overseas Service 

Spaatz, accused of terror bombing by: 

558 

Germany: vi;i 503 

air service in: 30 

air strength of: 38, 511-512 

Allied air offensive, vulnerabiity to: 

423-424 440.442-443, 497, 

504-506, 527, 550-552, 553, 

571-575 

Allied policy toward: 94, 112 

antiaircraft artillery in: 439-440,442 

area bombing of: 435-436, 487, 

Armaments Ministry complaints in: 

assessment oE 48-49. 77, 79, 104 

Czechoslovakia occupied by: 38 

bombing casualties in: 553 

bombw effects on: lWll0,323, 

326, 435, 439, 484, 510-511, 564 

defeat of: 60, 70, 75-80, 97, 155-156, 

283. 162, 164, 307. 421, 526-527, 

536-537, 571 

defense against invasion of Italy by: 

255-259 

defense oE 364-373, 376-380, 

500-501. 514-515, 518-519, 

536-537 

595-596 

492493,508,564 

538 

destruction assessed: 588-590, 

fuel shortages in: 44243,445 

Hungarian government deposed by: 

information on Allied radar gained by: 

importance of oil industry to: 398, 

manufacture of thorium and uranium 

military transportation in France: 410 

oil industrial targets in: 341,384,389. 

387 

47 

526-527 

m 579 

393, 400, 484. 490, 504, 526, 

588-589 

production of fighters in: 326,443, 

511, 513-515, 517-518, 560 

propaganda broadcasts hm: 304 

rail transport reduced by bombing in: 

retaliatory raids on: 432434 

410, 572 

779 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

reverses in Middle East suffered by: 

reverses on Eastern Front suffered by: 

shortage of trained crews in: 44 

strain of Ardms counteroffensive 

stmegic targeting against 284, 

296-306, 319-327, 345-357, 

50H-501, 503-506, 536, 543463, 

567-570 

lo6 

icn 

OIL' 537-540, 572 

400-408,424,484,490,492497, 

surrender of: 584-585 

technological infexiority of aircraft 

terror bombmg oE ix, 553, 558-561. 

transportation targets in: 506, 508, 

U.S Ambassador to recalled. 37 

V-1 sites aaacked in: 428431, 432 

368 

567-570, 581-582 

537, 588-589 

weathex factor in bombimg of: 564, 

567. 571 

Gerow, Leonard T. 

Chief, war Plans Div: 60 

Ghomdey, Robert L 

Ass"t Chief, Naval Operations: 47 

GHQ Air Force: 37,47 

organized: 24, 25 

redesignad 58 

revision of TR 440-15: 130 

Gibalm, Spain: 115 

Spa& meeting in: 16142,273 

Gies, Barney: 574 

acting AAF Commander: 548 

bombing German cities, views of: 

crew replacement policy set by: 

CIS, AAF: 303, 314, 348, 359, 523 

Luftwaf€e strength, reaction to: 

5Kl-561 

417-448 

521-522 

Gillem Board 

Goering, Herman: 64, 437. 518 

Spa;& testimony before: 4, 259 

Conlmander in Chief, Luftwaffe: 49, 

fighter protection, pressed for: 443, 

fuel shortage, effect felt by: 442 

order to shift to strategic defense: 514 

order to restrict flights uncovered: 492 

policies criticized: 368-369 

195 

415 

U.S. fighter escort ignored by: 368 

GOODWOOD (Operation): 461463,467 

Goose Bay, Labrador: 82 

Goriza 

Graham, Dominick 

Italian miser damaged. 198 

British military theorist 148 

compared with Spaatz: 288, 593 

"Billy" Mitchell court-martial, role m 

Grw Ulysses s. 

Graves. William S. 

21 

Great Britain. See England 

Greece 

Grenier Field, New Hampshire: 81, 82 

Crierson, C. M. 

SHAEF press conference: 558-559 

Ground control intercept (CCI) 

effectiveness of: 186187 

No. 2 307 

No. 4 148 

No. 5 95 

No. 11: 293, 310 

No. 12 51, 81. 309 

No. 83: 307, 311 

No. 84: 307 

No. 242 172 174, 187, 200, 208, 

Commonwealth evacuation from: 146 

Groups (numbered, RAF) 

209 

Groups (numbered, U.S.) 

20, 68,8296 

1st Pursuit (later Fighter): 6, 1618, 

2d Bombardment 199 

2d Pursuit: 6 

7th Bombardment 22 

20th Pursuit (later Fighter): 33, 288 

31st Pursuit (later Fighter): 68.90.96, 

33d Fighter: 183, 230, 239, 247, 258 

44th Bombardment 103,260 

52d Fighter: 183 

56th Fighter: 103. 359 

92d Bombardment. 103 

93d Bombardment 103,260 

97th Bombardment 82,96,103,199 

98th Bombardment 260 

100th Bombardment 371. 381, 479 

301st Bombardment: 103, 199 

303dBombardment: 103 

305th Bombardment: 103 

306th Bombardment 103 

183 

33% fighter: 259 

780 
INDEX 

353th Fighter 288 

355th Fighter. 384 

36Ost Fi- 512 

3364th Fighter: 408 

375th Bombardment: 260 

388th Bombardment: 260 

445th Bombardment: 512, 514 

Chief, Manhanan Project: 579 

Groves, Leslie R. 

Gruenther, Alfred M. 

Guam, Japanese attack on: 68 

Guderian, Heinz: 205 

c/s. U.S. Fifth Army: 230 

Chief, German General Staff: 580 

incapacitated in raid 580 

H2X: 543, 593. See also Radar 

accuracy oE 346,492, 504-506, 508, 

B-17s equipped with: 296-298 

Berlin amcked with aid oE 543, 567 

bombing through overcast aided by: 

D-Day operations aided by: 414 

Dresden attacked with aid oE 556, 

forbidden over occupied countries: 

Magdeburg attacked with aid of: 553 

pamitted against targets in France: 

Ploesti attacked with aid oE 388 

tracked by Germans: 440 

Zihich attacked with aid oE 575 

Halbtm~& Germany, raid on: 303 

Halifax, Lord 

Foreign Minister (British): 46 

Halle, Germany 

communications mter attacked at: 

521-522, 532, 543, 567, 570, 582 

306,328 

559, 564 

382 

401 

572 

Hallein, Germany, raid on: 584 

Halvcmn, Hany A. 

record-setting Question Mark flight, 

participant in: 22-23 

Hamburg, Germany: 89 

Battle oE 426 

RAF targets m 48, 557 

Hamilton, Nigel 

Pantellaia analyzed by: 238-239 

Hamm, Germany 

raids on: 391, 410. 508 

Hampton Gout, England 104 

Hansell, Haywood S.: 60,271, 322 

air planner, m 101 

ACTS instructor: 30 

moved to Pacific for B-29 operations: 

selection of targets. criticized for: 588 

strategic bombardment of Germany 

strategy refocused by: 11 1-1 12 

311 

assessed by: 484, 527 

Harmon, Millard F.. Chief of Staft 79 

Harris, Arthur T.: 113, 147, 315, 409, 

545. See also RAF Bomber 

command 

area bombing, views on: 506, 527, 

552, 564, 570. 581 

assessment oE 592 

background oE 9596 

Berlin raid requested by: 432433. 

bomb damage photos used by: 102 

Chief, RAF Bomber Comman& 82, 

close air support with heavy 

command arrangements assessed by: 

objectives assigned to: 306 

ovnux>RD command arrangements 

viewed by: 327, 334, 336338,353 

Portal relationship with: 496497 

preinvasion operations, views on: 411 

reprisal raids favored by: 437. 487 

strategic bombardment plans, views 

strategy oE 93-95, 329, 330. 570 

targeting directives issued to: 

544 

240, 267, 309, 454, 470, 496, 500 

bombardment agreed by: 517 

486 

on: 348, 349, 351 

492493, 500 

Hanison. Leland 

Hanison, Ruh 7 

Hart, Charles E. 

Hartle, Russell P. 

Hawaii 51 

Heston Airfield, England 481 

Hickey, Lawrence 

U.S. Minism to Swiaerland: 575 

Spaatz’s wife: 5 

acting commander in France: 464 

Commander, Oran Task Force: 127 

air ferry mute to Australiz 69 

Commander, XII Air Service 

Command: 242 

replaced: 242 

High Wycombe, England 83.93, 

78 1 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

9S96, 103 

Hill, Roderic M., Chief, ADGB: 307 

Himmler, Heinrich 437 

Hider, AdolE 399, 434,437, 440 

assass~on attempt on: 438 

decision to &fad Italy by: 265 

declaration of war on U.S. by: 67 

devastation of oil production faced by: 

disptxition of fighters by: 518 

last gamble oE 504-505, 511 

meteorological operations cut by: 302 

policies of criticized: 368-369 

territorial demands oE 38 

"woxkers" sent to Ruhr by: 510 

carria support for North Africa: 137 

host for Eisenhower and Cunningham: 

443,445 

HMS Argus 

HMS Aurora 

233 

HMS 'mgs 

commmcations command ship: 238 

Pantelleria 0perah-s hq ship: 233 

HMS Prince of Wales. loss oE 67 

HMS Repulse, loss oE 67 

HMS whadden 

Hodga, C3-y 

McCriggor's flagship: 233-234 

CG. First Army: 515. 523 

targeting preferences of: 535 

Commander, 2d Bombardment Div: 

Hodgez, James P. 

478479 

Holland 

AAF' fighter move to: 521 

Allied airfields attacked in: 535 

attack on German airfields in: 90 

paradrop into: 438, 503 

"workers" fbm: 510 

morale problem solved by: 189 

Spaatz compared with: 188-189 

Hopkins, Hany: 37. 158, 328. 595 

Arnold's idea on command and 

control endorsed by: 267 

chief aide to FDR: 70, 112 

Combined Bombex Offensive, views 

crosschannel invasion postponement 

supply airlift into: ix 

Hooker. Joseph ("Fightm' Joe") 

on: 268-270 

assessed by: 107-108 

Horthy, Miklos 

deposed: 387 

House, Edward J. 

black pilots, views on: 258-260 

commands, XII Air support 

Commd 242 

HavitZer: 4 

How Robert L. 

president of "Billy" Mitchell courtmartial: 20 

Huertgen Forest, offensive in: 482 

Hughes, Richard D'O. 

"Big Week" assessed by: 327 

Eighth AF operations planned by: 

OVERLORD preinvasion plans prepared 

target for Mission No. 1 selected by: 

target planner 300 

bombing ban on: 387-388 

74-75 

by: 332, 333. 334, 335 

98 

Hungary 

economic loss to Germany of: 573 

Red Army in: 573 

Hunter, Frank O'D. 

CG. VIII Fightex Command: 302,360 

observer to France and England: 49, 

prewar planning by: 62 

U.S. fighter groups stationed near: 81 

51 

Huntingdon, England 

HURRICANES I and II (Operations): 

494495, 528, 548, 571 

HUSKY (Operation): 239-243 

IFF: 56, 80 

Impact magazine 

circulated to publicize airpower: 102 

Imperial General sw. 347 

Indiary bombing 

Balk 553 

Dresden: 556-559 

Interdiction. See also STRANGE 

Allied, North Africa: 185, 196 

Allied, Sicily: 243, 253 

campaign in USSTAF: 404,411 

targets advocated by RAF: 284 

combat crews delayed to: 85 

U.S. fighters planned for: 80, 81 

(Operation) 

Ireland: 83 

Issoudun Pursuit Training Center: vii, 33 

Italian Air Force 

radio traffic monitored: 195 

782 
INDEX 

strength, Sicily: 240 

holdout of in Abyssinia: 146 

Italian Army 

Italy: 595 

Italian Royal Air Force: 127 

Air Service in: 30 

defeat of planned: 162, 230 

defeat of Sicily: 245-253 

fall oE viii. 263-280 

Gman fighters withdrawn hm: 518 

invasion oE 223, 255-260 

Luftwaffe bombers moved to: 241 

Pantell& defended by: 226-238 

plans against Sicily: 239-243 

RAF targets in: 45 

SlR.4NGI.E in: 404 

transportation targets attacked in: 385 

Jackson, Robert H.: 37 

Japrur 28, 77, 581 

ah seavice in: 30 

anibassador of in Berlin: 442 

attack on Pearl Harbor by: 67-68 

codes of broken: 79, 442 

information on German situation from: 

victories over British oE 107 

Jeb Stuart plan: 556, 572. See also 

Jenstm, Richard N.. 

500 

QUd Plan 

Patton's aide killed in bombing raid: 

Jet aircraft. See also Aircraft (German): 

203 

Me 262; (U.S.): P-80 

584 

538-541 

G~rman: 484, 500-501, 526, 539-542 

production in Germany: 514-515, 

U.S.: 512, 513-514 

Jews, murder of at Treblinka: 591 

Johnson, Louis: 37 

Joint Board of the Army and Navy: 

Joint Bombing Committee 

59-60 

dispute ova targeting strategic 

Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS): 59, 113 

bombardment 348-349 

bomber allocation to Italy, views on: 

bomber groups to North hca shifted 

bombing of cities, policy oE 560-561 

364 

by: 97 

OWRLORD, role in: 344 

reform of suggested: 246 

resources discussed by: 112 

unified bomber command insisted on 

by: 268 

Joint Operations Staff: 147 

Joint Planning Committee 

transportation plan discussed by: 336, 

345 

JUNIOR (code name for TORCH) 

air power: 109-110 

JUNIOR (Operation): 110 

Junior Military Aviator Rating: 14 

Karls~uhe, Gmany 

raid on: 510 

strained rail system in: 538 

Kassel, Germany 

targets in: 45, 390, 561-562 

Kasserine Pass: 136. 172, 181, 183, 184. 

Allied reorganization for: 177-184 

Battle oE 173, 177, 178, 198 

failure of OVERLORD forecast by: 350 

191 

Kaysen, Carl 

Kegelman, Charles C., hero: 90 

Keitel, Field Marshal Wilhelm 

German surrender teams presented by: 

585 

Kellor, R.F.L 

480 

Commander, 3d Canadian Inf Div: 

Kelsey, Benjamin S. 

Kennedy, Joseph P. 

observer to England: 42 

U.S. Ambassador to England: 43 

replaced: 52 

Kenney, George C. 

Ken6 Tyler, codes compromised by: 44n 

Kepner, William E. 

promoted to four-star rank: 579 

CG. 2d Bombardment Div: 478 

CG, WI Fighter Command: 302, 

fighter escort used by: 360 

fighter tactics created by: 367 

Kan, William B. 

air support criticized by: 217 

Kessehg, Field Marshal Albext 

German Supme Commander, 

316, 317, 359 

Mediterranean: 141 

Italy defended by: 264 

783 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

King; bt J.: 112 

Conmander in Chief, U.S. Fleet and 

Clhief, Naval Operations: 79, 97, 

355 

cross-channel invasion postponement 

studied by: 107-108 

King of England (George VI) 

fom1al OVERLORD plans presented to: 

408 

Kirk, Alan G. 

Kirkpatrick, Helen 

Naval Attach6 to England: 45 

asked to counter effects of RAF press 

release: 383 

Klagerlfurs Aust~ia, raid on: 584 

Knm, Hugh 

Battle of the Bulge. reaction to: 532 

Dpty for Administration to Spaatz: 

2% 

Koenig, Pierre Joseph 

Commander, French Force in Britain. 

408 

Khigsberg, Germany, raid on: 486 

Kru~Gruson Werke 

Kuter, Laurence S.: 60, 81, 271, 276 

Acting Chief, Allied Air Support 

air support doche of: 214, 215, 218 

attacks on cities planned by: 435-436 

bombing of troop movements rejected 

Malmalta participant in: 547 

press coverage of war viewed by: 

promotion of Spaa~ view on: 579 

repasal attacks apposed by: 435 

decline in tank production of: 537 

C~mmand: 174, 176, 204 

by: 412 

304, 559-560 

La Kroub, Tunisia 

La Mma, Tunisia 

Sparltz hq at 231 

pint MAC-NAAF Hq at: 247. 250 

Spar- hq at: 240,264 

Lampedusa, air strikes on: 236 

Lampat Committee: 19 

Lampime, air strikes on: 236 

Langley Field (later AFB), Virginia: 

La Pallice, France 

Lawrence, Oliver 

19-20, 25, 28, 37 

subrnarine pens targeted: 113 

strategic bombardment targets, views 

on: 351 

Lawson, G. M.: 145. 172, 182 

state of communications lamented by: 

140 

Lee, John C. 

Lee, Raymond E. 

Lee, Robat E. 

288 

CG, Senices of Supply, EM: 101 

U.S. Military Attach4 LonQn: 51 

campaign of compiaed to Spaatz’s: 

Le Haw, France, beachhead at 70 

Leigh-Mallory, Tdfd 51, 349, 351, 

352, 364 

307-3 18 

AEAF command smlctured by: 

AOC. Fighter Command: 309-310 

assessment of: 310, 593 

bridge targets assessed by: 404, 406, 

British in revamping of organizational 

Chief, Allied Air Forces in Southeast 

close air support from heavy bombers 

COBRA planner: 468-469 

Commander, Allied Expeditiormy A€? 

Commander, No. 12 Group: 49, 309 

command, relationship with: 310-311, 

312, 327, 330, 335, 352, 354, 406, 

417, 454-458, 462, 467468, 470, 

479, 595 

control over bomber forces, view on: 

337-339 

fighter escort for U.S. bombers lent 

by: 364 

background OE 309-3 11 

408 

structure favored by: 455 

Asia: 488-489 

plqosed by: 453454,466 

290, 293, 294 

intekiction targeting supported by: 

285. 299 

killed in air crash: 489n 

OVERLDRD, responsibility in: 344.409 

preinvasion planning, views on: 327, 

328,329, 330-339, 410, 413, 417 

St I.2 raid, reaction to: 470471 

sfatus of: 354357,454-455 

targets assessed by: 494 

transportation plan, comments on: 410 

attack on requested by Soviets: 553. 

communications targets attacked at 

Leipzig, Germany 

560-561 

784 
INDEX 

572 

raid on: 321, 322 

targets in studid 544, 553, 559, 563 

fighter manufacturing plant at: 398 

CC;, 3d Bombardment Div: 371 

Leipzig-Erla, Gemany 

May, Curtis 

remembranw of Spaatz 105-106 

Le Sers, Tunisia: 207 

Leuna, G-y 

losses over: 440, 526 

RAF targets in: 45, 398, 505 

raid on: 399 

Liberty Loan Drives: 14 

Libya 

Axis resurgence in: 69 

Axis ships sunk in ports oE 146 

conquest of: 147, 164 

Licata, Sicily, invasion of 227, 239 

Liege, Belgium 

Ljfe mag& 198 

1st Army Hq at 535 

Link& Charles A. 

flight training oE 9 

Linosa, air saes on: 236 

LinZ, Austria 

Luftwaffe defense oE 369 

raid on: 584 

Lippman. Walter 

press coverage by: 103 

Lippstadt, Germany 

troop connection at 573-574 

Lloyd, Hugh P. 

CG, North African Coastal AF: 157 

Lodge, Hemy Cabot, Jr., Senator: 246 

hire, France, raids on: 40344,408 

hclon, Englana 41, 46, 47, 81, 82, 

103, 105, 107-108, 116, 330, 333 

aaacks on by V-1 flying bombs: 426, 

432, 434 

bombing casual ti^ in: 439 

US. delegation in: 70 

effectiveness of US. bombers reported 

hgmore, Arthur 

Libyan command oE 147 

L'orienL France 

submarine pens targeted at 113 

Lossay, France, action at 464 

Loukiana, maneuvers in: 132, 167 

Love& Robert A.: 

London Times 

in: 100 

air support doctrine promoted by: 212 

area bombing assessed by: 591 

Ass't Sec of War for Air: 485, 490, 

494, 5D3, 513.531, 562-563 

morale bombing, views on: 437 

Pantelleria operations observed by: 

236 

Quesada plan adopted by: 548 

special Ass't to sec of war for Air 

58, 68, 301 

243 

Lucas, John P., Commander, VI Cop: 

Lene 3: 445 

Lyffrone Reich, signal decrypted: 514 

Luftwaffc 48, 56, 75, 86, 127, 334, 390 

AAF bombers atracked by fighters of: 

air superiority of, over Em-: 

99-100, 572, 584 

287-288 

514-515 

air superiority of, over Gmany: 

air superiority of, over North Africa: 

142. 171 

aircraft desmyed in WWII: 587 

airlifts supplies to Tunisia: 190-191, 

assessment oE 51, 53, 78-80, 107, 

195-196 

109-111. 350, 351, 353, 396, 398, 

595-596 

assessment of at Casablanca: 157, 

assessment of in North Afriw 183, 

Battle of the Bulge fought by: 532, 

bombers fi-om Sicily transferred by: 

campaign against airfields of: 144-145 

challenged by Spaatz: 300-303, 312, 

consumption of fuel by: 399, 484 

D-Day operations: 414418, 424426 

decline of: 492-493 

159. 164 

203 

535 

241 

316-317 

decline on Eastem Front oE 440,445. 

572-573 

decline in efficiency of: 364 

defeat of claimed by USSTW 394, 

defense of Normandy by: 472 

England attacked by: 47 

fighter defenses spread by: 263 

fight to bitter end by: 584 

impotence of in North Africa: 200, 

409, 414 

205, 208 

785 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

jet threat oE 484, 5W501, 539-542, 

losses to: 439, 519 

losses. Jan-Feb 44: 339 

losses, 14 Oct 43: 376 

losses, 27 Sep 44: 511 

losses. Aug 17, 43: 373-376 

losses. Mar 44: 358 

losses: 104 

lured to fight: 332, 333, 392, 396, 

neutralization oE 429432,490,517 

 nigh^. fighters oE 358, 501 

nigh1 raids on London: 51-52 

resurgence oE 50&501, 511-515, 

signals of tapped: 533, 535 

slmegic bombardment, effects on: 596 

strategic bombardment, defense 

strategic bombardment, target of: 266, 

573 

562 

pilot training in: 44 

518-523 

against: 358-379 

284, 298, 29-30. 350, 390. 395, 

41 1 

140 

strength, North &CZX Nov-~ 42 

strength, May 44: 3% 

strength, Jun 44: 425 

strength, Oct 44: 514 

strength, Sep 44: 526 

strength, Dec 44: 517-519 

strength, Mar 45 

strength, Sicily: 240 

transports at Bougie sunk by: 139 

U.S. positions dive-bombed by: 172 

Lutzkerdorf, Germany, raid on: 398 

Luxembourg: 513 

tacti~ OE 368-369, 378, 512-513 

Lyster, St G. 

ChieC British Naval Air Staff: 86 

Machhur, Douglas: 25 

area of responsibility: 97 

Chief of Staff, U.S. Army: 24-25 

prestige oE 267 

Mackay Trophy: 32 

Magdeburg. Germany 

AAF raids on: 398, 553, 556 

RAF raid on: 45 

strained rail system ix 538 

Mainz, Germany 

Maison Blanche 

air facility in Algiers: 142, 145 

Axis raidnear 176, 177 

U.S. attack on: 172 

Malaya, defense of: 146 

Malta. 545, 579 

agreements at 560 

RAF fields at: 190. 225. 231, 239 

raidon: 146 

Tripartite Conference at: 543,545, 

Maknassy, Tunisia 

546, 547-548, 572 

Manhattan Project: 579 

Ma~mheim, Germany 

assigned: 369 

Luftwaffe defense responsibility for 

Mantes-Ciassicourt, France 

Marble Arch, Tripolitania 

March Field (later AFB), Califomia: 23, 

March of Time: 103 

Mareth Line: 208 

Axis awk at: 203 

W- (Operation) 489 

assessment oE 503-504 

proposed by Montgomexy: 501 

scheduled: 438 

Marquis of Lothim 

Ambassador to US. (British): 41, 46 

Marrakwh, Africa: 173,210 

airfield at 189, 230 

feny route terminus: 153 

Senate commiltee visit to: 246 

Tripartite Conference in: 543 

raid on: 408 

WDAF at: 147 

25 

Marseilles, France 

Marshall, George C.: 38, 41, 57, 60, 68, 

70, 79, 112, 113, 152, 136, 234, 

249, 260, 272, 290. 299, 313, 335, 

344. 354, 536. 548-549, 553, 564, 

572, 578, 580 

air support doctrine, views on: 

Andrews selected CG, ETO, by: 101 

autonomous strategic bombardmmt 

operation supported by: 267 

AWPDI1 endorsed by: 435-436 

bomb% of Switzerland, reaction to: 

bombing of Rome discussed by: 261 

212-214, 218 

575 

bombing cities, views on: 550,561, 

59 1 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 162, 

786 
INDM 

164 

Chief of Staff, US. Anny: 270 

confidence in Eisenhower: 100 

crosschannel invasion postponed by: 

107-108 

Eaker reassignma view on: 276-278 

Eaker, leadership of Twelfth AF 

Eighth AF movement delayed by: 82 

Eighth AF operations plan ordered by: 

end of war. optimism on: 496,538 

invasion of Spain, views on: 230 

Luftwaffe defeat planned by: 75-77 

moving of bomb pup to Italy 

press coverage directed by: 103 

press coverage, reaction to: 559 

pmnotion of Bradley and Spaatz 

resources to Pacific allocated by: 97 

strategic bombardment plans, view on: 

strategic bombardment, views on: 266, 

USSTAF command, views on: 314, 

Vandenkg pmotion refused by: 

Manhall Memorank. 70-71, 75,91 

buildup of air power in England 

favored by: 126 

74-75 

rejected by: 263-264 

recommended by: 579 

348. 496 

548 

348 

4a67 

required by: 80, 81 

Masefield, Peter 

U.S. heavy bombardment effort 

cmdemned by: 97 

Maxwell Field (later AFB) Alabama: 28 

McCloy Committee 

training policies for blacks, views on: 

259 

McDonald, George C.: 51, 232 

Ass’t Attach6 for Air, England 43, 

Chief, Intelligence, Eighth AF: 144 

Chief, Intelligence, USSTm 478, 

German jet threat assessed by: 

Spaatz, relationship with: 593 

Commander, British naval assault 

Pantelleria naval bombardment 

45. 47 

524-525 

539-540 

McGrigor. R. R. 

forces: 227 

clirected by: 233 

Pantelleria operations, prepared for: 

231 

McNabb, C.V. 0”. 

counterattack in North Africa planned 

KAN. Anderson’s C/S: 171 

commande€, Army Ground Forces. 

by: 176 

McNair, Leslie J. 

135 

killed in action: 474 

McNamey, Joseph T.: 256 

air support doctine approved by: 213 

military expansion planned by: 38 

promoted to four-star rank: 579 

Mead, James M., Senatox 246 

Meade, George G. 

campaign of compared to Spaatz’s: 

288 

Mediterranean: 268.484435 

Axis ship sunk in: 146 

Axis bases in: 301 

coordination of USSTAF in: 315, 

invasion of Sicily plannd 239-243 

Italian operations: 255-260 

lessons oE 313 

operations: 69,232-239 

Sicilian operations: 243-253 

Mediterranean Air Command 

f0rmW 210, 280 

form& 178 

NAAF arrangements with: 247-250 

Allied stralegy in: 227 

385-386 

Mediterranean Allied Air Forces 

(MAAF): 272 

”Big Week” undertaken by: 31% 

321-326 

creae 250 

Eaker assigned CG of: 274 

Italian operations: 385 

raids on oil targets by: 400 

redesignae 273n 

STRANGLE Operations: 385-386 

Mediterranean Theater of Operations 

(Mm 

aircraft strength in: 526 

command restructured in. 267-280 

heavy bomb groups augmented in: 

lessons from: 331, 359 

strategic bombardment in: 26280 

airfield at 144 

273 

Medjez el Bab, Tunisia 

787 
SPAAlE AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Medje.2 Valley: 208-209 

Mersehurg, Germany 

Messina. Italy 

Meuse River. France 

raid5 on' 398.442, 505,526 

plans for bombing of: 240 

bridge targets on: 406 

drivle for: 522 

Gmans halted at: 533 

MEW (microwave early warning): 520, 

521-522 

introducd 513 

linked with RAF "Y Service: 514 

Mexico: 5 

"Middle East Training Pamflet No. 3: 

Middleton, Drew: 51-52, 83 

Midway, Baale oE 81 

Direct Air Support": 150 

effects of on move to England: 82 

Navy performance at: 90 

U.S foreknowledge oE 79 

German aircraft production, 

responsibility for: 323 

Milch, Erhard 

Mildenhall, England: 94 

Miles, Sherman 

commander, Army Corp Area: 81 

Military Attach6 to England: 45 

Militrny Air Observers: 4144 

Militrny Aviator Rating: 6, 14 

Miller, Henry F., incident involving: 391 

Mitchel Field, New York 32, 81 

Mitchtdl, William ("Billy"): vii, 6, 7 

air s~uperiority, views on: 17. 31 

Chief, Air Service Training and 

court-martial oE vii, 20-21. 32, 33, 

doche of: 93 

Spaatz, relationship with: 16-17 

Momyer, William W. 

CO, 33d Fighter Group: 257-258 

Montgomery, Bemard L.: 106, 521 

Commander, British 8th Amy: 135% 

Commander, 21 Army Group 307. 

Operations Group 14 

245 

147 

3 L 1, 459-460, 462-463, 464, 503, 

5'13 

command at Kasserine Pass: 173 

mand at Alam Half= 150 

heavy bombardment for close air 

support requested by: 479, 481 

King of England briefed on invasion 

plans by: 409 

467 

Leigh-Mallory, relationship with' 461, 

MARKET-GARDES ~IUPOS& by: 501 

personality of: 456458. 461, 467 

problems in Sicily: 239 

Rhine crossing led by: 575 

"Some Notes on High Command in 

WAF, relationship with: 241 

Morale. See also Germany; spa at^; 

affects on of inte€nmat: 379 

German: ix, 94,437-438, 450, 

leave behavior affected by: 380 

problems: 109-110, 188, 379-384, 

rotation policy. effects on: 381 

C/S, Supreme Allied Command: 294 

OVERIDRD planner: 312 

War" by: 212, 213 

united states Army Air Forces. 

459-460, 494, 550-552, 590-591 

44-50 

Morgan. Frederick 

Morrison. Joe, press coverage by: 102 

Momxo, Allied control of: 123 

Moselle River, France 

Mountba~ten, Louis 

destxuction near: 510 

Commander in Chief, SEAC 488 

Chief, Combined Operations: 231 

transfer of Leigh-Mallo~ to SEAC 

requested by: 488489 

Mulheitn Germany 

Munich Conference: 38 

Munich, Gmany 

cloud cover at: 564 

communications center attacked at 

Luftwaffe defense of: 369 

tonnage dropped on: 435, 570 

bridge charges set off at: 510 

572 

stlategic importance of: 45, 546, 549 

Mussolini, fall hm power of: 255,262 

Naples, Italy: 259 

cape 24%261,262 

plans for bombing oE 240 

National Broadcasting Company, 

coverage of war: 572 

National Defense Act of 192.0 8, 14, 16 

Nationalist china: 28 

National Theam 22 

Naval Attach6 to London: 45 

788 
INDEX 

Nazis: 436. See also Germany. 

invade unoccupied France: 123 

policies. 1938 38 

strategy for defeat oE 223 

wilr criminal list oE 437 

Chief of Air Staff, RAF: 41-42, 43 

Newall, Cyril: 49 

New Caledonia 

New York, New Yok 4 

New York Times 

U.S. troops in: 69 

Anglo-American objectives reported 

Berlin attack described by: 553 

Spaatz’s aerial victories in WWI, 

by: 87-89, 97 

described by: 7 

U.S. troops in: 69 

New Zealand 

Nimik Chester, prestige oE 267 

Norden Bomb Sight 

Normandy, France: 462, 523. See also 

effectiveness oE 462, 476 

OVERU>RD (Operation) 

air supaiority over 341 

assaulted: 414, 426, 430 

breakout hm: 438, 460, 461, 

Eisenhower inspects beachhead at: 

German defense oE 453 

invasion of studied: 107-108, 594 

lessons oE 515 

Ass’t CIS, NAAF: 232 

Chief, Intelligence, AF Combat 

Eisenhower hq joined by: 101 

Spaatz, relationship with: 594 

North Africa: 116. 596. See also 

Mediterranean Allied Command 

Allied airfields in: 225 

Allied reorganization in: 164-184 

Axis collapse in: 200-210 

Axis reversals in: 185-200 

campaign in: 119 

consolidation of Allied positions in: 

diversions to: 85, 87, 97, 142 

dochine invoked in: 130-137, 

invasion of assessed: 594-595 

invasion of, effects on Eighth AF: 

463-464 

457-458, 470472, 474 

Norstad, Lauris 

Command: 68 

138-154 

210-220 

106-1 16 

invasion of launched: 123-125 

invasion of planned: 68, 97, 101, 103 

operations to capture airfields m 

137-142 

spaatz anives in: viii 

theater created in: 155-164 

diversion of P-38s to: 288 

observations by ground commanders: 

organizations in: 178 

senate committee tows oE 246 

North African Theater 

217 

North American Aviation Corp., contract 

with British 65. See also Aircraft 

types, (U.S.), P-51. 

North Carolina, maneuvers in: 132 

North Field, San Diego, Califomia: 5 

Northwest African Air Forces (NAAF). 

see also Allied Air Forces; 

Meditex~anean Allied Air Forces 

Allied Air Force replaced by: 178, 

185 

antishipping efforts oE 186 

command form- 210, 219, 246 

invasion of Italy by: 255-0 

invasion of Sicily by: 243-248 

Mmakech airfield controlled by: 189 

mission oE 180, 202 

Pantelleria operations: 225-238 

preinvasion planning for Sicily by: 

press coverage for: 188 

radar net establiihed by: 187 

redesignated Mediterranean Allied Air 

photo reconnaissance oE 209 

239-243 

Forces: 273 

reorganized: us253 

strategic bombardment from Italy by: 

tonnage dropped on Pantelleria by: 

Northwest African Air Service command 

Northwest African Coastal Air Farce 

260-280 

236 

formed: 181 

(NACAF): 186. 280 

antishipping campaign of: 190-196 

effectiveness analyzed: 189 

invasion of Italy by: 255-0 

mission oE 157 

Pantelleria operations: 233-239 

reassigned: 178 

preinvasion planning for Sicily by: 

240-243 

789 
SPAA'TZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Sicily operations: 247-253 

Northwest African Strategic Air Force 

mASAF) 

antishipping campaign of: 1904% 

effectiveness analyzed: 189 

heavy bombardment campaign in 

invasion of Italy by: 255-260 

mission oE 157, 180, 186. 20-210 

morale problems in: 187 

Pantell& campaim oE 229-239 

Tunisia by: 19640 

preinvasion pl& for Sicily by: 

239-243 

preinvasion strikes in Italy by: 255 

reassigned: 178 

Northwest African Training Command 

Norway: 595 

formed: 181. 596 

sircraft from U.S. purchased by: 40 

Allied liberation of: 329 

Nmberg, Gamany 

bombing of: 570 

Luftwaffe defense oE 369 

Oahu, Hawaii: 67 

Oh K&ach, Germany 

rocket manufacturing site in attacked: 

432 

oboe, accuTacy oE 564 

O'Connor, Richard 

OCIACON. See Quebec Conference 

Oder River 

Wice of the Chief of Air Corps 

Commander, WAF: 147 

Soviet drive to: 543, 544 

(CEAC). See also Office of the 

Chief of Air Service. 

Plans Section: 37, 38 

sends observers to England: 42 

Training and Operations Section: 23 

Office of the Chief of Air Service. See 

also Office of the Chief of Air 

COp. 

Training and Operations Section: 20 

Office of Strategic Services: 347,487n 

Wice of Wax Information: 383 

Oil plan: 345-352. See also Combined 

Bomber Offensive; Spaa~ Carl k 

debated: 347 

implemented: 395400 

salviged by Spaatz: 384-394 

oissel, France 

raid on bridge at 408 

Oliphant, Heamam 37 

OMAHA Beach 

Oran Task Force: 127 

Oran, Tunisia: 125 

D-Day invasion on: 414n 

engineex battalions at: 145 

invasion force at 128 

occupation by Allies oE 123 

repair facilities at: 141-142 

Koosevelt visit to: 268 

U.S. airfield at 153 

"order of the white Feather" 

awarded to Spaak 558 

Oranienburg, Germany 

manufacture of thorium and uranium 

in: 579 

Orival, France 

raid on: 408 

Orleans/sriey Airfield (Paris) 

airlift to: 501 

Ome River, France 

action at: 454 

oschersleben, Germany 

fighter manufacturing plant at 398 

raid on: 303 

Oscoda, Michigan 20 

Oujda, Morocco 

U.S. airfield at 230 

OVERLDRD (Operation): 272,285,294, 

316, 327-339, 385, 387, 449. 485, 

497, 501 

control over: 271, 277, 315 

coordination with POINTBLANK: 

dispute over targets related to: 

diversion of effort from: 389 

fighter assistance for: 300 

launched: 414418, 424426 

planraed: 223. 264, 270, 283, 309, 

preinvasion operatiom 409-413 

requirements oE 588 

Spaatz's misjudgment of: 595 

transportation plan related to: 

395418 

349-359 

310, 312, 316, 327-339 

priority of: 306 

460408. 570 

Pacific 

commitments to at Casablanca: 161 

designated U.S. Navy arena: 97 

790 
INDEX 

divenion of aircraft to: 108 

strategy for at Quebec Conference: 

war plans for: 6748 

plans for bombing of: 240 

landing site on: 239 

raid on: 198, 199 

"Palm Sunday Massacre" 

German tramports shot down in: 195 

Panama Canal Zone: 51 

Pantelleria: 330 

484-489 

Palenno, Sicily 

Pan-AmeIican Flight. 33 

bombing of intensified: 233-234 

campaign against: 225-238 

operations analyzed: 236,238-241 

preliminary bombardment of: 229 

reduction of: viii 

surrender of: 235 

US. airfield on: 239 

Parachute operations 

MARKET-GARDEW: 489 

OVERLORD: 312, 413414 

Sicily: 243 

fall of: 45, 439 

335, 382, 401 

Paris, France: 501, 560 

Park House: 88. 105,322,323,327, 

Park, Keith 

Chief, Allied Air Forces in SEA 

Commander, No. 11 Group: 310 

Commander, RAF, Malta: 231 

Dpty Commander, Eighth AF: 317 

effect of bombing on: 450 

electrical system of: 428 

tonnage dropped on: 418,432 

Commander, U.S. Seventh Army: 523 

489n 

Partridge, Earle: 29 

Pasde-calais. France 

Patch, Alexander 

Pathfinder aircraft 296-298. See also 

raid on Wilhehhaven led by: 306 

results oE 502 

Chief, Air Service: 33 

409, 481, 515, 523 

H2X. 

Patrick, Masan 

Patton, Jr., George S.: vii, 106, 113 

air effort criticized by: 203-205,217 

air plan for TORCH accepted by: 109 

background of: 167-168 

CG, Seventh Army: 241, 242 

CG, Third Army: 307, 535 

Commander, North Mcan task force: 

coningham, dispute with: 203,207 

127 

hq bombarded: 205 

instructions by on paradmp in Sicily: 

244 

Pavesi, Gino 

Pantelleria surrendered by: 235 

Pay Classification Act of 1922: 16 

Pearl Harbor 

Army air power in: 90 

RAF press announcement by: 

attacked: 67 

Peck, Richard 

381-384 

PeenemUnde, Germany 

Peirse, Richard 

Pelagies 

P&ers, France: 470-471. 472, 474 

Pershing, John J. 

Forces: 124 

rocket site at attack& 432, 440 

Chief, RAF Bomber Command: 82 

air strikes on: 236 

action at 464-465 

Commader, American Expeditionary 

punitive expedition oE 5 

Commander, Vichy government 123 

Petaluma, California: 16 

F'forzheim, Germany, RAF raid on: 564 

Philippines: 32 

Photo reconnaissance 

P* Philip 

Army air power performanm in: 90 

post-attack 408 

weakness of in North Africa: 209, 

217-218 

Pilsen, Czechoslovakia 

raid on: 584 

Pinkley. Virgil 

European Manager, United Press: 562 

Ploesti, Romania 

German defenses in: 440 

losses over: 443 

raids on: 260-261,262,389,400,443 

ruled off limits by Portal: 384-385, 

straegic importance of: 354, 384, 389, 

POINTBLANK (Operation): 264,265,266, 

Gman petroleum SoUTce of: 75,346 

386, 388, 389 

416 

268, 270, 274, 315, 317, 318, 336, 

79 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

347, 355. 379.384, 386. 426 

Poland 

economic loss of to Germany: 573 

missions into: 379, 382, 398 

losses to friendly bombardment: 

Polish Army 

480482 

Polish Campaign of 1939 

PoliK Poland 

strafng tactics in: 366 

effecs of raid on: 399 

heavy losses over: 440 

raids on: 398.448 

Portal, ~Charles A.: 80, 113, 147, 267, 

290, 351. 383, 390, 416, 545, 546, 

580 

AEAF assessed by: 485-490 

apolctgy for RAF press release made 

bxkground oE 89 

Balkiin attacks requested by: 385-387 

bombiig policy of: 384-385, 521-522 

Cairci Conference, participation in: 

Casablanca Conference, participation 

Chief of Air Staff, RAF: 48,6243, 

civilian casualties, views on: 351 

Commander, RAF Bomber Command: 

comrnand and control, views on: 

command, relationship with: 461-462 

CROYSBOW operations assessed by: 

Eaka defended by: 274-276 

Gmian jets, views on: 543 

Hanis, relationship with: 496-497 

Malta Conference participant: 545 

OVMLORD planning by: 33&339, 

Ploesti bombing, view on: 385-389, 

PONIBLANK coordinator: 287,306, 

precision night kmbing on France 

retaliatory bombing assessed by: 

single air manager accepted by: 152 

strategic bombardment of Italy, views 

by: 383 

27 1 

in: 157-159, 163 

83 

48, 56 

26‘7-268. 337-339 

432 

344, 345 

315, 316-317 

ordered by: 330 

433-434 

on: 263,264,265-266 

strategic bombadment plans viewed 

transportation plan presented by: 

by: 348, 400.529, 545 

339-340 

Porter, Ray E: 177 

Posen, Poland. See also Poznan, Poland 

Poplan, Poland, raid on: 382 

Pratt and Whimey aircraft engines: 40 

Presque Isle, Maine: 81, 82 

Prestwick, Scotland: 81, 96 

feny mute: 271 

Prime Minister, (British). See Chmhill, 

Winston s. 

prince Consort Prize 

awarded to Tedder 146 

prisonas of war 

German shift oE 580-581 

Proximity fuze: 514 

introduced: 513 

Spaafz’s apprehension over: 513, 515 

F’ursuit aviation. See also fighter escort; 

air support doctrine of: 214 

target in: 322 

Aircraft (US.). 

considered for WWII: 64 

organized in post-WWI: 17 

role of: 18, 28-31 

Pyrenees Mountains: 230 

Quebec Conferences: 264,547-548 

Allied strategy discussed at 483, 490 

directives of: 492 

assessment oE 515-517 

postponed by weather: 515 

Quesada, Elwood R. (“Pete”): 467, 548 

COBRA coordinator: 468, 470, 474 

command, relationship with: 467-468 

CG, IX Fighter Command: 309 

CG, IX Tactical Air Command: 464 

Dpty Commander, NACAF: 232 

heavy bombardment for close air 

Question Murk flight, participation m 

tactics oE 466 

QUEEN (Operation): 482 

support, view on: 517 

22 

Quesada plan: 548. See also Jeb Stuart 

Question Murk 33 

plan. 

record for flight endurance set by: 

22-23 

792 
INDM 

Radar: 49, 56, 176, 368,462-463, 513, 

516, 520-522, 541, 572, 593, 596. 

See also Gee-H, H2X; RAF “Y‘ 

Service. 

advent of: 30 

assessment of, WWII: 590 

Axis radio traffic read by: 195 

blind bombing with: 274 

German: 371, 514 

impmtance of: 527. 528. 532 

microwave early warning (MEW): 

North Aliica, used in: 144, 171, 

navigation with. 283 

RAF “Y Service: 520 

shared by British with U.S.: 47, 187 

linked with MEW: 514 

vectoring on Gesman ground 

controllers by: 367, 368 

deployment schedules of: 59 

devised: 68 

Ramsey, Berthram H. 

Naval Commander, AEF: 307 

Red Army. See also Union of Soviet 

Socialist Republics (USSR). 

drive for Berlin by: 573, 574 

Hungaty and East hssia occupied 

storming of Berlin by: 591 

winh offensive of: 543, 549 

AAF position consolidated by through 

establish& 248 

Regensburg, Germany 

MAAF targets in: 319-321 

RAF targets in: 45 

USAAF losses over: 373 

Regiments (numbered) 

25th in fan^: 4-5 

504th Parachute: 243,244 

lom-~e, for c~mmand ships: 236 

513, 514 

186-187 

Rainbow No. 5 (war plan) 

by: 573 

REDLINE: 551 

communications: 280,485 

Rekhbahx 510, 511, 536-537. 549, 

572, 589. See also Germany. 

Reirns, France 

Rekjavik, Iceland 82 

Remagen, Germany 

Reynolds, Quentin: 83 

Rhineland 

s~rrrender of Germany at ix, 584-585 

bridge across Rhine capturd 573 

effects of strategic bombardment on: 

500 

Rhine River: 501, 572. See also 

Remagen, Germany. 

advance towar& 515, 572 

crossing of: 421, 438, 510, 575 

seizure of bridge at: 489,573 

Rhcdesia Regiment 95 

Richardson, Charles: 406 

Richardson, Robert C. 

Rickenbacker, Edward (“Eddie”): 6 

Ridgway, Matthew B. 

Riverside, California: 23 

Robb, James M. 

Spaarz’s dpty: 247 

milimy resources weighed by: 76-77 

CO, 504th Parachute Regiment 244 

C/S (Air), SHAEF 489, 514, 535 

Dpty Commander, AUied AF: 152 

HURRICANE II planner: 495 

liaison, AFHQ and EAC: 143 

Mountbatten’s dpty: 231-232 

Robinett, Paul M.: 168 

air support doctrine of: 217 

Robot bomb. See V-1 flying bomb. 

Rockwell Field, California: 31 

7th Bombardment Group at 22-23 

Romania See also Ploesti, Romania 

drops in oil production from: 389 

ranked as strategic emergency: 387 

taxgets in: 353, 384-387 

Axis defense of: 264,266 

raid on: 262 

Rommel, Irwii vii, 205, 408 

attack against at Maxeth Line: 203 

counterattack in Tunisia led by: 

offensive in Libya launched by: 106 

pursuit and defeat of: 150 

retreat of from Feriana-Kasserine Pass: 

retreat of fiwn Libya: 164 

Westem Desert campaign of: 146 

account of Casablanca Conference 

chief photo recomaksance unit 

Rome, Italy 

172-173 

1 83 

Roosevelt, Elliott 

given by: 163 

commanded by: 218n 

113, 272, 579 

Roosevelt, Franklin D.: 4849, 90, 1 11, 

aid to Britain, views on: 56, 59 

area bombing, knowledge of: 591 

793 
SPAAlE AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Cairo conferences, participation m 

266271 

Casablanca Conf~ participation 

in: 152-153 

crosschannel invasion, view on: 107 

"day of infamy" speech 67 

invasion of North Atiica directed by: 

Mission No. 1, infmed of: 98 war plans requested by: 5940.71 

pWWII talks with Churchill of: 46 

Quebec conferm. participation in: 

"stat)-in-the-back speech: 45 

Tehran Conference, participation in: 

69, 70. 108 

President: 37-39, 41, 44. 523 

264,484-485 

223, 267 

Restock, Germany, raid on: 382 

Rostov, USSR 

Rostow, Walt W. 

on: 347, 350 

Gman offensive hu& 111 

strategic bombardment targets, view 

Rotterdam, Holland 

raid on aborted: 99 

Row-Satteville, France 

adverse publicity over: 584 

selected as target for Mission No. 1: 

98 

ROWUP (plan) 

ROVER JOE 

invasion of NW Europe: 70 

introduced by Allies: 243 

Royal i4i1 Force (RAF): 41, 42 44, 45, 

51, 52. 56, 62, 79. 112, 171. 309, 

433. See also Royal Air Force 

Bomber Command; Royal Air 

Force Coastal command; Royal Air 

Fmce Fighter Command. 

223,246,268,290 

by: 89 

AAF, relationship with: 1%. 128, 

AAF operational integrity accepted 

Air Intelligence oE 47, 78 

aircrLdt podwtion oE 146 

antidipping campaign of: 1904% 

army-air control concepts of: 149-151 

bomtiing philosophy oE 30, 53, 88. 

94, 435439, 547. 562-564 

Casablanca confer- PaTtiCipation 

in: 157-160, 163 

casualties exacted by: 426 

combined bomber operations 

contemplated by: 260,280 

D-Day operations: 414418 

defensive sectors of: 49-50 

effects of weather on: 493 

escort of U.S. bombers by: 364 

Gman air industry attacked by: 298 

HURRIO~NES I and II approved by: 

in&pendmt status of: 181 

invasion of Sicily: 243-253 

missions of, Noah Atiiw. 137, 139, 

495 

143 

86 

for: 336-339 

night bombardment, commitment to: 

OVERLORD air command arrangements 

preinvasion operations: 409-410 

press statemats of: 381-384 

radar bombing developed by: 297-298 

ranks equivalent to those of U.S.: 43n 

reorganization, North Aliiw 164-185 

reprisal attacks studid 435-438 

strategic bombardment targets studied 

themy: 149, 178, 210, 212 

tonnage dropped by, WWII: 588 

tfvrt formations reorganized: 466 

unified bomber command opposed by: 

wastage of Spitfires: 144 

by: 348-349 

268 

Royal Air Force Air Intelligence Branch: 

3%. See also Royal Air Force. 

Bourguebu Ridge bombing assessed 

by: 462 

bridge targets supported by: 404 

Gman aircraft production Bssessed 

by: 514 

Gman aircraft opposition on D-Day 

predicted by: 413, 514-515 

Luftwaf€e performance assessed by: 

424426,534 

Royal Air Force Bomber Commd 47, 

95-96, 112, 267-268, 307, 309, 

390,453, 460. See also Royal Air 

Force; Hanis, Arthur T. 

504-505 

570. 591 

Ardemes counteroffensive, role in: 

area bombing by: 487, 528,550, 564, 

Berlin raids by: 306,435 

"Big Week" raids by: 319-326 

bombing accuracy oE 94, 462-463 

casualties. WWII: 588 

794 
INDEX 

control over: 341-344 

CROSSBOW targets assigned to: 

D-Day operations: 414-418 

Dresden attacked by: xi 549, 

pund operations supported by: 

losses, Jan-Mar 44: 329-330 

losses, May-Jun 44: 501 

mining campaign by, Danube River: 

night sorties over France by: 501 

oil targets struck by: 504-505 

430432 

556-559, 564.567 

462463,466, 479480,481, 516 

losses, sepoct 44: 501 

400 

operations, Mar-& 44: 358 

operations assessed: 595 

mm, role in: 331-339, 

341-344, 353 

prestige of: 267, 496497 

rail targets of: 410 

removal of from SHAEF control: 484 

rocket sites struck by: 432, 463 

short bombing of: 481-482 

strength, Sep 44: 526 

submarine pens in Germany struck 

by: 113 

587-596 

492-493, 495, 549 

summary of operations: 564,573, 

targeting directives issued to: 

THUNDEXCLAP, role in: 494 

tonnage dropped by, WWII: 587 

USSTAF, relationship with: 267-268, 

270, 314, 315 

command: 148 

Royal Air Force-Army Cooperation 

Royal Air Force Coastal Cornan& 309 

control over: 314, 338-339, 341-344 

Royal Air Force Fighter Command: SO, 

86, 309, 310, 311, 312 

control over: 341-344 

fighter capability in 63 

ohsaved by Spaatz: 42 

redesignated: 307 

Royal Air Force Delegation to 

Washington: SO. 93, 182, 263, 267 

Royal Air Force School of Army 

Cooperation: 309 

Royal Army (British) 

loss of TOW by: 106-107 

plans for Pantellaia: 229 

Royal Flying Corps: 89, 95, 146 

Royal Navy (British) 

bombardment of Pantelleria by: 233 

Pantelleria planning by: 229,233 

pressure on Axis shipping by: 190 

Royce, Ral~h: 467 

Ruhland, Germany 

raid on: 398 

Ruhr, Germany: 89,503 

isolation oE 510-511 

pocket, collapse oE 574 

plans for assault on: 571-572 

;rmduction in halted by shortages: 

537. 559 

targets in: 94,353,492,494,495, 

510, 546. 561 

Russel, Richard B., Senator: 246 

Russelsheim, Germany 

rocket manufactwing plant in 

attacked: 432 

Rydex, Charles W.: 171 

Commander, 34th Div: 207, 217-218 

saar, Germany: 501 

targets in: 492 494 

SaarWken, Germany 

Saarland, Germany: 510 

St Wer, France 

cargo airlift to: 501 

St Li, France 

breakthrough at: 439. 464-465, 

close air support by heavy bombers 

at: 470. 474476 

lessons of: 480, 482 

plans for bombing oE 468, 471 

submarine pens targeted in: 113 

strained rail system in: 538 

515-516, 517 

St. Nazaire, France 

St Paul’s School 

OVERLORD plans presented at: 409 

salmo, Italy: 257 

captured: 223 

naval support for operations: 256 

operations: 263 

selected for invasion: 255 

Salzburg, Austria, raid on: 584 

saunders. Arthur 

Leigh-Mallory’s dpty: 317 

Saw, Karl-Otto 

Chief, German Fighter Staff: 323 

Samoa 

U.S. ganison on: 69 

795 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Sanders. APM. 

San Diego, California 

San Francisco, California: 16 

Santiago. Chile: 125 

Sardinia 

Scanlon, Martin F. 

Schafhusen, Switzerland 

Ass't C/S for Air: 153 

shunle point for Question hark 22 

operations against: 225,230,240,241 

Military Anachi to Englad 42.43 

accicLentally bombed by AAF: 377, 

575 

Schlatt~x, David M.: 408 

as.sessed by: 458 

close air support by heavy bombers 

Schneitler Trophy 

Schofield Barracks, Hawaii: 4-5 

Schweinfurt, Germany 

Luftwaffe tactics over: 369 

raids on: 266,371 

invasion of: 239 

awarded to Doolinle, 1925: 125 

Scogli& Sicily 

Second Quebec Conference: 547. See 

heavy bomber control discussed at: 

military operations in Burma 

alm Quebec Conference. 

486 

diwussed at: 48 

Secretary of State for Air (British). See 

also Archibald Sinclair. 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 163 

Seine River bridges, France 

bombing oE 403-404 

destruction of for D-Day opxations: 

targeted: 406,408 

1st Pursuit Group at: vii, 16-18 

4110 

Selfridge Field, Michigan 

Service of Supply. ETO: 101 

Sevastapol, USSR 

German offensive, 1942 107. 111 

SHATTIX (Operation): developed by 

Sherwaod, Robert 

London: 383 

USflM 493 

h4, Ofice of War Information, 

Sheny, Michael S. 

American air commanders, views on: 

571 

Sicily: 123, 271-272, 330 

campaign in: 201,223,225230 

evacuation oE 251 

fall oE viii 

invasion of: 239, 243-253 

preinvasion planning for: 239-243 

Sidi Bou Zid Tunisia 

Siegfried Line: 517, 523 

Silesia 

captured by Axis: 173 

economic loss to Germany of: 573 

refugees from in Dresden: 557 

Russian conquest oE 545 

Simon&, G.C. 

commander, 2d Canadian corps: 480 

simp William G. 

CG. U.S. Ninth Army: 571 

Casablanca Conference, views at: 158, 

RAF press release, reaction to: 383 

Secretary of State for Air (Eiritish): 

Sinclair, Archibald 

159, 161 

89, 545 

Singapore: 146 

SLEDGEHAMMER (plan) 

invasion of NW Europe: 70 

Casablanca Cunference, views at: 

daylight bomber operations, views oE 

Eaker, relationship with: 593 

RAF Dir of Plans: 41, 43, 45, 47. 56 

role of dpty commander assessed by: 

Slessor, John 

157-158 

88 

251 

457 

by: 411 

Smith, Frederic H., Jr.: 310, 404, 406, 

bombing of troop movements rejected 

Chief, AEAF Operations: 355 

heavy bombers for close air support 

St. Li, raid reaction to: 470471 

Chief, Office of Information Services: 

assessed by: 458 

Smith, Rex 

524,525 

430 

234-235.463 

535 

on: 400 

Smith, Walter Bedelk 264,272,408, 

air-ground operations investigated by: 

Battle of the Bulge, comments on: 

bombing of French population, views 

Eaker reassignment viewed by: 276 

796 
INDEX 

Eisenhower, assessment of: 592 

Eisenhower's chief of stafE 101 

reorganization in England, views on: 

reprisal raids, views on: 433 

resumption of attacks on oil targets 

293, 313 

favored by: 541 

Smuts, Jan 

Sofia, Bulgaria, targeted: 385-386 

Solomon Islands 

resources for: 112 

Somewell, Brehon 

CCI, Army Services of Supply: 265 

Souk el Arba, Tunisia 

AAF raid on' 199 

RAF squadrons at 139 

Sousse, Tunisia: 247 

Allied airfield at: 195 

invasion task force hq for Pantelleria: 

transpodon plan, view on: 40243 

233, 234 

Oklahoma 

Southern State Teachers College, 

Eaker, graduate oE 32 

South East Asia Command (SEAC): 488 

Southwest Pacific Theatex 99 

Soviet High Command: 582 

Soviets. See Union of Soviet Socialist 

Republics (USSR). 

Spaarz, Carl A. ('Tooey") 

AAF in Mediterranean reorganized 

Acting Dpty Commander, Allied Air 

air command arrangements in ETO, 

airtaaft aid to Britain opposed by: 56, 

air-ground relations investigated by: 

air support doctrine redefined by: 

air support in North Africa assessed 

Army Command and General Staff 

my-air control in RAF observed by: 

Arnold and Eaker, association with: 

Arnold, association with: 31-35 

Arnold, relationship with: 467, 579, 

by: 249-253 

Form in North Afiica: 142 

1944, reviewed by: 485-490 

s9 

234-235 

210-220 

by: 205, 207. 209 

School attended by: 23-24 

I51 

31-33 

594 

assessment of: vii-ix, 35, 60, 352, 

assigned as single air commander by 

Ass't Chief of Air Corps: 57 

Ass't Military Attach6 (Air): 41 

aviation principles espoused by: 28 

Battle of the Bulge faced by: 532, 

Battle of Britain, observer of: 40. 

Berlin bombing determined by: 548, 

"Big Week" directed by: 318-327 

black pilots evaluated by: 257-260 

blacks in the military, views on: 4-5 

bombing directives, outburst provoked 

bombing of Rome planned by: 261 

bombing photos for publicity 

suggested by: 102, 103 

bombing separated hm close air 

support missions by: 143 

British air cooperation doctrine 

adopted by: 180 

592, 593 

Eisenhower: 152 

535, 541 

42-45, 47, 4849 

553 

over: 386-387 

cargo airlii assessed by: 503 

Casablanca Confereme, views at: 

Chief, Air Corps Materiel Div: 57 

Chief, Air Corps Plans Section: x 

Chief of Air Staff, AAl? x, 38-39, 58 

Chief, NASAF: 279-280 

Chief, Plans Div: 45, 57, 59 

Chief. Plans Section, OCAC 37, 38, 

41, 57 

Chief, Training and Operations Div, 

OCAC 23 

WON supported by: 549, 556, 572, 

582 

close air support by heavy bombers 

assessed by: 453-454, 459, 481, 

516, 517 

470477 

157-1 64 

COBRA operations assessed by: 

combat missions of: 199-200 

Combined Bomber Offensive, views 

on' 268 

command conflicts faced by: 385-386 

command Diary oE 93 

Commander, AF Combat Command: 

Commander, Allied Air Forces: 

7 1-72 

152-154. 156, 173-174. 176 

797 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Commander, NAAF: 178,183, 186 

commanders m Sicily changed by: 

CG. Twelfth AF. 185-186 

CG. USSTM 267, 272 279, 283. 

CO, 1st Bombardment Wing: 23.28 

CO, 1st Pursuit Group: 16-18 

CO, 7th Bombardment Group. 22,25, 

mand style oE 105-106 

Coningham, relationship with: 

201-202,204,206,207 

counterair offensive in Sicily planned 

by: 240-241 crew rotation policy oE 380, 446-448 

crosschannel invasion postponement 

CroswAannel invasion requirements 

CROSSBOW operalions assessed by: 

CROSSBOW opposed by: 296 

CROSSBOW targets accepted by: 

D-Day operations: 414418 

dispersal of aircraft m Hawaii, 

Dresden bombing, role in: 563-564 

EAC: support to British 1st Army 

Eakm reassignment, reaction to: 

Eastrm Front assessed by: 11 1, 545 

education oE 3-4 

Eighth AF autonomy, established by: 

Eighth AF buildup planned by: 70, 

Eighth AF crisis faced by: 287-288 

Eisenhower, relationship with: 90-91, 

employment of blacks, views on: 294 

Executive Officer, 2d Wing: 24, 28 

Far West Flying Circus, participation 

fighter escorts, view on: 5940.64 

final victory in Europe: 421 

Fredendall, disagreement with: 

Garnan technical advances, alarm 

Gerrnan bombing techniques assessed 

242-243 

290, 341 

28 

favored by: 107-108 

spelled out by: 11 1 

430-432, 450-450 

391-393 

suggested by: 67 

ordered by: 164 

276-278 

86-90 

74-78 

93, 392 

in. 14 

176-177 

over: 513-514 

by: 47-48, 51-53, 56 

German economy assessed by: 580 

German jet hear, reaction to: 

German surrender witnessed by: 

goals assigned at Casablanca to: 531 

Hwsell selected top planner for air 

heavy bombers for close air sum 

50-501, 539-542, 546, 550, 574 

584-585 

by: 101 

committed by: 460,517 

hq at Bushy P& 293-294 

HURRICANES I and II supported by: 

image of AAF promoted by: 523-526 

Inspector of Purrnit Training: 7 

interdiction targets disputed by: 285 

internment of pilots evaluated by: 

-9 

investigation of firing on paratroops 

by, Sicily: 144 

Leigh-Mallary. relationship with: 311, 

312, 327, 330, 352, 354, 357, 406, 

417, 454, 457, 459, 479 

logistics in England Hepared by: 83, 

85 

Luftwaffe assessed by: 78-79, 104, 

398, 416. 484, 511, 519-522 

Luftwaffe campaigns planned by: 

299-300, 32fj-327, 378-379 

Luftwaffe challenged by: 200403, 

Luftwaffe growing strength, rextion 

Mediterranean operations assessed by: 

Mexican F'unitive Expedition, 

Military Aviator rating awarded to: 14 

military expansion planned by: 38 

Mission No. 1 ppared by: 98 

missions reported to Amold by: 

99-100,305-306 

morale hbq opposed by: 

436438. 450, 459 

morale problems faced by: 188, 

199-200, 379-384, 445-450 

movie clip on Berlin attack directed 

by: 550-552 

Munich attack ordered by: 549 

Noah &ca, assignment to: viii, 119, 

Noah Aiiica, reorganization effected 

494 

312. 317, 392-394 

to: 511-512, 513-515, 519-521 

280 

participation in: 5 

121, 141-142, 156 

798 
by: 173-178. 181, 182, 185. 187 

oil targets favored by: 505506,546 

operational readiness rates defended 

by: 104 

OVERLORD air command arrangements 

made by: 336-339, 341-344. 352, 

354,409 

:3m-303 

oil plan salvaged by: 384394 

OvERLoRO objectives assessed by: 

OVERLORD pepared by: 327-339 

Pantelleria assault prepared by: 227, 

Pantelleria bombardment observed by: 

Pantelleria operations analyzed by: 

pathfinders employed by: 296-298 

pause in air effort requested by: 144 

Pearl Harbor attack, reaction to: 367 

perspective on end of war 538-539 

POINTBLANK, views on: 388 

policy explained to Amold by: 300 

population bombing assessed by: 

4W03. 434436, 561-546, 572, 

580. 591 

229,230 

233-234 

236,238-239 

post-WWI assignments of: 7-8 

preinvasion opaations planned by: 

press statements on raids by: 304 

prewar strategic plming by: 57-66, 

41 1-414 

367 

PIWIIO~~O~S of: 9-10, 16, 20, 23, 31, 

57-58, 71, 101, 189, 578-579 

radar requirements stressed by: 187, 

Question Mark commanded by: 22-23 

RAF pess announcement, reaction to: 

reassigned from command to advisory 

REDLINE communications established 

reinforcements requested by: 257 

remote control aircraft experiments 

rocket site attacks ordered by: 428, 

role in air warfare assessed: 587-596 

self analysis: 19 

separate air force. views on: 245-247 

St. L6 raid, reaction to: 470471, 

521-522 

381-384, 559-560 

functions: 143 

by: 248 

requested by: 428-429 

429, 431 

475476 

STRANGLE effects reviewed by: 404 

strategic bombardment from Italy 

planned by: 262-263, 266 

strategic bombardment problems faced 

by: 284, 484 

strategic targeting plans disputed by: 

345-353 

strategy for defeating Germany 

recommended by: 328-339350, 

423424,484,531 

223 

strategy for air outlined by: 76-80, 

strategy revised by: 111-113, 210-220 

style of cornan& 322, 41647,478 

submarine capabllities targeted by: 

Swiss bombing, apology for: 578 

tactics of: 299-300.358-364.364 

targeting priorities assessed by: 191, 

targeting priorities recommended by: 

targeting priorities set by: 490. 

Tedder, relationship with: 247-250 

testimony at Mitchell court-martial of: 

Theater Air Commander: 115 

theories on military aviation of: 

THUNDERCLAP accepted by: 543,546 

Time magazine story on: 198 

TORCH, disconcerted by: 109 

TORCH air plan accepted by: 109 

transportation plan opposed by: 403 

Twelfth AF planned and organized 

SHAEF opposed by: 484 

USSTAF control removed ftom 

USSTAF structured by: ix, 314-318 

Vandenberg as AEAF dpty requested 

Vandenberg as CG Ninth AF favored 

WACS supported by: 294 

weather midaations faced by: 

113 

195 

353, 406, 443, 526 

492497, 500, 527, 529 

ix, 20-22, 245 

16-18, 19, 33, 52, 245-246 

by: lWll0 

by: 354-355 

by: 466447 

103-104,305-306,429,503-504, 

564, 572 

Harrison, Ruth. 

spa at^, Ruth, actress: 22. See also 

spain 

Condor Legion in: 364 

suggestion to invade weighed: 

799 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

250-231 

Special Army Observer Groups: 62. See 

also U.S. obsaver Groups. 

estalJlished: 59 

architect of German war economy: 

fuel shortage faced by: 44243,445 

Gennan war production estimated by: 

Gennan Minister for Armament 

strategic bombardment effects, views 

SF. Albert 

57 1 

590 

RDdUCtiOrc 323 

OIL: 398, 399, 442-443, 500 

squadlnns 

1st ,4ero: 5 

5th Aero: 5 

94th Aero: 6 

99th Fighter: 230, 257-260 

Stalin, Josef V. 

Tehran Conference, participation in: 

223, 267 

Staliiad, USSR 

defenseoE 107 

Stanmore, England 

Daily Air Commanders Meeting at: 

4M. 470 

Li&-MaUoxy hq at: 464, 470 

Stendal, Germany 

Luftwaffe airfield at 564 

Stettin, Germany 

AAI: raid on: 382 

RAI: targets in: 45, 353 

Steyr. Austria 

Luftwaffe defense of: 369 

Stimson, Hemy L.: 75, 76. 79 

area bombing, knowledge of: 591 

briefed on targeting concepts: 76 

press story, reaction to: 559 

project to invade France approved by: 

Secretary of War: 60 

Coningham's dpty: 457 

C/S, Ninth AF: 318, 389 

Axis evacuation route: 251 

interdiction oE 243 

70 

Strafford, Stephen 

Strahr~ Victor H. 

Straits of Messina 

STRANGLE (Operation): commenced by 

Strategic Air Force 

MAAF: 285 

promoted by Amold: 267 

Strategic bombardmat: 113. See ulso 

"Big Week"; Combd Bomber 

Offensive; POINTBLANK. 

diversion of: 426 

initiad 268-306 

in the Meditaranean: 260-280 

planned: 79-80, 223, 283 

preinvasion planning, role of: 327-339 

role of analyd 17, 131, 132, 484, 

targeting disputes over: 345-357 

targeting selection, autumn 44: 

527 

4%500 

Stratemeyer, George E.: 164, 188. 202 

air support doche oE 214 

Chief, AAF Staff: 114-115, 143, 178 

appointment of Spaatz as Theater Air 

Commander, view on: 114-115 

Strickland, Aubry C. 

Smg, George V.: 53 

Pantellaia planner 235 

Ass't c/s, war Plans Div: 47 

War Dept. Air Board, memk 131 

developed: 511 

lllJG4: 512 

tactics oE 512 

Luftwaffe defense responsibility for 

assigned: 369 

raid on: 271, 319 

German bases in: 260 

German retreat to: 106 

cultivated by Spaatz: lK? 

Spaatz remembered by: 83, 85 

American heavy bombardment effort 

SUFERGYMNAST (Operation). See Noah 

Supreme Commander, Allied 

Sturmgruppe 

stuttgart, Germany 

Suez canal 

sulzberger, Arthur 0. 

Summersby, Kay 

Shy Times 

condemned in: 97 

Afiica. 

Expeditionary Force: 270-271, 307, 

322,330, 333, 338, 339. See also 

Allied Expedifomy Force, 

Eisenhower, Dwight D. 

hq moved to France by: 490 

strategic air force plans approved by: 

~RD, role in: 344,409 

345 

Supreme Headquarters, Allid 

800 
INDEX 

Ihpeditionary Force. see also 

ITiower, Dwight D.; Supeme 

Commander Allied Expeditiona~y 

l%rce. 

analyzed: 500 

air force support for pund form 

Battle of the Bulge faced by: 532 

control over heavy bombers removed 

moved: 490 

press conference on strategic 

from: 484-489 

tmbardment held at: 558, 559-560 

studied: 4@410 

rail bombing in France, effects 

THUNDERCLAP discussed by: 436-437 

Sweden 329, 595 

ainlaft hm U.S. purchased by, 1939 

flight of damaged aircraft to: 518 

U.S. internees in: 379, 448-450 

midental bombmg of: 575 

flight of damaged aircraft to: 518 

restrictions against accidental bombing 

U.S. internees in: 379, 448-450 

British landing site in: 239 

40 

Swit7.erland 

of established: 578 

Syracuse, Sicily 

Tafaroui, Algeria 

U.S. airfield at 145 

Taonnina, Sicily 

Luftwaffe hq on: 241 

Taranto, Italy: 264 

Tebessa, Tunisia: 172, 176 

Tedder, Arthur: viii, 152, 163, 178, 186, 

736, 245. 267, 271, 277, 279, 280, 

301, 313. 421, 428, 464, 479, 536 

A€* assessed by: 485 

AI,F dpty to Eisenhower: viii, 223, 

air support doctrine of: 211, 215 

Air Commander in Chief, 

279 

Mediterranean: 156, 204, 205, 219, 

‘251. 310 

view on: 174 

575 

AUied organization in Middle East, 

antiaircraft strikes recommended by: 

AOC, Middle East: 146-147 

appointed overall air commandex 

454455 

assessment of: 592 

background oE 146-147 

Berlin raid requested by: 432433 

bombing of Rome planned by: 261 

command in North Mca formalized 

command, relationship with. 458, 460, 

Coningham reprimanded by: 206 

control over bomber force, view on: 

337-339 

coordination of combined bomber 

offensive discussed by: 273 

CROSSBOW, role in: 431432 

firing on fiiendly paramops descxibed 

by: 244 

Geman surrender witnessed by: 

584-585 

heavy bombers for close air suppurt 

assessed by: 453-454, 516-517 

HURRICANE II planned by: 495 

interdiction targeting supparted by: 

moving bomb groups to Italy, view 

operations assessed by: 181 

Omm, role in: 314-315, 

COBRA, role 468,470 

by: 210 

46143, 467, 497 

285 

on: 263 

33&339, 344, 410 

panteiieria pi= prepared by: 227, 

231, 232, 234-235, 307 

Sicily, pinvasion planning by: 

Spaatz, relatiunship with: 245-250 

strategic bombardment plans, view on: 

tactical air forces for Eisenhower 

targeting priorities assessed by: 191 

targets assessed by: 497, 505-506, 

test exercises in Mediterranean, view 

Zuckerman plan supported by: 331 

war strategy conference in: 223,267, 

241-243 

345, 349-352 

coordinated by: 489490 

528-529, 546, 582, 592 

on: 234-235 

Tehran, Iran 

270 

Telergma, Tunisia 

Tenw bombing: 436-437; 558-560, 

564, 567-570. See also Berlin, 

Dresden 

airfield at 145. 186 

Thelepte, Tunisia: 172, 204, 207 

80 1 
SPAATZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

airfield at 183 

awarded to Doolittle, 1932 125 

100th Heavy Bombardment Group at 

Thompson Trophy 

Thorpe Abbotts, England 

381 

543-564 

approved: 494 

effectiveness of questiod 550 

originated: 435, 543 

targets for: 546 

~"DEFCCLV (Operation): 432439, 

targets in Berh 552 

Timberlake, Pattick W. 

"IDALWAVE (operaticm): 260 

air-pnd c00peration investigated by: 

234-235 

Time magazine 

story on air doctrine: 211 

story on Eighth AF: lU3 

story on 99th Fighter Squadron: 258 

story on Spaatz 198,524 

TOM, Libya: 146 

captured by Rommel: 106 

siege of: 150 

TORCH (Operation): 14. See dso North 

diversion of resources to: 85, 87, 97, 

doctrine for: 130 

Doolittle appointed air commander 

planned: 68-69, 97, 101, 103, 114 

Africa 

108, 109. 113, 142 

for: 126 

TR 440-15. See War Department 

Training Regulation 440-15. 

Transccmtinental Reliability Endurance 

Flight 14 

Transptnmion plan: 327, 345-354. See 

dso Combined Bomber Offensive; 

strategic bombardment; Tedder, 

Arthur. 

debated: 345-353 

delayed by Churchilk 40048 

Zuckerman's introduction oE 330-335 

AAF raid on Axis airfield in: 195 

Jews murdered at 591 

CIS, RAl? 30 

doctrine oE 93 

Italian cruiser smk 198 

Tram. Sicily 

Treblinka death camp 

Trenchitrd, Hugh: 463 

Trieste 

Tripoli, Libya 

Axis retreat to: 146 

Tripolitania. Libya: 156 

Tiuscott, Lucian K. 

bent 174, 176 

Tunis, Tunisia: 277 

Eisenhower's representative at the 

Allied anticipated caplure of: 140 

Allied drive on halted by Gmans: 

plan for capturing airfield at 137 

Allies reorganize in: 164-184 

Axis pxts in attacked: 146 

Axis supply line into studied: 

Axis surrender of: 210 

collapse of Axis in: viii, 201-210 

French forces in: 123, 137 

German bridgehead at 140 

heavy bombardment aviation in: 

race for: 123-154 

U.S. experience in: 366 

Tutow. Germany 

targets in: 322 

Twining, Nathan F.: 490, 495, 549, 572 

CG, Fifteenth AF. 319, 394,440 

CG, Thirteenth AF: 273 

reassignment oE 273. 275 

153 

Tunisia: 139, 163, 186, 215 

189-191 

196-200 

U-boats: 542-543, 582, 584 

attacks on: 584 

threat oE 78, 541, 543 

ULTRA: 98, 137. 5% 

analyzed in North Africa: 144 

effect oE 78,408 

Rekhbdn codes hken by: 

Axis shipping revealed by: -186, 189, 

190.209 

bomb damage in Germany revealed 

damage by low-level fighter attacks 

effects of bombing German airfields 

effects of oil offensive revealed by: 

by: 411 

revealed by: 367 

revealed by: 442.445 

492 

revealed by: 195 

by: 398, 399 

German air transport schedules 

German alarm over bombing revealed 

802 
INDEX 

German ground force losses revealed 

by: 464, 472 

information on Battle of the Bulge 

revealed by: 533 

Luftwaffe activity, Sicily revealed by: 

241 

Luftwaffe movements, D-Day 

revealed by: 425,426 

Luftwaf€e shift to defend Germany 

revealed by: 514 

Luftwaffe smength, May 44 revealed 

by: 396, 413 

Lufhvaffe transfer of fighters to 

Eastern Front revealed by: 573 

Luftwaffe weaknesses revealed by: 

302-303 

secret of in jeopardy: 199.200 

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics 

(USSR): 69, 518. See also Drh, 

Eastern Fro* Red Army. 

Berlin and hipig raids requested by: 

Dresden bombing, role in: 563-564 

Eastem Front assessed: 111, 157. 164, 

German surrender to: 584-585 

German militiuy operations: 354 

liaison with: 549 

US. crews force-landed in 450 

winter offensive of: 543, 560 

553. 561-562 

549-552 

United Press: 562, 572 

united states 

112-1 13 

aircraft production in: 38,644 

creation of military aviation in. 594 

defense, state of: 38 

entry of into WWII: 45, 59 

neutrality laws of: 40 

press coverage of war in: 304 

public opinion in: 160 

war production efforts of: 590 

United States Air Force. See also United 

States Army Air Service; United 

States Army Air Forces. 

autonomy advocated for: 245, 

522-523, 594 

doctrine of: 119 

United States Armored Force 

lack of air support voiced by: 135 

United States Army: 51. See ah Army 

states Army Air corps; united 

Groups; Annies; Corps; Divisions. 

accichtal death, causes m 14 

age and rank of officers in 1931: 13 

Axii in Tunisia defeated by: 200-210 

blacks in: 259 

bombed by U.S. sircraft: 470471 

Chief of Staff: 24-25, 57, 163 

command post exercises in: 135 

defense in Ardemes of: 533 

doctrine ix 130-136 

expansion of pld 38-39 

forces in Sicily: 244 

forces in Tunisia: 164-184 

heavy bomber, support for. 423-424, 

historical amount of operations in 

517 

Sicily by: 253 

officer COT in. 12-13 

preparation for WWII of: 60 

promotion system h 8 

struggle over air support in: 210-220. 

223 

United States Army Air Corps: 32 See 

also united states Air Force; 

United States Army Air Forces; 

united states Army Air service. 

budget allocation for: 14 

design&& 24 

doctrine of: 29,31, 53, 132 

expansion in: 37-39. 57, 61 

field grade officers in: 10-12 

observers in England b 4144 

strength, 1939 viii 

reorganized: 25 

United States Army Air Forces 

(USAAF). See also Allies; 

Mediterranean Allied Air Forces; 

Mediterranean Allied Strategic Air 

Force; Mediterranean Allied 

Tactical Air Force; United States 

Air Force; united states Army Air 

corps; united states Army Air 

Service; United States Strategic Air 

Forces. 

adverse publicity fought by: 584 

aircraft raids described: 371-372, 373, 

Air Staff: 215, 383, 436437, 

air support doctrine for TORCH: 

air support doctrine redefined by: 

antishipping campaign of: 189-1% 

aircraft capabilities of: 74 

408 

548-549 

13&136 

216-220 

803 
SPAA'IZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

area bombing policies of: 508. 550, 

arrival of in England 33, 85, 96 

assessment of air war in Europe: 

attacks on Berlin by: 306,348, 

attacks on Tunisian ports by: 146 

autmomy for ix. 594, 595 

Baub of the Bulge, efforts in: 

casualties exacted by: 426 

casualties inflicted by. WWII: 588 

challenges to Luftwaffe by: 300-303 

collapse of Axis bridgehead, North 

cmunand and control in: 266,271 

corrunand in Europe restructured by: 

cowtemeasures against Luftwaffe by: 

crew replacement policy oE 447-448 

delergation at conferences: 547-548 

doctrine oE 119. 196, 298-299, 360, 

early operations: 103-104 

Eighth AF Composite Command 

feqing of supplies to front by 

first bombing attack from England by: 

heavy bombardment in Tunisia by: 

image of: 90, 97 

imments to buildup faced by: 589 

indiary bombing by: 564,565, 

losses, 14 Oct 43: 376 

losses, oct 43: 373 

losses, Jan 44: 303, 304 

losses. Jan-Mar 44: 417 

losses. Feb 44: 323 

losses, Mar 44: 371. 376-377. 379, 

losses. 22 Ap 44: 378 

losses, Apr 44: 379, 384, 393-394, 

losses, D-Day: 414 

losses, Jun 44: 439 

losses, Jul44: 440, 442 

losses, Aug 44: 443 

losses, Nov 44: 519 

560. 578-570, 591 

587-596 

549-552, 553 

5136-542 

Ahica: 201-210 

267-280, 307 318, 478, 484-489 

5'21-522 

484 

activated by: 85 

bombers oE 501, 503 

90 

196-200 

567-570 

393-394, 396, 398, 512 

5 19 

losses, Dec 44: 532 535 

losses, Jan-Feb 45: 573 

losses, Mar-Ap 45: 584 

losses, first major attack on Berlin: 

losses, percentages compared: 371, 

losses, Schweinfurt: 287-288 

manpower shortage in: 257 

morale in: 445-450 

nonstrategic elements in Britain: 355 

North Afiican opexations, Nov-Dec 

organized: 58-59, 72 

Pantelleria operations: 225-238 

preinvasion Operations: 415, 417 

preparations for WWII by: 60-66, 67, 

Quesada plan, reception oE 548-549 

356 

446 

42 137-154 

70-72. 76-82 

RAF, relationship with : 124,128, 

181, 201 

ranks equivalent to RAF: 43n 

reorganized m MTO: 249-253 

reorganized in North Afiia 164-184 

repisal attacks by: 435-436 

rest facilities for blacks in: 259-260 

short bombing by: 470, 474-476, 

sorties flown, WWII: 587-588 

strategic planning in: 588 

strategic bombardment from England 

strategic bombardment from 

480481, 516 

by: 296-306, 319-327, 484 

Mediterranean by: 260-267 

157-158 

strategy OE 86-90, 101-102, 112-114, 

strength, England, Jun 42 85 

strength, England, Dec 43: 288, 290 

strength, Sep 44: 526 

strength, Dec 44. 518 

THUNDEBCIAP, participation in: 

tonnage dropped by: 506,573, 

TORCH planning, role in: 106-116, 

training in England oE 85,96 

weather effects on operations: 104, 

549-552 

587-588 

124 

283. 297, 303. 305-306, 323, 334, 

370-371, 377,378, 382, 393, 396, 

414.429, 468, 478, 503-505, 

518-519, 550. 553, 564 

United States Army Air Service: 33. See 

804 
INDM 

also united states Army Air cop; 

IJnited States Air Force; United 

States Army Air Forces. 

combat units organized in: 17 

created: 8 

demobilized: 31 

field grade officen in. 10-11 

physical standards set for: 9 

redesignated: 24 

role analyzed: 19-21 

WWI. participation in: 6 

United States Army Ground Forces: 58. 

See also Army Ground Forces. 

United States Army Signal Corps 

aviation in: 7 

Aviation Section: 14.32 

United States Congress: 31, 37, 38, 39, 

57. 523. See also House of 

Representatives; United States 

senate. 

air reform bills introduced by: 24 

expansion bill of 1939 passed by: 

Pay Classification Act of 1922 passed 

3940 

by: 16 

8 

14 

See also United States Congress; 

IJnited States Senate. 

Military Affairs Committee hearings 

held by: 19 

United States Military Academy at West 

Point: 3, 24 

United States Milimy Mission in 

Moscow: 549 

United States Navy: 79,246 

promotion list for U.S. Army set by: 

ratings for pilot skill authorized by: 

United States House of Representatives. 

casualties suffered by, WWII. 587 

cornmand post exercises obmed by: 

firing on fiiendly paratroops by, 

Malta agreement by: 560 

Midway, performance at: 90 

Paul Harbor attack on: 67 

preparation for WWII by: 60, 97 

proximity fuze secretly employed by: 

resources for Pacific oE 113 

United States Obsaver Group 

plans for WWII: 80 

135 

Sicily: 244 

5 13n 

United States Senate Select commiaee 

to Visit War Theaters: 246 

United States Strategic Air Forces in 

Europe (USSTAF). See also Allies; 

United States Army Air Forces. 

AEJW, relationship with: 354-357 

agreement to form: 267 

assessment of: 387, 445 

assessment of air war 587-596 

Berlin raid desaibed by: 373 

*Big Blow": 519 

bombing results reviewed: 567-570. 

572, 582, 589 

bridge targets oE 406 

cargo trucking operations: 501, 503 

city bombing, policies on: 560-561, 

CLARION operations undea'taken by: 

control over: 314-315 

D-Day operations: 414418, 424426 

exclusion fmm COBRA of: 468 

HURRICANES I and II planned by: 

importance of radar to: 527, 532 

imptance of: 421, 445 

instituted: 270-271, 303-304 

interdiction campaign oE 404 

long-range goals reappraised by: 538, 

losses, 194445: 526, 528 

losses, WWII: 587 

Luftwaffe defeated by: 393-394 

Me 262 concem over: 512 

missions of: 301, 305, 306, 317, 318, 

morale attacks studied by: 434435 

morale problems in: 445-450 

oil plan for targeting disputed: 

oil targets approved for: 

united states Steel corporation: 45 

591 

572-575 

494495 

541 

319-327 

345-357 

406,408 

387, 390-392 

oil targets requested by: 384-385, 

operations, Feb-Mar 44: 358, 379 

organization of: 290-291, 293 

OVERLORD, responsibilities for: 344, 

395 

OVERLORD, planning for: 330-339 

preinvasion bombing missions oE 

preinvasion operations: 409414 

396418 

805 
SPAKTZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

public image of: 524 

removal of from SHAEF control 

shm bombing by: 535 

strafmg casualties caused by: 365 

target assignments: 429432, 433. 

target planning committee formed in: 

T& suggests priorities for: 390, 

contemplated: 484-489 

436437, 443 

345 

391 

THlJNDmclAP assigned to: 494 

THUNDERCLAP targets of: 546, 549. 

V-1 sites targeted by: 428430, 432 

weather effects on operations: 

550 

495496, 501. 503-504, 515, 

520-524, 522, 532, 556, 589 

c:ommand 

United States Strategic Bomber 

planned by Arnold: 267 

United States Strategic Bomb Survey 

assessment of bombing in WWII: 

University of Southem Califmk 33 

uss Horn 125 

USS Iowa: 267, 268 

uss MonhanM: 43 

UTAH Beach 

Uxbxidge, England 

588 

D-Day invasion on: 414n 

AEAF Hq at: 411. 456 

V-1 flying bomb 

casualties hm: 426 

defense against 398 

launched against London: 426, 432 

priority of: 390,428430 

repisal for: 433434, 543 

sites attack& 296, 317, 390. 395, 

threat oE 294, 296, 424 

prompted by: 513n 

installations: 430432 

426. 429430 

use of proximity fuze in England 

V-2 rocket 437 

Vandenberg, Hoyt S.: 271, 310, 404, 

457, 464, 479. 524, 525 

attack on French cities, role in: 413 

Battle of the Bulge, role m 532 

bombing troop movements, view on: 

412 

CG, Ninth AF: 484 

command, relationship with: 467 

Dpty, AEAF: 328, 354-355, 457 

drop tanks opposed by: 61 

Eisenhower hq pmed by: 101 

heavy bombardment for close air 

support assessed by: 466 

Leigh-Mallory, relationship with: 455, 

457 

"misuse of air power" objected to by: 

143 

preinvasion operations, role in: 411, 

413 

promotion of scuttled by Marshall: 

46647 

SpaatL, relationship wih 593 

St l-6 raid, reaction to: 470-471 

V-Day anticipated: 542 

Vernon, France 

raid on bridge at: 408 

VHF 80 

Sicilian operations: 243 

Vichy government: 140 

Camany supported by: 368 

Victmy Rogram 

conceived: 60 

Vienna, Austria 

Mtwaffe defense oE 367 

targets in: 45. 263 

AAF raid Axis airfield m 199 

German offensive to: 11 1 

weapns issued to: 537 

Villacih, Sardinia 

Volga River, USSR 

Vdhturm 

Vomnezh, USSR 

German offensive through: 11 1 

Wake Island 

Japanese atkk on: 68 

Walker, Kenneth H.: 60 

Walker, Walton H. 

Commander, IV Armored Corps: 217 

observations on North hca by: 217 

Wm A. 

army-& control system created by: 

149 

war4 Orlando P. 

War Cabinet: 436 

Commander, 1st Armored Div: 167 

bombing of French population 

deliberated by: 401-402 

806 
INDEX 

devastation of cities rejected by: 437 

AEF organized by: 58 

Arnold. relationship with: 523 

assailed by "Billy" Mitchell: 20 

doctrine oE 29, 178, 210-220 

General Staff: 60,246 

Operations Div (OPD): 70, 270 

policy on blacks oE 294 

study on black pilots ordered by: 

"surplus" war material transferred to 

died command, views on: 114 war Plans Div: 60, 69 

War Depariment Air Board 

appointed by Woodring: 131 

War Department General Staff (WDGS): 

war Department 21, 23, 35, 245 

258-259 

England by: 45 

32 

dominated by ground officers 130 

role of aviation, views on: 17, 213 

War Department Training Regulation 

440-15 

support role to air force assigned 

under: 130 

revised: 13&131 

Washington Conference 

targeting piorities set for strategic 

bombardmat 284 

Washington. D.C.: vii, 3, 7. 19, 20, 21, 

23, 32, 81, 85. 260. 262, 264, 266, 

334, 387, 560 

AAF Hq at 304 

Arnold press conference in: 97 

British embassy in: 41 

Munitions Building in: 68 

Warhington Star 

terror bombmg reported in: 559 

WEARY-WILLIE 

remote control aircraft initiated: 428 

Weather effects on bombing. See Spaa~ 

Carl A.; United States Army Air 

Form; United States Strategic Air 

Force in Europe. 

Wedau, Germany, raid on: 510 

Wedemeyer, Albert C. 

staff, War Plans Div: 60 

Wehrrnacht 44. See also German Army. 

final stand of: 511. 532-533, 537 

ordnance depots targeted: 495 

requirements in France: 497 

Weigley, Russell F. 

campaign study by: 464 

We& William 

Chief, RAF Delegation to US.: 182, 

263,267 

Commander, EAC 140, 145, 171-172 

Westem Air Command. See also 

Twelfth Air Force. 

TORCH supported by: 124 

reassigned: 178 

lessons oE 152, 213, 366 

Westem Desert campaign 146, 147,148 

Westem Desert Air Force (WDAF): 

air support team in: 135q 136 

air control center in: 150-151 

8th Army, relationship with: 241 

FIAX, role in: 195 

lessons oE 151 

reassigned: 156 

ROVER JOE$ role in: 243 

Tobrukoperations: 150 

German traffic to Eastem Front from: 

German transfer of fighters to: 518 

last German offensive on: 531, 536 

Luftwaffe strength on: 527, 562 

Westover Field, Massachusens: 81 

Westover, Oscar 

White, Thomas D. 

147, 243, 241 

air supe€iority of: 2w210, 212 

Westem Front 563 

559 

Chief, Air Corps: 32 

Ass't Chief of Air Staff, Intelligence: 

478 

413, 428 

WIDEWINGS: 104, 108, 293, 314, 327, 

Wiener-Neustdt, Austria 

fighter manufactwing plant in: 398 

Luftwaf€e defense oE 369 

raid on: 252, 262 

Wiudesworth, H.E.P. 

 ground cooperation investigated by: 

234-235 

Tedder's $ty: 206 

raid on: 306 

targeted for bombing: 94 

Williams, Paul L. 

CG, IX Transport Command: 309 

Command: 170, 174. 176, 201, 

204-208 

Command: 219, 241 

Wilhelmshaven, Germany 

commander, m Air support 

transferred to Troop Canier 

807 
SPAAIZ AND THE AIR WAR IN EUROPE 

Williams, Robert B. 

Commander, 1st Bombardment Div: 

384 

Wilson, Russ 

Wilson, James Maitland: 386 

CG, 4th Bombardment Wing: 373 

Cormandex in Chief, Middle East 

Eaker, relationship with: 593 

targets in Balkans ordered by: 386 

morale of troops investigated by: 

271. 276, 321 

Wilson, James W. 

449450 

Wimbledon, England 

Winant, John G.: 93 

spaatz quarters at: 105 

U.S. Ambassador to England: 53, 

bombing of French population, views 

informed of RAF press release 

82-83. 275, 328, 595 

on: 401 

consequences: 382 

Wings (numbered) 

1st Bombardment 23, 28 

2d (GHQ AF): 22.28 

3d Air Defense: 187, 242 

3d Bombardment 30 

4th Bombardment 108, 126 

13th Combat: 371 

45th Bombardment 322 

51s~ Troop Canier: 244 

52d Troop Canier: 244 

53d Troop Carrier: 244 

supported by Spa: 294 

my-air control system created by: 

system adopted by RAF: 150 

system adopted by Spaatz: 180 

Secretary of War: 131 

Women’s Army Corps (WAC): 22 

Woodall, J. 

149 

Woodring, Harry H. 

World War I 6 

World War II. See also Arnold, Herny 

H.; Churchill, Winston S.; 

Roosevelt, Franklin D.; Spaatz, Carl 

A.; United States Army Air Forces 

losses: 587-588 

preparations for: 37, 60, 80 

U.S. entry into: 45, 59 

Wright Aeronautid 40 

Wright Field: 57 

Wright Wilbur 

Arnold’s fight instructor 32 

YalD 

agreements at 563 

Tripartite conference at: 543, 545 

Youks-les-Bains, Algeria 

Allied airfield at 183, 186 

RAF 4uadrons at 139 

Zeiu, Germany, raid on: 398 

Zhukov, Soviet Marshal 

advance on Berlin by: 553 

German surrender accepted by: 585 

Zossen, Gemany, raid on: 580 

Zuckerman. Solly: 385 

AEAF plans, chief architect oE 330 

bomb damage studied by: 231.236, 

bridge busting, views on: 406 

heavy bombardment for close air 

support assessed by: 458 

OWRD planner: 330-331. 

Pantellexia defenses studied by: 

238, 461 

333-336 

232-234 

plans disputed. 347, 353 

transportation plan prepared by: 331, 

345, 410 

Zitrich, Switzerland 

Zwickau, Germany, raid on: 3%. 398 

accidental bombing of: 575 

808